In this MT4Christ 24/7 podcast episode, host M.t. Clark opens with a snowy‑mountain photo as a visual metaphor for the mid‑week summit and shares a personal anecdote about discovering iPhone photo search. He then pivots to the central devotional theme: cultivating a genuine friendship with Jesus. Clark cites a recent In Touch devotion by Dr. Charles Stanley, emphasizing Jesus’ unconditional acceptance, availability, and willingness to listen, and urges listeners to speak to Jesus as a friend, especially in trials. He follows with a scriptural meditation drawn from John 1:11‑13 (via the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling) that highlights humility, the concept of being born again, and the need to avoid pride in one’s salvation. Next, Clark presents the day‑49 entry from J.E. Adams’ “Day by Day Along the Way,” reflecting on Proverbs 19:21 and the tension between human plans and God’s providential counsel, encouraging surrender to divine direction. He announces the inaugural Celebrate Freedom support/disciple group meeting at Star Point Church in Clifton Park, invites local listeners to attend, and provides contact information. Clark also promotes his online resources (mtforchrist.com, the M.t. for Christ 247 YouTube channel, various playlists) and requests financial support for his ministry, noting his LLC status. The episode concludes with a heartfelt prayer asking for God’s guidance, purpose, and blessings on listeners, and a final invitation to be “empty for Christ” by surrendering to the Holy Spirit.
Chapters
Welcome to the MT4Christ 24/7 podcast. I am M.t. Clark, and this is today's photo. To see today's photo, go to mt4christ.com or follow me, M.t. Clark, on Facebook or Twitter, or watch us on YouTube. Good morning. Today's photo of a snowy mountain under an amazing blue sky comes to us from an unknown Facebook friend who shared this mountain majesty on social media back on July July 13th, 2023. July? Yeah, I guess. Uh, all I can tell you, um, uh, is the date— is what date I added it to my iPhone. I can't tell you when our friend may have taken it or where in the world they were. So if this snowcap memory is yours and you want to tell us more about your peak experience, let me know and we will photo credit you, uh, after the fact. And yeah, so anyway, as is my habit, I share today's mountain photo to represent our arrival, uh, to another midweek, uh, summit visually. So happy hump day, everyone. There's a funny story about how I got this photo this morning, or at least I thought it was funny. Um, so I wanted a mountain photo, and because I have a lot of photos on my phone, sometimes it's difficult to locate one by just scrolling through them. So somehow I got the idea to do something I never tried before. I did a search of my photos with the word mountain, and you know what happened? A bunch of mountain photos popped up. Did you know you could do that? I didn't know, but I do now, and I have to thank the tech guys at Apple for making my life a little easier. You know, you don't know what you can do until you try, and similarly, a lot of people out there don't realize they can have a personal relationship with Jesus because although they may believe in him and said a prayer to make him Lord and Savior of their lives, they never really tried to connect with him. Uh, they never turned to him other than in times of need or at church and are missing out on the best friendship they could have. Um, the reason I do this blog and podcast is to let them know that they can have a very real friendship with Jesus, God, and the Holy Spirit by just talking to him. Speaking of having a friendship with Jesus, the In Touch with Dr. Charles Stanley devotion from yesterday spoke on this topic, and I'm sharing it on the blog today to help everyone, to tell everyone how they can have a friend in Jesus. Dr. Charles Stanley writes: Our best friend. Jesus always loves us and is always available to us. Believers think of the Savior as Lord, King, or Master, but how often do we think of Jesus as our friend? We may have difficulty with the concept, but he doesn't. Jesus accepts us. Unconditional acceptance means we can always approach him. He may want us to become more Christlike, but we are still accepted no matter what. Is happening in our life. Jesus walks through trials with us. God's promise is never to leave or forsake his people. He is our constant encourager and faithful friend during both the good and dark times in our life. Jesus is always available. He's never too busy to meet our needs or respond to our prayers. And Jesus listens to us. We can share our doubts, fears, and joys with the Lord because he cares about what's on our mind and wants to hear from us. Whatever we say, even angry shouts and tears, will be consistently met with assurance of his love. We can take comfort in knowing the Lord has a plan for each believer and will take care of us. Thank him today. For the way He looks out for us. As the old hymn says, "What a friend we have in Jesus." That was from Dr. Charles Stanley, and I say amen. Jesus is our friend, and He will help us. Can I get a "Help me, Jesus"? But seriously, I am serious when I encourage, encourage you to say those very words