Tag: church

Knit Together: Speaking the Truth in Love

by Emily Rose MasseyDevotionals / Discipleship

In a recent research survey, 61% of people ages 18-25 reported miserable loneliness in our post-pandemic world and felt as if no one cared for them. No matter if you are single or married, experiencing isolation and loneliness can often lead to depression that can be crippling. People in the world are looking to belong. In Christ, as His followers, we have the answer.

The Church is a family, and we should seek out those who are isolated because they may be truly suffering. We enlarge our heart and become vulnerable with each other, by God’s grace, to enjoy meaningful and fruitful friendships that are soul-quality and one-souled, knit closely together with one another. Do you struggle with being vulnerable with others? What is causing you to hold back with being transparent and open with someone? Perhaps you have been hurt in previous relationships- rejection or betrayal may have wounded your soul and you are scared to become vulnerable with others again. We must trust that Christ will heal that hurt and will bring you into healthy Christian friendships for His glory. 

To be able to build intimate Christian friendship, we must also learn how to go beyond surface level conversations and move into heart-to-heart type of conversations. It’s easy in our society to be self-isolated and guarded in the name of privacy. Sadly, consumerism in our culture has infiltrated our relationships too. If friendships don’t enhance value in our life, we see them as disposable and easily replaceable, or even ditch friendships altogether. As members of the Body of Christ and brothers and sisters in the family of God, He has called us to be joined together as Ephesians 4 tells us: 

“Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love” (15-16, ESV).

Intersecting Faith and Life: 

To be able to speak the truth in love to one another, we must cultivate trust in our friendships. True Christian friendships are rare and costly because they require a lot of work, selfless commitment, and intentional engagement. Our self-centered heart or past hurt can get in the way and can lead us to isolate and choose selfishness over investing in meaningful Christian friendships. We must press past these temptations to build up walls around our heart or seek only things that satisfy self. The foundation of good friendships must begin with Christ (vertical then horizontal) to be able to sustain loyal, sacrificial, intentional, caring, and committed relationships. We must also remember that friendship with the things of this world is to make one an enemy of God (James 4:4) and will keep you from growing in love- love for Christ and love for others. What worldly pursuits have become a stumbling block to your friendship with Jesus that may be keeping you from getting to know Him in a deeper way? Remember, the nearness of God is our good (Psalm 73:28). The more we grow in our relationship with Christ, the more we will grow in our friendships as well. The Lord wants us to flourish in both areas. To flourish in Christ means we must become fluent in friendship. Jesus is the ultimate friend and wants to have a friendship with us so that we can participate with His mission, which is discipleship. The consistent pattern in our life should be to draw near to Him to then draw near to others and grow in Christ together- for our good and for His glory.

Further Reading:

  • Colossians 3:12-13
  • 1 Thessalonians 5:11
  • Ecclesiastes 4:9-10
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Appreciating Your Pastor by Praying for Him

by Emily Rose MasseyDevotionals / Discipleship / Prayer

When the news of another pastor’s moral failure makes its way into the public eye, is your first reaction one of sarcasm and jadedness or does it cause you to weep and hit your knees in prayer? It seems easier to get angry or grow cynical when those in the pulpit fall into grave sin and disappoint those who have attributed much of their spiritual growth from their teaching. Instead of wagging our fingers or shaking our head in disappointment, it should truly break our hearts when leaders in the church fall.

There is a stern warning found in the book of James that should cause us pause to reflect upon the great and weighty responsibility that pastors carry as teachers of God’s Word:

“Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness” (James 3:1, ESV).

This verse begins a chapter in the book of James that focuses on the importance of the tongue and its ability to either bring encouragement and growth or hostility and destruction. We will all be held accountable for the words we speak, but for those who teach the Bible, there is a higher standard. With a higher standard comes a stronger judgement from God. This should motivate us to pray for teachers, especially those who pastor our own local church. 

In America (and perhaps even around the world, thanks to television and social media), the gospel of Jesus Christ has become extremely muddied by false teaching full of false gospels, New Age/occult/pagan practices, lying signs and wonders, and distractions from worldly desires that are all leading many to false Christs.


For almost half of our marriage, my husband and I were among those believers who were believing lies from the result of the twisting of scripture and emotional, mental, and spiritual manipulation from leaders in ministry whom we trusted. By God’s grace, we were rescued from this deception and now attend a sound and Biblical church that has been such a blessing to our family. Every week, the elders preach the Word of God with such conviction and clarity and are unashamed about the gospel. Although we finally feel “safe,” we know that these men of God are susceptible to the same temptations as we are, and instead of growing comfortable or letting our guard down, we must fiercely pray for the men in our life who teach God’s Holy Word because Satan has put a giant target on their back. The enemy knows how much damage can be done to the Body of Christ if God’s Word is abused or distorted, but the same is true for the carriers of that message; A teacher’s life is held to a higher standard because the Lord uses teachers to help us understand who He is. The weighty responsibility and calling of bringing truth to the sheep of God is one no one should have to bear alone. Let us shoulder Kingdom responsibility with our elders by making it a priority to daily pray for the teachers and pastors who give much influence to our spiritual well-being. 

