Max Lucado Daily: True Wealth
True Wealth
Posted: 09 Aug 2010 11:01 PM PDT
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.” Matthew 5:6 NIV
We usually get what we hunger and thirst for. The problem is, the treasures of earth don’t satisfy. The promise is, the treasures of heaven do . . .
Blessed are those who, if everything they own were taken from them, would be, at most inconvenienced, because their true wealth is elsewhere.
2 John 1
1-2My dear congregation, I, your pastor, love you in very truth. And I'm not alone—everyone who knows the Truth that has taken up permanent residence in us loves you.
3Let grace, mercy, and peace be with us in truth and love from God the Father and from Jesus Christ, Son of the Father!
4-6I can't tell you how happy I am to learn that many members of your congregation are diligent in living out the Truth, exactly as commanded by the Father. But permit me a reminder, friends, and this is not a new commandment but simply a repetition of our original and basic charter: that we love each other. Love means following his commandments, and his unifying commandment is that you conduct your lives in love. This is the first thing you heard, and nothing has changed.
Don't Walk Out on God
7There are a lot of smooth-talking charlatans loose in the world who refuse to believe that Jesus Christ was truly human, a flesh-and-blood human being. Give them their true title: Deceiver! Antichrist!
8-9And be very careful around them so you don't lose out on what we've worked so diligently in together; I want you to get every reward you have coming to you. Anyone who gets so progressive in his thinking that he walks out on the teaching of Christ, walks out on God. But whoever stays with the teaching, stays faithful to both the Father and the Son.
10-11If anyone shows up who doesn't hold to this teaching, don't invite him in and give him the run of the place. That would just give him a platform to perpetuate his evil ways, making you his partner.
12-13I have a lot more things to tell you, but I'd rather not use paper and ink. I hope to be there soon in person and have a heart-to-heart talk. That will be far more satisfying to both you and me. Everyone here in your sister congregation sends greetings.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: Revelation 21:1-5
1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea.
2 I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.
3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God.
4 He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."
5 He who was seated on the throne said, "I am making everything new!" Then he said, "Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true."
Now Is Not Forever
August 10, 2010 — by Julie Ackerman Link
There shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away. —Revelation 21:4
Think about how good it will feel when it stops hurting,” said my father. I received this advice from Dad often while I was growing up, usually after some minor bump or scrape had resulted in a major dramatic reaction. At the time, the advice didn’t help. I was incapable of focusing on anything other than my pain, and loud wails accompanied by buckets of tears seemed the only appropriate response.
Through the years, however, Dad’s advice has pulled me through some truly miserable situations. Whether it was the pain of a broken heart or the misery of a drawn-out illness, I would remind myself: Now is not forever.
The confidence we have as Christians is that God has something good planned for us. Suffering was not part of His original act of creation, but it serves as a temporary reminder of what happens in a world where God’s order has been broken. It also motivates us to spread the word about God’s plan to redeem the world from the suffering caused by sin.
Although we cannot avoid pain and disappointment (John 16:33), we know that it’s only temporary. Some sorrow will be relieved in this life, but all of it will be relieved when God finally and firmly establishes His new heaven and new earth (Rev. 21:1). Now is not forever.
We’ll catch the broken thread again,
And finish what we here began;
Heaven will the mysteries explain,
And then, ah, then, we’ll understand. —Cornelius
The gains of heaven will more than compensate for the losses of earth.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
August 10th , 2010
The Holy Suffering of the Saint
Let those who suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to Him in doing good . . . —1 Peter 4:19
Choosing to suffer means that there must be something wrong with you, but choosing God’s will— even if it means you will suffer— is something very different. No normal, healthy saint ever chooses suffering; he simply chooses God’s will, just as Jesus did, whether it means suffering or not. And no saint should ever dare to interfere with the lesson of suffering being taught in another saint’s life.
The saint who satisfies the heart of Jesus will make other saints strong and mature for God. But the people used to strengthen us are never those who sympathize with us; in fact, we are hindered by those who give us their sympathy, because sympathy only serves to weaken us. No one better understands a saint than the saint who is as close and as intimate with Jesus as possible. If we accept the sympathy of another saint, our spontaneous feeling is, “God is dealing too harshly with me and making my life too difficult.” That is why Jesus said that self-pity was of the devil (see Matthew 16:21-23 ). We must be merciful to God’s reputation. It is easy for us to tarnish God’s character because He never argues back; He never tries to defend or vindicate Himself. Beware of thinking that Jesus needed sympathy during His life on earth. He refused the sympathy of people because in His great wisdom He knew that no one on earth understood His purpose (see Matthew 16:23 ). He accepted only the sympathy of His Father and the angels (see Luke 15:10 ).
