2 John 1, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

 Max Lucado Daily: STAND UP AND LEAN INTO GOD’S GRACE

Everyone stumbles. The difference is in the response. Some stumble into the pit of guilt, others tumble into the arms of God. They make a deliberate decision to stand up and lean into the grace of God. Just like you, the prodigal son was given an inheritance; he was a member of the family. Perhaps just like you, he squandered it on wild living and bad choices. His trail dead-ended in a pigpen. He fed hogs for a living. Then he made a decision that changed his life forever: “I will arise and go to my father” (Luke 15:18).

You can do that! You can arise and go to your Father. Maybe you can’t solve all your problems or disentangle all your knots. You can’t undo all the damage you’ve done, but you can arise and go to your Father. Landing in a pigpen stinks. But, friend, staying there is just plain stupid.

2 John 1

 My dear congregation, I, your pastor, love you in very truth. And I’m not alone—everyone who knows the Truth that has taken up permanent residence in us loves you.

3 Let grace, mercy, and peace be with us in truth and love from God the Father and from Jesus Christ, Son of the Father!

4-6 I can’t tell you how happy I am to learn that many members of your congregation are diligent in living out the Truth, exactly as commanded by the Father. But permit me a reminder, friends, and this is not a new commandment but simply a repetition of our original and basic charter: that we love each other. Love means following his commandments, and his unifying commandment is that you conduct your lives in love. This is the first thing you heard, and nothing has changed.

Don’t Walk Out on God
7 There are a lot of smooth-talking con artists loose in the world who refuse to believe that Jesus Christ was truly human, a flesh-and-blood human being. Give them their true title: Deceiver! Antichrist!

8-9 And be very careful around them so you don’t lose out on what we’ve worked so diligently in together; I want you to get every reward you have coming to you. Anyone who gets so progressive in his thinking that he walks out on the teaching of Christ, walks out on God. But whoever stays with the teaching, stays faithful to both the Father and the Son.

10-11 If anyone shows up who doesn’t hold to this teaching, don’t invite him in and give him the run of the place. That would just give him a platform to perpetuate his evil ways, making you his partner.

12-13 I have a lot more things to tell you, but I’d rather not use paper and ink. I hope to be there soon in person and have a heart-to-heart talk. That will be far more satisfying to both you and me. Everyone here in your sister congregation sends greetings.

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Wednesday, January 27, 2021
Read: John 8:31–36

Dispute Over Whose Children Jesus’ Opponents Are
31 To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said, “If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

33 They answered him, “We are Abraham’s descendants and have never been slaves of anyone. How can you say that we shall be set free?”

34 Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. 35 Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. 36 So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.

INSIGHT
The Jews presumptuously believed that their spiritual heritage as Abraham’s descendants had given them a special standing with God—a misguided sense of privilege, immunity, and false spirituality (John 8:33, 39). But they had failed in their responsibility and duty as God’s chosen people (Deuteronomy 10:12–13). Jesus warned the teachers of the law and the Pharisees that they had “neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness” (Matthew 23:23) and “the love of God” (Luke 11:42; see Micah 6:8). Their privileged status as Abraham’s descendants blinded them, causing them to dishonestly say that they had “never been slaves of anyone” (John 8:33), when throughout their history they had been enslaved by Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Greece, Syria, and Rome. They also refused to see that they were slaves to sin (v. 34). They wouldn’t acknowledge that Jesus is who He claims to be—their promised Messiah (7:26–27, 40–43; 8:25).

Free at Last By Patricia Raybon
If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed. John 8:36

Twenty long years passed before British journalist John McCarthy—a five-year hostage during Lebanon’s grueling civil war—met the man who negotiated his release. When McCarthy finally met U.N. envoy Giandomenico Picco, McCarthy simply said, “Thank you for my freedom!” His heartfelt words carried great weight because Picco had risked his own life during dangerous negotiations to secure freedom for McCarthy and others.

We as believers can relate to such hard-won freedom. Jesus gave up His life—enduring death on a Roman cross—to secure spiritual freedom for all people, including each of us. Now as His children, we know “it is for freedom that Christ has set us free,” the apostle Paul boldly declared (Galatians 5:1).

The gospel of John also teaches of freedom in Christ, noting, “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed” (John 8:36).

But free in what ways? In Jesus, we experience freedom not only from sin and its hold on us but also from guilt, shame, worry, Satan’s lies, superstitions, false teaching, and eternal death. No longer hostages, we have freedom to show love to enemies, walk in kindness, live with hope, and love our neighbors. As we follow the Holy Spirit’s leading, we can forgive as we’ve been forgiven.

