Good News and Praise

How do you spend your free time? Where do you spend your treasures? How much of it is dedicated to helping others and obeying the word of God. Watching how you spend your time and energy can reap marvelous rewards both for the present and the future.

I was thinking about this today when we stopped for lunch at the local Chick-fil-a restaurant. The owner of this particular establishment is a young man named Justin Beard. We have had the opportunity to talk with Justin on a number of occasions and know him to be a fine upstanding young man dedicated to Christ and to his family and the community he lives in.

Today, like all of the Saturdays in the month of May Justin’s store was celebrating Military Appreciation Month. Feeding all the local Active Duty and Reserve personal FREE of Charge. Now to some that sounds like ‘oh, that’s nice” But if you saw what we saw, it is more like “WOW, That is Awesome!” because Justin’s store is just minutes from the main gate of March Air Force Base. It is my guess that he will serve many 100’s of free meals today and next Saturday and the Saturday after that.

In the Old Testament, Jehoshaphat reigned over Judah after his predecessor refused to humble himself before the Lord and died. Jehoshaphat’s “heart was devoted to the ways of the Lord” and he “walked in the ways his father David had followed . . . and sought the God of his father and followed his commands.” (II Chronicles 17:1-6) And for that time, blessings came to him.

I have no doubt that God will continue to bless Justin and his family and the Chick-fil-a operations nationwide, not just because they are good guys who love our military but because they Love God and are devoted to the principles he teaches and they put those lessons into practice everyday.

Jesus tells us in the gospel of Matthew to “lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will also be.” Matt 6:20-21. I take that to mean we are to worry less about the material world and stay focused on what is to come, to do that we must stay on the path and in the word.

Where is your devotion? To whom or what are you fully committed? Do you dedicate your free time to helping your community, working fervently to champion the cause of a worthy non-profit organization? Can you say that you spend a great deal of your time devoted to the study of His Word, trying to be more like Him, and less like you?

Be thankful for the opportunities you have to spend time in God’s Word, to meditate on His precepts, to approach Him with confidence in prayer.