“Finally, brothers, whatever things are true, whatever things are honest, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue, and if there is any praise, think on these things.”

— Philippians 4:8

Norman Vincent Peale is best known for his famous book The Power of Positive Thinking. Now he has been criticized by evangelical Christians for simply playing on one string of a harp, and there is perhaps a little truthfulness to this in that he left many of the great doctrines of the Christian faith not denied, but more or less ignored, while he played on the string of the power of positive thinking. But let me say this, he played better on that string than anybody else has, and he certainly helped many people.

I remember a young man who worked on our custodial staff here at the church who was one of the most negative, downcast, self-reproaching individuals that I have ever met. So I took out of my library my copy of Peale’s book and I told him that if anybody ever needed to read this book he did, and I gave it to him with the

hope that he profited from it. But long before Peale stressed positive thinking, the Apostle Paul was sounding the very same note. Perhaps the note from which Peale got his inspiration for his book, I don’t know that for certain, but the text that we read today is certainly one of the most positive thinking kinds of texts that there is. So certainly Paul was a man who knew the importance of positive thinking. You could not have a greater text for a message or book on true positive thinking than Philippians 4:8.

Beautiful Savior, give us the strength to take every thought captive and to think of the good and the lovely…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN
WALK BY FAITH NOT BY SIGHT.

“Brothers, I could not speak to you as to spiritual men… I have fed you with milk and not with solid food. For to this day you were not able to endure it…”

— 1 Corinthians 3:1a-2

The late Dr. Donald Gray Barnhouse pastored Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia. Barnhouse was the gentleman through whom I first heard the Gospel on the radio and through whom Christ was pleased to reveal Himself in me. And so he has been a person whom I have always appreciated, though I only met him one time. At that time, I told him who I was and that I had been converted about 4 years prior to that through one of his radio broadcasts.

He had preached for 16 years on the book of Romans and he got me at Romans 3:19 and 20. He generally preached on one or two texts at a time and went into them with a great deal of depth. Obviously the more texts that you try to preach on in a sermon the shallower will be the digging that you do. He believed in trying to go deeper and dig a deeper hole over a smaller area. So one or two texts a week took him 16 years to get through the book of Romans and so he had a great love and delight for the Apostle Paul.

There are different preaching styles. Dr. Barnhouse’s style may be too slow for some, but it does show that we can deeply plumb the depths of God’s Word and still come up with treasures. The meat is there for those who want to find it.

Lord, give us strength, insight, and wisdom to dig deep into Your Word. Let the Holy Spirit feed us the meat of Your Word…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN FIND
THE TREASURES IN GOD’S WORD.

“For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ. For it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.”

— Romans 1:16

Too many of us have an unusual problem. We have too many powers. We have powers of intellect, physical prowess, academic accomplishment, athletic trophies, business success, professional advancement, and social standing. The problem with all these superfluous powers is that they can prevent us from finding the power of God—which alone can bring ultimate success in life. As Jesus asked, What if you gain the whole world and lose your soul?

But power does not originate with us, does it? The physical strength that we have is derived from the food we eat. We have intellectual abilities. From whence did they come but from God? Even the power station does not make power. It simply finds it in one form and converts it to another. It may find it in a river and change it into electricity. It may find it in coal, and change it into steam. Or in the atom and change it into nuclear power.

That power is outside of us and all around us. The power of God is out there, around us like radio and television waves. But it is not until we turn on the dial that we can take hold of those powers and appropriate them and receive them for ourselves. The power of God is available to you and me. We need to receive power through Christ, who strengthens us. Then we will be able to achieve, to do all things. That is the secret.

Oh, God, Source of all strength, grant us today Your power and cleanse away all things that hinder Your power from flowing in our lives…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN LET THE
POWER OF THE GOSPEL CHANGE US.

“Do not fear, for you shall not be ashamed nor be humiliated; for you shall not be put to shame…”

— Isaiah 54:4

We all have to grapple with the fear of failure which immobilizes so many of us. I am sure there is not a person alive who has not had to wrestle in some dark night with that archfiend, the fear of failure. How many of us have started out and gone but a little way, until we felt the icy fingers of fear gripping our hearts and turning our blood to cold, jellied soup? The poet put it like this:

Lord, I’m afraid of ridicule.
So many things I’d like to attempt
But failure invites embarrassment.
Have you a promise for sensitive souls?

Does it sometimes seem to you that the whole world is against you? Why do the cosmic forces seem to be pressing against you? If you have ever felt that way, you have known the dread, the fear, the anxiety that has given rise to all the primitive religions of this world. Many of these religions were established because men thought the universe and the cosmic forces of the world were arrayed against them. Consequently, they created gods that they imagine live within the forces of thunder and lightning, tree and river, snake and alligator, and they have tried to propitiate them.

