Max Lucado Daily: The Holy One
The Holy One
Posted: 18 Oct 2010 11:01 PM PDT
I am the Holy One, and I am among you. Hosea 11:9
You can claim courage from God’s promises. May I give you a few examples?
When you are confused: “‘I know what I am planning for you’ says the Lord. ‘I have good plans for you, not plans to hurt you’” (Jeremiah 29:11).
On those nights when you wonder where God is: “I am the Holy One, and I am among you” (Hosea 11:9).
Job 23
Job
1 Then Job replied:
2 "Even today my complaint is bitter;
his hand [a] is heavy in spite of [b] my groaning.
3 If only I knew where to find him;
if only I could go to his dwelling!
4 I would state my case before him
and fill my mouth with arguments.
5 I would find out what he would answer me,
and consider what he would say.
6 Would he oppose me with great power?
No, he would not press charges against me.
7 There an upright man could present his case before him,
and I would be delivered forever from my judge.
8 "But if I go to the east, he is not there;
if I go to the west, I do not find him.
9 When he is at work in the north, I do not see him;
when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him.
10 But he knows the way that I take;
when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold.
11 My feet have closely followed his steps;
I have kept to his way without turning aside.
12 I have not departed from the commands of his lips;
I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.
13 "But he stands alone, and who can oppose him?
He does whatever he pleases.
14 He carries out his decree against me,
and many such plans he still has in store.
15 That is why I am terrified before him;
when I think of all this, I fear him.
16 God has made my heart faint;
the Almighty has terrified me.
17 Yet I am not silenced by the darkness,
by the thick darkness that covers my face.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: Isaiah 58:6-12
"Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter-- when you see the naked, to clothe him, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear; then your righteousness will go before you, and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.
9 Then you will call, and the Lord will answer; you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I. "If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday.
11 The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail.
12 Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings.
Hoarding Or Helping?
October 19, 2010 — by David C. McCasland
If you extend your soul to the hungry and satisfy the afflicted soul, then your light shall dawn in the darkness. —Isaiah 58:10
In August 1914, when Britain entered World War I, Oswald Chambers was 40 years old with a wife and a 1-year-old daughter. It wasn’t long before men were joining the army at the rate of 30,000 a day, people were asked to sell their automobiles and farm horses to the government, and lists of the dead and wounded began appearing in daily newspapers. The nation faced economic uncertainty and peril.
A month into the war, Chambers spoke of the spiritual challenge facing followers of Christ: “We must take heed that in the present calamities, when war and devastation and heart-break are abroad in the world, we do not shut ourselves up in a world of our own and ignore the demand made on us by our Lord and our fellowmen for the service of intercessory prayer and hospitality and care.”
God’s call to His people rings true in every age: “If you extend your soul to the hungry and satisfy the afflicted soul, then your light shall dawn in the darkness, and your darkness shall be as the noonday” (Isa. 58:10).
Fear causes us to grasp what we have; faith in God opens our hands and hearts to others. We walk in His light when we help others, not hoard for ourselves.
Give me a heart sympathetic and tender—
Jesus, like Thine, Jesus, like Thine—
Touched by the needs that are surging around me,
And filled with compassion divine. —Anon.
As Christ’s love grows in us, His love flows from us.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
October 19th, 2010
The Unheeded Secret
Jesus answered, "My kingdom is not of this world —John 18:36
The great enemy of the Lord Jesus Christ today is the idea of practical work that has no basis in the New Testament but comes from the systems of the world. This work insists upon endless energy and activities, but no private life with God. The emphasis is put on the wrong thing. Jesus said, “The kingdom of God does not come with observation . . . . For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you” (Luke 17:20-21). It is a hidden, obscure thing. An active Christian worker too often lives to be seen by others, while it is the innermost, personal area that reveals the power of a person’s life.
We must get rid of the plague of the spirit of this religious age in which we live. In our Lord’s life there was none of the pressure and the rushing of tremendous activity that we regard so highly today, and a disciple is to be like His Master. The central point of the kingdom of Jesus Christ is a personal relationship with Him, not public usefulness to others.
It is not the practical activities that are the strength of this Bible Training College— its entire strength lies in the fact that here you are immersed in the truths of God to soak in them before Him. You have no idea of where or how God is going to engineer your future circumstances, and no knowledge of what stress and strain is going to be placed on you either at home or abroad. And if you waste your time in overactivity, instead of being immersed in the great fundamental truths of God’s redemption, then you will snap when the stress and strain do come. But if this time of soaking before God is being spent in getting rooted and grounded in Him, which may appear to be impractical, then you will remain true to Him whatever happens.
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
The Very Different Children of the Very Same Father - #6202
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
You know what a busy day is. But here's busy! The scene: the maternity ward in a South Carolina hospital. In one 24-hour stretch recently, they had five sets of twins born! Did you ever see nurses on roller skates? Did you ever see women in a maternity ward taking numbers? One obstetrician actually met himself coming out of the delivery room! It must have been pandemonium! Five moms, ten deliveries, and five totally bewildered fathers! But sometimes the arrival of just one set of twins can make for an amazing night in the maternity ward. Like the birth of Alicia and Jasmin in a Queensland, Australia, hospital not too long ago. Mom is from a Jamaican-English background, and Dad is German. As for the twins: one is black, the other one is white. I was looking at a picture of them. They're calling it a million-to-one medical miracle.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Very Different Children of the Same Father."
That's what those twin girls are. As they grow older, people will look at them and notice how different they are. But the difference is literally only skin deep. They are the daughters of the same father; from the same blood.
And that's who we are, those of us who belong to Jesus Christ, different in some "skin deep" ways, but the children of the same Heavenly Father; born the same way - from the same blood. The blood of Jesus shed for us so we could be born into the family of Almighty God. Or, as it says in our word for today from the Word of God, Galatians 3 , beginning with verse 26, "You are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus...There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus" (NLT).
Where we let our differences come between us, our Father is not pleased. Think about your own relationships, your prejudices - the categories you put people in. Look around your school, your community, your church. Are there walls and chasms between some of God's children, who are all carrying the same spiritual DNA?
It may be that racial differences are separating children of the same Father, or social differences, the money we make, the clothes we wear, the education we have, the way we talk.
We can let denominational or doctrinal differences come between people who are united by the same blood - Jesus' blood. Sometimes we spend 90 percent of our time on the ten percent that divides us instead of coming together around the 90 percent that God's Bible-grounded children agree on.
Meanwhile, our divisions are giving lost people just another reason to ignore our Jesus. They look at us and say, "Hey, when you guys can get together, come and talk to me." It's time we started to act like what we really are: children of the same Father, born into the same family, sharing the same spiritual DNA, rescued at the same old rugged cross, spending eternity together in the same heaven. Isn't it time we made an effort to try to worship together, to learn from each others' unique perspective, to start praying together for a mighty move of God in our area, to reach out to a community that will sit up and take notice when we work together?
We can do it. We must do it because, as the Bible says, "He Himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier." How? "We have been brought near through the blood of Christ" (Ephesians 2:13-14 ). No, we may not look alike on the outside. But our differences are ultimately skin deep. Our Father looks at His very different kids and says, "You're both My children. You're both My blood." Why don't we treat each other like that?