Michael Harrison's e-devotion

  The first Thursday in May is set aside as the National Day of Prayer in the United States, and this will be the 70th observance of the day.  The day is tomorrow, May 6th.  Spend extra time praying. You can learn more about this day or get resources at www.nationaldayofprayer.org  to help guide your prayers. Colossians 4:2-4  NLT Devote yourselves to prayer with an alert mind and a thankful heart. 3 Pray for us, too, that God will give us many opportunities to speak about his mysterious plan concerning Christ. That is why I am here in chains. 4 Pray that I will proclaim this message as clearly as I should. Prayer is not something we add to our lives to make us better Christians.  Literally prayer is the connecter to God, it is the antenna to help us know what is going on around us, it is the place of wisdom seated in our lives and through us, and prayer is the vehicle that God followers choose to be on the path that keeps us with Him. Take these ...

One of the points of last Sunday’s sermon was the fact that the early church, the one we find in the book of Acts, did some things that made them experience God and helped others experience God in powerful ways.   That point was that they “devoted” themselves to the Word of God.   They loved and longed for Apostles teaching and spending time with other followers of Jesus.   Their example points us in the same direction and encourages us to fall deeply in love with the Bible.   It’s concepts and truth leads us to know God in great ways.   Yet we have to remember that reading the Bible should be coupled with a relationship with Jesus. My desire and our prayer for The Community family is that we will begin with a greater commitment to read and take in the Word of God that leads to loving it and ingesting it more and more.   The Bible leads us into a deeper relationship with our Savior.   Disciples stay close to the one they are following, and ...

Romans 13:1   NLT Everyone must submit to governing authorities. For all authority comes from God, and those in positions of authority have been placed there by God. I am an American.   I am also a Christian.   Those two things do go together, and it is not because all Americans are Christian.   I am an American because I was born in the United States of America.   I am a Christian because Jesus forgave my sins, and I accepted that truth for me. Because I am a Christian and an American I want to share what I believe with others.   It is important that we do what we believe is right and share with others.   Doing what is right is not always the popular thing to do, but it is always right. Romans 15:2   NLT We should help others do what is right and build them up in the Lord. Today is Election Day.   We have the awesome right to speak our mind by voting.   This is one of our rights as an American.   In ou...

Acts 2:42-43   NLT All the believers devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer.   A deep sense of awe came over them all, and the apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders. Yesterday we began a new series at The Community Fellowship called “Give it All Away”.   Over the next four weeks we will be discussed the lives of disciples, followers of Jesus, and how their lives are impacted by God and how they are impacting others through their connection to God. There is a cause and effect of almost everything we do.   That has been true since creation, and it will be true until the end of the earth.   In the verses above we see that the early church devoted themselves to God, and the outcome or result is the sense of awe that came over them.   The same thing that those early Christians experienced is the same thing that you can I can experien...