Max Lucado Daily: TRY DEFIANT JOY
My friend Rob cried freely telling his story about his young son’s challenging life. Daniel was born with a double cleft palate, dramatically disfiguring his face. He had surgery, but the evidence remains, so people constantly notice and occasionally make remarks. Daniel, however, is unfazed. He just tells people God made him this way so what’s the big deal?
He was named student of the week, and so was asked to bring something to show his classmates for show and tell. Daniel told his mom he wanted to take the pictures that showed his face prior to the surgery. His mom was concerned. “Won’t that make you feel a bit funny?” she asked. But Daniel insisted, “Oh, no, I want everyone to see what God did for me!” Try Daniel’s defiant joy and see what happens. God has handed you a cup of blessings. Sweeten it with a heaping spoonful of gratitude!
Isaiah 59
Look! Listen!
God’s arm is not amputated—he can still save.
God’s ears are not stopped up—he can still hear.
There’s nothing wrong with God; the wrong is in you.
Your wrongheaded lives caused the split between you and God.
Your sins got between you so that he doesn’t hear.
Your hands are drenched in blood,
your fingers dripping with guilt,
Your lips smeared with lies,
your tongue swollen from muttering obscenities.
No one speaks up for the right,
no one deals fairly.
They trust in illusion, they tell lies,
they get pregnant with mischief and have sin-babies.
They hatch snake eggs and weave spider webs.
Eat an egg and die; break an egg and get a snake!
The spider webs are no good for shirts or shawls.
No one can wear these weavings!
They weave wickedness,
they hatch violence.
They compete in the race to do evil
and run to be the first to murder.
They plan and plot evil, think and breathe evil,
and leave a trail of wrecked lives behind them.
They know nothing about peace
and less than nothing about justice.
They make tortuously twisted roads.
No peace for the wretch who walks down those roads!
9-11 Which means that we’re a far cry from fair dealing,
and we’re not even close to right living.
We long for light but sink into darkness,
long for brightness but stumble through the night.
Like the blind, we inch along a wall,
groping eyeless in the dark.
We shuffle our way in broad daylight,
like the dead, but somehow walking.
We’re no better off than bears, groaning,
and no worse off than doves, moaning.
We look for justice—not a sign of it;
for salvation—not so much as a hint.
12-15 Our wrongdoings pile up before you, God,
our sins stand up and accuse us.
Our wrongdoings stare us down;
we know in detail what we’ve done:
Mocking and denying God,
not following our God,
Spreading false rumors, inciting sedition,
pregnant with lies, muttering malice.
Justice is beaten back,
Righteousness is banished to the sidelines,
Truth staggers down the street,
Honesty is nowhere to be found,
Good is missing in action.
Anyone renouncing evil is beaten and robbed.
15-19 God looked and saw evil looming on the horizon—
so much evil and no sign of Justice.
He couldn’t believe what he saw:
not a soul around to correct this awful situation.
So he did it himself, took on the work of Salvation,
fueled by his own Righteousness.
He dressed in Righteousness, put it on like a suit of armor,
with Salvation on his head like a helmet,
Put on Judgment like an overcoat,
and threw a cloak of Passion across his shoulders.
He’ll make everyone pay for what they’ve done:
fury for his foes, just deserts for his enemies.
Even the far-off islands will get paid off in full.
In the west they’ll fear the name of God,
in the east they’ll fear the glory of God,
For he’ll arrive like a river in flood stage,
whipped to a torrent by the wind of God.
20 “I’ll arrive in Zion as Redeemer,
to those in Jacob who leave their sins.”
God’s Decree.
21 “As for me,” God says, “this is my covenant with them: My Spirit that I’ve placed upon you and the words that I’ve given you to speak, they’re not going to leave your mouths nor the mouths of your children nor the mouths of your grandchildren. You will keep repeating these words and won’t ever stop.” God’s orders.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Thursday, June 11, 2020
Today's Scripture & Insight:
Isaiah 48:5–11, 17
Therefore I told you these things long ago;
before they happened I announced them to you
so that you could not say,
‘My images brought them about;
my wooden image and metal god ordained them.’