But thankfully the God of the universe, who has revealed Himself in Christ, tells us to not fear, nor be ashamed. Regardless of how we feel at the moment, we can be confident, knowing that God is at work in our lives. Let faith replace fear.

Lord, thank You for what You said through Your servant Isaiah, “Do not fear, for you will not be ashamed.” Give us strength today to bring our fears to You. When we are afraid, let us trust in You…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE ARE
NOT BOUND BY OUR FEARS.

“But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, the excellency of the power being from God and not from ourselves.”

— 2 Corinthians 4:7

The Bible has resulted in the conversion of hundreds of millions of people— “earthen vessels”—by God’s grace. There are amazing stories of God’s amazing grace.

An interesting one is the conversion of Sgt. Jacob DeShazar, who flew with Doolittle’s squadron in World War II. His plane went down over Japan after they had bombed Nagoya. He was captured and placed in a five-foot cell in Japan. There he was treated cruelly. At first his heart was filled with hatred for his tormentors.

Then a small New Testament was placed in his hands by a visitor, and he began to read it. As a result, DeShazar accepted Jesus Christ into his heart as Savior and Lord of his life. He said that his heart was so filled with joy in that tiny five-foot cell that he would not have changed places with any person in the world. He came to forgive his enemies.

When the war ended and he was released and brought home, he determined to go back to Japan as a missionary, to take the love of God to those who had been his mortal enemies.

The story of his capture, his imprisonment, and his conversion was placed in a tract. That tract fell into the hands of Mitsuo Fuchida, the Japanese pilot who led the attack on Pearl Harbor. He was converted. He later found Sgt. Jacob DeShazar, and the two of them conspired to bring the Gospel of the love of God to the people of Japan. God can transform the human heart.

Lord God, thank You for the transforming power of the Gospel. Thank You for transforming my heart and daily forming me into Your own image. Thank You for making us part of Your story…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, OUR
HEARTS CAN BE TRANSFORMED.

“So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts to wisdom.”

— Psalm 90:12

Sometimes somebody can be present with you, but they are actually far away. We should strive to “be there” in the midst of conversations we are often half absent from—that we might “be there” in the moments that we have to spend with spouse or child or parent or friend.

Those who do not live in the present are like the man in the following poem:

He was going to be all that mortal should be—Tomorrow;
No one should be kinder nor braver than he—Tomorrow.
A friend who was troubled and weary he knew,
Who’d be glad of a life and who needed it, too,
On him he would call and see what he could do—Tomorrow.

Each morning he stacked up the letters he’d write—Tomorrow;
More time he’d have to give others, he’d say—Tomorrow.

The greatest of workers this man would have been—Tomorrow. The world would have known him had he ever seen—Tomorrow, But the fact is he died and he faded from view, And all that he left here when living was through Was a mountain of things he intended to do—Tomorrow.

Wherever you are, be there…today, if possible. Ask God to teach you to live fully in the present that you may take advantage of every opportunity He gives you to serve Jesus Christ.

Lord Jesus, give us the strength to live in the present and fulfill all our duties of the day…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN SERVE
HIM TODAY AND TOMORROW.

“Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in My house, and test Me now in this, says the Lord of Hosts, if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing, that there will not be room enough to receive it.”

— Malachi 3:10

God wants us to be generous, and He blesses us for it. You can’t out-give God, and the windows of heaven will be opened unto you. It isn’t a matter of finance—it’s a matter of faith and acting on God’s promise found here in Malachi. You cannot possibly lose. If you believe that promise, you will inevitably be a tither—or more. I think about a young boy in his very early teens. He wasn’t very strong and he was small for his age, but he had to make a living. He got a big cart and pushed it down the streets of Chicago, crying out, “Cheese for sale. Cheese for sale.” This little scrawny kid managed to make enough money to live when he had no other help.

His daughter (or niece, I am not sure which) came to our church years ago and wanted to meet with me in my office. I had the pleasure of listening to his story through her. God blessed this young man because he gave his life to Christ and determined that he would tithe on all he made. First thing you know he had somebody else pushing another cart. Then he had somebody else pushing another cart for him, and then another one, and another one. It wasn’t too many years later when children in school were in a spelling bee, and one of the children was asked, “How do you spell cheese?” and one little boy said, with a bright smile, “Kraft”— because the television had told him “that’s how you spell cheese.” J. L. Kraft’s name had become synonymous with cheese.

