Do the First Works

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss
September 16, 2009

Returning to Your First Love
Your First Love Relationship

Think about the time in your life when your love for Christ burned more strongly than ever. Does that describe you today? Find out why it could.

If you love Christ, you will love others. To have true love for others, you must have Christ. So when you fail to love Christ, you will fail to love others. When you fail to love others, you have failed to love Christ.

A door of your heart can be closed off to Christ even if you’re faithful, persevering, orthodox; even if your doctrine and lifestyle is right.

Apart from love for Christ and for others, all we do is in vain.


Even before today's "Revive Our Hearts" excerpt, I must admit, I have been in a strange place for a long time. I have felt that I have been missing something very important. The Scripture the Lord keeps bringing to mind is Revelation 2: 1-7:

"“To the angel of the church of Ephesus write,‘These things says He who holds the seven stars in His right hand, who walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands: “I know your works, your labor, your patience, and that you cannot bear those who are evil. And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars; and you have persevered and have patience, and have labored for My name’s sake and have not become weary. Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent and do the first works, or else I will come to you quickly and remove your lampstand from its place—unless you repent. But this you have, that you hate the deeds of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate. “He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes I will give to eat from the tree of life, which is in the midst of the Paradise of God.”’"

I have been praying and asking the Lord to show me what the first works are, so that I might do them again. I want that love and fire that burned in my heart for Jesus to blaze out of control again. I want to follow Christ, not just His words. I feel that I have become so focused on obeying doctrine, on obeying the word of God, that I stopped focusing on following the God of the word. It has been a scary place to be. Scary because I know that if I am missing it, if I am just giving my son a bunch of rules to follow, but nothing to hold him, no LIFE that makes him want to do what God says, then it is all in vain, and I will watch my son walk away from Christ, having just enough to innoculate him to the truth. I DON'T WANT THAT! So I know it has to start with me. I must be willing to reexamine my heart, what I believe and where I am with Christ. I must be living life abundantly, through faith in Christ, acknowledging that I don't know it all and leaning wholly upon Jesus. I must show him something worth dying for, that he might truly live. That is where I am. It is a hard place to be because I am finding out that I am differing in some views with some that I love dearly, and that is scary. But Christ is my hope...He is my Lord, my Guide, my ever present Help in time of trouble. He alone is the One that can keep my feet from slipping and can lift me up when I fall. Christ is ALL in ALL. HE is the point. I pray that I can quickly come back to the place where I am living that.

Jesus is my anchor...I am held fast

We Have an Anchor

Words by Priscilla J. Owens Music by William J. Kirkpatrick 1882
Hebrews 6:19 "Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, and which entereth into that within the veil;"

Will your anchor hold in the storms of life,
When the clouds unfold their wings of strife?
When the strong tides lift and the cables strain,
Will your anchor drift, or firm remain?

Chorus
We have an anchor that keeps the soul
Steadfast and sure while the billows roll,
Fastened to the Rock which cannot move,
Grounded firm and deep in the Savior's love.

It is safely moored, 'twill the storm withstand,
For 'tis well secured by the Savior’s hand;
And the cables, passed from His heart to mine,
Can defy that blast, thro' strength divine.

Chorus
We have an anchor that keeps the soul
Steadfast and sure while the billows roll,
Fastened to the Rock which cannot move,
Grounded firm and deep in the Savior's love.

When our eyes behold through the gath’ring night
The city of gold, our harbor bright,
We shall anchor fast by the heav'nly shore,
With the storms all past forevermore.

Chorus
We have an anchor that keeps the soul
Steadfast and sure while the billows roll,
Fastened to the Rock which cannot move,
Grounded firm and deep in the Savior's love.

