Most people love fruit. I know I do. I love banana’s with my ice cream, strawberries with my shortcake, peaches in my cobbler and apples in my bread pudding among others. The tastes and colors of fruit seem to be endless. I read this week there are approximately 2000 types of fruits around the world and the western world uses only 10% of those. There is so much more to enjoy. But according to Statista, the most popular fresh fruits around the world are bananas, apples, and grapes.

One of the things readily seen as you read the Scriptures is how saturated it is with calls, commands, and exhortations to love, worship, serve, fear, and obey our great God and Deliverer. But have you noticed one of the primary and common messages the Lord keeps repeating over and over again to motivate a heartfelt and grateful response? It revolves around what God lovingly, graciously, and powerfully did for His people, and He communicated it like this: “watch yourself, that you do not forget the Lord who brought you from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery” (Deut. 6:12; Psalm 106:21). Over and over again, God used His miraculous Egyptian deliverance to incentivize His people in a multiplicity of ways: 

As I was reading this week in Numbers 13–14, I was drawn to the profound influence of the words “see,“ saw,” and “sight.”

God had promised to give His people (Israel) the land of Canaan, a land flowing with milk and honey. He told Moses to select a leader from each one of the 12 tribes of Israel to “spy out the land of Canaan” and watch this: “SEE” what the land is like (“good or bad…fat or lean…trees or not”), what the people were like (“strong or weak…few or many”), how the cities were in which they lived (“open camps or with fortifications”), and to “get some of the fruit of the land” (Num. 13:18–20).

I saw the following posted by Owen Strachan (provost and research professor of theology at Grace Theological Seminary) and it is worth sharing:

Your trials, Christian, aren’t accidents unplanned by God, spiraling out of His control.

Your trials aren’t attacks— God hating you and making you pay with bitter resentment.

Your trials aren’t mere allowances of God, occurrences He oversees but aren’t really from Him.

Your trials are God’s appointments in which He uses real pain and difficulty to

How many times did you hear the words “Happy New Year” this past week? Most likely more than a few times. It is part of our annual tradition of ringing in a New Year and there is always something enticing about new things: new opportunities, new friends, new energy, new experiences, new blessings, a new year. The word “new” is often used to highlight things that are fresh, updated, or improved. It is used by marketers to bait us into wanting things that are “new and improved.” God uses the word “new” and its derivatives to teach and motivate us about the best and ultimate kind of new which never needs an update or improvement, but only a regular application of its fresh dynamic in our lives.

Three of my favorite quotes around Christmas time are the following. Take a moment and let them sink in, especially the third one.