Max Lucado Daily: PRAYER FOR REPENTANCE FROM ARROGANCE
I’m wondering if you’d be willing to join me in a prayer of repentance—repentance from arrogance. What have we done that God didn’t first do? What do we have that God didn’t first give us? Have any of us ever built anything that God could not destroy? Have we created any monument that the Master of the stars can’t reduce to dust?
God asked this question through the Prophet Isaiah:
“To whom will you compare me?
Or who is my equal? says the Holy One.
Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens: Who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one and calls forth each of them by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength, not one of them is missing (Isaiah 40:25 -26).
Let’s humble ourselves before the hand of God. The Bible reminds us that those who walk in pride God is able to humble. And… we don’t want God to humble us, do we? Because God’s promises are unbreakable our hope is unshakable!
2 Corinthians 8
Now, friends, I want to report on the surprising and generous ways in which God is working in the churches in Macedonia province. Fierce troubles came down on the people of those churches, pushing them to the very limit. The trial exposed their true colors: They were incredibly happy, though desperately poor. The pressure triggered something totally unexpected: an outpouring of pure and generous gifts. I was there and saw it for myself. They gave offerings of whatever they could—far more than they could afford!—pleading for the privilege of helping out in the relief of poor Christians.
5-7 This was totally spontaneous, entirely their own idea, and caught us completely off guard. What explains it was that they had first given themselves unreservedly to God and to us. The other giving simply flowed out of the purposes of God working in their lives. That’s what prompted us to ask Titus to bring the relief offering to your attention, so that what was so well begun could be finished up. You do so well in so many things—you trust God, you’re articulate, you’re insightful, you’re passionate, you love us—now, do your best in this, too.
8-9 I’m not trying to order you around against your will. But by bringing in the Macedonians’ enthusiasm as a stimulus to your love, I am hoping to bring the best out of you. You are familiar with the generosity of our Master, Jesus Christ. Rich as he was, he gave it all away for us—in one stroke he became poor and we became rich.
10-20 So here’s what I think: The best thing you can do right now is to finish what you started last year and not let those good intentions grow stale. Your heart’s been in the right place all along. You’ve got what it takes to finish it up, so go to it. Once the commitment is clear, you do what you can, not what you can’t. The heart regulates the hands. This isn’t so others can take it easy while you sweat it out. No, you’re shoulder to shoulder with them all the way, your surplus matching their deficit, their surplus matching your deficit. In the end you come out even. As it is written,
Nothing left over to the one with the most,
Nothing lacking to the one with the least.
I thank God for giving Titus the same devoted concern for you that I have. He was most considerate of how we felt, but his eagerness to go to you and help out with this relief offering is his own idea. We’re sending a companion along with him, someone very popular in the churches for his preaching of the Message. But there’s far more to him than popularity. He’s rock-solid trustworthy. The churches handpicked him to go with us as we travel about doing this work of sharing God’s gifts to honor God as well as we can, taking every precaution against scandal.
20-22 We don’t want anyone suspecting us of taking one penny of this money for ourselves. We’re being as careful in our reputation with the public as in our reputation with God. That’s why we’re sending another trusted friend along. He’s proved his dependability many times over, and carries on as energetically as the day he started. He’s heard much about you, and liked what he’s heard—so much so that he can’t wait to get there.
23-24 I don’t need to say anything further about Titus. We’ve been close associates in this work of serving you for a long time. The brothers who travel with him are delegates from churches, a real credit to Christ. Show them what you’re made of, the love I’ve been talking up in the churches. Let them see it for themselves!
