Max Lucado Daily: Ask for More
“Lord, teach me what you want me to do, and I will live by your truth.” Psalm 86:11
When kindness comes through grudgingly, we’ll remember God’s kindness to us and ask Him to make us more kind. When patience is scarce, we’ll thank Him for His and ask Him to make us more patient. When it’s hard to forgive, we won’t list all the times we’ve been given grief. Rather, we’ll list all the times we’ve been given grace and pray to become more forgiving.
Genesis 3
The Fall of Man
1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God really say, 'You must not eat from any tree in the garden'?"
2 The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.' "
4 "You will not surely die," the serpent said to the woman. 5 "For God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil."
6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the LORD God called to the man, "Where are you?"
10 He answered, "I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid."
11 And he said, "Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?"
12 The man said, "The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it."
13 Then the LORD God said to the woman, "What is this you have done?"
The woman said, "The serpent deceived me, and I ate."
14 So the LORD God said to the serpent, "Because you have done this,
"Cursed are you above all the livestock
and all the wild animals!
You will crawl on your belly
and you will eat dust
all the days of your life.
15 And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring [n] and hers;
he will crush [o] your head,
and you will strike his heel."
16 To the woman he said,
"I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing;
with pain you will give birth to children.
Your desire will be for your husband,
and he will rule over you."
17 To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which I commanded you, 'You must not eat of it,'
"Cursed is the ground because of you;
through painful toil you will eat of it
all the days of your life.
18 It will produce thorns and thistles for you,
and you will eat the plants of the field.
19 By the sweat of your brow
you will eat your food
until you return to the ground,
since from it you were taken;
for dust you are
and to dust you will return."
20 Adam [p] named his wife Eve, [q] because she would become the mother of all the living.
21 The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them. 22 And the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever." 23 So the LORD God banished him from the Garden of Eden to work the ground from which he had been taken. 24 After he drove the man out, he placed on the east side [r] of the Garden of Eden cherubim and a flaming sword flashing back and forth to guard the way to the tree of life.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: 2 Peter 1:3-16
3 His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.
4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires.
5 For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge;
6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness;
7 and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love.
8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
9 But if anyone does not have them, he is nearsighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been cleansed from his past sins.
10 Therefore, my brothers, be all the more eager to make your calling and election sure. For if you do these things, you will never fall,
11 and you will receive a rich welcome into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
Prophecy of Scripture
12 So I will always remind you of these things, even though you know them and are firmly established in the truth you now have.
13 I think it is right to refresh your memory as long as I live in the tent of this body,
14 because I know that I will soon put it aside, as our Lord Jesus Christ has made clear to me.
15 And I will make every effort to see that after my departure you will always be able to remember these things.
16 We did not follow cleverly invented stories when we told you about the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but we were eyewitnesses of his majesty.
Confidence In Scripture
August 22, 2010 — by Dennis Fisher
We did not follow cunningly devised fables . . . but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. —2 Peter 1:16
The Narnia children’s books written by C. S. Lewis symbolize Christian truth. In the tale Prince Caspian, Lewis tells the story of a tyrant who usurped the throne of the enchanted land of Narnia. His young nephew, Prince Caspian, has heard stories of Narnia’s great king who died and rose again to break the power of evil. His uncle dismisses this story as a fairy tale. However, the boy later discovers that the ancient story is in fact true.
Lewis’ intent was to illustrate how skeptics often dismiss the ancient story of Christ as a myth. But, like biblical scholars today, Lewis was convinced that based on the historic evidence, the record of Jesus’ supernatural life is true. Sir Frederic Kenyon, former director of the British Museum, held a similar conviction about Scripture’s reliability. Of this he wrote, “Both the authenticity and the general integrity of the books of the New Testament may be regarded as . . . established.”
The apostles had the same confidence in the record of Jesus: “We did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty” (2 Peter 1:16).
We can be assured that the biblical account of the King of kings is an accurate historical record.
The skeptic questions, doubts, and scoffs,
Protesting truths we hold so dear;
But God’s Word stands, its truth remains,
Proclaiming what we need to hear. —K. De Haan
In a changing world you can trust God’s unchanging Word.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
August 22nd , 2010
"I Indeed . . . But He"
I indeed baptize you with water . . . but He . . . will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire —Matthew 3:11
Have I ever come to the point in my life where I can say, “I indeed . . . but He . . .”? Until that moment comes, I will never know what the baptism of the Holy Spirit means. I indeed am at the end, and I cannot do anything more— butHe begins right there— He does the things that no one else can ever do. Am I prepared for His coming? Jesus cannot come and do His work in me as long as there is anything blocking the way, whether it is something good or bad. When He comes to me, am I prepared for Him to drag every wrong thing I have ever done into the light? That is exactly where He comes. Wherever I know I am unclean is where He will put His feet and stand, and wherever I think I am clean is where He will remove His feet and walk away.
Repentance does not cause a sense of sin— it causes a sense of inexpressible unworthiness. When I repent, I realize that I am absolutely helpless, and I know that through and through I am not worthy even to carry His sandals. Have I repented like that, or do I have a lingering thought of possibly trying to defend my actions? The reason God cannot come into my life is that I am not at the point of complete repentance.
“He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.” John is not speaking here of the baptism of the Holy Spirit as an experience, but as a work performed by Jesus Christ. “He will baptize you . . . .” The only experience that those who are baptized with the Holy Spirit are ever conscious of is the experience of sensing their absolute unworthiness.
“I indeed” was this in the past, “but He” came and something miraculous happened. Get to the end of yourself where you can do nothing, but where He does everything.
