Genesis 12:12 Therefore it will happen, when the Egyptians see you, that they will say, ‘This is his wife’; and they will kill me, but they will let you live.

When Abraham took his wife Sarah to try and get away from the famine in his own land, he thought he was doing the right thing.

When he got there he did not want the local people to take his wife because she was so beautiful; so he told a bit of a lie!

God does not want us to have to tell lies to get out of trouble but rather to trust in Him and depend on Him so the trouble will be dealt with by Him instead.

Trust is a very big word when you are worried by the people around you!

Proverbs 29:25 The fear of man brings a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord shall be safe.

Should you be afraid of a person who wants to hurt you with a big knife or something worse? Of course yes!

But human fear is very different to the fear we should have for God. Humans may be able to do all manner of bad things to us, but they can never take away our souls.

God wants to keep you and your soul safe and in peace with Him in heaven; that means we have a choice to make.

We either fear and trust in humans and get as far as the end of our lives, or we fear and trust in God who can keep us for eternity after our physical bodies conk out!

Isaiah 11:1 There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse, And a Branch shall grow out of his roots.

It is hard to try and describe something which has never been seen before; and harder still to describe a person whom you have not seen.

Isaiah was describing many different things in his prophecies and here we have a depiction of Christ as a slender rod or branch from which something bigger is going to grow.

When we plant a cutting to grow into a big plant, we start with something very small which grows as it is fed and nourished.

Don’t be put off thinking you are too small; God wants to nourish and feed you to become something great for Him!