Isaiah 22 Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

(Has God spoken to you lately if not click to listen to God's teaching?)

Max Lucado Daily:

God Gave His Best

Jenna, wake up.  It’s time to go to school. For four lightning-fast years she’d been ours, and ours alone. And now that was all going to change.  I knew it was time. And I knew she would be fine.  But I never knew it would be so hard to give her up on her first day of preschool.

Is that how you felt, God? Is what I felt that morning anything like what you felt when you gave up your son? It explains how your heart must have ached as you heard the cracking voice of Jesus say, “Father take this cup away.” (Mark 14:36).

I said good-bye and sent my little Jenna into a safe environment with a compassionate teacher ready to wipe away any tears. Yet, you Father, released Jesus into a hostile arena with a cruel soldier who turned the back of your son into raw meat.

God gave His best, the apostle Paul reasons. Why should we ever doubt His love?

from Six Hours One Friday

Isaiah 22

A Prophecy About Jerusalem

22 A prophecy against the Valley of Vision:

What troubles you now,
    that you have all gone up on the roofs,
2 you town so full of commotion,
    you city of tumult and revelry?
Your slain were not killed by the sword,
    nor did they die in battle.
3 All your leaders have fled together;
    they have been captured without using the bow.
All you who were caught were taken prisoner together,
    having fled while the enemy was still far away.
4 Therefore I said, “Turn away from me;
    let me weep bitterly.
Do not try to console me
    over the destruction of my people.”
5 The Lord, the Lord Almighty, has a day
    of tumult and trampling and terror
    in the Valley of Vision,
a day of battering down walls
    and of crying out to the mountains.
6 Elam takes up the quiver,
    with her charioteers and horses;
    Kir uncovers the shield.
7 Your choicest valleys are full of chariots,
    and horsemen are posted at the city gates.
8 The Lord stripped away the defenses of Judah,
    and you looked in that day
    to the weapons in the Palace of the Forest.
9 You saw that the walls of the City of David
    were broken through in many places;
you stored up water
    in the Lower Pool.
10 You counted the buildings in Jerusalem
    and tore down houses to strengthen the wall.
11 You built a reservoir between the two walls
    for the water of the Old Pool,
but you did not look to the One who made it,
    or have regard for the One who planned it long ago.
12 The Lord, the Lord Almighty,
    called you on that day
to weep and to wail,
    to tear out your hair and put on sackcloth.
13 But see, there is joy and revelry,
    slaughtering of cattle and killing of sheep,
    eating of meat and drinking of wine!
“Let us eat and drink,” you say,
    “for tomorrow we die!”
14 The Lord Almighty has revealed this in my hearing: “Till your dying day this sin will not be atoned for,” says the Lord, the Lord Almighty.

15 This is what the Lord, the Lord Almighty, says:

“Go, say to this steward,
    to Shebna the palace administrator:
16 What are you doing here and who gave you permission
    to cut out a grave for yourself here,
hewing your grave on the height
    and chiseling your resting place in the rock?
17 “Beware, the Lord is about to take firm hold of you
    and hurl you away, you mighty man.
18 He will roll you up tightly like a ball
    and throw you into a large country.
There you will die
    and there the chariots you were so proud of
    will become a disgrace to your master’s house.
19 I will depose you from your office,
    and you will be ousted from your position.
20 “In that day I will summon my servant, Eliakim son of Hilkiah. 21 I will clothe him with your robe and fasten your sash around him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live in Jerusalem and to the people of Judah. 22 I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open. 23 I will drive him like a peg into a firm place; he will become a seat[d] of honor for the house of his father. 24 All the glory of his family will hang on him: its offspring and offshoots—all its lesser vessels, from the bowls to all the jars.

25 “In that day,” declares the Lord Almighty, “the peg driven into the firm place will give way; it will be sheared off and will fall, and the load hanging on it will be cut down.” The Lord has spoken.


Our Daily Bread reading and devotion


Read: Matthew 18:23-35

English Standard Version (ESV)
23 “Therefore the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who wished to settle accounts with his servants.[a] 24 When he began to settle, one was brought to him who owed him ten thousand talents.[b] 25 And since he could not pay, his master ordered him to be sold, with his wife and children and all that he had, and payment to be made. 26 So the servant[c] fell on his knees, imploring him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you everything.’ 27 And out of pity for him, the master of that servant released him and forgave him the debt. 28 But when that same servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii,[d] and seizing him, he began to choke him, saying, ‘Pay what you owe.’ 29 So his fellow servant fell down and pleaded with him, ‘Have patience with me, and I will pay you.’ 30 He refused and went and put him in prison until he should pay the debt. 31 When his fellow servants saw what had taken place, they were greatly distressed, and they went and reported to their master all that had taken place. 32 Then his master summoned him and said to him, ‘You wicked servant! I forgave you all that debt because you pleaded with me. 33 And should not you have had mercy on your fellow servant, as I had mercy on you?’ 34 And in anger his master delivered him to the jailers,[e] until he should pay all his debt. 35 So also my heavenly Father will do to every one of you, if you do not forgive your brother from your heart.”

Bumper Cars

March 6, 2013 — by Joe Stowell

Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? Up to seven times? —Matthew 18:21

Life is a lot like “bumper cars” at an amusement park. You get in your car, knowing that you will get hit . . . you just don’t know how hard. And when you get hit, you step on the gas pedal, chase the one who has hit you, and hope to bump that person harder than they have bumped you.

