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MaxLucado.com: He Dismissed the Crowd
A world of insight is hidden in four words in Matthew 14:22: “He dismissed the crowd.” This wasn’t just any crowd that Jesus dismissed. This was a multitude with a mission. They’d followed Jesus around the sea. They’d heard Him teach. They’d seen Him heal. And they were ready to make Him King.
No one would turn down an opportunity to minister to thousands of people—right? Jesus did. He dismissed the crowd! Why?
Matthew 14:23 says, “After He had dismissed them, He went up on a mountainside by Himself to pray.”
Jesus said no to the important in order to say yes to the vital! It wasn’t a selfish decision. It was a deliberate choice to honor priorities.
If Jesus thought it necessary to say no to the demands of the crowds in order to pray—don’t you think you and I should to?
From In the Eye of the Storm
Psalm 136
1 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good.
His love endures forever.
2 Give thanks to the God of gods.
His love endures forever.
3 Give thanks to the Lord of lords:
His love endures forever.
4 to him who alone does great wonders,
His love endures forever.
5 who by his understanding made the heavens,
His love endures forever.
6 who spread out the earth upon the waters,
His love endures forever.
7 who made the great lights—
His love endures forever.
8 the sun to govern the day,
His love endures forever.
9 the moon and stars to govern the night;
His love endures forever.
10 to him who struck down the firstborn of Egypt
His love endures forever.
11 and brought Israel out from among them
His love endures forever.
12 with a mighty hand and outstretched arm;
His love endures forever.
13 to him who divided the Red Sea[a] asunder
His love endures forever.
14 and brought Israel through the midst of it,
His love endures forever.
15 but swept Pharaoh and his army into the Red Sea;
His love endures forever.
16 to him who led his people through the wilderness;
His love endures forever.
17 to him who struck down great kings,
His love endures forever.
18 and killed mighty kings—
His love endures forever.
19 Sihon king of the Amorites
His love endures forever.
20 and Og king of Bashan—
His love endures forever.
21 and gave their land as an inheritance,
His love endures forever.
22 an inheritance to his servant Israel.
His love endures forever.
23 He remembered us in our low estate
His love endures forever.
24 and freed us from our enemies.
His love endures forever.
25 He gives food to every creature.
His love endures forever.
26 Give thanks to the God of heaven.
His love endures forever.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Read: Revelation 2:1-7
“To the angel[a] of the church in Ephesus write:
These are the words of him who holds the seven stars in his right hand and walks among the seven golden lampstands. 2 I know your deeds, your hard work and your perseverance. I know that you cannot tolerate wicked people, that you have tested those who claim to be apostles but are not, and have found them false. 3 You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary.
4 Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken the love you had at first. 5 Consider how far you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first. If you do not repent, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place. 6 But you have this in your favor: You hate the practices of the Nicolaitans, which I also hate.
7 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give the right to eat from the tree of life, which is in the paradise of God.
A Working Church
October 12, 2012 — by David C. Egner
We give thanks to God always for you all, . . . remembering without ceasing your work of faith, labor of love, and patience of hope. —1 Thessalonians 1:2-3
My wife, Shirley, and I enjoyed a cruise along the fjords of Norway in celebration of our 50th wedding anniversary. As we journeyed northward, we stopped in numerous towns and villages, often visiting churches. Among them was a 12th-century church that our guide described proudly as “still a working church.” I asked, “What do you mean?” She referred to the days of the state church, when the state-appointed pastors simply collected their paychecks but no one attended the services. But this church had been faithfully holding worship services and actively serving the Lord for almost 1,000 years!
I immediately thought of the seven churches of Revelation 2 and 3 to whom Jesus said, “I know your works” (2:2,9,13,19; 3:1,8,15). In addition, the church of Thessalonica was commended by the apostle Paul for its “work of faith, labor of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Thess. 1:3).
I also thought of my church at home. For more than 130 years it has been faithful in preaching and caring for its congregation and community. It is truly a “working church.” What a privilege we have if we’re part of a local body of believers where we can grow and serve our Lord!
Lord, thank You for placing us into Your family and
giving us the privilege and responsibility to serve
You through our churches. May we be a shining light
of Your love to our communities and the world.
