Max Lucado Daily: Hang On To God
Hang On To God
Posted: 10 Apr 2011 11:01 PM PDT
“Those people who keep their faith until the end will be saved.” Matthew 24:13
In Portuguese, a person who has the ability to hang in and not give up has garra. Garra means “claws.” What imagery! A person with garra has claws which burrow in the side of the cliff and keep him from falling.
So do the saved. They may get close to the edge, they may even stumble and slide.
But they will dig their nails into the rock of God and hang on.
Mark 12:28-44 (New International Version, ©2011)
The Greatest Commandment
28 One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked him, “Of all the commandments, which is the most important?”
29 “The most important one,” answered Jesus, “is this: ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.[a] 30 Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’[b] 31 The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’[c] There is no commandment greater than these.”
32 “Well said, teacher,” the man replied. “You are right in saying that God is one and there is no other but him. 33 To love him with all your heart, with all your understanding and with all your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself is more important than all burnt offerings and sacrifices.”
34 When Jesus saw that he had answered wisely, he said to him, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And from then on no one dared ask him any more questions.
Whose Son Is the Messiah?
35 While Jesus was teaching in the temple courts, he asked, “Why do the teachers of the law say that the Messiah is the son of David? 36 David himself, speaking by the Holy Spirit, declared:
“‘The Lord said to my Lord:
“Sit at my right hand
until I put your enemies
under your feet.”’[d]
37 David himself calls him ‘Lord.’ How then can he be his son?”
The large crowd listened to him with delight.
Warning Against the Teachers of the Law
38 As he taught, Jesus said, “Watch out for the teachers of the law. They like to walk around in flowing robes and be greeted with respect in the marketplaces, 39 and have the most important seats in the synagogues and the places of honor at banquets. 40 They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. These men will be punished most severely.”
The Widow’s Offering
41 Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. 42 But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents.
43 Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. 44 They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: 1 Samuel 17:32-37
1 Samuel 17:32-37 (New International Version, ©2011)
32 David said to Saul, “Let no one lose heart on account of this Philistine; your servant will go and fight him.”
33 Saul replied, “You are not able to go out against this Philistine and fight him; you are only a young man, and he has been a warrior from his youth.”
34 But David said to Saul, “Your servant has been keeping his father’s sheep. When a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock, 35 I went after it, struck it and rescued the sheep from its mouth. When it turned on me, I seized it by its hair, struck it and killed it. 36 Your servant has killed both the lion and the bear; this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, because he has defied the armies of the living God. 37 The LORD who rescued me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear will rescue me from the hand of this Philistine.”
Saul said to David, “Go, and the LORD be with you.”
The Penny Syndrome
April 11, 2011 — by David C. McCasland
The Lord, who delivered me from the paw of the lion . . . , He will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine. —1 Samuel 17:37
The penny has been called the most despised unit of US currency. Many people will not bother to pick up a one-cent coin if they see it lying on the ground. But some charities are finding that pennies add up to significant sums, and that children are generous givers. As one participant said, “Small contributions can make a huge difference.”
The Bible account of David and Goliath describes a seemingly insignificant person whose confidence in God was greater than any of the powerful people around him. When David volunteered to face the giant Goliath, King Saul said, “You are not able to go against this Philistine” (1 Sam. 17:33). But David had faith in the Lord who had delivered him in the past (v.37).
David did not suffer from “the penny syndrome”—a sense of inferiority and helplessness in the face of an overwhelming problem. If he had listened to the pessimism of Saul or the threats of Goliath, he would have done nothing. Instead, he acted with courage because he trusted God.
It’s easy to feel like a penny in a trillion-dollar deficit. But when we obey the Lord in every circumstance, it all adds up. Collectively, our acts of faith, large or small, make a big difference. And every penny counts.
It matters not how large or small
Your faith may seem to be;
What really counts is whom you trust
In life’s uncertainty. —Fitzhugh
Courage will follow when faith takes the lead.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
April 11th, 2011
Complete and Effective Divinity
If we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection . . . —Romans 6:5
Co-Resurrection. The proof that I have experienced crucifixion with Jesus is that I have a definite likeness to Him. The Spirit of Jesus entering me rearranges my personal life before God. The resurrection of Jesus has given Him the authority to give the life of God to me, and the experiences of my life must now be built on the foundation of His life. I can have the resurrection life of Jesus here and now, and it will exhibit itself through holiness.
