Max Lucado Daily:The Work is His
Paul said in 1 Corinthians 13:4, "Love does not envy!" A number of years ago I learned of a new church across town. A friend came to me with this report: The church is great. It's bursting at the seams-the largest one in town. A more spiritual Max would have rejoiced. A more mature Max would have thanked God. But the Max who heard the report did not act mature or spiritual. He acted jealous. Rather than celebrate God's work, I was obsessed with my own. I wanted our church to be the biggest. Sickening!
In a profound moment of conviction, God let me know that the church is his church, not mine. The work is his work, not mine. And my life is his life, not mine. My job was not to question him, but to trust him. The cure for jealousy? Trust!
From A Love Worth Giving
2 Kings 16
Ahaz Rules in Judah
Ahaz son of Jotham began to rule over Judah in the seventeenth year of King Pekah’s reign in Israel. 2 Ahaz was twenty years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem sixteen years. He did not do what was pleasing in the sight of the Lord his God, as his ancestor David had done. 3 Instead, he followed the example of the kings of Israel, even sacrificing his own son in the fire.[h] In this way, he followed the detestable practices of the pagan nations the Lord had driven from the land ahead of the Israelites. 4 He offered sacrifices and burned incense at the pagan shrines and on the hills and under every green tree.
5 Then King Rezin of Aram and King Pekah of Israel came up to attack Jerusalem. They besieged Ahaz but could not conquer him. 6 At that time the king of Edom[i] recovered the town of Elath for Edom.[j] He drove out the people of Judah and sent Edomites[k] to live there, as they do to this day.
7 King Ahaz sent messengers to King Tiglath-pileser of Assyria with this message: “I am your servant and your vassal.[l] Come up and rescue me from the attacking armies of Aram and Israel.” 8 Then Ahaz took the silver and gold from the Temple of the Lord and the palace treasury and sent it as a payment to the Assyrian king. 9 So the king of Assyria attacked the Aramean capital of Damascus and led its population away as captives, resettling them in Kir. He also killed King Rezin.
10 King Ahaz then went to Damascus to meet with King Tiglath-pileser of Assyria. While he was there, he took special note of the altar. Then he sent a model of the altar to Uriah the priest, along with its design in full detail. 11 Uriah followed the king’s instructions and built an altar just like it, and it was ready before the king returned from Damascus. 12 When the king returned, he inspected the altar and made offerings on it. 13 He presented a burnt offering and a grain offering, he poured out a liquid offering, and he sprinkled the blood of peace offerings on the altar.
14 Then King Ahaz removed the old bronze altar from its place in front of the Lord’s Temple, between the entrance and the new altar, and placed it on the north side of the new altar. 15 He told Uriah the priest, “Use the new altar[m] for the morning sacrifices of burnt offering, the evening grain offering, the king’s burnt offering and grain offering, and the burnt offerings of all the people, as well as their grain offerings and liquid offerings. Sprinkle the blood from all the burnt offerings and sacrifices on the new altar. The bronze altar will be for my personal use only.” 16 Uriah the priest did just as King Ahaz commanded him.
17 Then the king removed the side panels and basins from the portable water carts. He also removed the great bronze basin called the Sea from the backs of the bronze oxen and placed it on the stone pavement. 18 In deference to the king of Assyria, he also removed the canopy that had been constructed inside the palace for use on the Sabbath day,[n] as well as the king’s outer entrance to the Temple of the Lord.
19 The rest of the events in Ahaz’s reign and everything he did are recorded in The Book of the History of the Kings of Judah. 20 When Ahaz died, he was buried with his ancestors in the City of David. Then his son Hezekiah became the next king.
Footnotes:
16:3 Or even making his son pass through the fire.
16:6a As in Latin Vulgate; Hebrew reads Rezin king of Aram.
16:6b As in Latin Vulgate; Hebrew reads Aram.
16:6c As in Greek version, Latin Vulgate, and an alternate reading of the Masoretic Text; the other alternate reads Arameans.
