Max Lucado Daily: It’s Still True
It’s Still True
Posted: 23 Apr 2010 11:01 PM PDT
“We must pay more careful attention, therefore, to what we have heard.” Hebrews 2:1, NIV
Stability in the storm comes not from seeking a new message but from understanding an old one. The most reliable anchor points are not recent discoveries, but are time-tested truths that have held their ground against the winds of change. Truths like:
My life is not futile. My failures are not fatal. My death is not final.
Nehemiah 6
"I'm Doing a Great Work; I Can't Come Down"
1-2 When Sanballat, Tobiah, Geshem the Arab, and the rest of our enemies heard that I had rebuilt the wall and that there were no more breaks in it—even though I hadn't yet installed the gates— Sanballat and Geshem sent this message: "Come and meet with us at Kephirim in the valley of Ono."
2-3 I knew they were scheming to hurt me so I sent messengers back with this: "I'm doing a great work; I can't come down. Why should the work come to a standstill just so I can come down to see you?"
4 Four times they sent this message and four times I gave them my answer.
5-6 The fifth time—same messenger, same message—Sanballat sent an unsealed letter with this message:
6-7 "The word is out among the nations—and Geshem says it's true— that you and the Jews are planning to rebel. That's why you are rebuilding the wall. The word is that you want to be king and that you have appointed prophets to announce in Jerusalem, 'There's a king in Judah!' The king is going to be told all this—don't you think we should sit down and have a talk?"
8 I sent him back this: "There's nothing to what you're saying. You've made it all up."
9 They were trying to intimidate us into quitting. They thought, "They'll give up; they'll never finish it."
I prayed, "Give me strength."
10 Then I met secretly with Shemaiah son of Delaiah, the son of Mehetabel, at his house. He said:
Let's meet at the house of God,
inside The Temple;
Let's find safety behind locked doors
because they're coming to kill you,
Yes, coming by night to kill you.
11 I said, "Why would a man like me run for cover? And why would a man like me use The Temple as a hideout? I won't do it."
12-13 I sensed that God hadn't sent this man. The so-called prophecy he spoke to me was the work of Tobiah and Sanballat; they had hired him. He had been hired to scare me off—trick me—a layman, into desecrating The Temple and ruining my good reputation so they could accuse me.
14 "O my God, don't let Tobiah and Sanballat get by with all the mischief they've done. And the same goes for the prophetess Noadiah and the other prophets who have been trying to undermine my confidence."
15-16 The wall was finished on the twenty-fifth day of Elul. It had taken fifty-two days. When all our enemies heard the news and all the surrounding nations saw it, our enemies totally lost their nerve. They knew that God was behind this work.
17-19 All during this time letters were going back and forth constantly between the nobles of Judah and Tobiah. Many of the nobles had ties to him because he was son-in-law to Shecaniah son of Arah and his son Jehohanan had married the daughter of Meshullam son of Berekiah. They kept telling me all the good things he did and then would report back to him anything I would say. And then Tobiah would send letters to intimidate me.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: Micah 6:1-8
1 Listen to what the Lord says:
"Stand up, plead your case before the mountains; let the hills hear what you have to say.
2 Hear, O mountains, the Lord's accusation; listen, you everlasting foundations of the earth. For the Lord has a case against his people; he is lodging a charge against Israel.
3 "My people, what have I done to you? How have I burdened you? Answer me.
4 I brought you up out of Egypt and redeemed you from the land of slavery. I sent Moses to lead you, also Aaron and Miriam.
5 My people, remember what Balak king of Moab counseled and what Balaam son of Beor answered. Remember [your journey] from Shittim to Gilgal, that you may know the righteous acts of the Lord."
6 With what shall I come before the Lord and bow down before the exalted God? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?
7 Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousand rivers of oil? Shall I offer my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?
8 He has showed you, O man, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
A “Banana Slug” Lesson
April 24, 2010 — by Bill Crowder
What does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God? —Micah 6:8
Bible in a year:
2 Samuel 19-20; Luke 18:1-23
Sports team names have a variety of origins. They come from history (Spartans, Mountaineers), nature (Cardinals, Terrapins), and even colors (Orange, Reds). One even comes from the mollusk family.
In the 1980s, the University of California at Santa Cruz was just starting to get involved in competitive sports. UCSC had a bit of disdain for the overemphasis some big-time schools place on athletics, so the student body sought a team name that would reflect a somewhat different approach. They decided on the Banana Slug, a yellow, slimy, slow, shell-less mollusk. It was a clever way for UCSC to give a balanced perspective on the relative worth of sports.
I have always loved sports, but I know that they can easily become more important than they should be. What matters most in life is what Jesus said is most vital—loving God with all of our hearts and loving our neighbors as ourselves (Matt. 22:37-39). Micah listed God’s requirements this way: “do justly,” “love mercy,” and “walk humbly with your God” (6:8). For believers in Jesus, it is vital that nothing else takes top priority over God’s expectations for us.
What matters most to you? The Spartans? The Red Sox? Or loving God in thought, word, and action?
Lord, what matters most to You today?
What can direct us in each thing we do?
Could it be to let nothing at all
Interfere with our deep love for You? —Branon
Beware of spending too much time on matters of too little importance.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
April 24, 2010
The Warning Against Desiring Spiritual Success
Do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you . . . —Luke 10:20
Worldliness is not the trap that most endangers us as Christian workers; nor is it sin. The trap we fall into is extravagantly desiring spiritual success; that is, success measured by, and patterned after, the form set by this religious age in which we now live. Never seek after anything other than the approval of God, and always be willing to go “outside the camp, bearing His reproach” (Hebrews 13:13 ). In Luke 10:20 , Jesus told the disciples not to rejoice in successful service, and yet this seems to be the one thing in which most of us do rejoice. We have a commercialized view— we count how many souls have been saved and sanctified, we thank God, and then we think everything is all right. Yet our work only begins where God’s grace has laid the foundation. Our work is not to save souls, but to disciple them. Salvation and sanctification are the work of God’s sovereign grace, and our work as His disciples is to disciple others’ lives until they are totally yielded to God. One life totally devoted to God is of more value to Him than one hundred lives which have been simply awakened by His Spirit. As workers for God, we must reproduce our own kind spiritually, and those lives will be God’s testimony to us as His workers. God brings us up to a standard of life through His grace, and we are responsible for reproducing that same standard in others.
Unless the worker lives a life that “is hidden with Christ in God” ( Colossians 3:3 ), he is apt to become an irritating dictator to others, instead of an active, living disciple. Many of us are dictators, dictating our desires to individuals and to groups. But Jesus never dictates to us in that way. Whenever our Lord talked about discipleship, He always prefaced His words with an “if,” never with the forceful or dogmatic statement— “You must.” Discipleship carries with it an option.