6 You have heard these things; look at them all.
Will you not admit them?
“From now on I will tell you of new things,
of hidden things unknown to you.
7 They are created now, and not long ago;
you have not heard of them before today.
So you cannot say,
‘Yes, I knew of them.’
8 You have neither heard nor understood;
from of old your ears have not been open.
Well do I know how treacherous you are;
you were called a rebel from birth.
9 For my own name’s sake I delay my wrath;
for the sake of my praise I hold it back from you,
so as not to destroy you completely.
10 See, I have refined you, though not as silver;
I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.
11 For my own sake, for my own sake, I do this.
How can I let myself be defamed?
I will not yield my glory to another.
17 This is what the Lord says—
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel:
“I am the Lord your God,
who teaches you what is best for you,
who directs you in the way you should go.
Insight
Isaiah, prophet to the people of Judah from 740–685 bc, warned that God would discipline them for their idolatrous unfaithfulness. He prophesied the destruction of Jerusalem and their temple and their seventy-year exile in Babylon (Isaiah 39:6–7; also Jeremiah 25:11) some 100 years before it happened. Isaiah also prophesied that God would bring His people back, restore them, and bless them. In Isaiah 48, Isaiah emphasized that whatever God purposed, He would bring to pass (vv. 3–6). This promise of return and restoration was not because they were deserving, but “for [his] own name’s sake” (vv. 8–9). God’s intention was to refine them, not to destroy them completely. And as the covenant-keeping God, He wouldn’t renege on His promise of restoration and thus defame His reputation (vv. 9–11).
Perspectives from Above
I will not yield my glory to another. Isaiah 48:11
When Peter Welch was a young boy in the 1970s, using a metal detector was only a hobby. But since 1990, he’s been leading people from around the world on metal-detecting excursions. They’ve made thousands of discoveries—swords, ancient jewelry, coins. Using “Google Earth,” a computer program based on satellite imagery, they look for patterns in the landscape on farmland in the United Kingdom. It shows them where roads, buildings, and other structures may have been centuries ago. Peter says, “To have a perspective from above opens a whole new world.”
God’s people in Isaiah’s day needed “a perspective from above.” They prided themselves on being His people yet were disobedient and refused to give up their idols. God had another perspective. Despite their rebellion, He would rescue them from captivity to Babylon. Why? “For my own sake, . . . I will not yield my glory to another” (Isaiah 48:11). God’s perspective from above is that life is for His glory and purpose—not ours. Our attention is to be given to Him and His plans and to pointing others to praise Him too.
Having God’s glory as our own life’s perspective opens a whole new world. Only He knows what we will discover about Him and what He has for us. God will teach us what is good for us and lead us along the paths we should follow (v. 17). By: Anne Cetas
Reflect & Pray
What can you praise God for today? How might you go about having God increase in your life and you decrease?
God, I want my life to be about You and not myself. Teach me and change me.
To learn about obtaining a biblical worldview, visit bit.ly/2lBDstL.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, June 11, 2020
Getting There (1)
Come to Me… —Matthew 11:28
Where sin and sorrow stops, and the song of the saint starts. Do I really want to get there? I can right now. The questions that truly matter in life are remarkably few, and they are all answered by these words— “Come to Me.” Our Lord’s words are not, “Do this, or don’t do that,” but— “Come to me.” If I will simply come to Jesus, my real life will be brought into harmony with my real desires. I will actually cease from sin, and will find the song of the Lord beginning in my life.
Have you ever come to Jesus? Look at the stubbornness of your heart. You would rather do anything than this one simple childlike thing— “Come to Me.” If you really want to experience ceasing from sin, you must come to Jesus.
