Genesis 19 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

 Max Lucado Daily:EVERYONE NEEDS A CHEERLEADER - May 17, 2021

Every person needs to hear a “wonderful.” Here’s why: companies spend billions of dollars to convince us that we are chubby, smelly, ugly, and out-of-date. Inadequacy indwells a billion hearts. Would you distribute encouragement? Will you make some happiness happen? Will you remind humanity that we are made in God’s image? That we are chosen and destined and loved?

Start by listening intently. Ask someone to tell you his or her story. Give the rarest of gifts: your full attention. Praise abundantly. Biblical encouragement is no casual kind word, but rather a premeditated resolve to lift the spirit of another person. Everyone needs a cheerleader. Give the gift that God loves to give: the gift of encouragement. This is how happiness happens.

Genesis 19

The two angels arrived at Sodom in the evening. Lot was sitting at the city gate. He saw them and got up to welcome them, bowing before them and said, “Please, my friends, come to my house and stay the night. Wash up. You can rise early and be on your way refreshed.”

They said, “No, we’ll sleep in the street.”

3 But he insisted, wouldn’t take no for an answer; and they relented and went home with him. Lot fixed a hot meal for them and they ate.

4-5 Before they went to bed, men from all over the city of Sodom, young and old, descended on the house from all sides and boxed them in. They yelled to Lot, “Where are the men who are staying with you for the night? Bring them out so we can have our sport with them!”

6-8 Lot went out, barring the door behind him, and said, “Brothers, please, don’t be vile! Look, I have two daughters, virgins; let me bring them out; you can take your pleasure with them, but don’t touch these men—they’re my guests.”

9 They said, “Get lost! You drop in from nowhere and now you’re going to tell us how to run our lives. We’ll treat you worse than them!” And they charged past Lot to break down the door.

10-11 But the two men reached out and pulled Lot inside the house, locking the door. Then they struck blind the men who were trying to break down the door, both leaders and followers, leaving them groping in the dark.

12-13 The two men said to Lot, “Do you have any other family here? Sons, daughters—anybody in the city? Get them out of here, and now! We’re going to destroy this place. The outcries of victims here to God are deafening; we’ve been sent to blast this place into oblivion.”

14 Lot went out and warned the fiancés of his daughters, “Evacuate this place; God is about to destroy this city!” But his daughters’ would-be husbands treated it as a joke.

15 At break of day, the angels pushed Lot to get going, “Hurry. Get your wife and two daughters out of here before it’s too late and you’re caught in the punishment of the city.”

16-17 Lot was dragging his feet. The men grabbed Lot’s arm, and the arms of his wife and daughters—God was so merciful to them!—and dragged them to safety outside the city. When they had them outside, Lot was told, “Now run for your life! Don’t look back! Don’t stop anywhere on the plain—run for the hills or you’ll be swept away.”

18-20 But Lot protested, “No, masters, you can’t mean it! I know that you’ve taken a liking to me and have done me an immense favor in saving my life, but I can’t run for the mountains—who knows what terrible thing might happen to me in the mountains and leave me for dead. Look over there—that town is close enough to get to. It’s a small town, hardly anything to it. Let me escape there and save my life—it’s a mere wide place in the road.”

21-22 “All right, Lot. If you insist. I’ll let you have your way. And I won’t stamp out the town you’ve spotted. But hurry up. Run for it! I can’t do anything until you get there.” That’s why the town was called Zoar, that is, Smalltown.

23 The sun was high in the sky when Lot arrived at Zoar.

24-25 Then God rained brimstone and fire down on Sodom and Gomorrah—a river of lava from God out of the sky!—and destroyed these cities and the entire plain and everyone who lived in the cities and everything that grew from the ground.

26 But Lot’s wife looked back and turned into a pillar of salt.

27-28 Abraham got up early the next morning and went to the place he had so recently stood with God. He looked out over Sodom and Gomorrah, surveying the whole plain. All he could see was smoke belching from the Earth, like smoke from a furnace.

29 And that’s the story: When God destroyed the Cities of the Plain, he was mindful of Abraham and first got Lot out of there before he blasted those cities off the face of the Earth.

30 Lot left Zoar and went into the mountains to live with his two daughters; he was afraid to stay in Zoar. He lived in a cave with his daughters.

31-32 One day the older daughter said to the younger, “Our father is getting old and there’s not a man left in the country by whom we can get pregnant. Let’s get our father drunk with wine and lie with him. We’ll get children through our father—it’s our only chance to keep our family alive.”

