Share the Light E-Book

Sam Sorbo

• Herausgeber: BroadStreet Publishing Group, LLC
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Seitenzahl: 113

Beschreibung

Make a Difference in Your World! Jesus spoke in parables, stories to teach truths with profound meaning. Good stories can move us and affect our thoughts. Thoughts compel action, and actions change the world. After the success of the theatrical release of their movie Let There Be Light, Sam and Kevin Sorbo now present a devotional follow-up that takes a deeper dive into themes from the movie, including family, fatherhood, atheism, faith, forgiveness, grief, and redemption.  Share the Light combines references to the movie's story, Scriptures, devotions, questions for reflection and discussion, and forty challenges that inspire action to change the world for the better. When we serve others, give our time and resources, and invest emotionally in the welfare of others, we are profoundly affected, improved, even. You can change the world, for one person or for many, and be transformed yourself as well. We all possess strengths we may not realize until they are needed. Hear the call to make a difference and share God's light.

Leseprobe

Sam and Kevin Sorbo are to be highly recommended for shining the light of their Christian faith in the entertainment industry. Their devotional Share the Light can help you be a faithful warrior for the Kingdom so you can change the world!

—Dr. Ted Baehr, www.movieguide.org

Kevin and Sam have written encouragement and inspiration into the pages of this book. After the fantastic success of Let There Be Light, I can’t imagine a better resource than Share the Light for making the world a better place!

—Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, US presidential candidate, best-selling author

Put your feet to your faith! In Share the Light, Sam and Kevin creatively inspire readers to effectively improve the world around them. Read it and be empowered!

—Dr. Robert Jeffress, pastor, First Baptist Church, Dallas

I found Share the Light to be a tremendous resource. It provides powerful words to help us go out and do what our Savior commanded us to do in Mark 16:15—to go out and share the good word with all of creation. I encourage every believer to use this powerful tool in their everyday walk.

—Michael Franzese, national speaker, author of Blood Covenant: The Michael Franzese Story

I really love Share the Light! What stuck out to me the most was the consistent message of not keeping the Light to yourself. This devotional is unique in that it encourages us to share God’s light with others. Light is impossible to contain. If we have the Light within us, we will not be able to keep it to ourselves. This devotional gives us practical ways to share that Light on a daily basis.

—Missy Robertson, Duck Dynasty

BroadStreet Publishing® Group, LLC

Savage, Minnesota, USA

BroadStreetPublishing.com

SHARE THE LIGHT: 40 WORLD-CHANGING DEVOTIONS

Copyright © 2018 Sam and Kevin Sorbo

ISBN 978-1-4245-5726-4 (softcover)

ISBN 978-1-4245-5727-1 (e-book)

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form, except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Some devotional content is from Make a Difference by Ken Castor. Used by permission.

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188, USA. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked TPT are from The Passion Translation®. Copyright © 2014, 2015, 2016 by BroadStreet Publishing Group, Racine, Wisconsin. thePassionTranslation.com. Used by permission. Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Stock or custom editions of BroadStreet Publishing titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, ministry, fundraising, or sales promotional use. For information, please email [email protected].

Cover design by Chris Garborg at garborgdesign.com

Interior by Katherine Lloyd at theDESKonline.com

Printed in the United States of America

18 19 20 21 22 5 4 3 2 1

CONTENTS

F

OREWORD BY

F

RANKLIN

G

RAHAM

I

NTRODUCTION

:

T

HE

P

OWER OF

S

TORYTELLING

1

L

IGHT IN THE

D

ARKNESS

2

F

EELING

A

LIVE

3

H

ELP

T

HOSE IN

N

EED

4

P

UT

Y

OUR

P

RIORITIES IN

P

LACE

5

Y

OUR

P

RESENCE

H

AS

I

MPACT

6

S

HARE

Y

OUR

L

IFE WITH

O

THERS

7

G

OOD

N

EWS FOR A

C

HANGE

8

M

Y

L

IGHT AND

M

Y

S

ALVATION

9

W

HAT THE

L

ORD

D

OES, SO

D

O

W

E

10

G

OD

P

RODUCES

F

AITH IN

U

S

11

A

NOTHER

P

LACE

12

T

HE

M

ESSAGE OF

C

REATION

13

S

HARING

G

OD’S

L

OVE IN

T

IMES OF

G

RIEF

14

T

EMPERING YOUR

T

EMPER

15

S

POTLIGHT

16

C

LEANING

U

P

M

ESSES

17

Y

OUR

C

ALLING FROM

G

OD

18

L

IFE

I

S

P

RECIOUS

19

M

AKE

I

T

R

EAL

20

L

IGHT

S

HINING IN

U

S

21

S

HARE

Y

OUR

F

AITH WITH

O

THERS

22

L

ET

T

HERE

B

E

L

IGHT

23

L

IGHT FOR

M

Y

P

ATH

24

G

OD

I

S

O

UR

H

ERO

25

T

HE

I

NTENSITY OF THE

L

IGHT OF

G

OD

26

T

HE

P

OWER OF

F

ORGIVENESS

27

G

OD

I

S WITH

Y

OU

28

U

NEXPECTEDLY

E

XTRAORDINARY

29

C

OMMUNICATING THE

L

IGHT

30

R

EPRESENTING

G

OD

31

C

OMMIT

Y

OUR

L

IFE TO

G

OD

32

W

ALK IN

H

IS

L

IGHT

33

T

HINK OF

O

THERS

34

O

VERCOMING

D

EATH

35

G

OD’S

P

LANS

I

NCLUDE

Y

OU

36

S

HARE THE

G

OOD

N

EWS

37

W

HOEVER

H

AS

J

ESUS

38

H

YPOCRITE

-P

ROOF

Y

OURSELF

39

L

ET

Y

OUR

L

IGHT

S

HINE BEFORE

O

THERS

40

S

PREADING THE

B

AND OF

L

IGHT

A

FTERWORD

:

R

ESCUE

B

OATS

A

CKNOWLEDGMENTS

A

BOUT THE

A

UTHORS

FOREWORD

Jesus is the light of the world, and He has given us His truth by which we are to live and shine His light in the darkness that falls upon sinful man. For those who believe in and follow the Lord Jesus Christ, we are called to serve Him by living a life that will point others to His forgiveness and His everlasting salvation, for He came to rescue us from the clutches of sin that so easily besets us (Hebrews 12:1).

