Isaiah 47 Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

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

Max Lucado Daily: Three Cookie Days

Every day, God prepares for us a plate of experiences.  Some days are “three cookie days.” Many are not!  Sometimes our plate has nothing but vegetables, twenty-four hours of celery, carrots, and squash.  Apparently God knows we need some strength, and though the portion may be hard to swallow, isn’t it for our own good?  All are important and all are from God. Romans 8:28 says, “We know that in everything God works for the good of those who love Him.”

The next time your plate has a portion you find hard to swallow, talk to God about it.  Jesus did. In the garden of Gethsemane His Father handed Him a cup of suffering so sour, so vile, that Jesus handed it back to heaven.

“My Father,” He prayed, “if it is possible may this cup be taken from Me.  Yet not as I will, but as You will.” (Mark 14:36).

from The Great House of God

Isaiah 47

The Fall of Babylon

47 “Go down, sit in the dust,
    Virgin Daughter Babylon;
sit on the ground without a throne,
    queen city of the Babylonians.[a]
No more will you be called
    tender or delicate.
2 Take millstones and grind flour;
    take off your veil.
Lift up your skirts, bare your legs,
    and wade through the streams.
3 Your nakedness will be exposed
    and your shame uncovered.
I will take vengeance;
    I will spare no one.”
4 Our Redeemer—the Lord Almighty is his name—
    is the Holy One of Israel.
5 “Sit in silence, go into darkness,
    queen city of the Babylonians;
no more will you be called
    queen of kingdoms.
6 I was angry with my people
    and desecrated my inheritance;
I gave them into your hand,
    and you showed them no mercy.
Even on the aged
    you laid a very heavy yoke.
7 You said, ‘I am forever—
    the eternal queen!’
But you did not consider these things
    or reflect on what might happen.
8 “Now then, listen, you lover of pleasure,
    lounging in your security
and saying to yourself,
    ‘I am, and there is none besides me.
I will never be a widow
    or suffer the loss of children.’
9 Both of these will overtake you
    in a moment, on a single day:
    loss of children and widowhood.
They will come upon you in full measure,
    in spite of your many sorceries
    and all your potent spells.
10 You have trusted in your wickedness
    and have said, ‘No one sees me.’
Your wisdom and knowledge mislead you
    when you say to yourself,
    ‘I am, and there is none besides me.’
11 Disaster will come upon you,
    and you will not know how to conjure it away.
A calamity will fall upon you
    that you cannot ward off with a ransom;
a catastrophe you cannot foresee
    will suddenly come upon you.
12 “Keep on, then, with your magic spells
    and with your many sorceries,
    which you have labored at since childhood.
Perhaps you will succeed,
    perhaps you will cause terror.
13 All the counsel you have received has only worn you out!
    Let your astrologers come forward,
those stargazers who make predictions month by month,
    let them save you from what is coming upon you.
14 Surely they are like stubble;
    the fire will burn them up.
They cannot even save themselves
    from the power of the flame.
These are not coals for warmth;
    this is not a fire to sit by.
15 That is all they are to you—
    these you have dealt with
    and labored with since childhood.
All of them go on in their error;
    there is not one that can save you.


Our Daily Bread reading and devotion

Read: Luke 16:1-10

The Parable of the Shrewd Manager

16 Jesus told his disciples: “There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. 2 So he called him in and asked him, ‘What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management, because you cannot be manager any longer.’

3 “The manager said to himself, ‘What shall I do now? My master is taking away my job. I’m not strong enough to dig, and I’m ashamed to beg— 4 I know what I’ll do so that, when I lose my job here, people will welcome me into their houses.’

5 “So he called in each one of his master’s debtors. He asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’

6 “‘Nine hundred gallons[a] of olive oil,’ he replied.

“The manager told him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it four hundred and fifty.’

7 “Then he asked the second, ‘And how much do you owe?’

“‘A thousand bushels[b] of wheat,’ he replied.

“He told him, ‘Take your bill and make it eight hundred.’

8 “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. 9 I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.

10 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.

Honor System

April 12, 2013 — by Cindy Hess Kasper

He who is faithful in what is least is faithful also in much; and he who is unjust in what is least is unjust also in much. —Luke 16:10

Many homes near ours offer produce and perennials for sale by the road. Sometimes we’ll drive up to an unattended stand that operates on the “honor system.” As we make our selection, we put our money into a cash box or an old coffee can. Then we go home to enjoy the freshly picked fruits and vegetables.

But the honor system doesn’t always work. My friend Jackie has a flower stand in front of her house. One day, as she glanced out her window she saw a well-dressed woman with a big hat loading pots of perennials into the trunk of her car. Jackie smiled as she mentally calculated a $50 profit from her labors in the garden. But when she checked the cash box later, it was empty! The honor system revealed that this woman was not honorable.

