Zechariah 8, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

Max Lucado Daily: GIVE GOD YOUR WHOLE HEART

God gives us more by going deeper than we ask. He not only wants your whole heart—He wants your heart whole. Why? Hurt people hurt people. Think about it. Why do you fly off the handle? Why do you avoid conflict? Why do you seek to please everyone? Might your tendencies have something to do with an unhealed hurt in your heart? God wants to help you for your sake.

Your family history has some sad chapters. But your history doesn’t have to be your future. The generational garbage can stop here and now. You don’t have to give your kids what your ancestors gave you. Talk to God about the scandals and scoundrels. Invite Him to relive the betrayal with you. The process may take a long time. It may take a lifetime. It may be difficult, for certain. But let God do His work!

From You’ll Get Through This

Zechariah  8

Rebuilding the Temple

1-2 And then these Messages from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:
“I am zealous for Zion—I care!
    I’m angry about Zion—I’m involved!”
God’s Message:

3 “I’ve come back to Zion,
    I’ve moved back to Jerusalem.
Jerusalem’s new names will be Truth City,
    and Mountain of God-of-the-Angel-Armies,
    and Mount Holiness.”
4-5 A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

“Old men and old women will come back to Jerusalem, sit on benches on the streets and spin tales, move around safely with their canes—a good city to grow old in. And boys and girls will fill the public parks, laughing and playing—a good city to grow up in.”

6 A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

“Do the problems of returning and rebuilding by just a few survivors seem too much? But is anything too much for me? Not if I have my say.”

7-8 A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

“I’ll collect my people from countries to the east and countries to the west. I’ll bring them back and move them into Jerusalem. They’ll be my people and I’ll be their God. I’ll stick with them and do right by them.”

9-10 A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

“Get a grip on things. Hold tight, you who are listening to what I say through the preaching of the prophets. The Temple of God-of-the-Angel-Armies has been reestablished. The Temple is being rebuilt. We’ve come through a hard time: You worked for a pittance and were lucky to get that; the streets were dangerous; you could never let down your guard; I had turned the world into an armed camp.

11-12 “But things have changed. I’m taking the side of my core of surviving people:

Sowing and harvesting will resume,
Vines will grow grapes,
Gardens will flourish,
Dew and rain will make everything green.
12-13 “My core survivors will get everything they need—and more. You’ve gotten a reputation as a bad-news people, you people of Judah and Israel, but I’m coming to save you. From now on, you’re the good-news people. Don’t be afraid. Keep a firm grip on what I’m doing.”

Keep Your Lives Simple and Honest
14-17 A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

“In the same way that I decided to punish you when your ancestors made me angry, and didn’t pull my punches, at this time I’ve decided to bless Jerusalem and the country of Judah. Don’t be afraid. And now here’s what I want you to do: Tell the truth, the whole truth, when you speak. Do the right thing by one another, both personally and in your courts. Don’t cook up plans to take unfair advantage of others. Don’t do or say what isn’t so. I hate all that stuff. Keep your lives simple and honest.” Decree of God.

18-19 Again I received a Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

“The days of mourning set for the fourth, fifth, seventh, and tenth months will be turned into days of feasting for Judah—celebration and holiday. Embrace truth! Love peace!”

20-21 A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

“People and their leaders will come from all over to see what’s going on. The leaders will confer with one another: ‘Shouldn’t we try to get in on this? Get in on God’s blessings? Pray to God-of-the-Angel-Armies? What’s keeping us? Let’s go!’

22 “Lots of people, powerful nations—they’ll come to Jerusalem looking for what they can get from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, looking to get a blessing from God.”

23 A Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies:

“At that time, ten men speaking a variety of languages will grab the sleeve of one Jew, hold tight, and say, ‘Let us go with you. We’ve heard that God is with you.’”