The church is a living body and must have working parts.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
October 12, 2012
Getting into God’s Stride
Enoch walked with God . . . —Genesis 5:24
The true test of a person’s spiritual life and character is not what he does in the extraordinary moments of life, but what he does during the ordinary times when there is nothing tremendous or exciting happening. A person’s worth is revealed in his attitude toward the ordinary things of life when he is not under the spotlight (seeJohn 1:35-37 and John 3:30). It is painful work to get in step with God and to keep pace with Him— it means getting your second wind spiritually. In learning to walk with God, there is always the difficulty of getting into His stride, but once we have done so, the only characteristic that exhibits itself is the very life of God Himself. The individual person is merged into a personal oneness with God, and God’s stride and His power alone are exhibited.
It is difficult to get into stride with God, because as soon as we start walking with Him we find that His pace has surpassed us before we have even taken three steps. He has different ways of doing things, and we have to be trained and disciplined in His ways. It was said of Jesus— “He will not fail nor be discouraged . . .” (Isaiah 42:4) because He never worked from His own individual standpoint, but always worked from the standpoint of His Father. And we must learn to do the same. Spiritual truth is learned through the atmosphere that surrounds us, not through intellectual reasoning. It is God’s Spirit that changes the atmosphere of our way of looking at things, and then things begin to be possible which before were impossible. Getting into God’s stride means nothing less than oneness with Him. It takes a long time to get there, but keep at it. Don’t give up because the pain is intense right now— get on with it, and before long you will find that you have a new vision and a new purpose.
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Better When Heated - #6720
Friday, October 12, 2012
My microwave has this very useful ability to bring food back to life; like, oh, store bought baked goods for example. Have you ever noticed? It's just better if you pop them in the microwave. You know, nuking it? If you get some of that store bought coffee cake or donuts or muffins, you know, they may not be like fresh from the bakery. But we found that they are so much better if you heat them up. What happens is the heat makes them softer. The other day I had a cookie that was getting a little on the old side, and I put it in the microwave and it was like it came right out of the oven - soft and warm. Sometimes the box will even tell you that you ought to "nuke it." And sometimes it will say, "Better when heated" or something like that. Actually, that would be true of about half of the human race.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Better When Heated."
Now, our word for today from the Word of God comes from 2 Kings 5:1. We're reading about a man named Naaman who it says is "...commander of the army of the king of Aram. He's a great man in the sight of his master, highly regarded, he was a valiant soldier." Now, that's at the beginning of the story. At the end of the story in verse 17, he is saying to God's man, Elisha the prophet, "Your servant will never again make burnt offerings and sacrifices to any other god but the Lord." Wow!
Something happened in between these two verses; something that made this man of war into a man of God. Now, what is it that makes a warrior into a worshipper? Well, I didn't read after it says "He was a valiant soldier." Let's go on. "...but he had leprosy." So he goes, and Elisha tells him he has to wash in the dirty waters of the Jordan River seven times in order to get well. It says Naaman went away angry. He said, "I won't go into the dirty river. We've got great rivers back in our country I could get into." And his servants say, "Hey, if he asked you to do some great act, you would do it wouldn't you? Why don't you go wash and be cleansed."
Then we read in verse 14, "So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times." He's finally humble. "And his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy." Now, Naaman did not yield to God until there was something bigger than he could possibly handle. When I say that, we've probably just described about half the human race; my half of the human race, the male half of the human race. When God turned up the heat on Naaman, He softened his heart so He could save him.
You know, a man says, "Hey, I can handle it." That's our motto, "I can handle it!" And we give God money, we give Him time, we give Him belief, but we want the control. God hears us say, "I can handle it" and He says, "Oh no, you can't." And so He sends to us men something that all our ability, and our power, and our connections cannot handle: a child goes astray, something happens to our health, our job, our marriage, an injury. The breaking of the man is the making of the man. It's not because God doesn't love you, it's because He does.
One man told me recently, "God could never get control of my life until my son attempted suicide." Another man recently said, "I almost died in an accident, and finally I surrendered to Christ." Another guy said, "I was an executive out of work suddenly for 32 months. Only then did God finally get control." See, God does this over and over again with us men; this humbling thing so we will finally let go to the Lord.
And guess what? Then we're finally complete; we're finally really strong, we're finally whole like Naaman was only after he was broken. See, God turns up the heat on us men because we get pretty hard like those old pastries, and He uses this heat to softened us up so we can finally become all we were created to be.
We're always better after we've been through God's heat, because remember, a breaking by the Lord is the making of the man.