Jesus Christ makes Himself the test to determine your genuineness. Look how He used the word come. At the most unexpected moments in your life there is this whisper of the Lord— “Come to Me,” and you are immediately drawn to Him. Personal contact with Jesus changes everything. Be “foolish” enough to come and commit yourself to what He says. The attitude necessary for you to come to Him is one where your will has made the determination to let go of everything and deliberately commit it all to Him.
“…and I will give you rest”— that is, “I will sustain you, causing you to stand firm.” He is not saying, “I will put you to bed, hold your hand, and sing you to sleep.” But, in essence, He is saying, “I will get you out of bed— out of your listlessness and exhaustion, and out of your condition of being half dead while you are still alive. I will penetrate you with the spirit of life, and you will be sustained by the perfection of vital activity.” Yet we become so weak and pitiful and talk about “suffering” the will of the Lord! Where is the majestic vitality and the power of the Son of God in that?
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
There is no condition of life in which we cannot abide in Jesus. We have to learn to abide in Him wherever we are placed. Our Brilliant Heritage
Bible in a Year: Ezra 1-2; John 19:23-42
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, June 11, 2020
The Happy Kind of Mad - #8719
Our daughter was gone for the morning and a friend had come to babysit our two grandsons. That was a brave lady! Actually, she had a relatively problem-free, crisis-free morning, except for one time when she just had to reprimand our three-year-old angel. Being a firstborn, he was very sensitive to being corrected. His later comment indicated that he had clearly recorded what was a very gentle reprimand - the kind you do with a smile on your face, not a snarl. When Mom returned and asked our little guy how his morning was with "Miss Wilma," he invented a new phrase to describe her correction. He said, "Miss Wilma got mad at me; she got happy mad."
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Happy Kind of Mad."
I found the idea of being "happy mad" intriguing. And, in fact, the Bible actually describes a kind of "mad" that God considers, more or less, the "happy" kind. It's the kind that doesn't tear down the person on the other end.
God's description of "righteous" anger is really realistic and helpful, especially in Ephesians 4:25-27, which is our word for today from the Word of God. Here's what it says, "Laying aside falsehood, speak truth each one of you with his neighbor, for we are members of one another. Be angry, and yet do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and do not give the devil an opportunity."
Apparently, it's possible to be angry with someone and deal with it in a way that isn't sinful. Let's call it "happy mad" as my grandson said. Sadly, we do a whole lot of sinning when we're angry. So we all need to know how to "be angry and yet not sin" as it says here. Righteous anger first has to be truthful, not exaggerated. "Speak truth," the Bible says. No exaggeration, no inflation, no stretching, no embellishing the truth to make your point. Stick to the facts.
Secondly, righteous anger needs to be kind and not cruel. Two verses later we're told, "Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building others up..." (Ephesians 4:29) - nothing that will tear the other person down. God is calling us to express our frustration and anger in a way that you attack the issue; you don't attack the person.
So I'm not going to resort to calling you a name...to belittling you. It means saying something like this: "What you said makes me feel like my feelings don't matter," instead of saying, "You don't give a rip about how I feel, do you?" One sticks to the facts about how I'm feeling; the other one attacks you and accuses you.
One other characteristic of righteous anger according to Ephesians 4 is it's short-lived, not stored up. "Do not let the sun go down on your anger." No day should ever end with you still being angry. When you store it, it grows and deepens and turns into hard feelings and bitterness. All that can be avoided if you never "let the sun go down on your anger." Otherwise you develop what the Bible calls in Hebrews 12:15, "A root of bitterness, that one day grows up and defiles many" and it says, "can cost you the benefit at that moment of the grace of God."
God knows we're going to get angry, but He has spelled out a way for us to deal with it that doesn't leave scars, doesn't leave walls and doesn't leave regrets. Be honest, be kind, and get right to it. If there's such a thing as "happy mad," I guess that's what it's like.