Isaiah 55 Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

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Max Lucado Daily: Chocolate Ice Cream or Okra?

Jesus said:  “The way you give to others is the way God will give to you.” (Luke 6:38).

It’s as if God sends you to purchase your neighbor’s groceries.  “Whatever you get your neighbor, get also for yourself.”  I’m crazy about double-chocolate ice cream, so I buy my neighbor double-chocolate ice cream.  But suppose your neighbor’s trash blows into your yard.  He’s in no rush—says he’ll get to it next week.

You’re just about to have a talk when God reminds you, “Time to go to the market and buy your neighbor’s groceries.” You march right past the double-chocolate ice cream toward the okra and rice. You drive back and drop the sack in the lap of your lazy, good-for-nothing neighbor. “Have a good dinner.”

The next time you go to your pantry, guess what you find? What will you be eating?  Chocolate ice cream or okra?  It’s up to you.

from The Great House of God

Isaiah 55

Invitation to the Thirsty

55 “Come, all you who are thirsty,
    come to the waters;
and you who have no money,
    come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
    without money and without cost.
2 Why spend money on what is not bread,
    and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
    and you will delight in the richest of fare.
3 Give ear and come to me;
    listen, that you may live.
I will make an everlasting covenant with you,
    my faithful love promised to David.
4 See, I have made him a witness to the peoples,
    a ruler and commander of the peoples.
5 Surely you will summon nations you know not,
    and nations you do not know will come running to you,
because of the Lord your God,
    the Holy One of Israel,
    for he has endowed you with splendor.”
6 Seek the Lord while he may be found;
    call on him while he is near.
7 Let the wicked forsake their ways
    and the unrighteous their thoughts.
Let them turn to the Lord, and he will have mercy on them,
    and to our God, for he will freely pardon.
8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
    neither are your ways my ways,”
declares the Lord.
9 “As the heavens are higher than the earth,
    so are my ways higher than your ways
    and my thoughts than your thoughts.
10 As the rain and the snow
    come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
    without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
    so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,
11 so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
    It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
    and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
12 You will go out in joy
    and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and hills
    will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the field
    will clap their hands.
13 Instead of the thornbush will grow the juniper,
    and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.
This will be for the Lord’s renown,
    for an everlasting sign,
    that will endure forever.”


Our Daily Bread reading and devotion

Read: Genesis 2:1-7

New International Version (NIV)
2 Thus the heavens and the earth were completed in all their vast array.

2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.

Adam and Eve

4 This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, when the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.

5 Now no shrub had yet appeared on the earth[a] and no plant had yet sprung up, for the Lord God had not sent rain on the earth and there was no one to work the ground, 6 but streams[b] came up from the earth and watered the whole surface of the ground. 7 Then the Lord God formed a man[c] from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

Dust Art

April 22, 2013 — by Julie Ackerman Link

The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. —Genesis 2:7

When God chose dust as His artistic medium to create Adam (Gen. 2:7), He didn’t have to worry about running out of material. According to Hannah Holmes, author of The Secret Life of Dust, “Between 1 and 3 billion tons of desert dust fly up into the sky annually. One billion tons would fill 14 million boxcars in a train that would wrap six times around the Earth’s equator.”

No one has to buy dust, for we all have more than we want. I ignore it as long as I can in my house. My reasoning is this: If I don’t disturb it, it’s not as noticeable. But eventually it accumulates to the point that I can no longer pretend it’s not there. So I haul out my cleaning supplies and start removing it from wherever it has found a resting place.

As I remove the dust, I see myself reflected in the smooth surface. Then I see another thing: I see that God took something worthless, dust, and made it into something priceless—you and me and every other person (Gen. 2:7).

The fact that God used dust to create humans makes me think twice about labeling someone or something worthless. Perhaps the very thing that I want to get rid of—a person or problem that annoys me—is the artistic medium God has given to display His glory.

