Max Lucado Daily: BE GRATEFUL
“How’s life?” someone asks. And we who have been resurrected from the dead respond, “Well, things could be better” or “I couldn’t get a parking place” or “My parents won’t let me move to Hawaii” or “People won’t leave me alone so I can finish my sermon on selfishness.” Really? Are you so focused on what you don’t have that you are blind to what you do have? If so, then come. Come thirsty. Come and drink deeply from God’s goodness.
You have a ticket to heaven no thief can take,
an eternal home no divorce can break.
Every sin of your life has been cast into the sea.
Every mistake you’ve made is nailed to the tree.
You are blood-bought and heaven-made.
A child of God—forever saved.
So be grateful, joyful—for isn’t it true?
What you don’t have is much less than what you do!
From A Love Worth Giving
Ezekiel 30
Egypt on Fire
1-5 God, the Master, spoke to me: “Son of man, preach. Give them the Message of God, the Master. Wail:
“‘Doomsday!’
Time’s up!
God’s big day of judgment is near.
Thick clouds are rolling in.
It’s doomsday for the nations.
Death will rain down on Egypt.
Terror will paralyze Ethiopia
When they see the Egyptians killed,
their wealth hauled off,
their foundations demolished,
And Ethiopia, Put, Lud, Arabia, Libya
—all of Egypt’s old allies—
killed right along with them.
6-8 “‘God says:
“‘Egypt’s allies will fall
and her proud strength will collapse—
From Migdol in the north to Syene in the south,
a great slaughter in Egypt!
Decree of God, the Master.
Egypt, most desolate of the desolate,
her cities wasted beyond wasting,
Will realize that I am God
when I burn her down
and her helpers are knocked flat.
9 “‘When that happens, I’ll send out messengers by ship to sound the alarm among the easygoing Ethiopians. They’ll be terrorized. Egypt’s doomed! Judgment’s coming!
10-12 “‘God, the Master, says:
“‘I’ll put a stop to Egypt’s arrogance.
I’ll use Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon to do it.
He and his army, the most brutal of nations,
shall be used to destroy the country.
They’ll brandish their swords
and fill Egypt with corpses.
I’ll dry up the Nile
and sell off the land to a bunch of crooks.
I’ll hire outsiders to come in
and waste the country, strip it clean.
I, God, have said so.
13-19 “‘And now this is what God, the Master, says:
“‘I’ll smash all the no-god idols;
I’ll topple all those huge statues in Memphis.
The prince of Egypt will be gone for good,
and in his place I’ll put fear—fear throughout Egypt!
I’ll demolish Pathros,
burn Zoan to the ground, and punish Thebes,
Pour my wrath on Pelusium, Egypt’s fort,
and knock Thebes off its proud pedestal.
I’ll set Egypt on fire:
Pelusium will writhe in pain,
Thebes blown away,
Memphis raped.
The young warriors of On and Pi-beseth
will be killed and the cities exiled.
A dark day for Tahpanhes
when I shatter Egypt,
When I break Egyptian power
and put an end to her arrogant oppression!
She’ll disappear in a cloud of dust,
her cities hauled off as exiles.
That’s how I’ll punish Egypt,
and that’s how she’ll realize that I am God.’”
20 In the eleventh year, on the seventh day of the first month, God’s Message came to me:
21 “Son of man, I’ve broken the arm of Pharaoh king of Egypt. And look! It hasn’t been set. No splint has been put on it so the bones can knit and heal, so he can use a sword again.
22-26 “Therefore, God, the Master, says, I am dead set against Pharaoh king of Egypt and will go ahead and break his other arm—both arms broken! There’s no way he’ll ever swing a sword again. I’ll scatter Egyptians all over the world. I’ll make the arms of the king of Babylon strong and put my sword in his hand, but I’ll break the arms of Pharaoh and he’ll groan like one who is mortally wounded. I’ll make the arms of the king of Babylon strong, but the arms of Pharaoh shall go limp. The Egyptians will realize that I am God when I place my sword in the hand of the king of Babylon. He’ll wield it against Egypt and I’ll scatter Egyptians all over the world. Then they’ll realize that I am God.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Tuesday, May 23, 2017
Read: Luke 9:51–56
When it came close to the time for his Ascension, he gathered up his courage and steeled himself for the journey to Jerusalem. He sent messengers on ahead. They came to a Samaritan village to make arrangements for his hospitality. But when the Samaritans learned that his destination was Jerusalem, they refused hospitality. When the disciples James and John learned of it, they said, “Master, do you want us to call a bolt of lightning down out of the sky and incinerate them?”
55-56 Jesus turned on them: “Of course not!” And they traveled on to another village.
INSIGHT:
Luke 9:51 says, “Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem.” Christ was deliberately going to Jerusalem to face even more opposition because of His commitment to die on the cross for our redemption. When James and John rightly perceived opposition to their Master, they wrongly responded with an attitude of vindictive punishment. Most likely they were thinking of Elijah calling down fire from heaven (2 Kings 1:10–12) and the fire that fell in judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 19). Yet they missed the point that Jesus’s truth claims are submitted for human consideration without coercion or duress.
As one theologian wisely said: “God is a Gentleman and will not violate our own free will.” The time of judgment that is most certainly coming has its own set time in God’s calendar. Before it arrives, each human being who hears the gospel has the freedom to believe it or reject it. God is “patient with [us],” the apostle Peter wrote, “not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).
How might you show grace and faithfulness in letting your gospel light shine today regardless of the response?
