Max Lucado Daily: WORRY STOPPERS TO BRING PEACE
Here are eight worry-stoppers, found in the letters of the word P-E-A-C-E-F-U-L.
Pray, first. “Casting the whole of your care upon Him …”
Easy, now. “Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him.”
Act on it. Be a doer, not a stewer.
Compile a worry list. Keep a list of things that trouble you. How many have turned into a reality?
Evaluate your worry categories. Pray specifically about them.
Focus on today. God meets daily needs daily.
Unleash a worry army. Ask a few loved ones to pray with you and for you.
Let God be enough. “Seek the Kingdom of God above all else.”
Eight steps. P-E-A-C-E-F-U-L.
Read more Fearless
2 Samuel 12
But God was not at all pleased with what David had done, 12 1-3 and sent Nathan to David. Nathan said to him, “There were two men in the same city—one rich, the other poor. The rich man had huge flocks of sheep, herds of cattle. The poor man had nothing but one little female lamb, which he had bought and raised. It grew up with him and his children as a member of the family. It ate off his plate and drank from his cup and slept on his bed. It was like a daughter to him.
4 “One day a traveler dropped in on the rich man. He was too stingy to take an animal from his own herds or flocks to make a meal for his visitor, so he took the poor man’s lamb and prepared a meal to set before his guest.”
5-6 David exploded in anger. “As surely as God lives,” he said to Nathan, “the man who did this ought to be lynched! He must repay for the lamb four times over for his crime and his stinginess!”
7-12 “You’re the man!” said Nathan. “And here’s what God, the God of Israel, has to say to you: I made you king over Israel. I freed you from the fist of Saul. I gave you your master’s daughter and other wives to have and to hold. I gave you both Israel and Judah. And if that hadn’t been enough, I’d have gladly thrown in much more. So why have you treated the word of God with brazen contempt, doing this great evil? You murdered Uriah the Hittite, then took his wife as your wife. Worse, you killed him with an Ammonite sword! And now, because you treated God with such contempt and took Uriah the Hittite’s wife as your wife, killing and murder will continually plague your family. This is God speaking, remember! I’ll make trouble for you out of your own family. I’ll take your wives from right out in front of you. I’ll give them to some neighbor, and he’ll go to bed with them openly. You did your deed in secret; I’m doing mine with the whole country watching!”
13-14 Then David confessed to Nathan, “I’ve sinned against God.”
Nathan pronounced, “Yes, but that’s not the last word. God forgives your sin. You won’t die for it. But because of your blasphemous behavior, the son born to you will die.”
15-18 After Nathan went home, God afflicted the child that Uriah’s wife bore to David, and he came down sick. David prayed desperately to God for the little boy. He fasted, wouldn’t go out, and slept on the floor. The elders in his family came in and tried to get him off the floor, but he wouldn’t budge. Nor could they get him to eat anything. On the seventh day the child died. David’s servants were afraid to tell him. They said, “What do we do now? While the child was living he wouldn’t listen to a word we said. Now, with the child dead, if we speak to him there’s no telling what he’ll do.”
19 David noticed that the servants were whispering behind his back, and realized that the boy must have died.
He asked the servants, “Is the boy dead?”
“Yes,” they answered. “He’s dead.”
20 David got up from the floor, washed his face and combed his hair, put on a fresh change of clothes, then went into the sanctuary and worshiped. Then he came home and asked for something to eat. They set it before him and he ate.
21 His servants asked him, “What’s going on with you? While the child was alive you fasted and wept and stayed up all night. Now that he’s dead, you get up and eat.”
22-23 “While the child was alive,” he said, “I fasted and wept, thinking God might have mercy on me and the child would live. But now that he’s dead, why fast? Can I bring him back now? I can go to him, but he can’t come to me.”
24-25 David went and comforted his wife Bathsheba. And when he slept with her, they conceived a son. When he was born they named him Solomon. God had a special love for him and sent word by Nathan the prophet that God wanted him named Jedidiah (God’s Beloved).