16:7 Hebrew your son.
16:15 Hebrew the great altar.
16:18 The meaning of the Hebrew is uncertain.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Monday, February 08, 2016
Read: Galatians 5:13-26
For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. 14 For the whole law can be summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”[a] 15 But if you are always biting and devouring one another, watch out! Beware of destroying one another.
Living by the Spirit’s Power
16 So I say, let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves. 17 The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you are not free to carry out your good intentions. 18 But when you are directed by the Spirit, you are not under obligation to the law of Moses.
19 When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, 21 envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God.
22 But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things!
24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. 25 Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives. 26 Let us not become conceited, or provoke one another, or be jealous of one another.
Footnotes:
5:14 Lev 19:18.
INSIGHT:
In his letter to the Galatians, Paul makes fourteen references to the Holy Spirit. Believers receive the Holy Spirit through faith the moment they believe (3:2–3, 5, 14). Believers are born of the Spirit (4:29), which qualifies them to call God “Abba, Father” (4:6). In today’s passage Paul warns that the flesh continues to resist the indwelling Spirit (5:17), but the key to victory is to walk in (or by) the Spirit (vv. 16, 25). Only in this way can a believer overcome the limitations of the flesh and live in a way that pleases God.
Can’t Take It Back
By Anne Cetas
The fruit of the Spirit is . . . gentleness and self-control. Galatians 5:22-23
I couldn't take my actions back. A woman had parked her car and blocked my way of getting to the gas pump. She hopped out to drop off some recycling items, and I didn't feel like waiting, so I honked my horn at her. Irritated, I put my car in reverse and drove around another way. I immediately felt bad about being impatient and unwilling to wait 30 seconds (at the most) for her to move. I apologized to God. Yes, she should have parked in the designated area, but I could have spread kindness and patience instead of harshness. Unfortunately it was too late to apologize to her—she was gone.
Many of the Proverbs challenge us to think about how to respond when people get in the way of our plans. There’s the one that says, “Fools show their annoyance at once” (Prov. 12:16). And “It is to one’s honor to avoid strife, but every fool is quick to quarrel” (20:3). Then there’s this one that goes straight to the heart: “Fools give full vent to their rage, but the wise bring calm in the end” (29:11).
As we cooperate with God and depend on Him, He produces the fruit of the Spirit in us.
Growing in patience and kindness seems pretty difficult sometimes. But the apostle Paul says it is the work of God, the “fruit of the Spirit” (Gal. 5:22-23). As we cooperate with Him and depend on Him, He produces that fruit in us. Please change us, Lord.
Make me a gentle person, Lord. One who doesn’t quickly react in frustration to every annoyance that comes my way. Give me a spirit of self-control and patience.
To study more about the fruit of the Spirit, read the Discovery Series booklet Live Free by Constantine Campbell.
God tests our patience to enlarge our hearts.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Monday, February 08, 2016
The Cost of Sanctification
May the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely… —1 Thessalonians 5:23
When we pray, asking God to sanctify us, are we prepared to measure up to what that really means? We take the word sanctification much too lightly. Are we prepared to pay the cost of sanctification? The cost will be a deep restriction of all our earthly concerns, and an extensive cultivation of all our godly concerns. Sanctification means to be intensely focused on God’s point of view. It means to secure and to keep all the strength of our body, soul, and spirit for God’s purpose alone. Are we really prepared for God to perform in us everything for which He separated us? And after He has done His work, are we then prepared to separate ourselves to God just as Jesus did? “For their sakes I sanctify Myself…” (John 17:19). The reason some of us have not entered into the experience of sanctification is that we have not realized the meaning of sanctification from God’s perspective. Sanctification means being made one with Jesus so that the nature that controlled Him will control us. Are we really prepared for what that will cost? It will cost absolutely everything in us which is not of God.
