Max Lucado Daily: Adopted
Adopted
Posted: 20 Jul 2010 11:01 PM PDT
“Serve only the Lord your God. Respect him, keep his commands, and obey him.” Deuteronomy 13:4
Christ’s kingdom is . . . a kingdom where membership is granted, not purchased. You are placed into God’s kingdom. You are “adopted.” And this occurs not when you do enough, but when you simply admit you can’t do enough. You don’t earn it; you simply accept it. As a result, you serve, not out of arrogance or fear, but out of gratitude.
Philippians 2
He Took on the Status of a Slave
1-4If you've gotten anything at all out of following Christ, if his love has made any difference in your life, if being in a community of the Spirit means anything to you, if you have a heart, if you care— then do me a favor: Agree with each other, love each other, be deep-spirited friends. Don't push your way to the front; don't sweet-talk your way to the top. Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead. Don't be obsessed with getting your own advantage. Forget yourselves long enough to lend a helping hand.
5-8Think of yourselves the way Christ Jesus thought of himself. He had equal status with God but didn't think so much of himself that he had to cling to the advantages of that status no matter what. Not at all. When the time came, he set aside the privileges of deity and took on the status of a slave, became human! Having become human, he stayed human. It was an incredibly humbling process. He didn't claim special privileges. Instead, he lived a selfless, obedient life and then died a selfless, obedient death—and the worst kind of death at that—a crucifixion.
9-11Because of that obedience, God lifted him high and honored him far beyond anyone or anything, ever, so that all created beings in heaven and on earth—even those long ago dead and buried—will bow in worship before this Jesus Christ, and call out in praise that he is the Master of all, to the glorious honor of God the Father.
Rejoicing Together
12-13What I'm getting at, friends, is that you should simply keep on doing what you've done from the beginning. When I was living among you, you lived in responsive obedience. Now that I'm separated from you, keep it up. Better yet, redouble your efforts. Be energetic in your life of salvation, reverent and sensitive before God. That energy is God's energy, an energy deep within you, God himself willing and working at what will give him the most pleasure.
14-16Do everything readily and cheerfully—no bickering, no second-guessing allowed! Go out into the world uncorrupted, a breath of fresh air in this squalid and polluted society. Provide people with a glimpse of good living and of the living God. Carry the light-giving Message into the night so I'll have good cause to be proud of you on the day that Christ returns. You'll be living proof that I didn't go to all this work for nothing.
17-18Even if I am executed here and now, I'll rejoice in being an element in the offering of your faith that you make on Christ's altar, a part of your rejoicing. But turnabout's fair play—you must join me in my rejoicing. Whatever you do, don't feel sorry for me.
19-24I plan (according to Jesus' plan) to send Timothy to you very soon so he can bring back all the news of you he can gather. Oh, how that will do my heart good! I have no one quite like Timothy. He is loyal, and genuinely concerned for you. Most people around here are looking out for themselves, with little concern for the things of Jesus. But you know yourselves that Timothy's the real thing. He's been a devoted son to me as together we've delivered the Message. As soon as I see how things are going to fall out for me here, I plan to send him off. And then I'm hoping and praying to be right on his heels.
25-27But for right now, I'm dispatching Epaphroditus, my good friend and companion in my work. You sent him to help me out; now I'm sending him to help you out. He has been wanting in the worst way to get back with you. Especially since recovering from the illness you heard about, he's been wanting to get back and reassure you that he is just fine. He nearly died, as you know, but God had mercy on him. And not only on him—he had mercy on me, too. His death would have been one huge grief piled on top of all the others.
28-30So you can see why I'm so delighted to send him on to you. When you see him again, hale and hearty, how you'll rejoice and how relieved I'll be. Give him a grand welcome, a joyful embrace! People like him deserve the best you can give. Remember the ministry to me that you started but weren't able to complete? Well, in the process of finishing up that work, he put his life on the line and nearly died doing it.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: John 1:10-18
10 He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.
11 He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.
12 Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God--
13 children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God.
14 The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the One and Only, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
15 John testifies concerning him. He cries out, saying, "This was he of whom I said, 'He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.'"
16 From the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another.
17 For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
18 No one has ever seen God, but God the One and Only, who is at the Father's side, has made him known.
Bridging The Gap
July 21, 2010 — by Joe Stowell
The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. —John 1:14
When my kids were young, I thought they would be impressed with what few accomplishments I may have had—that they would read my books and be impressed by my speaking engagements. But then I discovered that they hadn’t read any of my books and had no idea where I had been on a speaking gig. When my oldest son finally read one of my books, he told me that the only reason he read it was so that I would stop telling people that my children have never read my books!
Let’s face it—for the most part, kids are not impressed with our accomplishments. So the only way to bridge the gap is to meet them where they are, to get into their world—like getting into a game of Chutes and Ladders or playing catch in the backyard.
