Max Lucado Daily: FINDING GOD IN THE STORM
The psalmist prays: “Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me?” The writer of Psalm 42 was sad and discouraged. The struggles of life threatened to pull him under. But at just the right moment, he made this decision. “Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him…I will remember You from the land of Jordan, and from the heights of Hermon…” There is resolve in those words. “I shall yet praise you…and I will remember You.” The writer made a deliberate decision to treat his downcast soul with thoughts of God.
There’s nothing easy about this. Finding God amid the billows will demand every bit of discipline you can muster. But the result is worth the strain. Besides, will reciting your problems turn you into a better person? No, but changing your mind-set will!
From God is With You Every Day
2 Corinthians 13
Final Warnings
This will be my third visit to you. “Every matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.”[a] 2 I already gave you a warning when I was with you the second time. I now repeat it while absent: On my return I will not spare those who sinned earlier or any of the others, 3 since you are demanding proof that Christ is speaking through me. He is not weak in dealing with you, but is powerful among you. 4 For to be sure, he was crucified in weakness, yet he lives by God’s power. Likewise, we are weak in him, yet by God’s power we will live with him in our dealing with you.
5 Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you—unless, of course, you fail the test? 6 And I trust that you will discover that we have not failed the test. 7 Now we pray to God that you will not do anything wrong—not so that people will see that we have stood the test but so that you will do what is right even though we may seem to have failed. 8 For we cannot do anything against the truth, but only for the truth. 9 We are glad whenever we are weak but you are strong; and our prayer is that you may be fully restored. 10 This is why I write these things when I am absent, that when I come I may not have to be harsh in my use of authority—the authority the Lord gave me for building you up, not for tearing you down.
Final Greetings
11 Finally, brothers and sisters, rejoice! Strive for full restoration, encourage one another, be of one mind, live in peace. And the God of love and peace will be with you.
12 Greet one another with a holy kiss. 13 All God’s people here send their greetings.
14 May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.
Footnotes:
2 Corinthians 13:1 Deut. 19:15
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Friday, August 19, 2016
Read: Matthew 20:1–16
A Story About Workers
“God’s kingdom is like an estate manager who went out early in the morning to hire workers for his vineyard. They agreed on a wage of a dollar a day, and went to work.
3-5 “Later, about nine o’clock, the manager saw some other men hanging around the town square unemployed. He told them to go to work in his vineyard and he would pay them a fair wage. They went.
5-6 “He did the same thing at noon, and again at three o’clock. At five o’clock he went back and found still others standing around. He said, ‘Why are you standing around all day doing nothing?’
7 “They said, ‘Because no one hired us.’
“He told them to go to work in his vineyard.
8 “When the day’s work was over, the owner of the vineyard instructed his foreman, ‘Call the workers in and pay them their wages. Start with the last hired and go on to the first.’
9-12 “Those hired at five o’clock came up and were each given a dollar. When those who were hired first saw that, they assumed they would get far more. But they got the same, each of them one dollar. Taking the dollar, they groused angrily to the manager, ‘These last workers put in only one easy hour, and you just made them equal to us, who slaved all day under a scorching sun.’
13-15 “He replied to the one speaking for the rest, ‘Friend, I haven’t been unfair. We agreed on the wage of a dollar, didn’t we? So take it and go. I decided to give to the one who came last the same as you. Can’t I do what I want with my own money? Are you going to get stingy because I am generous?’
16 “Here it is again, the Great Reversal: many of the first ending up last, and the last first.”
INSIGHT:
Jesus taught the parable of the workers in the vineyard (Matt. 20:1–16) to show His disciples the generous heart of God. God is not unjust. He has no favorites and treats every Christian generously and equally (vv. 13–15). Paul later taught this same truth: “There is no favoritism with [God]” (Eph. 6:9; Col. 3:25). This extends to believers and the way we view others (1 Tim. 5:21).
Comparison Obsession
By Marvin Williams
Don’t I have the right to do what I want with my own money? Or are you envious because I am generous? Matthew 20:15
Thomas J. DeLong, a professor at Harvard Business School, has noted a disturbing trend among his students and colleagues—a “comparison obsession." He writes: “More so than ever before, . . . business executives, Wall Street analysts, lawyers, doctors, and other professionals are obsessed with comparing their own achievements against those of others. . . . This is bad for individuals and bad for companies. When you define success based on external rather than internal criteria, you diminish your satisfaction and commitment.”
Comparison obsession isn’t new. The Scriptures warn us of the dangers of comparing ourselves to others. When we do so, we become proud and look down on them (Luke 18:9–14). Or we become jealous and want to be like them or have what they have (James 4:1). We fail to focus on what God has given us to do. Jesus intimated that comparison obsession comes from believing that God is unfair and that He doesn’t have a right to be more generous to others than He is to us (Matt. 20:1–16).
By God's grace, we can overcome comparing ourselves with others.
