Max Lucado Daily: TRIUMPH IN CHRIST
We honor the triumphant. The determined explorer returning from his discovery. The winning athlete holding aloft the triumphant trophy of victory. Yes, we love triumph. Triumph is fleeting, though. Hardly does one taste victory before it is gone.
The triumph of Christ is not temporary. “Triumphant in Christ” is not an event or an occasion. It is not fleeting. To be triumphant in Christ is a lifestyle…a state of being! To triumph in Christ is not something we do, it’s something we are. A victor in the world rejoices over something he did. But the believer rejoices over who he is—a child of God, a forgiven sinner, an heir of eternity. Nothing can separate us from our triumph in Christ. Nothing! Even though we are pressed on every side, the victory is still ours. Nothing can alter the loyalty of God!
From God is With You Every Day
2 Chronicles 24
King Joash
Joash was seven years old when he became king; he was king for forty years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Gazelle (Zibiah). She was from Beersheba.
2-3 Taught and trained by Jehoiada the priest, Joash did what pleased God throughout Jehoiada’s lifetime. Jehoiada picked out two wives for him; he had a family of both sons and daughters.
4-6 The time came when Joash determined to renovate The Temple of God. He got the priests and Levites together and said, “Circulate through the towns of Judah every year and collect money from the people to repair The Temple of your God. You are in charge of carrying this out.” But the Levites dragged their feet and didn’t do anything.
7 Then the king called in Jehoiada the chief priest and said, “Why haven’t you made the Levites bring in from Judah and Jerusalem the tax Moses, servant of God and the congregation, set for the upkeep of the place of worship? You can see how bad things are—wicked Queen Athaliah and her sons let The Temple of God go to ruin and took all its sacred artifacts for use in Baal worship.”
8-9 Following the king’s orders, they made a chest and placed it at the entrance to The Temple of God. Then they sent out a tax notice throughout Judah and Jerusalem: “Pay the tax that Moses the servant of God set when Israel was in the wilderness.”
10 The people and their leaders were glad to do it and cheerfully brought their money until the chest was full.
11-14 Whenever the Levites brought the chest in for a royal audit and found it to be full, the king’s secretary and the official of the chief priest would empty the chest and put it back in its place. Day after day they did this and collected a lot of money. The king and Jehoiada gave the money to the managers of The Temple project; they in turn paid the masons and carpenters for the repair work on The Temple of God. The construction workers kept at their jobs steadily until the restoration was complete—the house of God as good as new! When they had finished the work, they returned the surplus money to the king and Jehoiada, who used the money for making sacred vessels for Temple worship, vessels for the daily worship, for the Whole-Burnt-Offerings, bowls, and other gold and silver liturgical artifacts.
14-16 Whole-Burnt-Offerings were made regularly in The Temple of God throughout Jehoiada’s lifetime. He died at a ripe old age—130 years old! They buried him in the royal cemetery because he had such a distinguished life of service to Israel and God and God’s Temple.
17-19 But after the death of Jehoiada things fell apart. The leaders of Judah made a formal presentation to the king and he went along with them. Things went from bad to worse; they deserted The Temple of God and took up with the cult of sex goddesses. An angry cloud hovered over Judah and Jerusalem because of this sin. God sent prophets to straighten them out, warning of judgment. But nobody paid attention.
20 Then the Spirit of God moved Zechariah son of Jehoiada the priest to speak up: “God’s word: Why have you deliberately walked away from God’s commandments? You can’t live this way! If you walk out on God, he’ll walk out on you.”
21-22 But they worked out a plot against Zechariah, and with the complicity of the king—he actually gave the order!—they murdered him, pelting him with rocks, right in the court of The Temple of God. That’s the thanks King Joash showed the loyal Jehoiada, the priest who had made him king. He murdered Jehoiada’s son. Zechariah’s last words were, “Look, God! Make them pay for this!”