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion   
Tuesday, July 04, 2017

Read: Romans 6:15–23

What Is True Freedom?
15-18 So, since we’re out from under the old tyranny, does that mean we can live any old way we want? Since we’re free in the freedom of God, can we do anything that comes to mind? Hardly. You know well enough from your own experience that there are some acts of so-called freedom that destroy freedom. Offer yourselves to sin, for instance, and it’s your last free act. But offer yourselves to the ways of God and the freedom never quits. All your lives you’ve let sin tell you what to do. But thank God you’ve started listening to a new master, one whose commands set you free to live openly in his freedom!

19 I’m using this freedom language because it’s easy to picture. You can readily recall, can’t you, how at one time the more you did just what you felt like doing—not caring about others, not caring about God—the worse your life became and the less freedom you had? And how much different is it now as you live in God’s freedom, your lives healed and expansive in holiness?

20-21 As long as you did what you felt like doing, ignoring God, you didn’t have to bother with right thinking or right living, or right anything for that matter. But do you call that a free life? What did you get out of it? Nothing you’re proud of now. Where did it get you? A dead end.

22-23 But now that you’ve found you don’t have to listen to sin tell you what to do, and have discovered the delight of listening to God telling you, what a surprise! A whole, healed, put-together life right now, with more and more of life on the way! Work hard for sin your whole life and your pension is death. But God’s gift is real life, eternal life, delivered by Jesus, our Master.

INSIGHT:
Some of the spiritual giants of the church were profoundly changed by Paul’s Spirit-inspired words in Romans. One of those was Martin Luther (1483–1546), a German theologian, writer, and reformer of the church. As a monk, Luther struggled with the impossible task of trying to be righteous on his own merits or works. The words of Romans 1:17, “The righteous will live by faith,” led Luther to realize that justification (being made holy) is through faith by God’s grace alone. God through His Word lifts the burden of sin and sets us free.

Who can you share the freeing words of Romans with today? Alyson Kieda
Celebrate Freedom

By Julie Ackerman Link

The law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. Romans 8:2

After being kidnapped, held hostage for thirteen days, and released, New Zealand news cameraman Olaf Wiig, with a broad smile on his face, announced, “I feel more alive now than I have in my entire life.”

For reasons difficult to understand, being freed is more exhilarating than being free.

The law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death. Romans 8:2
For those who enjoy freedom every day, Olaf’s joy was a good reminder of how easily we forget how blessed we are. This is also true spiritually. Those of us who have been Christians for a long time often forget what it’s like to be held hostage by sin. We can become complacent and even ungrateful. But then God sends a reminder in the form of a new believer who gives an exuberant testimony of what God has done in his or her life, and once again we see the joy that is ours when we are “free from the law of sin and death” (Rom. 8:2).

If freedom has become boring to you, or if you tend to focus on what you can’t do, consider this: Not only are you no longer a slave to sin, but you are freed to be holy and to enjoy eternal life with Christ Jesus! (6:22).

Celebrate your freedom in Christ by taking the time to thank God for the things you are able and free to do as His servant.

What are you thankful for? Share on our Facebook page:
 Facebook.com/ourdailybread.

Living for Christ brings true freedom.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Tuesday, July 04, 2017
One of God’s Great “Don’ts”
Do not fret— it only causes harm. —Psalm 37:8
  
Fretting means getting ourselves “out of joint” mentally or spiritually. It is one thing to say, “Do not fret,” but something very different to have such a nature that you find yourself unable to fret. It’s easy to say, “Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him” (Psalm 37:7) until our own little world is turned upside down and we are forced to live in confusion and agony like so many other people. Is it possible to “rest in the Lord” then? If this “Do not” doesn’t work there, then it will not work anywhere. This “Do not” must work during our days of difficulty and uncertainty, as well as our peaceful days, or it will never work. And if it will not work in your particular case, it will not work for anyone else. Resting in the Lord is not dependent on your external circumstances at all, but on your relationship with God Himself.