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Friday, February 28, 2020
Today's Scripture & Insight:
Acts 27:27–38
The Shipwreck
27 On the fourteenth night we were still being driven across the Adriaticc Sea, when about midnight the sailors sensed they were approaching land. 28 They took soundings and found that the water was a hundred and twenty feetd deep. A short time later they took soundings again and found it was ninety feete deep. 29 Fearing that we would be dashed against the rocks, they dropped four anchors from the stern and prayed for daylight. 30 In an attempt to escape from the ship, the sailors let the lifeboaty down into the sea, pretending they were going to lower some anchors from the bow. 31 Then Paul said to the centurion and the soldiers, “Unless these men stay with the ship, you cannot be saved.”z 32 So the soldiers cut the ropes that held the lifeboat and let it drift away.
33 Just before dawn Paul urged them all to eat. “For the last fourteen days,” he said, “you have been in constant suspense and have gone without food—you haven’t eaten anything. 34 Now I urge you to take some food. You need it to survive. Not one of you will lose a single hair from his head.”a 35 After he said this, he took some bread and gave thanks to God in front of them all. Then he broke itb and began to eat. 36 They were all encouragedc and ate some food themselves. 37 Altogether there were 276 of us on board. 38 When they had eaten as much as they wanted, they lightened the ship by throwing the grain into the sea.d
Insight
The journey from Jerusalem to Rome consumed about three years of Paul’s life, beginning with his arrest in Jerusalem—which happened all the way back in Acts 21:27! That arrest wasn’t prompted by Paul’s actions but by those of his Jewish countrymen who had rioted. His arrest nearly resulted in a flogging (22:25–29) and generated a series of trials before Roman-appointed officials—none of whom found Paul guilty of anything (26:30–32). As was his right as a Roman citizen, Paul appealed his case to Caesar, and that choice set him on the journey that would include the shipwreck events in Acts 27.
To learn more about Paul, visit bit.ly/2M4RQag. By: Bill Crowder
The Faith to Endure
Suffering produces endurance. Romans 5:3 esv
Ernest Shackleton (1874–1922) led an unsuccessful expedition to cross Antarctica in 1914. When his ship, aptly named Endurance, became trapped in heavy ice in the Weddell Sea, it became an endurance race just to survive. With no means of communicating with the rest of the world, Shackleton and his crew used lifeboats to make the journey to the nearest shore—Elephant Island. While most of the crew stayed behind on the island, Shackleton and five crewmen spent two weeks traveling 800 miles across the ocean to South Georgia to get help for those left behind. The “failed” expedition became a victorious entry in the history books when all of Shackleton’s men survived, thanks to their courage and endurance.
The apostle Paul knew what it meant to endure. During a stormy sea voyage to Rome to face trial for his belief in Jesus, Paul learned from an angel of God that the ship would sink. But the apostle kept the men aboard encouraged, thanks to God’s promise that all would survive, despite the loss of the ship (Acts 27:23–24).
When disaster strikes, we tend to want God to immediately make everything better. But God gives us the faith to endure and grow. As Paul wrote to the Romans, “Suffering produces endurance” (Romans 5:3 esv). Knowing that, we can encourage each other to keep trusting God in hard times. By: Linda Washington
Reflect & Pray
What’s your usual response to hardship? How can you encourage someone who’s going through difficult times?
Heavenly Father, I need Your help to keep going, even when it’s tough.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, February 28, 2020
“Do You Now Believe?”
"By this we believe…." Jesus answered them, "Do you now believe?" —John 16:30-31
“Now we believe….” But Jesus asks, “Do you…? Indeed the hour is coming…that you…will leave Me alone” (John 16:31-32). Many Christian workers have left Jesus Christ alone and yet tried to serve Him out of a sense of duty, or because they sense a need as a result of their own discernment. The reason for this is actually the absence of the resurrection life of Jesus. Our soul has gotten out of intimate contact with God by leaning on our own religious understanding (see Proverbs 3:5-6). This is not deliberate sin and there is no punishment attached to it. But once a person realizes how he has hindered his understanding of Jesus Christ, and caused uncertainties, sorrows, and difficulties for himself, it is with shame and remorse that he has to return.