Father God,

In the age we live in, we can know personal details of public figures very quickly and easily. It seems there is always a new Christian leader who has given into fleshly temptation and taken advantage of the trust of their sheep. This should cause us heartache and wake us up to the reality that the enemy wants to cause destruction among God’s people. These moral failings cause distrust among sheep, but they also hurt our witness to the world when they see the hypocrisy and corruption within the visible church. Lord, please give us a burden to pray for church leaders, but more importantly, the leaders of our very own church who have given their lives to shepherd souls and teach others about You and Your ways. We are called to make disciples and need to be equipped by Your Word to do that. You have called teachers and pastors to a higher standard to equip the Body for the work of the ministry by teaching us what Your Word says. May we be quick to lift them up every day, knowing the seriousness of their high calling as teachers of Your Holy Word. In Jesus’ name, amen. 

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Longing for the whole Truth!

by Emily Rose MasseyDeception / Discernment

Today, I’m simply here to just write.

Vent, I guess you could say…

…gracefully vent.

*Sigh*

I’m going through something right now. Actually, my husband and I are both going through something right now.

Little by little, we have been placed in situations of surrender and letting go of things we were holding onto for security and comfort and learning how to fully trust God alone.

The house.

The furniture.

The freedom of being a stay-at-home mom to then take on a side job to help out some friends.

And now our place of Sunday worship.

Over the last several months, everything that has been the foundation of our faith has been challenged, and we are left unlearning a lot of things once again. We are searching out the scriptures to discover why we believe what we believe. And what we have discovered is that we don’t believe, or agree with, much of what we have been taught.

Needless to say, it’s been challenging…

…especially for my husband, Paul, since he sat under the same teaching for 20 plus years of his life (almost 25), and after we left the church he grew up at in 2010, we were led to a church whose pastor also sat under that very same teaching for years.

When you hear the same teaching for 20 plus years of your life and you trust your pastor more than God, you embrace what you are being told as truth.

And sometimes as the only truth.

But there’s a problem with that- we need to find truth in the Word of God alone and not necessarily an interpretation of what you are being told is truth. It becomes a danger because we never line up what is being said from the pulpit with what the Word of God really says. We should trust the Holy Spirit to be our teacher. We cannot just embrace everything that proceeds out of the pastor’s mouth because, honestly, he should know more than us, right?

Sadly, this happens more often than not in the churches of America. Many people do not read their Bible, and we put all the responsibility on the pastor to feed us, teach us, guide us. His job is to definitely help us learn, but most importantly, encourage us and equip us to go home and study out what we just heard. He was never supposed to walk out our walk with God for us.

A scripture taken out of context and twisted to fit our methods, principles, main points, and often, our fleshly desires, has been genetically modified, my friends. #SayNoToGMO

We can’t just embrace everything we hear from people. It must line up with the totality of God’s Word, what is called the whole counsel of God. Not just one scripture…the WHOLE THING! Much of what is heard on a Sunday morning is out of context. We have experienced this first hand, and the Lord had to reveal it to us the more we studied out His Word for ourselves!

I don’t write all of this as a jab at any pastor or man/woman of God in particular, I’m just simply expressing where we are in our walk. We have been disappointed countless times by numerous teachers of God’s Word, whether those we have sat under, or those we have listened to through the information super-highway.

We aren’t giving up on the Church. Although we are disappointed, we aren’t surprised. The Word of God explains to us that this is going to happen in the Last Days. And clearly, we are in the Last Days!

My husband is responsible for our family. I am responsible for my own heart and what my son hears and has sown into his heart until he is old enough to guard his own heart.

Above all, we must always judge what we are hearing, even if it is coming from the pulpit.

Don’t allow people to tell you that you are not supposed to judge…

…that’s a real popular topic among believers and non-believers alike.

Jesus tells us:

“Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment.”

John 7:24, NKJV

What is “righteous judgment?”

“Judgment” in Greek in this particular verse means “the concept of determining the correctness of a matter.”

Use the word of God to discern what is false and what is unrighteous (Hebrews 4:12).

“If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that accords with godliness, he is puffed up with conceit and understands nothing. He has an unhealthy craving for controversy and for quarrels about words, which produce envy, dissension, slander, evil suspicions, and constant friction among people who are depraved in mind and deprived of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain.”

1 Timothy 6:3-5, ESV

Let the Word of God light your way, every single step. The Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth and peace.

I’m holding onto the Word, who is also Jesus, the Word made flesh! He’s our only hope in these times of testing and times of deception we all face!

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