Are we prepared to be caught up into the full meaning of Paul’s prayer in this verse? Are we prepared to say, “Lord, make me, a sinner saved by grace, as holy as You can”? Jesus prayed that we might be one with Him, just as He is one with the Father (see John 17:21-23). The resounding evidence of the Holy Spirit in a person’s life is the unmistakable family likeness to Jesus Christ, and the freedom from everything which is not like Him. Are we prepared to set ourselves apart for the Holy Spirit’s work in us?
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
There is no allowance whatever in the New Testament for the man who says he is saved by grace but who does not produce the graceful goods. Jesus Christ by His Redemption can make our actual life in keeping with our religious profession. Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, 1465 R
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Monday, February 08, 2016
Stepping Where God's Shown You the Light - #7586
It was one of those ministry trips where I had to take my office with me. I had my files and I had my computer. I was going to three different cities so I had to be prepared for everything. In other words, I had a lot of luggage. There was this one garment bag that I used often and I always ended up stuffing it to the gills! I actually introduced my bag to airline agents as Big Bertha. Yeah, I named my suitcase.
One day, I was loaded down with heavy luggage as I was paying my hotel bill. I looked over at the door that I was going to be using to leave the hotel and there was a problem. There was no handle on that door. I had this heavy load and a door with no apparent way to open it. Is that a problem? Well, of course not. You know what happened. As I walked toward that door, wow, it opened all by itself.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have A Word With You today about "Stepping Where God's Shown You the Light."
Our word for today from the Word of God; we're in Joshua 3 where the Jews are about to cross into their Promise Land. But they are facing a flooded Jordan River and they're wondering how in the world they are ever going to get across when God gives these instructions in verse 8, "Tell the priests who carry the ark of the covenant: 'When you reach the edge of the Jordan's waters, go and stand in the river." Now, this is a roaring, flooded stream. "As soon as the priests who carry the Ark of the Lord, the Lord of all the earth, set foot on the Jordan. Its waters flowing downstream (God said) will be cut off and stand up in a heap." That's what happened!
Verse 15, "Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during Harvest. Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water's edge, the water from upstream stopped flowing." Now when did the water's part? It said, "...as soon as their feet touched the water's edge."
I might have tried to negotiate this one, "I'll tell you what, Lord. How about you part the waters and I'll start walking in." He says, "No. You start walking in and I'll part the waters." Sounds like my automatic door at the hotel. It looked like I could hurt myself if I just kept walking toward that door. I couldn't see any way it would open, so I could have stood there with Bertha, my suitcase, all afternoon waiting for an opening. But the door opened as I was walking toward it – by faith you might say.
Now, that's the Lord's way of directing your whole life. We, of course, want to know how every door might open. We want to know how every need will be met, every obstacle will be removed, and the Lord says, "Just start walking." So meanwhile, we just stand still waiting for the waters to part or until we've had a lot of our questions answered, till it looks safe. And many people have lost God's plan for their lives that way over and over again.
God is asking you to walk by faith, not by sight. Maybe you're insisting on walking by sight. The waters are never going to part for you at this rate. God's primary way of showing you the next step is His Word. You can't separate God's will from God's Word.
David prayed, "Direct my footsteps according to your word." That means your destiny is tied to whether or not you are faithfully having your time with Jesus through what He wrote to you in the Bible. But it's not just reading the words, it's asking the Lord to show you through those words what specific things He wants to touch in your life that day.
And as you obey that, you take a step in the direction of His larger will for you. His macro will for your life is made up of a thousand micro wills; a thousand daily obediences to something God says He wants to touch in your life. God will combine scripture with His prayer leading, with His Godly counsel and with circumstantial confirmation to shine light on the next step He wants you to take. Take it and He'll show you the next one. You will end up being the right person in the right place at the right time. How does it work? Take a step, see a step.
Right now you need to be taking steps in the direction God seems to be leading before the waters part. That's the way to walk in His good and pleasing and perfect will, even if it looks risky, unconventional, and uncertain.
Like walking toward a door with no handle, it's a door that opens as you walk toward it.