We need to rely on the resurrection life of Jesus on a much deeper level than we do now. We should get in the habit of continually seeking His counsel on everything, instead of making our own commonsense decisions and then asking Him to bless them. He cannot bless them; it is not in His realm to do so, and those decisions are severed from reality. If we do something simply out of a sense of duty, we are trying to live up to a standard that competes with Jesus Christ. We become a prideful, arrogant person, thinking we know what to do in every situation. We have put our sense of duty on the throne of our life, instead of enthroning the resurrection life of Jesus. We are not told to “walk in the light” of our conscience or in the light of a sense of duty, but to “walk in the light as He is in the light…” (1 John 1:7). When we do something out of a sense of duty, it is easy to explain the reasons for our actions to others. But when we do something out of obedience to the Lord, there can be no other explanation— just obedience. That is why a saint can be so easily ridiculed and misunderstood.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Jesus Christ is always unyielding to my claim to my right to myself. The one essential element in all our Lord’s teaching about discipleship is abandon, no calculation, no trace of self-interest.
Disciples Indeed
Bible in a Year: Numbers 20-22; Mark 7:1-13
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, February 28, 2020
How "Lost" Ends - #8645
Several years ago, it was like the talk of people watching TV. It was that show "Lost." I never got hooked on that series, but a whole lot of my friends did. I would often see the day after that they'd be shaking their heads, rolling their eyes, and they're kind of tongue-tied when it came to trying to explain what happened the night before. Well, one Sunday night, their long journey ended with this 2 ½ hour finale, creatively titled, "The End." I don't know how long they worked on that title.
The journey actually had started six years before with a plane crash on a remote island. And it ended that Sunday night in an ethereal chapel, somewhere on the other side of death. In between was this convoluted roller coaster of mysterious twists, unexplained dark forces, and revealing flashbacks of the checkered pasts of the crash survivors. Fans were left with a pile of questions and theories exchanged on the worldwide web trying to answer them.
But the journey finally ended that one night. "Lost" fans had a wide variety of feelings about the destination. Some loved it - some didn't. I, of course, didn't have an opinion because I didn't spend any time on what they called "the island." But I'll tell you this, I know about loss.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "How 'Lost' Ends."
From the time that series roared into center stage in our pop culture, the title haunted me. Sure, one-word TV titles aren't new: "Seinfeld," "Survivor," "M.A.S.H." But this one got to me a little, probably because "lost" is a God-word.
Over and over in the Bible, God describes our spiritual condition using that word. In a way, "Lost" could be the title for the long-running series of every life on this planet. Jesus called us "lost sheep." He told a story about us being like a "lost son." And then in our word for today from the Word of God in Luke 19:10, He said His whole reason for coming into our world was - here it is - "to seek and save what was lost." I was one of those "lost" that He came to save. That's why I know about "lost."
Lost means that you don't know for sure where you are. You don't know the way to get home. You're alone. You're afraid. That's a pretty vivid description of how we feel deep in ou
r soul so many times. It isn't that we haven't tried some roads to get home, to get off "the island"; none of which have taken us there so far.
That's why Jesus came! We wouldn't look for Him. He came looking for us, because "home" is a relationship with the One who made us. The Bible literally says that, "All things were created by Him and for Him." You could put your name in that. You were created by Him and for a relationship with Him.
But then the Bible says, "we have all wandered away like sheep" (Isaiah 53:6). We're away from God. We are lost. But Jesus went all the way to a cross to find us; to die for us, to pay our death penalty that keeps us from being forgiven, from going to God's heaven, from having the hole in our heart ever filled.
Today He wants to bring you home to a relationship with Him. If you've never begun that relationship and you're tired of "lost," I hope you'll go to our website today. It's a place where many have gone and walked through there the way they begin a relationship with God forever. It's called ANewStory.com. I hope you'll go there.
I'll tell you, I'll thank Him forever for the day He found me; the day I grabbed Him with both hands, this One who paid so much to bring me Home. See, "Lost" ends in Jesus' arms.