For all of this, let’s thank God today. Then let’s love so others will know the power of His freedom too.
What spiritual chains still hold you hostage? As you release those chains to God, what words can you use to thank Him for setting you free?
Dear liberating God, thank You for my freedom—for setting me free from spiritual death and releasing me to love.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Wednesday, January 27, 2021
Look Again and Think
Do not worry about your life… —Matthew 6:25

A warning which needs to be repeated is that “the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches,” and the lust for other things, will choke out the life of God in us (Matthew 13:22). We are never free from the recurring waves of this invasion. If the frontline of attack is not about clothes and food, it may be about money or the lack of money; or friends or lack of friends; or the line may be drawn over difficult circumstances. It is one steady invasion, and these things will come in like a flood, unless we allow the Spirit of God to raise up the banner against it.

“I say to you, do not worry about your life….” Our Lord says to be careful only about one thing— our relationship to Him. But our common sense shouts loudly and says, “That is absurd, I must consider how I am going to live, and I must consider what I am going to eat and drink.” Jesus says you must not. Beware of allowing yourself to think that He says this while not understanding your circumstances. Jesus Christ knows our circumstances better than we do, and He says we must not think about these things to the point where they become the primary concern of our life. Whenever there are competing concerns in your life, be sure you always put your relationship to God first.

“Sufficient for the day is its own trouble” (Matthew 6:34). How much trouble has begun to threaten you today? What kind of mean little demons have been looking into your life and saying, “What are your plans for next month— or next summer?” Jesus tells us not to worry about any of these things. Look again and think. Keep your mind on the “much more” of your heavenly Father (Matthew 6:30).

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, 395 L

Bible in a Year: Exodus 16-18; Matthew 18:1-20

A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Wednesday, January 27, 2021
How Habits Inhibit - #8883

For the first 16 years of my life you could pretty well guess what I would order in a restaurant. If it wasn't a hamburger, it was fried chicken. If it wasn't fried chicken, it was a hamburger. Now, people - especially my parents - tried to get me to try other foods, but eating out meant two things and only two. Did I mention it was hamburgers and fried chicken? Oh, yeah.

Well, somewhere along the way, someone encouraged me to try a little pasta, and I don't know why I took the risk, but I liked it. After all those years I could have been eating it and I didn't know. Now you can't get me to stop eating it. Someone encouraged me to try certain vegetables prepared in creative ways. I had avoided those vegetables. I love them now. Even casseroles. Oh, I avoided casseroles like the measles. I thought casserole was a naughty word. I love casseroles. I used to hate it when my Mother made them; I never tried them. Spoiled brat! Today there are just too many foods I like: Chinese, Italian, Mexican, you name it. I can't believe what I was missing all those years because I was sure food meant hamburger or chicken. I can't believe what I missed because I was such a creature of habit.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "How Habits Inhibit."

In our word for today from the Word of God in Mark 2, Jesus is talking to religious folks - Pharisees, scribes, people who had ways in which they thought God would always work. They couldn't accept the fact there might be some new things God wanted to try. Now, Jesus came along and blew the walls off the narrow box they had God in. He wasn't working in any of the ways that they were used to, and they kept saying, "Well, I don't know, God never did it this way before. I'm not sure it's God." And Jesus had a whole new way of doing it.

In chapter 2, verse 22 of Mark, Jesus said, "No one pours new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins and both the wine and the wine skins will be ruined. No, he pours new wine into new wine skins." See, Jesus is talking to people who were hide-bound in their traditions; sure that God was going to work just like He always has. They've got God in a box, and maybe He's talking to the people of our day and saying, "I've got something new I want to do among you, but it can't happen if you insist on the same old ways of doing it.'"

As a teenager I got in my eating rut. I stayed there and I missed all kinds of great experiences that were outside of my rut. We tend to be the same way with our Lord. There's a place in Northern Canada where the roads run out and I've heard there's a sign that says, "Choose your rut carefully; you will be in it for the next 50 miles." It probably doesn't say miles, it says kilometers, but let's go with it. We're sort of like that spiritually. We have a tendency to say, "This is how God did work, and He always will work." Could it be that it's time for some new wineskins in your life? The Lord is trying to open you up to some new worship or new ways of studying His Word, or new ways of praying, new avenues of service, new steps of faith. And you're saying, "Hamburgers or chicken! Hamburgers or chicken! That's the way it's always been."

Churches and ministries often wither to ineffectiveness and irrelevance because they will not change. Methods and approaches that once were the new wineskins are now brittle, tired, irrelevant. I know you're restless for God's best, and often God's best is in a surprising new package. He won't stay in our box. We just get too tied to the formula and we miss the Lord.

Don't let your religious habits inhibit the exciting new thing God wants to do. You'll never taste the gourmet menu if you limit God to the same old choices on His miracle menu.