23-24 A year or so later Aramean troops attacked Joash. They invaded Judah and Jerusalem, massacred the leaders, and shipped all their plunder back to the king in Damascus. The Aramean army was quite small, but God used them to wipe out Joash’s large army—their punishment for deserting God, the God of their ancestors. Arameans implemented God’s judgment against Joash.
25-27 They left Joash badly wounded and his own servants finished him off—it was a palace conspiracy, avenging the murder of the son of Jehoiada the priest. They killed him in his bed. Afterward they buried him in the City of David, but he was not honored with a grave in the royal cemetery. The temple conspirators were Zabad, whose mother was Shimeath from Ammon, and Jehozabad, whose mother was Shimrith from Moab. The story of his sons, the many sermons preached to Joash, and the account of his repairs on The Temple of God can be found contained in the commentary on the royal history.
Amaziah, Joash’s son, was the next king.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Read: Psalm 121
A Pilgrim Song
I look up to the mountains;
does my strength come from mountains?
No, my strength comes from God,
who made heaven, and earth, and mountains.
3-4 He won’t let you stumble,
your Guardian God won’t fall asleep.
Not on your life! Israel’s
Guardian will never doze or sleep.
5-6 God’s your Guardian,
right at your side to protect you—
Shielding you from sunstroke,
sheltering you from moonstroke.
7-8 God guards you from every evil,
he guards your very life.
He guards you when you leave and when you return,
he guards you now, he guards you always.
INSIGHT:
Psalm 121 is the second in a series of fifteen psalms known as “songs of ascent.” They are a collection of songs by different composers, with four attributed to David and one to Solomon. Ten are anonymous. If they did not all carry the superscription “a song of ascent,” they might appear unrelated. The superscription, however, shows they are connected in the liturgy of ancient Israel. One view is that they were sung by the Levitical worship leaders (priests) as they ascended the steps into the temple in Jerusalem. The more prevalent view is that these psalms were assembled so that pilgrims traveling to Jerusalem to celebrate the three annual high feasts in community could sing them on their journey (Deut. 16:16).
Relief from the Scorching Sun
By Amy Boucher Pye
The Lord is your shade at your right hand. Psalm 121:5
Living in Britain, I don’t usually worry about sunburn. After all, the sun is often blocked by a thick cover of clouds. But recently I spent some time in Spain, and I quickly realized that with my pale skin, I could only be out in the sunshine for ten minutes before I needed to scurry back under the umbrella.
As I considered the scorching nature of the Mediterranean sun, I began to understand more deeply the meaning of the image of the Lord God as His people’s shade at their right hand. Residents of the Middle East knew unrelenting heat, and they needed to find shelter from the sun’s burning rays.
We can find a safe place in the Lord.
The psalmist uses this picture of the Lord as shade in Psalm 121, which can be understood as a conversation on a heart level—a dialogue with oneself about the Lord’s goodness and faithfulness. When we use this psalm in prayer, we reassure ourselves that the Lord will never leave us, for He forms a protective covering over us. And just as we take shelter from the sun underneath umbrellas, so too can we find a safe place in the Lord.
We lift our eyes to the “Maker of heaven and earth” (vv. 1–2) because whether we are in times of sunshine or times of rain, we receive His gifts of protection, relief, and refreshment.
Heavenly Father, You protect me. Shield me from anything that would take my focus away from You.
We find refuge in the Lord.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
The Holy Suffering of the Saint
Let those who suffer according to the will of God commit their souls to Him in doing good… —1 Peter 4:19
Choosing to suffer means that there must be something wrong with you, but choosing God’s will— even if it means you will suffer— is something very different. No normal, healthy saint ever chooses suffering; he simply chooses God’s will, just as Jesus did, whether it means suffering or not. And no saint should ever dare to interfere with the lesson of suffering being taught in another saint’s life.
