Max Lucado Daily: Your “Go-To” for Life
Glory Days require an ongoing trust in God’s Word! Wilderness people trust scripture just enough to escape Egypt. Canaan dwellers, on the other hand, make the Bible their “go-to” book for life! God told Joshua in Joshua 1:8 to meditate on God’s Word day and night. The literal translation reads, you shall mutter over this Torah document. It is the image of a person reciting, rehearsing, and reconsidering God’s Word over and over again.
Canaan is loud with enemy voices. The devil megaphones doubt and death into our ears. Take heed to the voice you hear. Begin with a prayer, God, please speak to my heart today as I read. Then with an open heart continue until a message hits you. Keep meditating. Great rewards come to those who do. God promised Joshua, “You will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.” (Joshua 1:8).
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John 20
The Resurrection
20 Early on Sunday morning,[a] while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance. 2 She ran and found Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved. She said, “They have taken the Lord’s body out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!”
3 Peter and the other disciple started out for the tomb. 4 They were both running, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. 5 He stooped and looked in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he didn’t go in. 6 Then Simon Peter arrived and went inside. He also noticed the linen wrappings lying there, 7 while the cloth that had covered Jesus’ head was folded up and lying apart from the other wrappings. 8 Then the disciple who had reached the tomb first also went in, and he saw and believed— 9 for until then they still hadn’t understood the Scriptures that said Jesus must rise from the dead. 10 Then they went home.
Jesus Appears to Mary Magdalene
11 Mary was standing outside the tomb crying, and as she wept, she stooped and looked in. 12 She saw two white-robed angels, one sitting at the head and the other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had been lying. 13 “Dear woman, why are you crying?” the angels asked her.
“Because they have taken away my Lord,” she replied, “and I don’t know where they have put him.”
14 She turned to leave and saw someone standing there. It was Jesus, but she didn’t recognize him. 15 “Dear woman, why are you crying?” Jesus asked her. “Who are you looking for?”
She thought he was the gardener. “Sir,” she said, “if you have taken him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will go and get him.”
16 “Mary!” Jesus said.
She turned to him and cried out, “Rabboni!” (which is Hebrew for “Teacher”).
17 “Don’t cling to me,” Jesus said, “for I haven’t yet ascended to the Father. But go find my brothers and tell them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’”
18 Mary Magdalene found the disciples and told them, “I have seen the Lord!” Then she gave them his message.
Jesus Appears to His Disciples
19 That Sunday evening[b] the disciples were meeting behind locked doors because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders. Suddenly, Jesus was standing there among them! “Peace be with you,” he said. 20 As he spoke, he showed them the wounds in his hands and his side. They were filled with joy when they saw the Lord! 21 Again he said, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you.” 22 Then he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 If you forgive anyone’s sins, they are forgiven. If you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.”
Jesus Appears to Thomas
24 One of the twelve disciples, Thomas (nicknamed the Twin),[c] was not with the others when Jesus came. 25 They told him, “We have seen the Lord!”
But he replied, “I won’t believe it unless I see the nail wounds in his hands, put my fingers into them, and place my hand into the wound in his side.”
26 Eight days later the disciples were together again, and this time Thomas was with them. The doors were locked; but suddenly, as before, Jesus was standing among them. “Peace be with you,” he said. 27 Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and look at my hands. Put your hand into the wound in my side. Don’t be faithless any longer. Believe!”
28 “My Lord and my God!” Thomas exclaimed.
29 Then Jesus told him, “You believe because you have seen me. Blessed are those who believe without seeing me.”
Purpose of the Book
30 The disciples saw Jesus do many other miraculous signs in addition to the ones recorded in this book. 31 But these are written so that you may continue to believe[d] that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing in him you will have life by the power of his name.
Footnotes:
20:1 Greek On the first day of the week.
20:19 Greek In the evening of that day, the first day of the week.
20:24 Greek Thomas, who was called Didymus.
20:31 Some manuscripts read that you may believe.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Friday, October 09, 2015
Read: Job 29:1-6; 30:1-9
ob Speaks of His Former Blessings
29 Job continued speaking:
2 “I long for the years gone by
when God took care of me,
3 when he lit up the way before me
and I walked safely through the darkness.
4 When I was in my prime,
God’s friendship was felt in my home.
5 The Almighty was still with me,
and my children were around me.
6 My steps were awash in cream,
and the rocks gushed olive oil for me.
ob Speaks of His Anguish
30 “But now I am mocked by people younger than I,
by young men whose fathers are not worthy to run with my sheepdogs.
2 A lot of good they are to me—
those worn-out wretches!
3 They are gaunt from poverty and hunger.
They claw the dry ground in desolate wastelands.
4 They pluck wild greens from among the bushes
and eat from the roots of broom trees.
5 They are driven from human society,
and people shout at them as if they were thieves.
6 So now they live in frightening ravines,
in caves and among the rocks.
7 They sound like animals howling among the bushes,
huddled together beneath the nettles.
8 They are nameless fools,
outcasts from society.
9 “And now they mock me with vulgar songs!
They taunt me!
INSIGHT:
Job’s world had been turned upside down, having lost his wealth (1:14-17), his family (1:18-19), and his health (2:7). Even as he reached an impasse with his three friends while trying to unravel the real reasons for his suffering and pain (chs. 3–31), Job was trying to come to terms with the consequences of his physical and financial losses. Spiritually, he felt that God had abandoned him (29:1-5); emotionally, he was deprived of happiness and enjoyment (29:5-6); and socially, he had lost his standing, power, respect, and honor (30:1-9). Despite his many questions, Job proclaimed his trust in the sovereign God (42:1-6). Sim Kay Tee
The Song of Our Lives
By Keila Ochoa
The Lord God is my strength and my song. —nlt Isaiah 12:2
Everyone touched by a piece of music hears it differently. The composer hears it in the chamber of his imagination. The audience hears it with their senses and emotions. The members of the orchestra hear most clearly the sound of the instruments closest to them.
