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11/02/20 Affirming Your Children

Do your children know of their intrinsic value? I’m not talking about telling them how well they’re performing. I’m talking about how valuable they are to God and to you. If you are a father who is performance-oriented and you place your expectations on your children, they may grow up to be successful because of the striving attitude you’ve taught them; but they’ll never be able to rest in the worth they have simply because they’re breathing.

God has called everyone into being. His desire was for all of your children to be born, and He calls them good. As a father, you are to carry on His attitude toward them. You’re commanded to build in them, by the power of the Holy Spirit, a knowledge of His love and acceptance of them. You’re to show them they are accepted just as they are and not for what they do. It begins with teaching them how much you appreciate them as His representatives.

If you are not in the habit of affirming your children and have set a course where they need your approval to maintain their worth, they’re on the road to a life of needing that approval even after you’re gone. If they don’t have it, they will need to find it from some other source. Many lives are spent seeking approval of some kind because you, as a father, haven’t established God’s kind of approval in them through your words and actions toward them.

Begin now! Seek the Lord as to how you can be used to change the course of the direction of the lives of your children. Ask Him to show you the wounds you may have already caused and how He wants to use you to heal them. Commit to creating an atmosphere of affirming their worth with your words and actions, so they are free to be who they are. Give them the freedom to fail without your disapproval. Give them the freedom to live their lives, not yours. Show them Jesus through your attitude toward them. You will be amazed at how beautiful they really are.

Let’s talk more!

Jim Corbett

10/31/20 Keep Pressing In

“My mercy is always with you. Never think that I am against you. I have paid a great price to have you with Me for eternity. What Jesus gave will never go to waste just because you do not have the strength to overcome. In fact, it is because of your weakness and helplessness that He spent His life. At present, you have little ability to be what you need to become. Keep pressing in. Repent of your sin. Cry out for My mercy. It will always be there for you when you do.”

Hebrews 13:5b AMP

…for He [God] Himself has said, I will not in any way fail you nor give you up nor leave you without support. [I will] not, [I will] not, [I will] not in any degree leave you helpless nor forsake nor let [you] down (relax My hold on you)! [Assuredly not!]

Hebrews 12:12-13 NLB

12) So take a new grip with your tired hands and stand firm on your shaky legs.

13) Mark out a straight path for your feet. Then those who follow you, though they are weak and lame, will not stumble and fall but will become strong.

There are several forces always at work as we learn to follow Jesus. Although we are new creatures in Christ, our old sin nature continually raises its ugly head. We fall, get up, need to cry out for mercy, take strides forward; and then fall again. This cycle repeats itself with less frequency the longer we are with the Lord, but it is part of our growing up.

At the same time as this cycle is very present in our lives, we are often called upon to represent Jesus to a world needing to see His nature through us. Our command is to occupy until He comes for us. We are His only ambassadors, given the stewardship of His Word.

I am convinced that both are at play to form us into the nature of Jesus. As we fail, we need to cry out for mercy. As we cry out for mercy, we begin to understand the kindness of the Lord. We learn of His forgiveness. We also learn to submit to His Lordship and are taught obedience.

Eventually, as we allow the nature of Christ to flow through us more and more because of the work accomplished in us through our crying out to the Lord for our failures, we begin to understand the wonder of His plan. We understand that His abundant mercy teaches Who He is. Our need for His mercy teaches us of our need for Him and the wonder of what Jesus has done.

Thank You, Lord,

Jim Corbett

10/31/20 Affirming Your Wife

When was the last time you sat down and simply told your wife of her value? I don’t mean the “I love you, Honey.” I’m talking about looking her in the eyes and telling her how valuable she is not only in God’s eyes, but in yours, too.

In the Word, you, as a husband, are directed to lay your life down for your wife in the same way Jesus laid His life down for you. He died for you; you are told to die to all your selfishness and personal interests in regard to your wife and your marriage. Affirming her is one way to do that.

Men, take this challenge. Wait on the Lord for His timing. In the proper time - when your heart believes it - make a special effort to tell your wife of her intrinsic value and how important she really is. Let her know you consider her a gift, and that you’re thankful God put you together. Start there and take it wherever God leads. Do it regularly and mean it.

Next, find opportunities throughout your life to affirm your wife in front of your children. Stay away from the amorous stuff, and focus on the habit of letting them see your Christ-like attitude toward her when they are around - even if she’s not there. Whether you know it or not, they’re watching and learning from you. Teach them the wonder of expressing value by your words and your actions. It will go a long way in allowing them to see the character of Christ up close and personal.

Let’s talk more!

Jim Corbett

10/29/20 If You Belong to Him

“Are your prayers for others as important to you as the ones for yourself and your own needs? Do you even concern yourself about what others are going through? The heart of Jesus broke to the point of making Him willing to sacrifice His life, so that you could be rescued from an impossible situation. Now you are asked to take on the same heart that He has. As He lives His life through you, others become a priority. You will find yourself caring that others find Jesus. You will pray them through hard times. You will sacrifice your own needs so that the needs of many can be met. It is His way, so it is also your way if you belong to Him.”

Gal. 4:19 NIV

My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you.

Eph. 1:17-19a NIV

17) I keep asking that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, may give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation, so that you may know Him better.

18) I pray also that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in the saints,

19a) and his incomparably great power for us who believe…

Eph 4:12-13 AMP

12) His intention was the perfecting and the full equipping of the saints (His consecrated people), [that they should do] the work of ministering toward building up Christ’s body (the church),

13 [That it might develop] until we all attain oneness in the faith and in the comprehension of the [full and accurate] knowledge of the Son of God, that [we might arrive] at really mature manhood (the completeness of personality which is nothing less than the standard height of Christ’s own perfection), the measure of the stature of the fullness of the Christ and the completeness found in Him.

It is so much easier to separate ourselves from difficult relationships, judge the actions of others, or condemn those who are not as spiritual as we think we are than it is to labor in prayer for them once, twice, or a hundred times. It is simple to love those who love us back. It is a breeze to be gracious to someone who thinks the world of us and places our spiritual wisdom on a par with the great men and women of faith.

However, the way of Jesus is always the way of the cross. He is seen in the lives of individuals who have the interests of other people, not themselves, as a priority. That kind of life cannot be counterfeited, imitated, or faked for very long. It can only be lived through the power of the life of Jesus flowing through us. It can only come from His heart pumping through His willing vessel, a heart that cannot serve itself but one that must move on behalf of others in order for it to be satisfied.

Make me a willing vessel, Lord,

Jim Corbett

10/29/20 How’s That Working for You?

How is your marriage working? Do you, as a husband, love your wife as Christ loved His church, dying daily for her as he died for you? Do you and your wife love each other in a way that your children see the example of Christ and the church?

How about your children? Are they well on their way to a significant life because the life of Christ is alive and well in them? Do you and they have a loving companionship? Are they receptive to the deep things of God because you represent to them the way Christ lived?

If you answer all the above questions negatively, you need to make some changes. In God’s economy, you, as a husband and father, have a God-given responsibility to establish a Christ-like atmosphere that nurtures His ways and His plans in your family. If that’s not happening, it’s time to dive into your prayer closet and find out what God desires you to do about it.

When anything is out-of-line in a family, most people look for the others involved to change. God looks for you to change. Your office holds so much spiritual power that as you go spiritually, so goes your family. Any and every problem can be defeated if you determine to make your relationship with your Father in heaven your priority in life. You and your family win if you humble yourself before your Lord. All of you lose if you don’t take up your responsibility. Will you be the first to respond?

Let’s talk more!

Jim Corbett

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