Joy In The Middle Of It | Daily Devotional 1631

You're listening to My Morning Devotional Podcast, episode 1631. Today's sevo is called Joy in the Middle of It.

Hey there, we're the Alexis, a ministry family working together in our church in Miami, Florida. And if you're like us, when days get busy, the to-do lists get longer, it can be hard to find devotional time. That's why every weekday we share a five-minute daily dose of heaven. This is the My Morning Devotional Podcast.

Good morning, everybody, and happy Monday. Welcome to My Morning Devotional Podcast. My name is Rochelle Alesi, and I get to be your host this week. I'm very excited because I usually get to introduce our month. And this month we're actually going to be going over the book of Philippians. And so each of us girls are going to take a chapter and we're going to go over it. And so I'm very excited to kick this series of joy and perspective and everything that the book of Philippians brings. So let's jump right into it. Today I'm going to be reading Philippians 1 through uh 1 through 11, but I'm actually going to start from verse 3. And I it's actually the NAV version. And so it says, I thank my God every time I remember you in all my prayers for all of you. I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Jesus Christ. It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart. And whether I am in chains or defending that, confirming the gospel, all of you share in God's grace with me. God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Jesus Christ. And this is my prayer, that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and in depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless for the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God. This is such a beautiful chapter, because as the title of this episode is called Joy in the Middle of It, we actually get to hear right here that he is joyful no matter his circumstance. And we know the Philippians is such an encouraging book for all of us. But let's let's think of this. Paul writes from prison, yet his first instinct is joy and gratitude. When we are in a hard place, our first instinct is what? I'm not gonna say what it is for you, only you know that. But I know what it is for me. Sometimes when I'm in a really hard place, my first instinct is complaining. I could just look at my circumstances and say, This is just not right. And you complain about people, about things. You look at your lack because there's something you don't have, and so you start to complain about your lack, you start to get mad at people or others, and you start to see how all of that creates a mixture that does not even make you feel great. And yet in this verse, we see that Paul is writing from a really hard place from prison, and he's not even in prison because he did something wrong, he's in prison because he is literally fighting for the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is right after Jesus, and he is saying, I am going to give my life to the ministry, I am going to proclaim the name of Jesus, I'm gonna go everywhere and make sure the name of Jesus is heard, and that's the reason why he is in prison. Yet he's full of joy when he's writing to these people, he thanks God for them, he finds greatness wherever he is because what truly brought him joy inside was knowing that the gospel of Jesus Christ was being spoken about. And so, guys, I think this can put a great perspective for us today. It will challenge even our current circumstances for us to say some of the places that we are at at this moment might not be something we did, some of them are, it might be consequences to our choices, but either one, we hold the power to see a situation and have authority over it and change what we see because we get to do this life with Christ, you get to be thankful, and when you are thankful, your perspective shifts completely. I'll give you an example, but it's funny enough, this past Sunday at our church, the message was about thankfulness and how when you are thankful, your perspective changes and you get to see things that you could not see before. And when you do that, you tap into a place internally that you're like, I can do anything because I'm seeing things differently. You have a perspective that others don't have. And as I'm sitting there, I'm saying, What is that thing for me? And I realize that there is an area of my my life where all I see is lack, all I see is the problems. But when I decided to say, Hey, thank you, God, for this, God started to bring my mind all the people that are joining along for the ride that He's brought to me to be able to do what we need to do. And in that moment, I was like, Lord, thank you. And I started to name those people by name. And I even send them a little text thanking them, letting them know that they are an answer to prayer. And sometimes when we are in a transition season like that, it's so hard to see anything but lack. But the Lord has provision. But we first have to be thankful because no matter where we're from or where we are at, if we are thankful, we have a different perspective from anybody else that helps us conquer wherever we are at. So today I challenge you and I challenge myself. Let's be thankful, let's praise God and just say thank you for all the little things that we have in our lives. And we will be surprised at the different perspective we gain. And so, if you do this, please write to us back. I was thankful for this, and I was able to see this. I would love to hear your testimonies on this and the things that you're saying. I'm going to be grateful for, and then we find out how you gain a new perspective and how now you see the Lord working in your life. So let's pray. Dear Father God, we want to thank you for all the amazing things that you bring to our lives. We're not going to focus on the lack or the frustration, but we are just going to say thank you, Lord, for everything that you have done up to this point. And I pray that as we bring our thankful hearts to you, you reveal to us things that we have not been able to see before that will unlock something in us to be able to help us move into our next. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

So there you have it, your five minute daily dose of heaven. Thank you so much for tuning in today. We pray these devotionals empower you to take on your day. If you found value in this devotional, share it with a friend, leave a comment or review for us on the app you're using right now. Until tomorrow, we pray that your latte is strong, but your love for Jesus is stronger.