By God’s grace we can learn to overcome comparison obsession by focusing on the life God has given to us. As we take moments to thank God for everyday blessings, we change our thinking and begin to believe deep down that God is good.
I need a better focus, Lord. Help me to keep my eyes off others and instead on You and Your good heart for all of us.
God expresses His goodness to His children in His own way.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, August 19, 2016
Self-Awareness
Come to Me… —Matthew 11:28
God intends for us to live a well-rounded life in Christ Jesus, but there are times when that life is attacked from the outside. Then we tend to fall back into self-examination, a habit that we thought was gone. Self-awareness is the first thing that will upset the completeness of our life in God, and self-awareness continually produces a sense of struggling and turmoil in our lives. Self-awareness is not sin, and it can be produced by nervous emotions or by suddenly being dropped into a totally new set of circumstances. Yet it is never God’s will that we should be anything less than absolutely complete in Him. Anything that disturbs our rest in Him must be rectified at once, and it is not rectified by being ignored but only by coming to Jesus Christ. If we will come to Him, asking Him to produce Christ-awareness in us, He will always do it, until we fully learn to abide in Him.
Never allow anything that divides or destroys the oneness of your life with Christ to remain in your life without facing it. Beware of allowing the influence of your friends or your circumstances to divide your life. This only serves to sap your strength and slow your spiritual growth. Beware of anything that can split your oneness with Him, causing you to see yourself as separate from Him. Nothing is as important as staying right spiritually. And the only solution is a very simple one— “Come to Me….” The intellectual, moral, and spiritual depth of our reality as a person is tested and measured by these words. Yet in every detail of our lives where we are found not to be real, we would rather dispute the findings than come to Jesus.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Jesus Christ can afford to be misunderstood; we cannot. Our weakness lies in always wanting to vindicate ourselves.
The Place of Help
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, August 19, 2016
Climbing Hills to Nowhere - #7725
There was just something about those great vacation adventures I would plan for our family. Somehow our kids got to dreading my announcement that "Dad has another great adventure!" Maybe it was the day on Cape Cod. Near Provincetown there are these monster sand dunes. And I heard that if you climbed to the top of this particular mountain of sand, you'd have this beautiful panoramic view of the ocean. So on a hot July day, we started trudging up that dune. And I kept encouraging the troops with the prospect of that fabulous view at the top. And when we finally reached the top, there it was – a panoramic view of another sand dune! Well, against strenuous protests, I moved the troops down that dune and up the next one, sure that our view was one dune away. And there, atop that next dune, we were rewarded with, yeah, another sand dune. And so went our afternoon, up a dune, down a dune, up a dune, down a dune. My mistake – I was sure that what I was looking for must be just over that next hill. It wasn't.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Climbing Hills to Nowhere."
You know, a lot of people live their whole lives that same way-thinking that what they're looking for is just over the next hill. The love, the peace, the fulfillment, the meaning I'm looking for; oh it will be in that next relationship, that next accomplishment, that next experience. But so far we've left behind us a trail of hills that were supposed to fill the hole in our heart and didn't. Some people trudge on all the way to that final hill called death – still looking, still not finding. Maybe for you, life has been a lot of climbing hills to nowhere; to disappointment, emptiness and loneliness.
You may need to climb one more hill – the one that really does have what your soul has been searching for. Our word for today from the Word of God comes from John 6:35, where Jesus Christ promises to satisfy what nothing and no one else has been able to satisfy. It says, "Then Jesus declared, 'I am the bread of life. He who comes to Me will never go hungry, and he who believes in Me will never be thirsty'." Oh, there have been people or things that briefly satisfied the hunger and thirst in your heart, but never for long, certainly never for good.
Jesus says He is the end of that search for satisfaction. Why? Because He came to earth to reunite us with the God whose love we were made for. We've lost Him by living for ourselves instead of for Him. We've got this wall between us and God, the One we were created for. The hole in your heart was made for your Creator – and He's on the other side of that sin-wall. No one and nothing on earth can ever fill that hole, no matter how many more hills you climb.
But there is that one hill that will finally bring the restless years to an end. It's called Skull Hill. It's got a cross on top of it. On that cross hangs the Son of God, suspended by nails in His hands and feet. He's there, in Jesus' own words, "giving His life as a ransom for many." In other words, paying the price to get you back to your Creator. And when you fall at the foot of that cross, putting all your trust in the Man who died for you there, the wall between you and God finally comes down. And the hell you deserve is replaced with the heaven you couldn't possibly deserve. And the search for what's always been missing is finally over.
Today could be your day to climb the only hill where you'll find what you've looked for all these years. At Jesus' cross, you can finally begin the eternal love-relationship you were made for. If you want to begin that relationship with Jesus, would you tell Him that right where you are?
Go to our website, ANewStory.com, and let me show you there how you can be sure you have begun a relationship with Jesus Christ that will last forever. You don't have to waste one more day climbing hills to nowhere.
Jesus is what your heart has always been hungry for, and your lifelong search can end today at His cross.