26-30 Joab, at war in Rabbah against the Ammonites, captured the royal city. He sent messengers to David saying, “I’m fighting at Rabbah, and I’ve just captured the city’s water supply. Hurry and get the rest of the troops together and set up camp here at the city and complete the capture yourself. Otherwise, I’ll capture it and get all the credit instead of you.” So David marshaled all the troops, went to Rabbah, and fought and captured it. He took the crown from their king’s head—very heavy with gold, and with a precious stone in it. It ended up on David’s head. And they plundered the city, carrying off a great quantity of loot.
31 David emptied the city of its people and put them to slave labor using saws, picks, and axes, and making bricks. He did this to all the Ammonite cities. Then David and the whole army returned to Jerusalem.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Friday, January 11, 2019
Today's Scripture & Insight:
Ephesians 3:16-21
14-19 My response is to get down on my knees before the Father, this magnificent Father who parcels out all heaven and earth. I ask him to strengthen you by his Spirit—not a brute strength but a glorious inner strength—that Christ will live in you as you open the door and invite him in. And I ask him that with both feet planted firmly on love, you’ll be able to take in with all followers of Jesus the extravagant dimensions of Christ’s love. Reach out and experience the breadth! Test its length! Plumb the depths! Rise to the heights! Live full lives, full in the fullness of God.
20-21 God can do anything, you know—far more than you could ever imagine or guess or request in your wildest dreams! He does it not by pushing us around but by working within us, his Spirit deeply and gently within us.
Glory to God in the church!
Glory to God in the Messiah, in Jesus!
Glory down all the generations!
Glory through all millennia! Oh, yes!
Insight
Ephesians 3:16–21 is actually a prayer that flows out of the context of Ephesians 2, where Paul outlines what God has done for us. Though we were dead in our sins, God gave us new life (2:1–10) and brought Jews and Gentiles together to form His church (2:11–22). In Ephesians 3 Paul builds on that by saying, “For this reason . . .” (3:1). But then he interrupts himself to explain his own unique role in sharing the “mystery” of the church with them (vv. 2–6). All of this sets the stage for verses 16–21, as he returns to the phrase of 3:1, “For this reason . . .” (v. 14). Throughout Ephesians we see the theme of God’s lavish and unmerited grace and “glorious riches” (v. 16) extended to His people.
Infinite Dimensions
By Elisa Morgan
I pray that you . . . [will] grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ.
Ephesians 3:17–18
I lay still on the vinyl-covered mat and held my breath on command as the machine whirred and clicked. I knew lots of folks had endured MRIs, but for claustrophobic me, the experience required focused concentration on something—Someone—much bigger than myself.
In my mind, a phrase from Scripture—“how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ” (Ephesians 3:18)—moved in rhythm with the machine’s hum. In Paul’s prayer for the Ephesian church, he described four dimensions to God’s love in order to stress the unending parameters of His love and presence.
My position while lying down for the MRI provided a new image for my understanding. Wide: the six inches on either side of where my arms were tightly pinned to my body within the tube. Long: the distance between the cylinder’s two openings, extending out from my head and feet. High: the six inches from my nose up to the “ceiling” of the tube. Deep: the support of the tube anchored to the floor beneath me, holding me up. Four dimensions illustrating God’s presence surrounding and holding me in the MRI tube—and in every circumstance of life.
God’s love is ALL around us. Wide: He extends His arms to reach all people everywhere. Long: His love never ends. High: He lifts us up. Deep: He dips down, holding us in all situations. Nothing can separate us from Him! (Romans 8:38–39).
What situations cause you to question God’s love? How will you choose to trust Him?
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, January 11, 2019
What My Obedience to God Costs Other People
As they led Him away, they laid hold of a certain man, Simon…, and on him they laid the cross that he might bear it after Jesus. —Luke 23:26
If we obey God, it is going to cost other people more than it costs us, and that is where the pain begins. If we are in love with our Lord, obedience does not cost us anything— it is a delight. But to those who do not love Him, our obedience does cost a great deal. If we obey God, it will mean that other people’s plans are upset. They will ridicule us as if to say, “You call this Christianity?” We could prevent the suffering, but not if we are obedient to God. We must let the cost be paid.