Worrying always results in sin. We tend to think that a little anxiety and worry are simply an indication of how wise we really are, yet it is actually a much better indication of just how wicked we are. Fretting rises from our determination to have our own way. Our Lord never worried and was never anxious, because His purpose was never to accomplish His own plans but to fulfill God’s plans. Fretting is wickedness for a child of God.

Have you been propping up that foolish soul of yours with the idea that your circumstances are too much for God to handle? Set all your opinions and speculations aside and “abide under the shadow of the Almighty” (Psalm 91:1). Deliberately tell God that you will not fret about whatever concerns you. All our fretting and worrying is caused by planning without God.

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

We must keep ourselves in touch, not with theories, but with people, and never get out of touch with human beings, if we are going to use the word of God skilfully amongst them.  Workmen of God, 1341 L


A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Tuesday, July 04, 2017

The Most Dangerous Place In the World - #7952

Years ago I heard a friend tell about a scene from his childhood that he never forgot. My friend was around on that black day in 1929 that marked the beginning of the Great Depression. One of the great traumas of America's financial collapse, of course, was that many banks just went under almost overnight. Well, my friend literally remembered seeing a neighbor at the locked gates of his bank, and he was literally pounding his fists bloody on those gates, screaming at the top of his lungs, "Give me my money! Give me my money!" There was no money to give.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Most Dangerous Place in The World".

That desperate man, and millions like him, placed their security in an institution. An institution that sure seemed safe but that ultimately and suddenly failed them. A lot of church folks are making that mistake today. Did you know that? Placing their eternal security in their church; in believing its beliefs, attending its meetings, even taking church leadership. Sadly, none of that's enough to get your sins forgiven or to get you into God's heaven.

Sometimes religious folks argue over which church is the right church. Well, in Jeremiah's time there was no argument. God's people were the Jews and their temple was God's self-declared house on earth. But even that wasn't enough.

In our word for today from the Word of God, in Jeremiah 7, beginning with verse 10, God says, "You come and stand before Me in this house, which bears my Name, and you say 'We are safe'...'But I have been watching,' declares the Lord." God goes on to point out the sin in their lives – sin that no amount of 'church' can make right. He goes on to describe His pending destruction of what God calls (Listen to these words.) "the temple you trust in."

Boy, that's the danger of being religious. You tend to trust in your religiousness instead of in Christ. Christianity will never get anyone to heaven. Only Christ can get you there. Only Christ died to pay for the sin that disqualifies every one of us from going to heaven. Jesus established the Church to represent Him on earth, to do His work on earth. But church can be the most dangerous place in the world if that's where your trust is.

Christianity is all about Jesus, but it can actually cause you to miss Jesus. It's called false security; feeling like you're okay with God because you speak the language, you agree with the teachings, and you've been around it all these years. Why, no one would even question that you have a relationship with Jesus – except Jesus. And He's the only One who matters.

Could it be that somehow in the midst of a religion all about Jesus you've missed a personal relationship with Jesus even while you've been a good church person for a long time? Jesus described some active church folks to whom He will say on Judgment Day, "I never knew you" (Matthew 7:21-23).

Somehow, they have never actually given themselves in total faith to the One who died to pay for their sins. There has to be that time when you say, "Jesus, some of those sins You died for were mine, and I have no hope of heaven except You and what You did on the cross for me. So beginning right now, Jesus, I'm yours."

Have you taken that step? I would say that if you don't know, you probably haven't. If you've missed it, don't go another day without moving Christ from your head to your heart...from being a belief to being your own personal Savior. Tell Him today, "Jesus, I'm yours."

Look, let me invite you to go to our website at your first opportunity today. Because I've laid out there a way you can be sure that you belong to Jesus Christ now and forever. And I know that's what you want. It's ANewStory.com.

The church you've trusted in, the religion you've trusted in, the goodness you've trusted in are inadequate substitutes for the real thing – putting your total trust in Jesus. Because it's all about Jesus!