Lamentation - yet hope

"I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of His wrath. He has led me and made me walk in darkness and not in light. Surely He has turned His hand against me time and time again throughout the day. He has aged my flesh and my skin, and broken my bones. He has besieged me and surrounded me with bitterness and woe. He has set me in dark places like the dead of long ago. He has hedged me in so that I cannot get out; He has made my chain heavy. 8 Even when I cry and shout, He shuts out my prayer. He has blocked my ways with hewn stone; He has made my paths crooked. He has been to me a bear lying in wait, like a lion in ambush. He has turned aside my ways and torn me in pieces; He has made me desolate. He has bent His bow and set me up as a target for the arrow. He has caused the arrows of His quiver to pierce my loins. I have become the ridicule of all my people—their taunting song all the day. He has filled me with bitterness, He has made me drink wormwood. He has also broken my teeth with gravel, and covered me with ashes. You have moved my soul far from peace; I have forgotten prosperity. And I said, “My strength and my hope have perished from the LORD.” Remember my affliction and roaming, the wormwood and the gall. My soul still remembers and sinks within me. This I recall to my mind, therefore I have hope. Through the LORD’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness. “ The LORD is my portion,” says my soul, “ Therefore I hope in Him!” The LORD is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him. It is good that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD. It is good for a man to bear the yoke in his youth. Let him sit alone and keep silent, because God has laid it on him; Let him put his mouth in the dust—there may yet be hope. Let him give his cheek to the one who strikes him, and be full of reproach. For the Lord will not cast off forever. Though He causes grief, yet He will show compassion according to the multitude of His mercies. For He does not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men. To crush under one’s feet all the prisoners of the earth, to turn aside the justice due a man before the face of the Most High, or subvert a man in his cause—the Lord does not approve. Who is he who speaks and it comes to pass, when the Lord has not commanded it? Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that woe and well-being proceed? Why should a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins? Let us search out and examine our ways, and turn back to the LORD; Let us lift our hearts and hands to God in heaven. We have transgressed and rebelled; You have not pardoned. You have covered Yourself with anger and pursued us; You have slain and not pitied. You have covered Yourself with a cloud, that prayer should not pass through. You have made us an offscouring and refuse in the midst of the peoples. All our enemies have opened their mouths against us. Fear and a snare have come upon us, desolation and destruction. My eyes overflow with rivers of water for the destruction of the daughter of my people. My eyes flow and do not cease, without interruption, till the LORD from heaven looks down and sees. My eyes bring suffering to my soul because of all the daughters of my city. My enemies without cause hunted me down like a bird. They silenced my life in the pit and threw stones at me. The waters flowed over my head; I said, “I am cut off!” I called on Your name, O LORD, from the lowest pit. You have heard my voice: “ Do not hide Your ear from my sighing, from my cry for help.” You drew near on the day I called on You, and said, “Do not fear!” O Lord, You have pleaded the case for my soul; You have redeemed my life." Lamentations 3:1-58


Whatever You're Doing (Something Heavenly) by Sanctus Real

It’s time for healing, time to move on,
it’s time to fix what’s been broken too long
Time to make right what has been wrong;
it’s time to find my way to where I belong

Chorus:
There’s a wave that’s crashing over me, and all I can do is surrender
Whatever You’re doing inside of me
It feels like chaos, but somehow there’s peace
And it’s hard to surrender to what I can’t see, but I’m giving in to something heavenly

Time for a milestone, time to begin again, re-evaluate who I really am
Am I doing everything to follow Your will or just climbing aimlessly over these hills?
So show me what it is You want from me I give everything – I surrender

Chorus:
Whatever You’re doing inside of me
It feels like chaos, but somehow there’s peace
And it’s hard to surrender to what I can’t see, but I’m giving in to something heavenly

Time to face up, clean this old house
Time to breathe in and let everything out that I’ve wanted to say for so many years
Time to release all my held back tears

Whatever You’re doing inside of me
It feels like chaos, but I believe …
You’re up to something bigger than me
Larger than life, something heavenly

Whatever You’re doing inside of me
It feels like chaos, but now I can see
This is something bigger than me
Larger than life
Something heavenly, something heavenly

Time to face up, clean this old house
Time to breathe in and let everything out