Shine for Him

Josh Mihalko gives us great insight for us today. Ty Josh well done.

So it’s Saturday morning, May 2 it’s my weekend off. My normal shift at the State prison is 6 AM to 2:30 PM so I usually wake up around 4 AM. My days off days I get to sleep in and wake up around 6:30 to 7 AM. I start my day by opening my eyes and given thanks to the Lord, get out of bed. Let all three dogs outside and get the coffee started. After the dogs come in I get them fed get my coffee and sit down with my Bible app, my Journal and my Bible. I did my normal morning thing and have been being pulled to the book of Daniel yesterday and had another strong, pulling into it today. I’m sure the majority of the people reading this know the story that is in the book of Daniel, but in particular on this day in chapter 3, it really stuck out to me. King Nebuchadnezzar created and made his golden image and if you did not know, he gave strict orders. And Daniel 3:5-7 States “that when you hear the sound of the Horn pipe liar try again harp bagpipe, and every kind of music you are to fall down and worship the golden image of King Nebuchadnezzar has set up. And whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace.” Now the King had some sidekicks or what we would call today is “narcs” squealed on Shadrach,Meshach,  andAbendigo.  That they were not falling down and worshiping the golden image. The king called them to him and asked them if this was true.  The three told the king they would not worship his golden image that they only worship their God. He threw them into a furnace a furnace that was seven times hotter than it’s ever been and they walked right out of that fire without a single mark on them. Why? We really wonder why.  There’s a simple answer to that. Those three men had such awesome faith.   No matter what was thrown at them they knew that their Lord would keep them safe.  Daniel 3:17 “ if this be so, our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and he will deliver us out of your hand,  O King.” My prayer today is that everybody reading this devotional starts to have faith like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abendigo.    True faith like living our life for Christ. If we’re being honest to our Christianity and we are saying we are born again then we die to our old self and we completely become new. That means everything that was in the past is gone, and we are a new creature in him. If you’re still living like you have been for the last 30 years then that’s not true for you let’s not fool ourselves.  The Bible tells us that we need to be fully transformed. That doesn’t mean half transformed that doesn’t mean 90% transformed. It means fully transformed. Jesus died on the cross so that we would change our lives here on earth to have. Jesus shine through us so other people can see him in us and want to follow him. That’s the kind of faith that those three guys had.  I challenge everybody reading this to put all your faith in the Lord to live every second of the day for him to love him with all of your heart and all of your mind and all of your soul and to love everybody else the same in that way and your life will change and it will be mind blowing.   Believe me,  my family (wife Tara, son Liam, and myself) lives have been radically changed.  And I could tell you miracles that have happened in my life that I’ve seen with my own eyes.   I sit in silence with the  Lord frequently,  and recently I’ve been hearing “ strict obedience” It’s a very narrow road that we are to walk on, there is no one perfect but him he knows your heart. He knows your thoughts. Make them all focused towards him in your life.  And yes it’s hard and there are days where you fail and ITS OK!   We must all remember he was the only one perfect. Your life Will change in an amazing way when you start living your life for him.   We are so quick as a society to take up the identity of what life is doing around us instead of taking up the identity of Jesus. We gotta stop letting life be about our feelings and how no one cares and how life is about you because if we really think about it and we’re a Christian, our life was made for him to shine for him . Come shine with me let’s make this light shine so bright that everybody wants to come to it.   I’m sorry if this was all over the place I hope everybody has a blessed day.  1 John 4: 7-8 “ beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. .

Make it Thoughtful Thursday! God is good..,