Lord, too often I want to quickly ignore
or dismiss difficult people and circumstances.
Help me to be open to learn from
You through them and to see Your glory.
Being all fashioned of the self-same dust, let us be merciful as well as just. —Longfellow


My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
April 22, 2013

The Light That Never Fails

We all, with unveiled face, beholding . . . the glory of the Lord . . . —2 Corinthians 3:18

A servant of God must stand so very much alone that he never realizes he is alone. In the early stages of the Christian life, disappointments will come— people who used to be lights will flicker out, and those who used to stand with us will turn away. We have to get so used to it that we will not even realize we are standing alone. Paul said, “. . . no one stood with me, but all forsook me . . . . But the Lord stood with me and strengthened me . . .” (2 Timothy 4:16-17). We must build our faith not on fading lights but on the Light that never fails. When “important” individuals go away we are sad, until we see that they are meant to go, so that only one thing is left for us to do— to look into the face of God for ourselves.

Allow nothing to keep you from looking with strong determination into the face of God regarding yourself and your doctrine. And every time you preach make sure you look God in the face about the message first, then the glory will remain through all of it. A Christian servant is one who perpetually looks into the face of God and then goes forth to talk to others. The ministry of Christ is characterized by an abiding glory of which the servant is totally unaware— “. . . Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone while he talked with Him” (Exodus 34:29).

We are never called on to display our doubts openly or to express the hidden joys and delights of our life with God. The secret of the servant’s life is that he stays in tune with God all the time.


A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft

Women in Combat - #6856

Monday, April 22, 2013

So, the Defense Department has approved women being in combat roles. Well, women being in combat might be new for the military, but they're not new.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Women in Combat."

I've been there when my wife brought a new life into the world. Believe me, she was a warrior. I've been close by when our daughter and daughters-in-law birthed our grandchildren. A battle they fought and won, big-time. I've joked that if men had to have the babies, the human race would probably be extinct in a generation.

I know women who refuse to cave in to the "everybody's doing it" pressure to give up one of their greatest treasures - their virginity. They insist - against the tide - that they will keep sex special for the man they will commit their life to. In many cases, that's a lonely stand - one that merits a moral Medal of Honor. Some will call them weird. I say they're rare - and, like collectibles, the less there are of them, the more valuable they become.

There are the women warriors who fight for their marriage when others would have given up. They believe, as God does, that marriage is for life - while their world bombards them with the notion that marriage is until it gets hard. I just checked my Bible. It still says, "They are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate" (Mark 10:8, 9). No matter what the latest opinion poll says, it's nice to know you've got God on your side.

Can raising a whole and healthy child in this culture be considered anything less than a battle? Today our kids are navigating a spiritual minefield, and it's littered with moral IED's that can blow up a life. But between many a child and those destructors stands a Mom who's fighting for them. Countering the lies of a deceived and deceiving culture with winsome truth about what's really right and what really matters. Lovingly listening as a son or daughter grapples with the inconsistency between the lies they hear at school and the truth they hear at home.

This woman winsomely sows - and models day and night - God's ways from the Bible. Because it's "a lamp to my feet and a light for my path" the Bible says (Psalm 119:111). The child who makes God's ways their way can say with the psalmist, "I run in the path of Your commands." Oh wait, you mean all bound by rules, right? Hardly. It goes on to say, "For You have set my heart free" (Psalm 119:32).

And though the battle that rages for a child's life can be scary, the medal-deserving Mom doesn't succumb to that paralysis of fear. She knows "God did not give us a spirit of fear, but of power and love and a sound mind" (2 Timothy 1:7). She refuses to just play defense, hoping she'll raise a "survivor." She plays offense, determined to raise a game-changer.

The ultimate woman warrior is not the one with the M-16 and the body armor. She knows the ultimate weapon for winning the battle for a life. She's a woman, on her knees, crying out to her all-powerful God for someone she's fighting for. Here's our word for today from the Word of God, 2 Chronicles 20:15, "the battle is not yours, but God's."

This woman knows that prayer unleashes God's power to (in the Bible's words) "demolish strongholds", to "destroy the Devil's work", to "remove a heart of stone" and "give you a new heart" (2 Corinthians 10:4; 1 John 3:8; Ezekiel 36:26). She releases the ones she loves to the One who loves them so much more.

Yes, women have been fighting life's most decisive battles for a long time. And those who have embraced Jesus as the great love of their life fight their battles with His death-reversing, resurrection power on their side.

So if you know one of these women, honor her. Thank her. Treasure her. And pray for her. She (in the words of Scripture) "fights the Lord's battles" (1 Samuel 25:28).