Perhaps to her, taking the flowers seemed like a small thing. But being honest in little things indicates how we will respond in the big things (Luke 16:10). Honesty in all areas of our lives is one way we can bring honor to Jesus Christ, our Savior.

The best “honor system” for a follower of Christ is Colossians 3:17, “Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.”

Give of your best to the Master;
Give Him first place in your heart;
Give Him first place in your service,
Consecrate every part. —Grose
Honesty means never having to look over your shoulder.


My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
April 12, 2013

Complete and Effective Dominion

Death no longer has dominion over Him. . . . the life that He lives, He lives to God. Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God . . . —Romans 6:9-11

Co-Eternal Life. Eternal life is the life which Jesus Christ exhibited on the human level. And it is this same life, not simply a copy of it, which is made evident in our mortal flesh when we are born again. Eternal life is not a gift from God; eternal life is the gift of God. The energy and the power which was so very evident in Jesus will be exhibited in us by an act of the absolute sovereign grace of God, once we have made that complete and effective decision about sin.

“You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you . . .” (Acts 1:8)— not power as a gift from the Holy Spirit; the power is the Holy Spirit, not something that He gives us. The life that was in Jesus becomes ours because of His Cross, once we make the decision to be identified with Him. If it is difficult to get right with God, it is because we refuse to make this moral decision about sin. But once we do decide, the full life of God comes in immediately. Jesus came to give us an endless supply of life— “. . . that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:19). Eternal life has nothing to do with time. It is the life which Jesus lived when He was down here, and the only Source of life is the Lord Jesus Christ.

Even the weakest saint can experience the power of the deity of the Son of God, when he is willing to “let go.” But any effort to “hang on” to the least bit of our own power will only diminish the life of Jesus in us. We have to keep letting go, and slowly, but surely, the great full life of God will invade us, penetrating every part. Then Jesus will have complete and effective dominion in us, and people will take notice that we have been with Him.


A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft

The World's Best Builders are Women - #6850

Friday, April 12, 2013

Rosie the Riveter! That's a sweet, fragile name for a lady, huh? How would you like to go out on a date with somebody called Rosie the Riveter? Actually, Rosie was a symbol during WWII. She was a symbol of the millions of women who left their homes to go to work in America's factories.

Well, look! So many of the men were at war, and help was desperately needed in our plants and factories. And so, women went to war in machine shops, assembly lines, defense plants, and in jobs that were usually reserved for men. They were kind of symbolized by old Rosie. Now, that may have started a trend, but Rosie the Riveter wasn't totally a new idea. In fact, women have been involved in major construction for centuries.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The World's Best Builders are Women."

Our word for today from the Word of God comes from 1 Peter chapter 3. I'm going to read about those people in the construction business; those women that are great builders. It talks about one of them in 1 Peter 3:5-6. It goes back into the life of Sarah, a great builder. Here's what it says, "This is the way the holy women of the past, who put their hope in God used to make themselves beautiful. They were submissive to their own husbands, like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master. You are her daughters if you do what is right and do not give way to fear."

Now, this passage is in the context of how to win over your husband spiritually; particularly if you happen to be married to an unbelieving husband and you believe in Christ. But I think it goes beyond that to talk about how a woman can literally change the man she lives with. Now, Abraham and Sarah we know had their difficult moments, but ultimately Abraham became one of the most respected leaders in the world of his time. And he's still revered by the three great religions of the world.

But behind the scenes was a builder, and her name was Sarah. And she kept building him up as her leader, and he grew to be the leader of many. I think this scripture suggests, as many others do, the awesome power that a woman has to make a man feel very significant or very insignificant. That ability to build a man uses one power tool. It's not a saw; it's not a drill. The power tool in a woman's tool kit to build a man is praise. A man tends to become what his wife calls him. That's a scary thought isn't it?

If she picks on what he isn't, he'll never grow. If she praises what he is, he'll become that even more. If a man in your life has a weakness, and I'm sure he has many, look for those times when he shows a little progress in that area, and then build him up even if it's just a little progress. Men change slowly, and only when they feel secure enough to take a risk. And a women's acceptance, and praise, and encouragement can give a guy enough confidence to change.

We're told by social scientists that for every one negative or criticism we get, we need seven positives to bring us back to zero. I wonder what the ratio is between you and the man in your life with praise to criticism. If you're a mother, a sister, a girlfriend, especially a wife, be in the construction business. Don't let frustration drive you into the demolition business, finishing off an already damaged man.

Use that powerful tool of praise to construct a more Christ-like man. Whether or not women know what to do with a hammer or a saw, they sure are the world's best builders.