Look at God’s incredible waste of His saints, according to the world’s judgment. God seems to plant His saints in the most useless places. And then we say, “God intends for me to be here because I am so useful to Him.” Yet Jesus never measured His life by how or where He was of the greatest use. God places His saints where they will bring the most glory to Him, and we are totally incapable of judging where that may be.
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Trapped Where You Don't Want To Be - #6152
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
It seemed harmless enough when I entered. I was just a kid at an amusement park in Chicago, and the ride was just a big cylinder that made you feel like you were walking into a washing machine. They called it The Rotor. I stood against the edge and I waited for it to do its thing. Then it started to do what something called The Rotor might be expected to do - rotate. As it began to spin faster and faster, the floor started to disappear in front of my feet. I was plastered against the side of the cylinder, looking down into this yawning black hole. I hated it. I wanted off. Too bad!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Trapped Where You Don't Want To Be."
It's one thing to be stuck on a ride you really don't want to be on. It's something else to be stuck in a life you really don't want to be in. And a lot of people are; sometimes, people that might surprise you.
There was a national magazine awhile back that published a candid interview with the man they called "TV's hottest action hero." He stars in one of the most successful, most talked about shows on American television, but he seems to be on a ride he really doesn't want to be on. Too often, his feelings of being as he said "trapped" and "caged," cause him to revert to alcohol for some relief. Here's how he feels about it in his own words. "I should be able to wake up in the morning without going, 'Oh, no! Where's my boot?' Or, 'Where am I?' Or 'One of my friends didn't happen to being my car home, did they?' It's not a very clever way to live, and I don't want to live like that." This admirably successful star goes on to say: "I have a few drinks and I'm not so worried about tomorrow and I'm not thinking about yesterday. Then the next day, I go, 'Oh God, don't let me do that again.' So why do I do it again, and again, and again?"
His battle echoes the battle raging in many hearts; the feeling of being trapped in a cycle that's going nowhere and leaving us disappointed or disgusted. It's not a new struggle. Paul, one of the writers of the Bible, wrote these words in Romans 7, beginning in verse 15. It's our word for today from the Word of God. "I do not understand what I do...I have the desire to do good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; no, the evil I do not want to do - this I keep on doing...Who will rescue me?"
There's a me I want to be, and then there's the me I am. In between is this darkness that I can't overcome. It's got a name. The Bible calls it sin. We're trapped in a cycle of doing things we know we shouldn't do, of treating people in ways that we later regret - especially people we love, of handling life in ways that hurt us and hurt other people.
And, as the Bible writer suggests, our only hope is spiritual rescue. We can't get ourselves out of our sin. We can't get ourselves out of the hell that is the eternal death penalty for our sin. We need a rescuer. Paul goes on to answer his "who will rescue me?" question, with these words, "Thanks be to God," he says, "through Jesus Christ our Lord!"
Sin's power could only be broken by a sacrifice that was even more powerful - the death of Jesus Christ on the cross. He gave His life there to pay for my sin and to break its hold on me...and on you. Three days later, He demonstrated His supreme power by walking out of His grave. Death could not hold Him, and now He stands ready to walk into your life with all that love and all that power. So you can be forgiven for every sin. So you can be rescued from sin's cycle of defeat and despair.
But you do have to grab the Rescuer and let Him rescue you. He's waiting to do just that this very day. It's a matter of you talking to Him and saying, "Jesus, I'm tired of my sin. I'm ready to turn from my sin and turn to You as my only hope. You died to rescue me. And here I am." That's how your new beginning happens. If you're ready to begin this incredibly life-changing relationship with Jesus, then we're ready to help and support you in doing it. Our website's there to help you begin your relationship with Him, and I really want to encourage you to visit us there today. It's yoursforlife.net.
Things don't have to be the way they've always been. Jesus died so you could be free. He's waiting to do for you what only He can do.