Defending God
By Tim Gustafson
A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. Proverbs 15:1
The anti-God bumper stickers covering the car seized the attention of a university professor. As a former atheist himself, the professor thought perhaps the owner wanted to make believers angry. “The anger helps the atheist to justify his atheism,” he explained. Then he warned, “All too often, the atheist gets exactly what he is looking for.”
In recalling his own journey to faith, this professor noted the concern of a Christian friend who invited him to consider the truth of Christ. His friend’s “sense of urgency was conveyed without a trace of anger.” He never forgot the genuine respect and grace he received that day.
A gentle answer turns away wrath. Proverbs 15:1
Believers in Jesus often take offense when others reject Him. But how does He feel about that rejection? Jesus constantly faced threats and hatred, yet He never took doubt about His deity personally. Once, when a village refused Him hospitality, James and John wanted instant retaliation. “Lord,” they asked, “do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?” (Luke 9:54). Jesus didn’t want that, and He “turned and rebuked them” (v. 55). After all, “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him” (John 3:17).
It may surprise us to consider that God doesn’t need us to defend Him. He wants us to represent Him! That takes time, work, restraint, and love.
Lord, when we are confronted with hate, help us not to be haters but to respond as Your Son did: “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” (Luke 23:34)
The best way to defend Jesus is to live like Him.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Tuesday, May 23, 2017
Our Careful Unbelief
…do not worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; nor about your body, what you will put on. —Matthew 6:25
Jesus summed up commonsense carefulness in the life of a disciple as unbelief. If we have received the Spirit of God, He will squeeze right through our lives, as if to ask, “Now where do I come into this relationship, this vacation you have planned, or these new books you want to read?” And He always presses the point until we learn to make Him our first consideration. Whenever we put other things first, there is confusion.
“…do not worry about your life….” Don’t take the pressure of your provision upon yourself. It is not only wrong to worry, it is unbelief; worrying means we do not believe that God can look after the practical details of our lives, and it is never anything but those details that worry us. Have you ever noticed what Jesus said would choke the Word He puts in us? Is it the devil? No— “the cares of this world” (Matthew 13:22). It is always our little worries. We say, “I will not trust when I cannot see”— and that is where unbelief begins. The only cure for unbelief is obedience to the Spirit.
The greatest word of Jesus to His disciples is abandon.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Beware of bartering the Word of God for a more suitable conception of your own. Disciples Indeed, 386 R
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Tuesday, May 23, 2017
Heart Holes - #7922
I'm not sure if it's harder for a baby to have major surgery or adults like us. At least the baby has no idea of what's going on – which might make it easier. We know too much. We worry a lot. Little Jamie? He was not even a year old, but he had to undergo heart surgery; which I associate kind of with older people. Jamie was the nephew of one of our team members, and she was from Australia. The miles made it pretty tough on her, so we all joined her in praying for this little guy so far away. And thankfully, Jamie came through with flying colors. His heart was fixed. It was a tough operation, but it had to be done. You see, Jamie, they said, had a hole in his heart, and you can't just leave it that way!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Heart Holes."
It's understood that a hole in the human heart is serious business and that you have to take corrective action to get it fixed. Thank God, there are surgeons with the ability to do just that. But when it comes to emotional holes and the spiritual holes in the human heart, it's amazing how many people are walking around with that heart condition totally untreated. But, like its physical equivalent, a hole in your heart spiritually will greatly limit what your life could be, and one day it will cost you your life. The good news is there's a surgeon who repairs the spiritual hole in the human heart. He's done it for many people. He's done it for a long time.
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from John 4. It's a story out of Jesus' life. It's noon, it's hot, and Jesus stops at a well for a meeting that it turns out God has arranged. A woman arrives at the well with her water pot to get another day's water supply. She has no idea Jesus knows all about her. She's a woman with a past, with a reputation, with a lot of mistakes, a lot of men in her life. As the conversation proceeds, she's forced to admit that she's been divorced five times and she's currently living with another guy. Her life has been an endless search for love and fulfillment in a series of unfulfilling relationships. She's got a hole in her heart that's never gone away. Maybe like you.
Jesus addresses it in a disarming way by comparing it to the physical thirst that brings her to the well that very day. Verse 13 of chapter 4, He says, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again." Thirsty again. You know, that's a word picture for our lifelong search for something that will quench the thirst in our soul – to fill the hole in our heart. It could be that every relationship, every accomplishment, every religion has left you "thirsty again."
Listen to Jesus' offer: "But whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life." Who needs all these trips to wells that never fill you up when Jesus could put a spiritual and emotional spring inside you that will finally quench your thirst.
All our lives, it's our creator we've been thirsty for, because all of the me-first, sinful choices of our life have cut us off from the One who made us, whose love we were made for. But all the garbage was heaped on Jesus when He went to the cross to pay for your sin and mine so we could finally find that peace-giving relationship with God we've needed all along.
It's a relationship that's within your reach right now; if you'll tell Jesus you want Him to be your Savior from your sin. That woman we just read about did not have "meeting the Savior" on her list for that day, and you probably didn't either. But Jesus met her where she was, which is what He's doing with you right now. So today could be your last trip to wells that never satisfy.
Would you tell Him, "Jesus, if you died for me, I know I can trust you with my life. I need my sins erased from God's Book. I want the life that lasts forever. I want to ask you into my life this very day. ANewStory.com. If you can remember that, that's our website, and that's where you'll get all the story of how Jesus' story can change your story forever.
See, Jesus is the only Heart Surgeon who can finally repair the lifetime spiritual hole in your heart. Why go one more day with the emptiness inside, when the Son of God has come to fill it forever?