When our obedience begins to cost others, our human pride entrenches itself and we say, “I will never accept anything from anyone.” But we must, or disobey God. We have no right to think that the type of relationships we have with others should be any different from those the Lord Himself had (see Luke 8:1-3).
A lack of progress in our spiritual life results when we try to bear all the costs ourselves. And actually, we cannot. Because we are so involved in the universal purposes of God, others are immediately affected by our obedience to Him. Will we remain faithful in our obedience to God and be willing to suffer the humiliation of refusing to be independent? Or will we do just the opposite and say, “I will not cause other people to suffer”? We can disobey God if we choose, and it will bring immediate relief to the situation, but it will grieve our Lord. If, however, we obey God, He will care for those who have suffered the consequences of our obedience. We must simply obey and leave all the consequences with Him.
Beware of the inclination to dictate to God what consequences you would allow as a condition of your obedience to Him.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
The Christian Church should not be a secret society of specialists, but a public manifestation of believers in Jesus. Facing Reality, 34 R
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, January 11, 2019
Life-Saving Love - #8350
It was 3:00 A.M. in the multi-family house in New Brunswick, New Jersey, and a fire started as fifteen residents slept. A Deputy Fire Chief was first on the scene. He arrived alone in his car and discovered a building ablaze with its residents unaware of that deadly danger. The chief realized he didn't have time to put on his usual protective gear. Minutes were precious at a time like this, so he rushed into that burning building and began pounding on doors, and screaming for people to get up and get out. One older man was unable to get out by himself, so this valiant rescuer carried him down the stairs, out to the street and then went in for more. All fifteen people got out alive. The man who saved their lives did not.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Life-Saving Love."
One man gave his life so others would not die. I owe my life to someone like that. The rescuer who gave His life so I-and many others like me-would not have to die eternally for the wrong things I've done. It's what the Bible calls sin; -rebellion against the God who made us.
It's a spiritual death penalty that hangs over the head of every one of us, because the Bible says that by God's holy standards, "There is no one righteous, not even one" (Romans 3:10). Which kicks in the head the false hope of somehow I'm going to pay for my sin by doing a lot of good things. It will never be enough. That's why God sent the Rescuer. Because God is holy, this sin couldn't just be ignored or the penalty excused. If any human judge did that, he wouldn't be worthy to be a judge any more.
But because God is love, He didn't want you and me to pay that awful, hellish penalty, even though we deserve it. So He sent the only one who could be perfect and have no sin of His own to pay for. He sent His only Son, Jesus. And He went into that burning building we were in, and He did what it took to get us out and laid down His life to do it.
Listen to how Jesus Himself describes His rescue mission for you and me in John 10, beginning with verse 10, our word for today from the Word of God. He says, "I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. I lay down my life; no one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord." Let's get this straight, no one killed the Son of God. He made the tree He was hanging on. He made the men who put Him there. No, He thought you were worth laying down His life for. And in the greatest act of love in human history, He submitted to that cross to bear in His body and in His soul all the guilt, all the shame, all the pain, and all the hell of your sin and mine.
Then He rose from the dead to prove He can be our Life-Giver. He says about those whom He died for and who belong to Him, "I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish." That can be you today.
You and I are that man in the burning building who can't get ourselves out. We have to let Jesus carry us to safety. Which means you have to reach for Him, put your arms around Him, and trust only Him to save you. Have you ever done that? Well, if not, you're still in sin's burning building with time running out. It isn't enough just to know He died to save you. No, you've got to put your total trust in Him to save you. And this could be your day of rescue. This could be the day every sin you've ever done could be forgiven. This is the day your hell could be cancelled.
Grabbing Jesus to save you means you tell Him, "Jesus, you're my only hope, and I'm Yours." If you've never done that, please don't wait another day. That act of faith brings you to safety in a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Look, it's why we put our website together--ANewStory.com. Because we wanted you to have a landing place where you could come away knowing you belong to Him. Get there today, please.
The greatest tragedy of all would be if Jesus gave His life so you could live, and you lived and died without Him, paying a penalty He already paid. The Rescuer has come to you. He's knocking on the door of your heart. Grab Him while you can.