U PICK!

TODAY'S READING: Lev. 20-22; Acts 20
Scripture
Acts 20:[24] However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me—the task of testifying to the good news of God's grace.
Acts 20:[32] “Now I commit you to God and to the word of his grace, which can build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified.
Acts 20:[35] In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ ”
Acts 20:36-38a When Paul had finished speaking, he knelt down with all of them and prayed. [37] They all wept as they embraced him and kissed him. [38] What grieved them most was his statement that they would never see his face again.
Observation
Motivation: [Joe’s paraphrase of the verses above] My only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord has given to me, committed to God and the word of his grace; we must help the weak; share Jesus, stop talking about it and pray together.
Application
By Friday Pastor Ed and I will have performed, participated in or attended five funerals in three weeks. The last verse of Acts 20 grabbed at my heart. v.38 “What grieved them most was his statement that they would never see his face again...” it caused me to reflect about my own funeral some day. I don’t want to be remember for my love of golf, trips to the coast and time spent with family. As great as all that is, and it is. I want to be remember for “running the race” to the end - always growing in Christ Jesus. Focusing on the task - loving God, and loving others; committed to God and the word of his grace - may my legacy be the time I spent listening to God through prayer and reading His Word. May I be remember for helping the “weak” and may that help be more in the form of prayer, than rhetoric.
You pick, how do you want to be remembered?
I love how Paul said in verse 35, “we must help the weak,” it’s about community working together, that’s why I post my Life Journal Entries, that“we” might grow together, that “we” might serve together. That “we” might please a God who loved us first.
Prayer
Father,
Show us a hundred ways to testify to the good news of God’s grace
and give us a million opportunities to do it.