Father God, give to us the strength to be faithful in our giving to Your kingdom. Thank You that You are so generous, You just give and give and give. Let us be like You…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN GIVE TO
THE LORD, KNOWING HE OWNS IT ALL.

“But if it is of God, you will not be able to overthrow them, lest perhaps you be found even fighting against God.”

— Acts 5:39

After the conversion of Constantine, he allowed for the freedom of the Christian church for the first time in its existence. The Christians could crawl out of the catacombs and actually build buildings where they could publicly worship Jesus. It was a glorious time for the church after 300 years of persecution.

But a few decades after Emperor Constantine’s death, there arose a ruler from his own family who tried to turn his back on Christianity and make the Roman empire solidly pagan. His name was Julian the Apostate.

By rejecting Jesus, Julian the Apostate made a wreck of his life, but thankfully his reign was short-lived. It is said that he was wounded in battle, and as he lay dying, sinking into the sand, he picked up a handful of sand filled with his own blood and threw it into the sky and said, “Thou hast conquered, Oh Thou Galilean” and thus, Julian’s work perished with him. Attempting to overthrow the Christian religion by writing a book against it, he inadvertently ended up confirming most of its basic historic tenants.

Our faith is built upon a solid rock that neither pagan nor demon can overthrow. Yes, there have been small clouds that have come and obscured the sun for a moment. “Julian was such a cloud,” said Athanasius, the great defender of the faith. But the cloud, as he said, “…it is a little cloud, it passes away.” The sun, however, continues to shine in its brightness in the sky, and so it is with Christ.

Lord, give me strength to endure the godless cry of pagans and persecutors, knowing that they are but clouds before the sun…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN PERSIST,
KNOWING JESUS WILL PREVAIL.

“The king, before whom I also speak freely, knows about these things. For I am persuaded that none of this is hidden from him, for this was not done in a corner.”

— Acts 26:26

There continue to be some skeptics, not of a learned sort I may say, who deny the historicity of Jesus. But there is no true historian in all of the world who would dare place his reputation on the line by saying that Jesus never lived. However, there are those amateur skeptics that like to come up with such statements from time to time that Christ was a fable, He never really existed, and the Bible is a collection of myths. But there is a great deal of attestation for both.

It is like a tumor of the brain, to use a not very happy metaphor, which cannot be removed by surgery without killing the patient. To remove the Scriptures and to remove Christ from history is indeed to destroy the body of history completely.

There is more evidence for the fact that Jesus Christ lived than that Julius Caesar lived. To deny the basic historicity of the New Testament is to deny all of ancient history together. Not only do we have the witness of the New Testament writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Paul, Peter, James, and Jude, but we have many other Christian writers of the first and second centuries, including Barnabas, Ignatius, Clement, Irenaeus, Hermes, and Tertullian. And then there are many non-Christian sources testifying to the existence of Jesus and the Christians. These include Josephus, Tacitus, Thallus, Phlegon, Suetonius, Pliny the Younger, Emperor Hadrian, Emperor Trajan, Lucian of Samosata, Mara bar Serapion, The Talmud, and Toledoth Jeschu. By first century historical standards, Jesus was well-established historically.

Dear Lord, give us the strength and opportunity to share with somebody the incredibly strong proof of Your life and work…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN
RECOGNIZE THAT HISTORY IS HIS STORY.

“You are cursed with a curse, your whole nation, for you are robbing Me.”

— Malachi 3:9

Some people avoid church because they think it’s all about money. But it is really more about the concept of stewardship. The first principle of stewardship is very simply stated by the psalmist: “The earth belongs to the Lord, and its fullness, the world, and those who dwell in it” (Psalm 24:1). It all belongs to God. He created it, and He allows us to use it. We are mere stewards of these resources. He blesses us with good seasons and rain and all of the things that are needful. However, He does say one thing: we are to return a tenth of that to Him, just as a test of our faith and obedience to Him.

This brings us to the second principle of stewardship, namely, that the tithe belongs to the Lord. It is His, He claims it, and therefore if we do not return it, we are, He says, robbing Him. “Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me. But you say, ‘How have we robbed You?’ In tithes and offerings” (Malachi 3:8).

It is not ours. One writer says, “When we keep it, it is simply an act of theft. We may have put it in our bank account…we may have a new car that we have driven in to church, we may be watching football games on a new TV, but it is not ours.” At minimum, give to the Lord ten percent of what you have, and watch how He blesses you for it.

Dear God, give us the strength today to set aside that which is Yours. Forgive us for any stinginess on our part. Please, make us generous, as You are generous…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN
GIVE FREELY AND GENEROUSLY.