Max Lucado Daily: God Came Near
God Came Near
Posted: 28 Oct 2010 11:01 PM PDT
We are eyewitnesses of his majesty.” 2 Peter 1:16, RSV
God came near. To be seen.
And ... those who saw him were never the same. “We saw his glory” exclaimed one follower. “We were eyewitnesses of his majesty,” whispered a martyr…
Christianity, in its purest form, is nothing more than seeing Jesus. Christian service, in its purest form, is nothing more than imitating him whom we see.
Job 30
1 "But now they mock me,
men younger than I,
whose fathers I would have disdained
to put with my sheep dogs.
2 Of what use was the strength of their hands to me,
since their vigor had gone from them?
3 Haggard from want and hunger,
they roamed [a] the parched land
in desolate wastelands at night.
4 In the brush they gathered salt herbs,
and their food [b] was the root of the broom tree.
5 They were banished from their fellow men,
shouted at as if they were thieves.
6 They were forced to live in the dry stream beds,
among the rocks and in holes in the ground.
7 They brayed among the bushes
and huddled in the undergrowth.
8 A base and nameless brood,
they were driven out of the land.
9 "And now their sons mock me in song;
I have become a byword among them.
10 They detest me and keep their distance;
they do not hesitate to spit in my face.
11 Now that God has unstrung my bow and afflicted me,
they throw off restraint in my presence.
12 On my right the tribe [c] attacks;
they lay snares for my feet,
they build their siege ramps against me.
13 They break up my road;
they succeed in destroying me—
without anyone's helping them. [d]
14 They advance as through a gaping breach;
amid the ruins they come rolling in.
15 Terrors overwhelm me;
my dignity is driven away as by the wind,
my safety vanishes like a cloud.
16 "And now my life ebbs away;
days of suffering grip me.
17 Night pierces my bones;
my gnawing pains never rest.
18 In his great power God becomes like clothing to me [e] ;
he binds me like the neck of my garment.
19 He throws me into the mud,
and I am reduced to dust and ashes.
20 "I cry out to you, O God, but you do not answer;
I stand up, but you merely look at me.
21 You turn on me ruthlessly;
with the might of your hand you attack me.
22 You snatch me up and drive me before the wind;
you toss me about in the storm.
23 I know you will bring me down to death,
to the place appointed for all the living.
24 "Surely no one lays a hand on a broken man
when he cries for help in his distress.
25 Have I not wept for those in trouble?
Has not my soul grieved for the poor?
26 Yet when I hoped for good, evil came;
when I looked for light, then came darkness.
27 The churning inside me never stops;
days of suffering confront me.
28 I go about blackened, but not by the sun;
I stand up in the assembly and cry for help.
29 I have become a brother of jackals,
a companion of owls.
30 My skin grows black and peels;
my body burns with fever.
31 My harp is tuned to mourning,
and my flute to the sound of wailing.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: 2 Timothy 3:14-17
14 But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have become convinced of, because you know those from whom you learned it,
15 and how from infancy you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.
16 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,
17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
Truth Or Error?
October 29, 2010 — by Anne Cetas
Be diligent to present yourself approved to God. —2 Timothy 2:15
Steve often witnesses to his co- workers. But when he mentions something directly from the Bible, someone frequently responds: “Wait! That was written by men, and it’s full of errors just like any other book.”
The following letter to the editor in our local newspaper expresses a similar thought: “Believers cite that the Word of God is infallible, but I see no apparent reason to believe that the words written in the Bible by man are any more infallible than the words written in a science journal by man.”
How do we respond when the Scriptures are so readily dismissed as being just man’s words with errors? Most of us aren’t biblical scholars and may not have an answer. But if we do some reading (2 Tim. 2:15), we’ll find the evidence that it’s God-inspired (3:16) and therefore trustworthy.
For example, consider this: Over a period of 1,600 years, 40 different authors wrote the 66 books of the Bible. There were 400 silent years between the 39 books of the Old Testament and the 27 of the New Testament. Yet, Genesis to Revelation tell one unified story.
While we accept the Bible by faith, there’s plenty of evidence that it’s true. Let’s be diligent to study and share what we learn with others.
