New Blog Name

In the next couple days I will be changing the name of my blog:
       upheldtofollow

This is taken from Psalm 63. The Psalmist cries out to his God, saying how he longs so desperately for his Lord.  David realizes that His Father's love is  much richer and satisfying than anything life can offer; even life itself.

     Verse 3. "...Your steadfast love is better than life"

Near the end of this Psalm, David says, "My soul follows hard after You; Your right hand upholds me."

In the original Greek, the word for 'follow hard' is 'dabaq'. Which means ;
      cling, stick, stay close, cleave, keep close, stick to, stick with, follow closely, join to, overtake, to stay with, to be joined together, to cleave to, to pursue closely, to overtake, to be made to cleave.

Think about that definition for a minute. To be joined together, to stay close and stick to... We are literally MADE to cleave to our Lord. 

The second part of that verse is the most important. "Your right hand upholds me". The Greek word for 'upheld' is ' 'tamak', which means;
       to grasp, hold, support, attain, lay hold of, hold fast, grasp, lay hold of, attain, to hold up, support, to hold, keep, to take hold of each other, to be seized, be held.

The Lord lays hold of my heart and life. He keeps me, and supports me to follow hard after Him. It's a beautiful picture of His love and grace. This is the most important and crucial part of this verse because we are incapable of clinging to or following hard after the Lord, without Him upholding us.
This is the reason and meaning for my blog name... for those of you that actually care! As His children, we follow hard after Him in faith, believing and trusting in Him as His righteous right hand uphold us. Thank You, Jesus!!

Repenting of Our Righteousness

'The Prodigal God' by Tim Keller is all about the parable of 'The Two Sons' Jesus tells to the Pharisees in Luke 15. In his book, Tim, talks about the need to repent not only of our unrighteousness, but our righteousness as well. Here's an excerpt from his book that I find both challenging and humbling:

"What must we do, then, to be saved? To find God we must repent of the things we have done wrong, but if that is all you do, you may remain just an elder brother. To truly become a Christian we must also repent of the reasons we ever did anything right. Pharisees only repent of their sins, but Christians repent for the very roots of their righteousness, too. We must learn how to repent of the sin under all our other sins and under all our righteousness – the sin of seeking to be our own Savior and Lord. We must admit that we’ve put our ultimate hope in both our wrongdoing and right doing we have been seeking to get around God or get control of God in order to get hold of those things.


It is only when you see the desire to be your own Savior and Lord—lying beneath both your sins and your moral goodness—that you are on the verge of becoming a Christian indeed. When you realize that the antidote to being bad is not just being good, you are on the brink. If you follow through, it will change everything—how you relate to God, self, others, the world, your work, you sins, your virtue. It’s called the new birth because its so radical”

Psalm 37

Verse 3-8

"Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.

Delight yourself in the LORD and He will give you the desires of your heart.

Commit your way to the LORD; trust in Him, and He will act.

He will bring forth your righteousness as the light, and your justice as the noonday.

Be still before the LORD and wait patiently for Him; fret not yourself over the one who prospers in his way, over the man who carries out evil devices.

Refrain from anger, and forsake wrath! Fret not yourself; it ends only to evil."