if you're dealing with trials, because as Stanley points out, Jesus accepts you no matter what you are doing or going through. He walks through trials with you and he is available to help you. But if you don't actually speak to him, call it prayer, you will never understand how he also listens to you too. He is God with us, so let's not ignore him. Yes, we have a friend in Jesus, so let's be a better friend to him and start letting him into all the areas of our lives by talking to him. So he can come in and heal us and set us free. Today's Bible verses come from the Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling by John G. Cruis. This morning's meditation verses from— come from the section on humility or pride. Um, and, uh, today's verses are John 1:11-13. And the word of God says, he came to do that which was his own. But his own did not receive him. Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. Today's verses are the third of four passages of scripture that fall under the sixth point of our Counseling Reference Guide's resource section on humility, or pride. And, um, that sixth point is: are you a Christian, born again? If so, God alone gets the glory. Today's Bible verses clearly points out that those who come to God are now God's children, but we shouldn't take pride in our decision to make Jesus our Lord and Savior. Sure, we should have joy and gratitude about it, but it's because scripture tells us that we are now God's children, not by natural descent nor of human decision or a husband's will. Uh, we are God's sons and daughters because we are born of God. And just like a baby has no idea where they came from or didn't play any part in their existence, we didn't birth ourselves into God's kingdom. God decided he wanted a family to live with him forever, and he chose to birth some kids. It's his grace that caused us to be born again, and we should walk in humility because we would have been lost without about God's decision to make us his children. As always, we encourage everyone to go to mtforchrist.com, where we always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to help our brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk. Today we continue sharing from Day by Day Along the Way by J.E. Adams. It's a 365-day devotional, and we're on day 49, where J.E. Adams shares Proverbs 19:21, which says, many plans are in a man's heart, but the counsel of Yahweh will prevail. And J.E. Adams writes, God's counsel will take place. Man's plans are cut short, altered, or delayed by the will of God worked out in his providence. You plan to become a baseball player and end up in the ministry. You think that you will marry Brad but end up marrying Bill. Your plans are not like the laws of the Medes and the Persians, unalterable. God often will change them for you. Are you satisfied to sit loose in the saddle, as they say? Are you willing to submit your plans to God for blue penciling, or do you grumpily complain about his alterations? If you have difficulty in accepting divine changes in your circumstances, you will be a miserable person. Why? Because you can't do anything about them. Instead, why not learn to readily accept God's counsel for your life? Actually, you should become excited about the changes God, God works, wondering what better plans he has in store for you. To do so can be an adventure. Remember, he knows what is best for you. How many times have you been glad that your plans did not take place? In heaven, you will know about many others as well. Amen. And that's just it, you know. God has a plan for our lives, and when we go against it, we suffer. And when those changes happen, if we're against them, you know, um, you know, we might need to resist some things, um, But when you realize it's from the Lord, you sort of just go with it. And that's the best way to discover peace in walking in the Spirit, is to agree with God. And when you are hit with things that you don't understand, or things that happen, don't understand, lean on him to get peace and trust in him that this is happening for a reason and that he's moving you toward the plan that he has for your life. You might have to endure and be strong and, and do some work, but the Lord is moving you to something great, and it's, you know, into his kingdom. And he has a purpose for you here on earth, and he's trying to move you into your purpose. But if you're ignoring him, not talking to him, you'll never understand what your purpose is, and you might, you know, only meet a part of it. Um, you know, because you resisted. And, uh, you know, Lord will tell you, well, we had other things for you, but you didn't really do them. As it— as one of the verses we shared recently says, God's will is good, acceptable, and perfect. And so that means there's some, some wiggle room in terms of how our lives work out. Um, if we just do what's acceptable, that's one thing, but then if we do what's good, that's better. And then there's a perfect will of God Um, and so the difference in what we will experience is our decision to follow the Lord and agree with what he wants to do in our lives. So we always ask the question, you know, are you fully surrendered to God? Um, have you made the