The saint who satisfies the heart of Jesus will make other saints strong and mature for God. But the people used to strengthen us are never those who sympathize with us; in fact, we are hindered by those who give us their sympathy, because sympathy only serves to weaken us. No one better understands a saint than the saint who is as close and as intimate with Jesus as possible. If we accept the sympathy of another saint, our spontaneous feeling is, “God is dealing too harshly with me and making my life too difficult.” That is why Jesus said that self-pity was of the devil (see Matthew 16:21-23). We must be merciful to God’s reputation. It is easy for us to tarnish God’s character because He never argues back; He never tries to defend or vindicate Himself. Beware of thinking that Jesus needed sympathy during His life on earth. He refused the sympathy of people because in His great wisdom He knew that no one on earth understood His purpose (see Matthew 16:23). He accepted only the sympathy of His Father and the angels (see Luke 15:10).
Look at God’s incredible waste of His saints, according to the world’s judgment. God seems to plant His saints in the most useless places. And then we say, “God intends for me to be here because I am so useful to Him.” Yet Jesus never measured His life by how or where He was of the greatest use. God places His saints where they will bring the most glory to Him, and we are totally incapable of judging where that may be.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
The great word of Jesus to His disciples is Abandon. When God has brought us into the relationship of disciples, we have to venture on His word; trust entirely to Him and watch that when He brings us to the venture, we take it.
Studies in the Sermon on the Mount
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Wednesday, August 10, 2016
Yesterday's Power, Today's Needs - #7718
There was no warning. All the power just suddenly went out in this building where we had our offices. No thunder, no lightning, no wind - just a sudden shutdown of our computers, our phones, our heat, all our power. In an instant, like our building was dead. And it stayed dead for two full days making for some interesting opportunities to be resourceful, flexible, adaptable, and inefficient! Our offices were in a pretty old building. And when they dug into the cause of the shutdown, they found that some antique electric part in the building had finally just died. Since this part was apparently original equipment – we think from the Revolutionary War – It was impossible to find another part like it. They don't make them anymore! So we were talking some creative electrical work here! Those old connections just couldn't deliver what was needed for today's demands!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have A Word With You today about "Yesterday's Power, Today's Needs."
You just can't get the power you need for today from yesterday's connections. The power failure in our building proved that; the power failure in people's lives proves that! See, if you're trying to meet the demands of your family, your responsibilities, your problems, your burdens, your ministry with yesterday's connections, you're often going to fall short of the power you need. And right now, the events and pressures you're facing may be heavily underscoring your need for greater spiritual power to handle them.
Then this would be a good time to look at a Biblical picture of how God supplies the resources you need, the resources you could never come up with yourself. His people, the Jews, are in the wilderness where there is no real food supply to meet the demands of hundreds of thousands of people; a massive need with woefully inadequate resources. Sound familiar? Well, here comes the manna.
Our word for today from the Word of God – Exodus 16 beginning at verse 4, "Then the Lord said to Moses, 'I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day." Well, when the manna fell that first manna-morning, the Bible says, "Each one gathered as much as he needed" (16:18). "Then Moses said to them, 'No one is to keep any of it until morning.' However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell." It's tough enough to wake up in the morning; it's really tough when you wake up to Maggot Krispies for breakfast!
But God was teaching a vivid lesson here. He supplies what we need in 24-hour deliveries – always fresh resources, always new mercies for this new morning. And no matter how high a mountain of manna you may have piled up on Monday, it isn't going to be what you need for Tuesday. Old resources will not meet today's new needs.
Unfortunately, too many times we try to coast on manna we got from God last week, or last month, or even longer ago. But, like the building our offices were in, you just couldn't keep trying to meet today's demands with some old connections you had to the Source of power. You may have some tremendous memories in your spiritual scrapbook, some great times with the Lord in the past, but you've gotten so busy-or maybe just lazy or careless-and you've been relying on what did go on between you and God to meet the demands of what's going on now. And the lights are flickering, the power is failing.
Maybe you need to get on your knees today and say, "Lord, I need a fresh touch, some new victories, a fresh cleansing of the dirt that I've allowed to accumulate, a renewing of my attitude, a new Holy Spirit takeover." If you've been relying on yesterday's connections, a power failure is inevitable. Each new day, go for a fresh touch from God-today's connection for today's needs.