Max Lucado Daily: JESUS BECAME FLESH
John 1:14 says, “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood” (The MSG).
Let’s begin where the earthly ministry of Jesus began— in the womb of Mary. The God of the universe, for a time, kicked against the wall of that womb. He was born in the poverty of a peasant and spent his first night in the feed trough of a cow. He didn’t have to, did he? Jesus could have become a voice— a voice in the air. He could have become a message— a message in the night. Jesus could have become a light— a light in the night. But he became flesh. Why?
Jesus came to be near you. Any concerns you might have about his power and love were removed from the discussion the moment he became flesh and entered the world. What a beginning. What an entrance. And what a moment.
2 Corinthians 11:1-15
Will you put up with a little foolish aside from me? Please, just for a moment. The thing that has me so upset is that I care about you so much—this is the passion of God burning inside me! I promised your hand in marriage to Christ, presented you as a pure virgin to her husband. And now I’m afraid that exactly as the Snake seduced Eve with his smooth patter, you are being lured away from the simple purity of your love for Christ.
4-6 It seems that if someone shows up preaching quite another Jesus than we preached—different spirit, different message—you put up with him quite nicely. But if you put up with these big-shot “apostles,” why can’t you put up with simple me? I’m as good as they are. It’s true that I don’t have their voice, haven’t mastered that smooth eloquence that impresses you so much. But when I do open my mouth, I at least know what I’m talking about. We haven’t kept anything back. We let you in on everything.
7-12 I wonder, did I make a bad mistake in proclaiming God’s Message to you without asking for something in return, serving you free of charge so that you wouldn’t be inconvenienced by me? It turns out that the other churches paid my way so that you could have a free ride. Not once during the time I lived among you did anyone have to lift a finger to help me out. My needs were always supplied by the believers from Macedonia province. I was careful never to be a burden to you, and I never will be, you can count on it. With Christ as my witness, it’s a point of honor with me, and I’m not going to keep it quiet just to protect you from what the neighbors will think. It’s not that I don’t love you; God knows I do. I’m just trying to keep things open and honest between us.
12-15 And I’m not changing my position on this. I’d die before taking your money. I’m giving nobody grounds for lumping me in with those money-grubbing “preachers,” vaunting themselves as something special. They’re a sorry bunch—pseudo-apostles, lying preachers, crooked workers—posing as Christ’s agents but sham to the core. And no wonder! Satan does it all the time, dressing up as a beautiful angel of light. So it shouldn’t surprise us when his servants masquerade as servants of God. But they’re not getting by with anything. They’ll pay for it in the end.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Tuesday, March 10, 2020
Today's Scripture & Insight: Luke 9:11–17
but the crowds learned about it and followed him. He welcomed them and spoke to them about the kingdom of God,x and healed those who needed healing.
12 Late in the afternoon the Twelve came to him and said, “Send the crowd away so they can go to the surrounding villages and countryside and find food and lodging, because we are in a remote place here.”
13 He replied, “You give them something to eat.”
They answered, “We have only five loaves of bread and two fish—unless we go and buy food for all this crowd.” 14 (About five thousand men were there.)
But he said to his disciples, “Have them sit down in groups of about fifty each.” 15 The disciples did so, and everyone sat down. 16 Taking the five loaves and the two fish and looking up to heaven, he gave thanks and broke them.y Then he gave them to the disciples to distribute to the people. 17 They all ate and were satisfied, and the disciples picked up twelve basketfuls of broken pieces that were left over.
Insight
Matthew’s account of the feeding of the five thousand suggests Jesus had withdrawn to a solitary place to mourn the death of John the Baptist (14:12–13). But when the crowds followed Him, “he had compassion on them” (v. 14). This demonstrates His self-giving character. He placed His own desires aside to meet the needs of those who came to Him. He said to His disciples, “You give them something to eat” (Luke 9:13). Imagine how that sounded to them. Jesus wasn’t unaware of their situation; He knew they didn’t have enough food for everyone. Jesus knows what we have and what it will take to accomplish what He’s asking us to do. When we give what we have to Him, He uses it in ways that only He can.
Broken to Be Shared
You give them something to eat. Luke 9:13
We met every Thursday after he lost his wife in a car accident. Sometimes he came with questions to which no answers exist; sometimes he came with memories he wanted to relive. Over time, he accepted that even though the accident was a result of the brokenness in our world, God could work in the midst of it. A few years later, he taught a class at our church about grief and how to lament well. Soon, he became our go-to guide for people experiencing loss. Sometimes it’s when we don’t feel like we have anything to offer that God takes our “not enough” and makes it “more than enough.”
Jesus told His disciples to give the people something to eat. They’d protested that there was nothing to give; Jesus multiplied their meager supplies and then turned back to the disciples and gave them the bread, as if to say, “I meant it: You give them something to eat!” (Luke 9:13–16). Christ will do the miraculous, but He often chooses to involve us.
Jesus says to us, “Place who you are and what you have in My hands. Your broken life. Your story. Your frailty and your failure, your pain and your suffering. Put it in My hands. You’ll be surprised what I can do with it.” Jesus knows that out of our emptiness, He can bring fullness. Out of our weakness, He can reveal His strength. By: Glenn Packiam
Reflect & Pray
What brokenness have you experienced? What would it look like to offer that experience to Jesus and ask Him to bring life to others from it?