decision to make Jesus your Lord and Savior and decide to actually follow him and turn from your sin and try to do good works in his name? Um, we encourage you to do so because it makes your life, as Adam said, an adventure, and it's not boring humdrum. This is the epic story of all existence, that God called man to be with Him, and we get to play a part in that as we can grow in our faith individually, and we can share our faith corporately and bring people into the kingdom, or at least, you know, show them the way to the Lord, and, you know, God will birth them into the kingdom too. So it's an amazing life in Christ.. And a lot of people don't know it because we make religion, or, you know, our religion, this small part of our life where it's supposed to be the biggest thing ever, you know. Um, and so we encourage people to follow. And I followed the Lord, and part of my purpose was to lead the Celebrate Freedom support group at Starpoint Church. I didn't expect it, but there it is. Um, and there it is tonight. Uh, we are meeting for the first time in 2025 this evening, uh, at 6:30 PM in the K through 3rd grade classroom at Star Point Church, and I cordially invite anybody from Upstate New York who, uh, needs a Christian community, uh, you know, support and, uh, maybe help with the recovery and discipleship to come out and join us tonight as we, uh, begin again, as we try to encourage each other to come overcome our hurts, habits, and hangups. Yes, but also to become more and more, uh, like the people that God created us to be. Um, we teach walking in the spirit more than recovery, I'd say. Uh, anyway, uh, if you can't make it to Clifton Park tonight, uh, that's a bummer. But guess what? We're, we're doing the teachings from Celebrate Freedom. Um, it's a modified version because it's not a group support group, obviously, but I'm doing my teachings for Celebrate Freedom on a weekly basis. And we just started on Monday, and we did the introduction, uh, the ABCs of Celebrate Freedom, and then we did the first lesson from Celebrate Recovery's material on denial. So they're both out there. If you want to enter in recovery and don't have a group to get to, jump on board, and you can always contact me at email M.t. Clark at mt4christ.com to ask me questions, you know, or, you know, try to get support. So there's that anyway, and we are asking for support, for this endeavor. So if you want to support me in my efforts to help people with Christian recovery, you can go to mtforchrist.com, the group events page, and you can give us a donation to support, support what I'm doing, to try to, try to help, like, cover the cost of my ministry, basically. And so we— it's not tax deductible, I'm— it's just me. I'm an LLC, not a, not a, not a non-for-profit at this point, but, uh, you never know someday. But it'll be greatly appreciated anyway. Um, however, and, and we do other things too. Um, basically there, there are podcasts that we've done in the past for Bondage Breaker, Victory Over the Darkness, Freedom in Christ, Celebrate Freedom Discipleship Group. They're all online, all on YouTube, uh, for free. And, um, basically they're available through our playlist say you want to go to my channel, M.t. for Christ 247, and go to the playlist to look those up. Um, you'll see a lot of playlists there, um, basically because I put a lot of— I just made playlists out of things that inspired me or I thought were interesting, um, to, to assist people and say, hey, look at this. So if you want to see what you should look at, go to M.t. for Christ, uh, 247 YouTube channel and check out that, or go to our M.t. for Christ, um, and go to our playlist page. It'll show you all the stuff that I produced. So there's that. Anyway, we end every session by asking the question, are you empty for Christ too? That's just another way of saying, are you surrendered to God's will? Are you willing to let the Holy Spirit come into your life and move you to become more and more like the person he created you to be? If so, we say, great, keep on walking and talking with God. If not, we implore you to pray and ask for the Lord to reveal himself to you and to, you know, start the conversation. Start talking to God and see if he talks back, because you'll probably get a response. And so we encourage you to do that. We know that prayers are answered because we've experienced it, and that's why we pray every day, like right now. Lord God, Heavenly Father, thank you for another day in your kingdom. We thank you so much for everything you've done for us, Lord, and how you're moving us in further and further into our purpose. And Lord, we need your help, uh, because we don't always get it and we struggle. Um, so we need you to show us the way today too. Um, open our eyes to the things you want us to see and lead us in the way we should go. And while you're at it, Lord, we also ask for you to help the people read or watch this message, um, or watch, uh, or listen to it, um, that you encourage them and bring them further into their purpose too, and that you would, um, you know, answer their prayer request. Lord, we thank you, we praise you, and we love you, and we pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.