The idea all through the apostle Paul’s writings is that after the decision to be identified with Jesus in His death has been made, the resurrection life of Jesus penetrates every bit of my human nature. It takes the omnipotence of God— His complete and effective divinity— to live the life of the Son of God in human flesh. The Holy Spirit cannot be accepted as a guest in merely one room of the house— He invades all of it. And once I decide that my “old man” (that is, my heredity of sin) should be identified with the death of Jesus, the Holy Spirit invades me. He takes charge of everything. My part is to walk in the light and to obey all that He reveals to me. Once I have made that important decision about sin, it is easy to “reckon” that I am actually “dead indeed to sin,” because I find the life of Jesus in me all the time (Romans 6:11). Just as there is only one kind of humanity, there is only one kind of holiness— the holiness of Jesus. And it is His holiness that has been given to me. God puts the holiness of His Son into me, and I belong to a new spiritual order.
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Poison in Pretty Packages - #6326
Tuesday, April 11, 2011
It takes a little longer to pick out a cereal at the supermarket than it used to. I mean, I have to read about the ingredients, and the nutrients, and how much calcium, and how much of my daily requirement of vitamin C, and vitamin X there is in it, you know. It's all there on the package now. In fact, on everything we buy in the supermarket, it's there because of laws that we call "truth in packaging."
And it's good that they have to tell you what's inside, because of course the package probably would never tell you that - all the bright colors and everything. It's good to know what you're really getting. The clever commercials, the bright packages...they probably would never tell you that. Now, it's too bad there aren't "truth in packaging" laws to clarify some of our bigger choices.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Poison in Pretty Packages."
Our word for today from the Word of God is found in Genesis chapter 19. I'll be in verses 4-9. It's sort of like an x-ray machine. You know at the airport how the x-ray machine shows up what's inside the luggage, and maybe even inside you these days? Well, this is an x-ray passage to show what sin really does. Now, the devil obviously does not believe in truth in packaging. You would never buy into some of the things he's trying to get you to do if he told you where it would take you...what was really inside. That sin that's tugging on you right now, it seems to promise so much pleasure, relief, excitement, advancement. That's why God exposes what's in the package in Genesis chapter 19.
In this passage sin is exposed in all of its ugliness. Oh, it looked good to Lot before we get to Genesis 19 . Remember, Lot had left Abraham and decided to move into Sodom - a city full of wickedness. And pretty soon Sodom had moved into him. And Sodom had looked good; the bright lights, the music, all the advertisements - they looked great. But then he discovered three poisons about sin that are not on the package. Here's what they are. I'll read these verses to you. What has happened is that the two angels have come now to warn Sodom and get Lot out of there, because they are about to be destroyed.
Here's what it says: "Before they'd gone to bed, all the men from every part of the city of Sodom, both young and old, surrounded the house. They called to Lot, 'Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so we can have sex with them.' Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him and said, 'No, my friends don't do this wicked thing. Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a man. Let me bring them out to you and you can do what you like with them." Can you believe this? "But don't do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof.' 'Get out of our way,' they said. 'This fellow came here as an alien, and now he wants to play the judge. We'll treat you worse than them.' And they kept bringing pressure on Lot and moved forward to break down the door."
Well, there's three poisons that weren't on the package, Lot. Number one, sin calls the shots. Notice how demanding sin is. You think it's freedom you're going to get, only to find out you're a slave, man. Sin won't take no for an answer. It wants your time, your relationships, your best, your soul. Secondly, sin cheapens relationships. These people were Lot's friends he thought. You watch what happens if you stop doing the sin that connects you to some of your friends. They'll drop you so fast! See, you're expendable if you get in the way of my desires if sin is our connection. Sin cheapens relationships. And thirdly, sin makes people into objects. These men wanted these other men just to have sex with. Lot was willing to give away his daughters! We go from thinking about love to the word used because sin is so terribly depersonalizing.
It may be that you've got regrets over some of the ways you've bought the lies of sin in your past. How good it would be to be clean. So many of us found that there's a spiritual shower that cleans us up forever in God's eyes the day we give our heart to Jesus Christ. I'd love to help you do that, and our website is for that. If you'd like to be clean today from all that dirt of the past, would you go to our website and check it out? It's YoursForLife.net.
That sin that looks so good on the package; it will take over your personality, your body, your relationships, your dignity, and your worth. It's poison! No matter how inexpensive sin seems to be, it will actually end up costing you everything.