Max Lucado Daily: A LESSON IN TRUST
In one of Henri Nouwen’s books, he tells about the lesson of trust he learned from a great trapeze artist. The acrobat said, “The flyer does nothing and the catcher does everything. I have simply to reach out my arms and hands and wait for him to catch me and pull me safely over the apron. The flyer must trust, with outstretched arms, that his catcher will be there for him.”
In the great trapeze act of salvation, God is the catcher, and we are the flyers. We trust. Period. We rely solely upon God’s ability to catch us. As we do trust Him, a wonderful thing happens– we fly! Your Father has never dropped anyone. He will not drop you. His grip is sturdy and his hands are open. Place yourself entirely in his care. As you do, you will find it is possible—yes, possible—to be anxious for nothing.
Read more Anxious for Nothing
Genesis 3
The serpent was clever, more clever than any wild animal God had made. He spoke to the Woman: “Do I understand that God told you not to eat from any tree in the garden?”
2-3 The Woman said to the serpent, “Not at all. We can eat from the trees in the garden. It’s only about the tree in the middle of the garden that God said, ‘Don’t eat from it; don’t even touch it or you’ll die.’”
4-5 The serpent told the Woman, “You won’t die. God knows that the moment you eat from that tree, you’ll see what’s really going on. You’ll be just like God, knowing everything, ranging all the way from good to evil.”
6 When the Woman saw that the tree looked like good eating and realized what she would get out of it—she’d know everything!—she took and ate the fruit and then gave some to her husband, and he ate.
7 Immediately the two of them did “see what’s really going on”—saw themselves naked! They sewed fig leaves together as makeshift clothes for themselves.
8 When they heard the sound of God strolling in the garden in the evening breeze, the Man and his Wife hid in the trees of the garden, hid from God.
9 God called to the Man: “Where are you?”
10 He said, “I heard you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked. And I hid.”
11 God said, “Who told you you were naked? Did you eat from that tree I told you not to eat from?”
12 The Man said, “The Woman you gave me as a companion, she gave me fruit from the tree, and, yes, I ate it.”
God said to the Woman, “What is this that you’ve done?”
13 “The serpent seduced me,” she said, “and I ate.”
14-15 God told the serpent:
“Because you’ve done this, you’re cursed,
cursed beyond all cattle and wild animals,
Cursed to slink on your belly
and eat dirt all your life.
I’m declaring war between you and the Woman,
between your offspring and hers.
He’ll wound your head,
you’ll wound his heel.”
16 He told the Woman:
“I’ll multiply your pains in childbirth;
you’ll give birth to your babies in pain.
You’ll want to please your husband,
but he’ll lord it over you.”
17-19 He told the Man:
“Because you listened to your wife
and ate from the tree
That I commanded you not to eat from,
‘Don’t eat from this tree,’
The very ground is cursed because of you;
getting food from the ground
Will be as painful as having babies is for your wife;
you’ll be working in pain all your life long.
The ground will sprout thorns and weeds,
you’ll get your food the hard way,
Planting and tilling and harvesting,
sweating in the fields from dawn to dusk,
Until you return to that ground yourself, dead and buried;
you started out as dirt, you’ll end up dirt.”
20 The Man, known as Adam, named his wife Eve because she was the mother of all the living.
21 God made leather clothing for Adam and his wife and dressed them.
22 God said, “The Man has become like one of us, capable of knowing everything, ranging from good to evil. What if he now should reach out and take fruit from the Tree-of-Life and eat, and live forever? Never—this cannot happen!”
23-24 So God expelled them from the Garden of Eden and sent them to work the ground, the same dirt out of which they’d been made. He threw them out of the garden and stationed angel-cherubim and a revolving sword of fire east of it, guarding the path to the Tree-of-Life.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Thursday, September 21, 2017
Read: Ephesians 6:18–19
Be prepared. You’re up against far more than you can handle on your own. Take all the help you can get, every weapon God has issued, so that when it’s all over but the shouting you’ll still be on your feet. Truth, righteousness, peace, faith, and salvation are more than words. Learn how to apply them. You’ll need them throughout your life. God’s Word is an indispensable weapon. In the same way, prayer is essential in this ongoing warfare. Pray hard and long. Pray for your brothers and sisters. Keep your eyes open. Keep each other’s spirits up so that no one falls behind or drops out.
19-20 And don’t forget to pray for me. Pray that I’ll know what to say and have the courage to say it at the right time, telling the mystery to one and all, the Message that I, jailbird preacher that I am, am responsible for getting out.
INSIGHT
Ask God to help you model faith and prayer this week to the younger generation—children or grandchildren, youth in your church, or children in your neighborhood.
For more on prayer, visit ourdailybread.org/topics/prayer/.
The Daily Prayer
By Cindy Hess Kasper
Pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. Ephesians 6:18
Singer/songwriter Robert Hamlet wrote “Lady Who Prays for Me” as a tribute to his mother who made a point of praying for her boys each morning before they went to the bus stop. After a young mom heard Hamlet sing his song, she committed to praying with her own little boy. The result was heartwarming! Just before her son went out the door, his mother prayed for him. Five minutes later he returned—bringing kids from the bus stop with him! His mom was taken aback and asked what was going on. The boy responded, “Their moms didn’t pray with them.”
