Max Lucado Daily: Love is a Fruit
Love is a Fruit
“The Spirit produces the fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control.” Galatians 5:22
Love is a fruit. A fruit of whom? Of your hard work? Of your deep faith? Of your rigorous resolve? No. Love is a fruit of the Spirit of God. “The Spirit produces the fruit of love” (Gal. 5:22, NCV).
Mark 4:21-41 (New International Version, ©2010)
A Lamp on a Stand
21 He said to them, “Do you bring in a lamp to put it under a bowl or a bed? Instead, don’t you put it on its stand? 22 For whatever is hidden is meant to be disclosed, and whatever is concealed is meant to be brought out into the open. 23 If anyone has ears to hear, let them hear.”
24 “Consider carefully what you hear,” he continued. “With the measure you use, it will be measured to you—and even more. 25 Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.”
The Parable of the Growing Seed
26 He also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. 27 Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. 28 All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. 29 As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.”
The Parable of the Mustard Seed
30 Again he said, “What shall we say the kingdom of God is like, or what parable shall we use to describe it? 31 It is like a mustard seed, which is the smallest of all seeds on earth. 32 Yet when planted, it grows and becomes the largest of all garden plants, with such big branches that the birds can perch in its shade.”
33 With many similar parables Jesus spoke the word to them, as much as they could understand. 34 He did not say anything to them without using a parable. But when he was alone with his own disciples, he explained everything.
Jesus Calms the Storm
35 That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, “Let us go over to the other side.” 36 Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. 37 A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. 38 Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?”
39 He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, “Quiet! Be still!” Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.
40 He said to his disciples, “Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?”
41 They were terrified and asked each other, “Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: Isaiah 49:13-18
Isaiah 49:13-18 (The Message)
13Heavens, raise the roof! Earth, wake the dead!
Mountains, send up cheers!
God has comforted his people.
He has tenderly nursed his beaten-up, beaten-down people.
14But Zion said, "I don't get it. God has left me.
My Master has forgotten I even exist."
15-18"Can a mother forget the infant at her breast,
walk away from the baby she bore?
But even if mothers forget,
I'd never forget you—never.
Look, I've written your names on the backs of my hands.
The walls you're rebuilding are never out of my sight.
Your builders are faster than your wreckers.
The demolition crews are gone for good.
Look up, look around, look well!
See them all gathering, coming to you?
As sure as I am the living God"—God's Decree—
"you're going to put them on like so much jewelry,
you're going to use them to dress up like a bride.
Greater Compassion
February 22, 2011 — by Bill Crowder
Can a woman forget her nursing child, and not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely they may forget, yet I will not forget you. —Isaiah 49:15
I first met my wife, Marlene, in college. I was majoring in pastoral studies, and she was working on a degree in elementary education. The first time I saw her working with children, I knew what a natural fit this was for her. She loved children. It became even more obvious when we got married and had children of our own. Seeing her with them was an education in unconditional love and acceptance. It was clear to me that there is nothing in all the world like the tender love and compassion of a mother for her newborn child.
That’s what makes Isaiah 49:15 so remarkable. It’s here that God told His people, who were feeling forsaken and forgotten (v.14), that His compassion is even greater than a mother’s: “Can a woman forget her nursing child, and not have compassion on the son of her womb? Surely they may forget, yet I will not forget you.”
Sometimes we face struggles in life, and we are tempted to think that God has forgotten us. We may even believe that God no longer loves us. But God’s love for us is as expansive as the open arms of Christ on the cross. And the tender compassion of our heavenly Father is more dependable and more enduring than the love of a nursing mother for her infant. Be comforted—His love never fails.
God will not forget His children
Nor will He forsake our care;
His compassion is enduring—
Even when we’re unaware. —Sper
God’s love for us is as expansive
as the open arms of Christ on the cross.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
February 22nd, 2011
The Discipline of Spiritual Perseverance
Be still, and know that I am God . . . —Psalm 46:10
Perseverance is more than endurance. It is endurance combined with absolute assurance and certainty that what we are looking for is going to happen. Perseverance means more than just hanging on, which may be only exposing our fear of letting go and falling. Perseverance is our supreme effort of refusing to believe that our hero is going to be conquered. Our greatest fear is not that we will be damned, but that somehow Jesus Christ will be defeated. Also, our fear is that the very things our Lord stood for— love, justice, forgiveness, and kindness among men— will not win out in the end and will represent an unattainable goal for us. Then there is the call to spiritual perseverance. A call not to hang on and do nothing, but to work deliberately, knowing with certainty that God will never be defeated.
If our hopes seem to be experiencing disappointment right now, it simply means that they are being purified. Every hope or dream of the human mind will be fulfilled if it is noble and of God. But one of the greatest stresses in life is the stress of waiting for God. He brings fulfillment, “because you have kept My command to persevere . . .” (Revelation 3:10).
Continue to persevere spiritually.
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
The Line Between Night and Day - #6292
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
When I'm on a plane I usually don't have much time for looking out the window; I usually have a lot of work to take with me. But one night I caught a view that was very distracting. My son happened to be with me on this trip, so I pointed it out to him. There was literally a line in the sky. On one side there was the glow of the setting sun. It was day in that half of the sky. The other side was pitch black, and everything on that side, of course, was like very night. Now, I don't know all the scientific explanations for this; I'm not going to get into the meteorology. I just know what I saw. I poked my son, I got his headphones off his head so he knew what I was saying, and I pointed excitedly toward that startling contrast. And I said, "Look! It's the line between night and day!"
Well, I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Line Between Night and Day."
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from 1 Thessalonians chapter 5. I'll begin reading in verse 5. "You are all sons of the light and sons of the day. We do not belong to the night or to the darkness. So then, let us not be like others who are asleep, but let us be alert and self-controlled. For those who sleep, sleep at night. And those who get drunk, get drunk at night. But since we belong to the day, let us be self-controlled, putting on faith and love as a breastplate, and the hope of salvation as a helmet. Therefore, encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing."
Well, I saw it in the sky that night, and I see it in the scripture today. There's a line between night and day. It's clear-cut and you belong to one side or the other. It says you belong to the day or the night in this passage. Now that line runs right through your school, right through your neighborhood, right through the place you work. Probably there are less people on the side of the day then on the side of the night, but it's a clear-cut line.
Now, do you know where you belong? See, the indicator of spiritual life in you is that you know you're out of place when you're in the dark; when the language, or the humor suddenly is dark, you start to get uneasy. You know you don't belong there. When the conversation turns negative, critical, when sin is being passed off as normal or good, I hope you hear that voice in you saying, "Hey, you don't belong here. This isn't home. It's night on this side."
Now, this passage gives us three identifying marks of daytime people. One, it says they're alert. That means you're distinguishing right from wrong and you're able to get out as soon as you can tell that this is the lie of the devil, "This isn't true, even though everybody's buying it." You're not careless; you're wide awake.
Secondly, you're self-controlled if you're a daytime person. That means that your glands, your schedule, your family, your temper are under control. Day people are like that; night people aren't.
Thirdly, it says you're an encouraging person if you're a daytime person. You're one of those builder-uppers. I wonder, how do people feel after they've been around you? Do they feel lighter or darker? Have you built them up, or have you been critical - torn them down; made them feel anything but important? Maybe you've been living too close to that line. Your temper keeps crossing into the night; your humor, your thoughts, your physical involvement with someone else. Or maybe it's an attitude or an action that's just too dark for a day person like you. You don't belong there.
Remember where you belong...on the bright side of that line between night and day.