Confirming One’s Calling and Election

2 Peter 1:5-7 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, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, 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.

Friday, January 31, 2014

Revelation 12, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

Max Lucado Daily: The Big News

The big news of the Bible is not that you love God, but that God loves you; not that you can know God, but that God already knows you!
God tattooed your name on the palm of his hand. You never leave his mind, escape his sight, flee his thoughts. He sees the worst of  you and loves you still. Your sins of tomorrow and failings of the future will not surprise him, he sees them now. Every day and deed of your life has passed before his eyes and been calculated in his decision. He knows you better than you know you and reached his verdict: He loves you still!
No discovery will disillusion him, no rebellion will dissuade him. You need not win his love.  You already have it. And since you can't win it, you can't lose it! He loves you with an everlasting love!
From The Lucado Inspirational Reader

Revelation 12

New International Version (NIV)
The Woman and the Dragon

12 A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. 2 She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. 3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. 4 Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. 5 She gave birth to a son, a male child, who “will rule all the nations with an iron scepter.”[a] And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. 6 The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days.

7 Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 9 The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him.

10 Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say:

“Now have come the salvation and the power
    and the kingdom of our God,
    and the authority of his Messiah.
For the accuser of our brothers and sisters,
    who accuses them before our God day and night,
    has been hurled down.
11 They triumphed over him
    by the blood of the Lamb
    and by the word of their testimony;
they did not love their lives so much
    as to shrink from death.
12 Therefore rejoice, you heavens
    and you who dwell in them!
But woe to the earth and the sea,
    because the devil has gone down to you!
He is filled with fury,
    because he knows that his time is short.”

13 When the dragon saw that he had been hurled to the earth, he pursued the woman who had given birth to the male child. 14 The woman was given the two wings of a great eagle, so that she might fly to the place prepared for her in the wilderness, where she would be taken care of for a time, times and half a time, out of the serpent’s reach. 15 Then from his mouth the serpent spewed water like a river, to overtake the woman and sweep her away with the torrent. 16 But the earth helped the woman by opening its mouth and swallowing the river that the dragon had spewed out of his mouth. 17 Then the dragon was enraged at the woman and went off to wage war against the rest of her offspring—those who keep God’s commands and hold fast their testimony about Jesus.
Footnotes:

    Revelation 12:5 Psalm 2:9


Our Daily Bread reading and devotion   

Read: Genesis 3:1-8

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 certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat from 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.

Insight
Satan misapplied God’s words in today’s passage. God’s prohibition against eating applied only to the “tree of the knowledge of good and evil” (Gen. 2:16-17), not to every tree (3:1). Satan’s phrase “You will not surely die” (v.4) was a direct challenge to God’s declaration, “You shall surely die” (2:17). In turn, Eve also modified God’s clear instruction: “nor shall you touch it” (3:3). The story of the fall is a clear warning to us to study and know God’s Word so that we will not be led astray.

Buyer’s Remorse

 January 31, 2014 — by Poh Fang chia

He has clothed me with the garments of salvation, He has covered me with the robe of righteousness. —Isaiah 61:10



Have you ever experienced buyer’s remorse? I have. Just prior to making a purchase, I feel the surge of excitement that comes with getting something new. After buying the item, however, a wave of remorse sometimes crashes over me. Did I really need this? Should I have spent the money?

In Genesis 3, we find the first record of a buyer’s remorse. The whole thing began with the crafty serpent and his sales pitch. He persuaded Eve to doubt God’s Word (v.1). He then capitalized on her uncertainty by casting doubt on God’s character (vv.4-5). He promised that her eyes would “be opened” and she would become “like God” (v.5).

So Eve ate. Adam ate. And sin entered the world. But the first man and woman got more than they bargained for. Their eyes were opened all right, but they didn’t become like God. In fact, their first act was to hide from God (vv.7-8).

Sin has dire consequences. It always keeps us from God’s best. But God in His mercy and grace clothed Adam and Eve in garments made from animal skins (v.21)—foreshadowing what Jesus Christ would do for us by dying on the cross for our sins. His blood was shed so that we might be clothed with His righteousness—with no remorse!
Then will I set my heart to find
Inward adornings of the mind:
Knowledge and virtue, truth and grace,
These are the robes of richest dress. —Watts
The cross, which reveals the righteousness of God, provides that righteousness for mankind.


My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
January 31, 2014

Do You See Your Calling?

