Shellie Rushing Tomlinson's Blog: Shellie Rushing Tomlinson's Blog, page 18

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 11th

There is more hope available to us today. There is more peace, more comfort, more joy, more of everything we need. God is at hand, offering more of Himself than any of us have experienced. Let’s reach for Him.

God’s invitation is so much bigger than mere rescue because life is God’s idea and He wants to experience it with us. You and I were never meant to travel through this world without His Presence, toughing it out all by our lonesome. Our good Father intended to share our waking-up,...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 10th

What is sustaining you this Christmas? And I’m not talking about coffee and chocolate versus smoothies and kale. (I know where I fall on that one!) This is a reminder that what we’re depending on or Who we’re drawing from is obvious to those around us.

It’s called a food chain. We’ve heard of them, but do we realize we’re passing on what we’re feeding on? Genesis tells us that once Eve ate, she gave to her husband and he ate. That’s sobering. It means the conclusions we draw about what is...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 9th

Trying to create a wonderful Christmas for someone else wearies the best of us. It’s also as futile as trying to earn God’s love when we already have it. This season is ours to enjoy, but we can miss it while we work for it! Let’s fire ourselves from the impossible job of making Christmas happen and let Jesus rule the day.

There’s no comparison between that life of striving and the one where we trust Jesus to deliver us from the power of sin the same way He delivered us from its guilt! It’s...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 8th

I need Jesus. You do, too. The truth is, our best intentions to fix our eyes on Jesus and walk through Christmas worshipping Him instead of getting ambushed by the demands of the holiday will fail us without His holy help. Call to Him with me. #911 Jesus, we need you!

As I’ve confessed, I’m not beyond getting stuck in the muck of me, but I’ve found that when I live asking the Holy Spirit to alert me to my wrong thinking, He is faithful to do precisely that, and those times are growing fewer...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 7th

We don’t have to participate in the Crazy Christmas Countdown. We can enjoy this day instead of seeing it as one less opportunity to get everything done. Here’s an idea: Let’s ask God to be God to us today. The very idea brings my blood pressure down, and it’s not even mine. It’s His!

Over and over in the Scriptures, God expresses His intention to be our God and for us to be His people. The variation of this phrasing I love the most is His often-expressed desire to “be God to you.” It’s...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 6th

Here’s a challenge for us all. Let’s expect God today to reveal Himself to us. Wherever we are and whatever task we’re marking off the Christmas list, let’s remind ourselves that God is near, ask Him to speak, and listen.

I believe you and I experience God in our daily lives to the degree that we desire and expect to experience God. Our relationship with Him will be as strong or as weak as our determination to know Him beyond the understanding we have when we first believe. Too many of us...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 5th

Believer, beware. It’s possible to get so caught up doing Christmas that we resort to coasting on the leftovers of our last devotional or worship service. Whether that be a conscious or unintentional decision, we’ll be weaker for it.

Have you settled somewhere between coming to Jesus for eternal life and continuing to come to Him for abundant life? You’re not alone, and that’s not a good thing. I don’t know what’s more tragic, that this Door of nourishment and fellowship is undervalued and...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent- Day 4th

We can have so much more than a meaningful Christmas. Jesus can form Himself in the Bethlehem of our hearts as surely as He grew up in the ancient city if we’ll own our complacency and ask God to turn it into holy hunger.

We are pilgrims, designed for more. In Him we can be satisfied without being settled, loved without being lazy, rest while ever reaching. If we get saved to sit down, we miss the delightful God-designed tension of living in pursuit of an inexhaustible and eternal Savior who...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 3rd

The goal of walking through Christmas with our eyes trained on Jesus isn’t to make it through the holidays without going straight running crazy (although much can be said for being sane come January). The goal is nothing short of knowing the transformative presence of the Savior the baby was born to be!

God won’t drag us into the deep and wide life, and we can’t find it by trying harder to do better. That’s religion, man meeting the bar man sets so man feels good about man. Living life...

Finding a Deep and Wide Christmas Advent – Dec. 2nd

It’s impossible not to recognize the increasing commercialism of Christmas, and it’s a good and necessary idea to ask the Holy Spirit to help us stay focused on its true meaning. But as we walk through this season, let’s make sure our observations don’t lead to communication that alienates those who most need to hear the good news of Jesus!

Super-abounding grace in the face of very real sin was the glorious reality presented in the garden at sin’s initial strike. Promise given even as...