Who does your heart belong to?

Who do you follow?

Who do you turn to when darkness overshadows and discouragement follows?

Jesus said, “He who follows Me will have the light of life. … As long as I am in the world I am the light of the world” (John 8:12; 9:5).

When Jesus departed from this earth to return to His Father in heaven, He gave us the great privilege and enormous responsibility to be His light. That is not always easy to do because we still struggle with human frailty. At times we may bend to peer pressure and overlook what we know to be wrong. But the Bible tells us that we must become “children of God without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world” (Philippians 2:15).

You may ask, How can we do this? The Bible tells us that the Holy Spirit lives within each believer and will guide and direct our paths if we obey God’s Word. Our good works mean nothing if they are not empowered by the Lord Jesus Christ and His truth. When we faithfully speak His Word and follow His commands, it pleases Him to open up ways for our lives to bless others as we speak His name, which brings hope and glorifies the Master of our lives. “For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth), finding out what is acceptable to the Lord” (Ephesians 5:8–10).

May God bless you as you seek to honor His mighty name and Share the Light.

Franklin Graham

President and CEO

Billy Graham Evangelistic Association

Samaritan’s Purse

INTRODUCTION

THE POWER OF STORYTELLING

What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him?

If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit?

Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

James 2:14–17, NKJV

We all love a good story. If it’s told well and strikes our emotions, it moves us, stays with us, and affects us in our daily lives. Stories can change the world.

It’s very clear that in the Bible, one of the most useful tools that Jesus employs to convey his teachings is the parable—a story that uses consonances and analogies to express some broader or more profound meaning. Jesus effectively changed the world with storytelling, and, as Christian filmmakers, to do that is what Kevin and I also intend. Good stories can move us and affect our thoughts; thoughts compel action, and actions change the world.

After the immense success of the theatrical release of our movie Let There Be Light, we decided to produce a book that combines storytelling, devotion to God, reflection on our shared Christian faith, and then action in the public and private domains to change the world for the better.

For instance, the Parable of the Sower paints the picture of seeds planted in different types of soil. A seed’s potential is not fulfilled in the planting but in its growth into a plant. Let There Be Light was, for us, like planting seeds. Now we would like to water those seeds with the ideas in this book, to encourage you to flourish both in your faith and in your actions. We would like to watch a veritable forest of light and charitable acts mature out of the initial planting that the movie realized.

James speaks concisely that faith must be accompanied by action. Without action, how will anything change or improve? On a national scale, action changed colonial America into the United States of America. Men, almost all of whom were Christian, with the rest heavily influenced by Christianity, purposed to create a new nation “conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal,” as Abraham Lincoln noted in his Gettysburg Address. This accomplishment consequently upended the status quo of one ruler over the many that the world had traditionally embraced for millennia. The variations of emperor, king, dictator, and despot were replaced with a new concept of self-rule, in both the vernacular and in practice. And, subsequently, a surprisingly peaceful transfer of power between two rival political parties occurred, and astonished other governments around the globe, all because of the teachings in our Christian Bible. Loving God and your fellow man was put into action, and it rocked the world.

One notable caveat is John Adams’ quote that “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” Consider that laws are only as strong as the will of the people to obey them, and once enough members of our society decide to pursue the rule of selfishness (i.e., “What’s in it for me?”) as opposed to the Golden Rule (i.e., “Do unto others as you would have done unto you.”), we will have self-serving rulers at the top creating chaos and tyranny for everyone else. These rulers will demand more powerful, more intrusive, and more controlling policies and policing to get their self-interests served. We believe that to retain the freedoms we enjoy in this country, we must exercise our Christian faith, both as a way of exhibiting its value to others and because we are called to love our brethren. A great way to do that is by serving others.

You can employ this concept on a daily basis in your own life, and experience its effects and rewards personally. You can create life-changing results, because influencing a single human being always impacts more than just that one.

These are merely suggestions. You can also invent more and even better ways to serve your fellow man and your culture (and posterity). For this reason, there are several prompts in the book to share your stories on social media with the hashtag “LTBL” (#LTBL) to make it easier for people to find them.

The most amazing thing is that when you serve others, give of your time and your resources, and invest emotionally in the welfare of those around you, it leaves you profoundly affected—improved even. While this book is focused on changing the world, it is an unavoidable and extraordinary benefit that when we look outside ourselves to see the bigger picture, the larger story, and the greater suffering that exists beyond our general focus, we begin to re-imagine our role in society and our place in God’s creation. We gain perspective that often makes our own troubles pale in comparison. To put it bluntly, serving others is the greatest thing we can do for ourselves, personally.

Through this book, Kevin and I would like to sound that clarion call to action and provide the impetus and the concepts for what those actions might be.

We can change the world, for one person or for many, and through it we transform ourselves as well!

Sam and Kevin Sorbo

January 23, 2018

1

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