FreshBread

Good Morning Friends
Yesterday we spoke of repentance….heading in a new direction, thinking differently! This is now a path to walk! However, very often we seek to do God’s will our way. I want to share with you a devotional that I read this morning that helps us remember our path. Check it out!
“I, Paul, the prisoner of the Lord, implore you…” (Ephesians 4:1a).
To be the prisoner of the Lord means that we accept the sentence of death and are resigned to our fate. We are not the Lord’s prisoner if we are still protesting our innocence. If we do not agree with the Lord that self is worthy of death, then we unnecessarily delay the inevitable. If we must take up the Cross and be crucified, it is better to submit ourselves to it as Christ did, giving up our spirit into the Father’s hands, and bowing our head in peace. So let us drink the cup that the Father gives us. If we struggle and protest, like the two thieves, then we only prolong our agony, and the soldiers must come and break our legs. Either way, the cross means death. The sooner we surrender to it, the sooner we find Resurrection.
Have a Great day! Hey, if you have Facebook, check out my WALL. Tomorrow morning I have a huge announcement coming out about an AWESOME IDEA! Let’s talk again in the AM!
Running the Race,
Scott

Good Afternoon Friends!
Many of you have probably seen people at work today with ashes on their foreheads. Today is a day in the Western Church known as Ash Wednesday. It is the first day of a season called Lent. This is 40 days (not counting Sundays) before Easter. So over these next 40 days I will encourage us through Freshbread to take an introspective journey in our faith.
The Ashes are taken from the palm branches that are burned from last Palm Sunday and then placed on peoples’ foreheads as a sign of repentance. Ash Wednesday is a day to focus on the need for repentance in our lives.
The scripture teaches us that even though God has made a way for us to walk with him, we have chosen to walk our own way and NOT acknowledge the completed work that he did for us on the cross. When we realize this, the scripture calls us to repentance. Repentance means to head in a new direction…..where we were seeking out own way, now we seek first the Kingdom of God and his justice! It is truly sad to see someone waste the gift of completeness that God secured for them in the stubbornness of their own way!
Repentance then becomes part of life! Often we leave the “path-lights” that God has set for us and again seek our own way. Many Christians seek their own way in trying to please God, which does not work!
Take a moment and look into the spiritual mirror. Have you gotten away from the place God won for you on Calvary’s Cross? It cannot be earned, just received……but we must drop “our nets”, that which keeps us from living our own way and REPENT! Today is that day….why not take a few moments and confess to God (tell him what he already knows) where you have left his way…..then repent, head in a different direction, a Kingdom direction…..and tune into tomorrow as we take that journey of these next forty days together!
Running the Race,
Scott

Good Morning Friends,
Tomorrow is a day that begins a 40 day period of reflection called Lent that the church has celebrated for years. We will take the next 40 days and take a personal look into our own walk with Christ.
In Hebrews 11: 1 God tells that: Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. People hope for a lot of things. Some are hoping to get a job, others that sickness will not come, many during storm season hope that a hurricane will not hit. Is the writer saying that if we have faith whatever we hope for we will be able to be certain about? Do we hope for the things that God is talking about or for other things? What does God hope for? Should our hopes be the same as God’s hopes? What do you hope for right now? Is it about you or about God? Wrestle with some of those questions today…fasten your seatbelts and we will dive into the “deep water” in the AM! Have a GREAT DAY…walk with confidence because nothing can happen today that you and God can’t handle!

Running the Race,
Scott