SaGe

SAGE Ministries is a dynamic bible study held every Tuesday @7.30pm. We discuss everything from family to failure, the cross and the future. All are welcome!

[UCB @UCBMedia]

Don't live in your own little world! Ask God where He would want you to go 😁
Read today's UCB Word For Today at https://t.co/fsezoj18nN

[Joel Osteen @JoelOsteen]

Isaiah said, “Arise and shine for the glory of the Lord is upon you.” The glory of God is on you right now. But if you’re going to see it, you have to arise. You won’t shine like you should if you play it safe all the time.

[John Piper @JohnPiper]

“Put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires.” Ephesians 4:22

Since desires can deceive, they are no measure of truth.

[Byron Donalds @ByronDonalds]

To you, it's just a Cracker Barrel parking lot. To me, it's where I gave my life to Jesus Christ.

I was 21 years old. I was working at the Cracker Barrel in Tallahassee after some of the worst years of my life. I'd made mistakes. Real ones.

I grew up in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, raised by a mom who worked hard and didn't accept excuses. But I made decisions that should have ended my story before it ever really started. By the grace of God, they didn't. But every day, I was carrying them.

One afternoon, a church group came into the restaurant, just back from a revival. I served them their meals like I served any other table. But something happened while I was serving them. I can't fully explain it to you. The Lord spoke to me. He said, “Stop running from Me.”

It knocked me back.

I went to find the table, and they were all gone. I could see through their windows that they were getting on their bus, and I knew deep down that if I let them drive away, I was going to keep running. So I went outside. The last woman, just as she was stepping onto the bus, turned to me and asked, “Are you okay?”

I told her, “No ma’am, I’m not okay.” I told her the Lord was telling me to stop running.

That whole bus emptied out, stood with me in the parking lot of a Cracker Barrel in Tallahassee, Florida, and prayed over me right there.

I gave my life to Christ that day. Right there.

I still get emotional about it. Because I know what I was before that moment, and I know what He's done since. He gave me a wife who shares my faith. He gave me three sons. He gave me a career, a community, a calling I never would have dared to ask for. He took a kid from Crown Heights who’d run out of chances and gave him a life that doesn't make sense apart from grace.

People ask me sometimes why I talk about it. Why I bring up the parking lot. Why I don't just keep that part private and let folks see the polished version.

I'll tell you why.

Because there's a young man out there right now — maybe in Tallahassee, maybe in Tampa, maybe in Miami, maybe in a small town in the Panhandle — who thinks his story is already over. Who thinks the mistakes he's made disqualify him from the life he could have had. Who thinks God doesn't want anything to do with somebody like him.

I'm here to tell him: that's a lie.

In life, you're not who you are at the lowest point. You're who you choose to become after.

The Lord met me in a Cracker Barrel parking lot. He'll meet you wherever you are.

You just have to stop running.

[David Jeremiah @davidjeremiah]

"Until the Holy Spirit comes to live within you because you have invited Christ to be your Savior you haven't been born again."

[In Touch Ministries @InTouchMin]

“Pay attention, Job, and listen to Me; be silent, and I will speak.” -Job 33:31

Jesus is often speaking to us, but we get so busy we don't hear Him. Then we're left wondering why God is silent. My friend, stop and listen. God is waiting for your full attention.

[Desiring God @desiringGod]

“Let all who take refuge in you rejoice; let them ever sing for joy, and spread your protection over them, that those who love your name may exult in you.” —Psalm 5:11

[Chuck Swindoll @chuckswindoll]

We've all carried the heaviness of being wounded — a careless word, a betrayed trust, a deep cut from someone we loved. And we've all known the slow corrosion of holding onto it. Resentment is a strange thing: we cling to it thinking it protects us, but it only chains us to the very pain we want to escape.

Chuck reminds us that the path to true healing isn't through revenge or rehearsing the wrong. It's through forgiveness — that supernatural release that loosens the grip pain has on our hearts. It doesn't excuse what happened. It frees you from being defined by it.

Is there someone you need to forgive today?

[In Touch Ministries @InTouchMin]

"And Jesus came up and spoke to them, saying, 'All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me.'" –Matthew 28:18 #Bible

[Joel Osteen @JoelOsteen]

You were created in the image of God. When He made you, He put a part of Himself in you. You have the DNA of Almighty God. You are powerful. You are anointed. You are favored. You are blessed.

[UCB @UCBMedia]

Make reading the Word of God a daily discipline 😊
Read today's UCB Word For Today at https://t.co/fsezoj18nN

[In Touch Ministries @InTouchMin]

Moses, though he had his hesitations, obeyed the Lord. He set an example for the people of Israel as He led them into the promised land. As followers of Christ, we are leaders and examples to those around us. My friend, what example are you setting today?

[Mark Chironna @markchironna]

We should be honest about why fear has become the dominant grammar of so much Christian speech. The platforms that now form more believers than any pulpit are built to reward certainty, outrage, and alarm, because those are the emotions that hold attention and sell. Fear has always been more profitable than formation. A people discipled by an algorithm will inherit the algorithm’s appetites, and they will learn to call those appetites faith.

[Desiring God @desiringGod]

“I will show my greatness and my holiness and make myself known in the eyes of many nations. Then they will know that I am the Lord.” —Ezekiel 38:23

[Timothy Keller (1950-2023) @timkellernyc]

We want the storyline of our lives to go from strength to strength, from success to success, and end happily ever after. But throughout the Bible we see something completely different — a persistent narrative pattern of life through death or triumph through weakness.

[Joel Osteen @JoelOsteen]

God has an assignment for you at every age. You are not too old. This world needs what you have. We need your wisdom. We need your talent, your experience, your love.

[In Touch Ministries @InTouchMin]

"Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a worker who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth." –2 Timothy 2:15 #Bible

[Chuck Swindoll @chuckswindoll]

We live in a noisy world. Podcasts, headlines, well-meaning friends, viral takes — voices come at us from every direction, often dressed up in spiritual language. Even the people who love us most can sometimes hand us advice that sounds caring but doesn't quite line up with truth. So how do we know what to trust?

There's only one voice that never shifts with the cultural wind, never gives bad counsel, and never leads us astray. Scripture is our anchor — the steady measuring line we hold every other word against. That doesn't mean we stop listening to others. It means we filter what we hear through what God has already said.

What's a passage that's been steadying you lately?

[Desiring God @desiringGod]

If you are in Christ, then the God of love and power is with you — right where you are.

In your relationships. In your life. In the battles no one else sees.

There is no real need in your life that God isn’t able to meet — far beyond what you could ask or imagine.

So, start your day there. Slow down. Open his word. Sit with him until your soul remembers: God is enough.

Watch Scott Hubbard’s message “Get Your Heart Happy in God.”

[John Piper @JohnPiper]

“Speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ.” Ephesians 4:15

Love + Truth = growth into Christ.