. . . separated to the gospel of God. . . —Romans 1:1

Our calling is not primarily to be holy men and women, but to be proclaimers of the gospel of God. The one all-important thing is that the gospel of God should be recognized as the abiding reality. Reality is not human goodness, or holiness, or heaven, or hell— it is redemption. The need to perceive this is the most vital need of the Christian worker today. As workers, we have to get used to the revelation that redemption is the only reality. Personal holiness is an effect of redemption, not the cause of it. If we place our faith in human goodness we will go under when testing comes.

Paul did not say that he separated himself, but “when it pleased God, who separated me . . .” (Galatians 1:15). Paul was not overly interested in his own character. And as long as our eyes are focused on our own personal holiness, we will never even get close to the full reality of redemption. Christian workers fail because they place their desire for their own holiness above their desire to know God. “Don’t ask me to be confronted with the strong reality of redemption on behalf of the filth of human life surrounding me today; what I want is anything God can do for me to make me more desirable in my own eyes.” To talk that way is a sign that the reality of the gospel of God has not begun to touch me. There is no reckless abandon to God in that. God cannot deliver me while my interest is merely in my own character. Paul was not conscious of himself. He was recklessly abandoned, totally surrendered, and separated by God for one purpose— to proclaim the gospel of God (see Romans 9:3).


A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft

On Time Delivery - #7060

Friday, January 31, 2014

We were in Phoenix on a ministry trip, and the last thing I expected was to be leaving something there when we were ready to come back. But we did, or rather my wife did. She decided to leave her gall bladder there. She had unexpected major surgery about 2,500 miles from home. I thought I was going to be back to my office, of course, that week. And I needed all kinds of files and reports urgently. So, I asked our office to mail me my office overnight while my wife is getting the surgery we hadn't expected. So they boxed everything up and sent it by a mail service that guarantees "next day delivery" by 10:30 A.M. So, the next morning I happened to be talking on an outdoor pay phone (Remember those?) when the truck pulled up. The driver made a mad dash toward me, handed me my package breathlessly, and I looked at my watch-10:27 A.M.! They're good! I was impressed. Just in time, but in time.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "On Time Delivery."
Our word for today from the Word of God; we're in Genesis 22, and it talks about the day that God got a new name. It's one that's been especially important to many of us-Jehovah Jireh, the Lord who provides. It happened on the mountain where Abraham was bringing his son, Isaac. God was testing the faith of this great man of faith by asking him to be willing to sacrifice what he loved most on that mountain-his son.
And so it says in verse 2, "Then God said, 'Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.'" Abraham's most precious possession. He obeys God. He takes the wood for sacrifice up there. They're at the top of the mountain. He puts him on the altar.
Here's what it says, "He bound his son, Isaac, laid him on the altar on top of the wood. Then he reached out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. But the angel of the Lord called out to him from heaven, 'Abraham! Abraham!' 'Here I am' he replied. 'Do not lay a hand on the boy' He said. 'Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God because you have not withheld from Me your son, your only son.' Abraham looked up and there in the thicket he saw a ram caught by its' horns. He went over, took the ram, and sacrificed it as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called that place The Lord Will Provide-Jehovah Jireh.
Well, it may very well be that you need God to be Jehovah Jireh in some area of your life right now. And you'll meet Him as Abraham did when God is testing you. Maybe you're going through it right now. It's Jehovah Jireh time! But notice God's delivery schedule. Just at the last moment, when it looks as if it's over, like the Jews at the Red Sea, the waters part at the last possible moment. Here the knife is in the air, and then the ram appears. I cannot tell you how many times God has come through for me on that same schedule. He'll never take you over the edge, but He'll take you to the edge. Why? Because He knows that faith is the key that unlocks His great power in any situation.
We don't have much of that, so He stretches us, pushes us, and allows us to wait so we'll develop the maximum faith from this experience. And God gets great glory when He delivers in a way that is obviously Him. And you'll end up more amazed by Him, more trusting in Him, more worshiping Him, more in love with Him than ever. The trick is to trust God while you're waiting, even when it's apparently past the point of no return. Human answers might be over, the time when our clock over, but God isn't finished yet. Faith even when there seems to be no way. You reach Jehovah Jireh on the mountain of the Lord; that place where He tests you and takes you to the point of no return and then comes through.
Well, I watched that delivery service roll in at just about the last possible minute, and they kept their promise of guaranteed on-time delivery. God's going to provide for you. He always delivers, and it will be on time! Don't be surprised if it's just in time