For Further Study
To understand more about why we can trust the Bible, read Can I Really Trust The Bible?
at www.discoveryseries.org/q0402
In a skeptical world you can trust God’s reliable Word.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
October 29th, 2010
Substitution
He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him —2 Corinthians 5:21
The modern view of the death of Jesus is that He died for our sins out of sympathy for us. Yet the New Testament view is that He took our sin on Himself not because of sympathy, but because of His identification with us. He was “made. . . to be sin. . . .” Our sins are removed because of the death of Jesus, and the only explanation for His death is His obedience to His Father, not His sympathy for us. We are acceptable to God not because we have obeyed, nor because we have promised to give up things, but because of the death of Christ, and for no other reason. We say that Jesus Christ came to reveal the fatherhood and the lovingkindness of God, but the New Testament says that He came to take “away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29). And the revealing of the fatherhood of God is only to those to whom Jesus has been introduced as Savior. In speaking to the world, Jesus Christ never referred to Himself as One who revealed the Father, but He spoke instead of being a stumbling block (see John 15:22-24). John 14:9 , where Jesus said, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father,” was spoken to His disciples.
That Christ died for me, and therefore I am completely free from penalty, is never taught in the New Testament. What is taught in the New Testament is that “He died for all” (2 Corinthians 5:15)— not, “He died my death”— and that through identification with His death I can be freed from sin, and have His very righteousness imparted as a gift to me. The substitution which is taught in the New Testament is twofold— “For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” The teaching is not Christ for me unless I am determined to have Christ formed in me (seeGalatians 4:19).
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Being Someone's Miracle - #6210
Friday, October 29, 2010
My fascination started at a historic old life-saving station on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. It was there I learned about the heroism of the crews who once manned those life-saving stations all along the maritime Atlantic coast. Their heroism actually gave birth to what we know today as the United States Coast Guard. Their motto says it all: "So others may live." Some of that modern-day heroism was portrayed in a recent movie called "The Guardian." It's a story about that elite group of 280 men and women known as rescue swimmers - the first responders who jump from choppers into violent seas to rescue people who would otherwise die there. Now in the movie, a veteran rescuer shows a film of a burning ship from which he helped to rescue some desperate crewmen. He frames the essence of their mission in these sobering words: "They're looking for a miracle to save them. You have to find a way to be that miracle."
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Being Someone's Miracle."
Now, I can just imagine Jesus saying those words to me and to you about the people who are part of our lives day after day. "They're looking for a miracle to save them, and you have to find a way to be that miracle." Because they are, in God's words from the Bible, "lost" (Luke 19:10 ), "condemned" (John 3:18 ), "those who are being led away to death" (Proverbs 24:16 ), and "without hope and without God in the world" (Ephesians 2:12 ).
The folks around you may not realize they're dying spiritually. But they do know that something's missing, that life isn't working, that they don't have personal peace, or that they are living as one writer said, "lives of quiet desperation." They need a miracle to save them - they need a miracle with skin on. Someone close enough to rescue them from a life and an eternity without Christ. A spiritual rescuer who will take whatever risks necessary to bring them to the real Rescuer, Jesus Christ.
They need you. Just as another man in need of a miracle needed the people who could get him to Jesus. Their story is in Mark 2 , beginning with verse 3, it's our word for today from the Word of God. And in many ways, it's your story and the story of someone you know who has never met Jesus. "Some men came, bringing to Him a paralytic, carried by four of them. Since they could not get him to Jesus, because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus and, after digging through it, lowered the mat the paralyzed man was on. When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, 'Son, your sins are forgiven.'" Later He told the paralyzed man to take up his mat and walk, and the miracle man "walked out in full view of them all."
But no life-changing miracle can happen unless someone cares enough about him to get him to Jesus. You know people like that, and you've been placed in their life to be God's designated bringer. It starts when you ask God for the passion of those four, through-the-roof friends, "I've got to get him to Jesus whatever it takes."
What does it mean to be their miracle? You pray daily for God to open up natural opportunities for you to talk about Jesus. Then you look for those opportunities as you go through your day. Don't count on getting them to a meeting; you need to reach them where they are. Use the power of your personal hope story to open their heart...your story of the difference that Jesus is making in your life. Most of all, pray every day by name for the lost people that God has planted around you.
Yes, you'll be afraid. Yes, there will be obstacles. Yes, it may take a lot of patience and perseverance. But lives are at stake - every bit as much as they are for those people going down in those stormy seas. They need a miracle to save them. Find a way to be that miracle!