Dear Jesus, take my “not enough” and make it “more than enough.” Take my pain, my failure, and my frailty, and make it something more.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Tuesday, March 10, 2020
Being an Example of His Message
Preach the word! —2 Timothy 4:2
We are not saved only to be instruments for God, but to be His sons and daughters. He does not turn us into spiritual agents but into spiritual messengers, and the message must be a part of us. The Son of God was His own message— “The words that I speak to you are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63). As His disciples, our lives must be a holy example of the reality of our message. Even the natural heart of the unsaved will serve if called upon to do so, but it takes a heart broken by conviction of sin, baptized by the Holy Spirit, and crushed into submission to God’s purpose to make a person’s life a holy example of God’s message.
There is a difference between giving a testimony and preaching. A preacher is someone who has received the call of God and is determined to use all his energy to proclaim God’s truth. God takes us beyond our own aspirations and ideas for our lives, and molds and shapes us for His purpose, just as He worked in the disciples’ lives after Pentecost. The purpose of Pentecost was not to teach the disciples something, but to make them the incarnation of what they preached so that they would literally become God’s message in the flesh. “…you shall be witnesses to Me…” (Acts 1:8).
Allow God to have complete liberty in your life when you speak. Before God’s message can liberate other people, His liberation must first be real in you. Gather your material carefully, and then allow God to “set your words on fire” for His glory.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Am I getting nobler, better, more helpful, more humble, as I get older? Am I exhibiting the life that men take knowledge of as having been with Jesus, or am I getting more self-assertive, more deliberately determined to have my own way? It is a great thing to tell yourself the truth. The Place of Help, 1005 R
Bible in a Year: Deuteronomy 11-13; Mark 12:1-27
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Tuesday, March 10, 2020
Hiding Our Scars - #8652
Mine's in my shoulder, from replacement surgery. Our grandson, well, his is in his chest from heart surgery. Country singer, Carrie Underwood's was on her face from a bad fall and 40 stitches a while back. But most of ours are deep inside, where no one can see them.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You about "Hiding Our Scars."
Yep! Our scars. For Carrie Underwood, being such a public figure, having scars on her face was an understandable cause for concern. She couldn't be sure what she would look like when she healed. Her first public appearance came some four months later at the Academy of Country Music Awards. Her song: "Cry Pretty." She confessed to being "super nervous." She said, "I felt like I'd never been on stage before." The audience gave her a rousing ovation.
As I read about her anxiety over people's reaction to her scar, it struck a chord in me. I kept thinking, "Hey, we all have scars - emotional scars. And we don't want anybody to see them." Our scars might be the result of a fall - I mean an embarrassing failure or a major mistake. Some of us are scarred by rejection, betrayal, abuse, mistreatmen, divorce, or grief. Major life wounds leave major life scars.
We're not sure how people will react if we open up about the wounds. So, all too often, we stuff the hurt, we stuff the pain, we stuff the anger. But just like a beach ball pushed under the water, what we stuff will surface one way or another. And the more we push it under, the higher it's going to go when it goes. Years of hidden wounds and scars pile up into a building volcano of anger, resentment, self-pity, fear, distrust, depression - continually spilling out on those closest to us.
When my Karen, the love of my life, was suddenly gone on that awful day, I knew a lot of people would be watching how I responded. Because I'm in ministry, I would be expected to "be strong," proclaiming all the Christian "talking points," the things they affirm when they lose someone. And let there be no confusion here - my hope in Christ has been the anchor that holds in the most devastating storm of my life.
But, purely by God's grace, I made the choice to be as honest about the hurt as I was about the hope. To be real. To let the scar on my heart be seen and known. I had no idea the effect that would have. It seemed to give many people permission to talk about their hurts. To get beyond the rhetoric to the real. I'm seeing how an open heart opens hearts, including opening hearts to my Jesus.
So maybe we need to be more afraid of hiding our scars than sharing them. In most cases, letting our wounds be known allows people to offer comfort, encouragement, love, all of which bring healing to our hurt. And which can help other people unload the burden they've carried alone far too long.
Jesus famously said, "The truth will set you free" (John 8:32). And there is a sense of release in allowing yourself to be known and understood. Often the first step to healing a broken relationship is to share that hidden wound that has turned your heart cold. Not blaming, just reaching out for healing.
Jesus calls us to "carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill
the law of Christ" (Galatians 6:2). But we can't carry a burden that we don't know. I'm asking Jesus to make me a man people can feel safe with. Because our world is starved for people who will not condemn, who we know will love us with the mask off and with all the ugly out in the open.
My Jesus is like that. Not "I love you if..." or "I love you until..." Just His unconditional "I love you." Period. He knows about scars. They're the only thing from earth He took back to heaven with Him; from the nails in His hands and feet - the forever evidence of how endlessly He loves us.
He waits to come into your heart and begin to forgive your sin and heal the wounds of your past, and help you be somebody who can help heal the wounds of others. If you tell Him, "Jesus, I'm yours" it starts right there.
Our website's a place where many people have begun their relationship with Jesus. CanI encourage you to go there today? It's ANewStory.com.
Listen to the words of our Lord, "I will not forget you! See, I have you engraved on the palms of My hands" (Isaiah 49:15-16). He really is our one safe place.
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