In the book of Ephesians, Paul urges us to pray “on all occasions with all kinds of prayers” (6:18). Demonstrating our daily dependence on God is essential in a family since many children first learn to trust God as they observe genuine faith in the people closest to them (2 Tim. 1:5). There is no better way to teach the utmost importance of prayer than by praying for and with our children. It is one of the ways they begin to sense a compelling need to reach out personally to God in faith.
Daily prayers lessen daily worries.
When we “start children off” by modeling a “sincere faith” in God (Prov. 22:6; 2 Tim. 1:5), we give them a special gift, an assurance that God is an ever-present part of our lives—continually loving, guiding, and protecting us.
Help me to depend more fully on You in every moment of the day and to rest in the assurance that You are always with me.
Daily prayers lessen daily worries.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, September 21, 2017
The Missionary’s Predestined Purpose
Now the Lord says, who formed Me from the womb to be His Servant… —Isaiah 49:5
The first thing that happens after we recognize our election by God in Christ Jesus is the destruction of our preconceived ideas, our narrow-minded thinking, and all of our other allegiances— we are turned solely into servants of God’s own purpose. The entire human race was created to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. Sin has diverted the human race onto another course, but it has not altered God’s purpose to the slightest degree. And when we are born again we are brought into the realization of God’s great purpose for the human race, namely, that He created us for Himself. This realization of our election by God is the most joyful on earth, and we must learn to rely on this tremendous creative purpose of God. The first thing God will do is force the interests of the whole world through the channel of our hearts. The love of God, and even His very nature, is introduced into us. And we see the nature of Almighty God purely focused in John 3:16— “For God so loved the world….”
We must continually keep our soul open to the fact of God’s creative purpose, and never confuse or cloud it with our own intentions. If we do, God will have to force our intentions aside no matter how much it may hurt. A missionary is created for the purpose of being God’s servant, one in whom God is glorified. Once we realize that it is through the salvation of Jesus Christ that we are made perfectly fit for the purpose of God, we will understand why Jesus Christ is so strict and relentless in His demands. He demands absolute righteousness from His servants, because He has put into them the very nature of God.
Beware lest you forget God’s purpose for your life.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
We are in danger of being stern where God is tender, and of being tender where God is stern. The Love of God—The Message of Invincible Consolation, 673 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, September 21, 2017
Never Home Alone - #8009
I grew up as an only child. My parents took me to most of the places that they went, but I remember one time they left me home by myself. I was home alone. (You know, maybe somebody could make a movie about that someday.) Well, anyway, we lived in this third floor apartment on the south side of Chicago. It was getting very late. I was sitting near the back door waiting and they should have been home by now. I was worried. I remember hearing sirens and I thought, "Oh, no!" Okay, my imagination went crazy; it was taking me all over the place. I was thinking of all the bad things that might have happened to my parents. I was already there and then the sirens came. I was sure the sirens were for my mommy and my daddy, but they weren't. But the fear I had that night was so great, (How about this?) I still remember it don't I?
I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have A Word With You today about "Never Home Alone."
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Romans 8, beginning with verse 37. You probably know this fear of abandonment that I had that night. That's not unique to me, or even to a child. I'm thinking of a friend of ours who struggled her whole life with it. She was left by her parents a lot because they were in mission work and there were a lot of "goodbyes" and she was always vulnerable to some bad choices because she was always afraid that she'd lose what she loved and what loved her.
All right, Romans 8:37, referring to the most disastrous things that could happen to you in your life, "In all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced (Boy, here's the best news you might have ever heard.) that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, (Boy, this has got everything covered!) nor any powers, neither height nor depth (And that's like just in case I've forgotten anything.) neither anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus, our Lord."
This is where God promises one unloseable relationship. God created us to anchor ourselves to one relationship. The problem is that every other relationship on earth is losable. I think of the night when my wife was almost dying from hepatitis, and we weren't sure she'd make it and she was talking about the kinds of things people talk about when they think they may not make it. And I knelt by her bed and I said, "Dear God, please spare her." And I thank Him that He did spare her life. But that night I almost lost the one relationship I thought would never leave me. She said she would never choose to leave and I would never choose to leave her, but you know what? There come those times when the choice is out of our hands.
See, you need a relationship you can't lose, and you can't take Jesus away. He will not leave you-ever. He is the unloseable one. Any human love I receive, well, that's a welcome bonus, but my identity is supposed to be knowing Jesus. So, do you know Him? See, life is never secure until you belong to Christ. That begins the day you get your sin erased by putting your faith in what Jesus did when he died on the cross for that sin and then you're in His arms to stay.
Nothing in heaven, nothing on earth, nothing in hell can take you away from Him. Not because you're so good at hanging on, but because He's so good at hanging onto you. You've had your sins forgiven. The only thing that will keep you out of God's heaven is gone because you've put your trust in the One who died to remove them-Jesus, His One and only Son who's alive because He walked out of His grave. He can walk into your life today.
Earth folks will leave, but you can have a Savior who never, never will. He said, "I will never leave you or forsake you." (Hebrews 13:5) And you decide whether that relationship ever begins, and you decide when it begins. Let it be today. Tell Him, "Jesus, I'm Yours."
Pay a visit to our website today and you'll find there everything you need to know from God's Word about making sure you belong to Him. That website is ANewStory.com. Your new story could begin right there today.
The child in all of us hears the sirens. We imagine life without someone who loves us and we fear a future alone, and then Jesus steps in at your invitation and makes this awesome promise, "I am with you always." (Matthew 28:20)
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