Jesus did this with us. John said of Jesus, “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory” (John 1:14). In other words, He stooped down to our level when He came to this earth, which led to His greatest accomplishment of all: bridging the gap between His world and ours once and for all. Only then could we begin to understand how worthy He is of our utmost adoration and praise!
Our Lord is worthy all our days
Of all our love and highest praise;
He died to take our sin and shame—
Oh, bless the Savior’s holy name! —Egner
Jesus bridged the gap between the infinite God and finite man.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
July 21st , 2010
The Doorway to the Kingdom
Blessed are the poor in spirit . . . —Matthew 5:3
Beware of thinking of our Lord as only a teacher. If Jesus Christ is only a teacher, then all He can do is frustrate me by setting a standard before me I cannot attain. What is the point of presenting me with such a lofty ideal if I cannot possibly come close to reaching it? I would be happier if I never knew it. What good is there in telling me to be what I can never be— to be “pure in heart” ( Matthew 5:8 ), to do more than my duty, or to be completely devoted to God? I must know Jesus Christ as my Savior before His teaching has any meaning for me other than that of a lofty ideal which only leads to despair. But when I am born again by the Spirit of God, I know that Jesus Christ did not come only to teach— He came to make me what He teaches I should be. The redemption means that Jesus Christ can place within anyone the same nature that ruled His own life, and all the standards God gives us are based on that nature.
The teaching of the Sermon on the Mount produces a sense of despair in the natural man— exactly what Jesus means for it to do. As long as we have some self-righteous idea that we can carry out our Lord’s teaching, God will allow us to continue until we expose our own ignorance by stumbling over some obstacle in our way. Only then are we willing to come to Him as paupers and receive from Him. “Blessed are the poor in spirit . . . .” This is the first principle in the kingdom of God. The underlying foundation of Jesus Christ’s kingdom is poverty, not possessions; not making decisions for Jesus, but having such a sense of absolute futility that we finally admit, “Lord, I cannot even begin to do it.” Then Jesus says, “Blessed are you . . .” ( Matthew 5:11 ). This is the doorway to the kingdom, and yet it takes us so long to believe that we are actually poor! The knowledge of our own poverty is what brings us to the proper place where Jesus Christ accomplishes His work.
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
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Summer heat time is not when you want your car air conditioner to go out on you - especially when you're driving a long trip. Tough - that's when the a/c decided to die on us. Now I know that brave people survived without air conditioning for centuries. You know, somehow that philosophical observation didn't make me feel any better as we sped along with our windows open and hot air slowly putting the driver to sleep. Oh, but there's more. More than once, belching black exhaust smoke came blowing in our open windows. Then there was the discarded cigarette butt that bounced off the window, narrowly missing the driver. We really enjoyed the spider that came in, of course, and the clumps of pollen; they were great. Probably our favorite thing of all was what came flying at us from two tractor trailers that passed us. Now, I'm not going to give you all the gory details but I will tell you that those trucks were carrying cattle. Open window: kind of a nasty trip.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Open Window."
It's amazing what can get in when you leave the window open - stuff you really don't want inside. But that could be exactly what's happening in your life right now; a lot of nasty stuff is coming in because you've left the window open.
That's one reason God gives us some very practical advice to avoid getting stuff you don't really want in your life. It's brief. It's to the point, and it's our word for today from the Word of God. Ephesians 4:27 says, "Do not give the devil a foothold." Or we might say, don't leave any window open that the devil could use to get in.
The context of this actually warning provides us with some specific examples of how that can happen. The verse before the "no foothold" verse talks about anger that you allow to last more than a day. Smoldering anger morphs into more anger, then into resentment and hard feelings, and ultimately into a damaging, broken and hostile relationship. All because you didn't close the window before the devil blew in all his anger junk. Whatever the issue is, get over it - fast!
The verses after this "keep the devil out" warning talk about not stealing. It's true that anytime you cheat or take what isn't yours to have, you might as well say, "Devil, come on in and mess up my life." Then the next verses talk about unkind words - which leave wounds that can become something very ugly and divisive. That's the little seed the devil needs to grow some major hurt and destruction. Bitterness is mentioned here, too. Maybe you've let bitterness and hard feelings set up shop in your heart. You've opened the window to something that will turn you hard, poison innocent people, and it will make you its slave. And forgiving is the only way to get rid of bitterness poison. Then close the window and don't let any of those kinds of feelings get inside again.
Unresolved conflicts, a wandering eye, playing with temptation that you should be avoiding like the plague, letting your passions push you to the moral edge, watching and listening to stuff that opens your heart to things you think you'll never do - those are open windows. Windows that you can't afford to leave open one more day.
For an open window is all that the enemy of your soul needs to corrupt and to ultimately control your life. So think about "Where's he been getting in?" It's much easier to close the window than to deal with the mess he will make of everything that you care about.