In a sense, we are the members of God’s orchestra. Often we hear only the music closest to us. Because we don’t hear a balanced work, we are like Job who cried as he suffered: “Now those young men mock me in song; I have become a byword among them” (Job 30:9).
Job recalled how princes and officials had respected him. His life was “awash in cream, and the rocks gushed olive oil for me” (29:6 nlt). But now, he had become the target of mockers. “My harp plays sad music,” he lamented (30:31 nlt). Yet there was much, much more to the symphony. Job simply couldn’t hear the whole song.
Maybe today you can hear only the sad notes of your own violin. Don’t lose heart. Every detail in your life is part of God’s composition. Or perhaps you are listening to a cheerful flute. Praise God for it and share your joy with someone else.
God’s masterpiece of redemption is the symphony we are playing, and ultimately everything will work together for His good purposes. God is the composer of our lives. His song is perfect, and we can trust Him.
Lord, help me to trust You, especially when my life seems discordant and out of tune. I thank You because I’m part of Your symphony and Your song is perfect.
Faith in God’s goodness puts a song in the heart.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, October 09, 2015
Building on the Atonement
…present…your members as instruments of righteousness to God. —Romans 6:13
I cannot save and sanctify myself; I cannot make atonement for sin; I cannot redeem the world; I cannot right what is wrong, purify what is impure, or make holy what is unholy. That is all the sovereign work of God. Do I have faith in what Jesus Christ has done? He has made the perfect atonement for sin. Am I in the habit of constantly realizing it? The greatest need we have is not to do things, but to believe things. The redemption of Christ is not an experience, it is the great act of God which He has performed through Christ, and I have to build my faith on it. If I construct my faith on my own experience, I produce the most unscriptural kind of life— an isolated life, with my eyes focused solely on my own holiness. Beware of that human holiness that is not based on the atonement of the Lord. It has no value for anything except a life of isolation— it is useless to God and a nuisance to man. Measure every kind of experience you have by our Lord Himself. We cannot do anything pleasing to God unless we deliberately build on the foundation of the atonement by the Cross of Christ.
The atonement of Jesus must be exhibited in practical, unassuming ways in my life. Every time I obey, the absolute deity of God is on my side, so that the grace of God and my natural obedience are in perfect agreement. Obedience means that I have completely placed my trust in the atonement, and my obedience is immediately met by the delight of the supernatural grace of God.
Beware of the human holiness that denies the reality of the natural life— it is a fraud. Continually bring yourself to the trial or test of the atonement and ask, “Where is the discernment of the atonement in this, and in that?”
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Re-state to yourself what you believe, then do away with as much of it as possible, and get back to the bedrock of the Cross of Christ. My Utmost for His Highest, November 25, 848 R
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, October 09, 2015
4 Words For the Hard Times - #7500
You'd think "teenager" is a disease instead of an age. I mean, the way parents talk about it when they suddenly have a teenager on their hands. You know, they get this apprehensive look on their face, and they say, "My daughter's about to be a teenager!" You can hear the pain in their voice; the fear. Thirteen is a tough year. Sometimes we want them to go away somewhere and come back like when they're fifteen or sixteen! Not really, we really do love them. But when kids navigate through junior high and those kind of years, parents often look at one another – my wife and I did – and say four letters which stand for four words, "T.T.S.P."
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "4 Words For the Hard Times."
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from 2 Corinthians 4:16-18, and it's about T.T.S.P. What does that mean? It's pretty simple, This Too Shall Pass. I love the way the old King James says, "And it came to pass." Well, when we said that about our kids in junior high, guess what? It did! It came to pass. This, too, did pass.
Let's go to 2 Corinthians chapter 4, "Therefore, we do not lose heart." Okay, you got my attention, Paul. After all you got beat up, why did you not lose heart? "Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day. For our light and momentary troubles..." Did you get that? Doesn't it feel like when you're going through a hard time that it's going to go on forever? He says, "Our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal."
You know, when our son was, I think eight years old, he and I went to the grocery store together. I had just gotten my allowance and he had just gotten his. And I heard him jingling his change in his pocket, and we both headed out the door shopping. I was pretty sure when I saw him in that long aisle of junk food that he was going to come out broke. Well, I did after I bought all the groceries. I said, "What did you get?" He said, "Oh, I didn't spend anything, Dad." I said, "Really? Why not?" He said, "Well, Dad, I decided it's best just to spend on what lasts." Wow!
That's what Paul's talking about here; to think about the things that are going to last, not the things that are going to pass. You're going to make bad choices if you make choices based on what's temporary. This is not always going to be here. Some other things always will be. You can't just decide based on the situation. You've got to have non-negotiables that are based upon what's eternal. Even if the storm gets pretty bumpy, you ride out the storm. You don't bale out because of the storm.
You know why? Because the storm is temporary; this too shall pass. Don't give up something permanent for something temporary. You almost always give up something permanent for something temporary when you make just "now" kinds of choices.
So, if you're facing turbulent times, ask yourself this question, "What's temporary here?" Then, "What's lasting here?" Base your decision on that. Make that the basis of all your choices – your non-negotiables. Don't look at what is temporary; look at what is eternal. T.T.S.P. – this too shall pass. It is a great clarifier when you're about to make a decision and it helps you sort out life's two lists: The things that really matter and the things that really don't. Because guess what? Those things get jumbled don't they? They clarify when you realize, "This is going to pass. This is going to be eternal."
Because of Christ, our temporary situation can be put against the vast backdrop of the eternal. So, decide on what will last forever, because the other stuff - T.T.S.P.