That may be a fun strategy for bumper cars, but it’s a terrible strategy for life. When you get bumped in life, bumping back only escalates matters and in the end everyone suffers damage.

Jesus had a better strategy: Forgive those who have “bumped” us. Like Peter, we may wonder how many times we have to forgive. When Peter asked Jesus, “Up to seven times?” Jesus answered “Up to seventy times seven” (Matt. 18:21-22). In other words, there are no limits to grace. We should always extend a spirit of forgiveness. Why? In the story of the forgiving master, Jesus explained that we forgive not because our offenders deserve it but because we’ve been forgiven. He says, “I forgave you . . . because you begged me. Should you not also have had compassion on your fellow servant, just as I had pity on you?” (vv.32-33).

Since we are among those who’ve been forgiven much, let’s stop the damage and share that blessing with others.

Lord, remind us of how deeply we have offended You
and how often You have extended the grace of
forgiveness to us. Teach us to forgive others and to trust
You to deal with those who sin against us.
Forgiveness is God’s grace in action through us.


My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
March 6, 2013

Taking the Next Step

. . . in much patience, in tribulations, in needs, in distresses —2 Corinthians 6:4

When you have no vision from God, no enthusiasm left in your life, and no one watching and encouraging you, it requires the grace of Almighty God to take the next step in your devotion to Him, in the reading and studying of His Word, in your family life, or in your duty to Him. It takes much more of the grace of God, and a much greater awareness of drawing upon Him, to take that next step, than it does to preach the gospel.

Every Christian must experience the essence of the incarnation by bringing the next step down into flesh-and-blood reality and by working it out with his hands. We lose interest and give up when we have no vision, no encouragement, and no improvement, but only experience our everyday life with its trivial tasks. The thing that really testifies for God and for the people of God in the long run is steady perseverance, even when the work cannot be seen by others. And the only way to live an undefeated life is to live looking to God. Ask God to keep the eyes of your spirit open to the risen Christ, and it will be impossible for drudgery to discourage you. Never allow yourself to think that some tasks are beneath your dignity or too insignificant for you to do, and remind yourself of the example of Christ inJohn 13:1-17 .


A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft

Suddenly Interested - #6823

Wednesday, March 6, 2013

It was right at the beginning of the first Gulf War when I got an unusual and an unexpected insight from one of the soldiers who had been shipped out for that very dangerous mission. Thousands and thousands of our military were sent out to the desert to try to liberate the nation of Iraq. And they were hit with such intense desert heat that it could require six gallons of water a day to keep from dehydrating. And they faced the very real fear of chemical warfare. They had to be prepared to resist that. Not just guns and tanks, but deadly gas.

What struck me was the comment of one female soldier who had just spent her first few days on that front. She said, "You know, they tried to tell us about chemical warfare and masks and all that stuff in training, and nobody listened. We dozed off." She said, "You know what? They're teaching us again. We're listening now!"

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Suddenly Interested."

Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Numbers 32. Now, it's interesting how combat situations change our attitude toward what we're learning. In fact, remember this principle: An awareness of war gives you an appetite for training. Numbers 32 talks about the tribes of Israel that had the opportunity to settle on the quiet side of the Jordan River. They weren't going to cross over the Jordan River into Canaan; their land, the Reubenites and the Gadites, happened to be on the side of the Jordan where they didn't have to fight for it. They didn't have to go against all those big, bad Canaanites.

So in chapter 32, verse 4, they say, "The land the Lord subdued before the people of Israel, and this land is suitable for our livestock, and your servants have livestock. If we have found favor in your eyes," they said to Moses, "let this land be given to your servants as possessions. Do not make us cross the Jordan. (That's the front lines.) Moses said to the Gadites and the Reubenites, 'Shall your countrymen go to war while you sit here?'"

In verse 16 it says, "They came up to him and said, 'We would like to build pens here for our livestock and cities for our women and children. But we're ready to arm ourselves and go ahead and fight.' And so, fully armed they crossed the Jordan River." Here they are living on the quiet side of the Jordan. They weren't thinking about fighting; they were ready to relax, settle down, and in essence Moses says, "Hey, guys, this is not a picnic. This is a war! Get your weapons." You know, there is a war raging fiercely all around us in our generation. Two kingdoms are fighting it out, and these may be the last great battles before Jesus Christ comes back.

If you live in one of the heavily persecuted parts of the world where Christians pay a high and often deadly price for their allegiance to Christ, you know we're in a war. You can see the battle. But see, you and I live kind of on the quiet side of the river, but there's no less of a battle. Lives all around you are prisoners of Satan and prospects for hell. There are Christians compromising all around you, embarrassing their Lord, betraying their Lord. Lives are being lost to loneliness and emptiness because they're living without knowing God. How can you sit here when there's a war going on?

We tend to get bored reading our Bible, and going to church, and hearing the same old story. Like that soldier who didn't listen to all the training until she realized she needed it, because she was about to be involved in a war. You want to wake up people who are dozing off on God's Word? Give them a mission to do. Give them responsibility. Preach about the war. Tell them they're responsible for a lost friend. They're not listening because they're not fighting.

Our job isn't to entertain or babysit, or even to inform. It's to prepare people for battle. So, do whatever you do under this banner. This is war! I think you'll find sleeping soldiers suddenly interested.