33-35 They got their father drunk with wine that very night. The older daughter went and lay with him. He was oblivious, knowing nothing of what she did. The next morning the older said to the younger, “Last night I slept with my father. Tonight, it’s your turn. We’ll get him drunk again and then you sleep with him. We’ll both get a child through our father and keep our family alive.” So that night they got their father drunk again and the younger went in and slept with him. Again he was oblivious, knowing nothing of what she did.

36-38 Both daughters became pregnant by their father, Lot. The older daughter had a son and named him Moab, the ancestor of the present-day Moabites. The younger daughter had a son and named him Ben-Ammi, the ancestor of the present-day Ammonites.

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Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Monday, May 17, 2021
Read: Jonah 2:1–9

From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the Lord his God. 2 He said:

“In my distress I called to the Lord,
    and he answered me.
From deep in the realm of the dead I called for help,
    and you listened to my cry.
3 You hurled me into the depths,
    into the very heart of the seas,
    and the currents swirled about me;
all your waves and breakers
    swept over me.
4 I said, ‘I have been banished
    from your sight;
yet I will look again
    toward your holy temple.’
5 The engulfing waters threatened me,[b]
    the deep surrounded me;
    seaweed was wrapped around my head.
6 To the roots of the mountains I sank down;
    the earth beneath barred me in forever.
But you, Lord my God,
    brought my life up from the pit.

7 “When my life was ebbing away,
    I remembered you, Lord,
and my prayer rose to you,
    to your holy temple.

8 “Those who cling to worthless idols
    turn away from God’s love for them.
9 But I, with shouts of grateful praise,
    will sacrifice to you.
What I have vowed I will make good.
    I will say, ‘Salvation comes from the Lord.’”

INSIGHT
Prophets Jonah, Hosea, and Amos ministered to the Northern Kingdom of Israel when Jeroboam II was king (782–753 bc). Although Jeroboam was unfaithful, God still helped him to successfully push the Assyrians out of Israel (2 Kings 14:23–28). When God called Jonah to minister to Nineveh, a city in Assyria, Jewish nationalistic zeal was running high. Jonah initially refused to proclaim a message of salvation to an enemy nation (Jonah 1:1–3). When he finally obeyed, the Assyrians repented (3:6–10), and God relented from punishing them (4:1–2). But the repentance of the Assyrians was short-lived. Soon a resurgent Assyria attacked Israel (2 Kings 15:19–20, 29). Within three decades of Jonah, Assyria destroyed the Northern Kingdom of Israel (722 bc) and advanced menacingly towards Judah (2 Kings 17:1–6; 18:9–12). God then raised up Nahum who prophesied against Nineveh, proclaiming her inevitable downfall (Nahum 1:1; 2:3–10; 3:1–7).

Visit ChristianUniversity.org/jonahnahum

Pursued by Love
I will say, “Salvation comes from the Lord.” Jonah 2:9

“I fled Him, down the nights and down the days,” opens the famous poem “The Hound of Heaven” by English poet Francis Thompson. Thompson describes Jesus’ unceasing pursuit—despite his efforts to hide, or even run away, from God. The poet imagines God speaking to him and saying, “I am He whom thou seekest!”

The pursuing love of God is a central theme of the book of Jonah. The prophet received an assignment to tell the people of Nineveh (notorious enemies of Israel) about their need to turn to God, but instead “Jonah ran away from the Lord” (Jonah 1:3). He secured passage on a ship sailing in the opposite direction of Nineveh, but the vessel was soon overcome by a violent storm. To save the ship’s crew, Jonah was thrown overboard before being swallowed by a large fish (1:15–17).

In his own beautiful poem, Jonah recounted that despite his best efforts to run away from God, God pursued him. When Jonah was overcome by his situation and needed to be saved, he cried out to God in prayer and turned toward His love (2:2, 8). God answered and provided rescue not only for Jonah, but for his Assyrian enemies as well (3:10).

As described in both poems, there may be seasons of our lives when we try to run from God. Even then Jesus loves us and is at work guiding us back into restored relationship with Him (1 John 1:9).

When have you tried to run from God? How did He provide rescue?

Jesus, thank You for lovingly pursuing me to offer rescue.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Monday, May 17, 2021

His Ascension and Our Access

It came to pass, while He blessed them, that He was parted from them and carried up into heaven. —Luke 24:51

We have no experiences in our lives that correspond to the events in our Lord’s life after the transfiguration. From that moment forward His life was altogether substitutionary. Up to the time of the transfiguration, He had exhibited the normal, perfect life of a man. But from the transfiguration forward— Gethsemane, the Cross, the resurrection— everything is unfamiliar to us. His Cross is the door by which every member of the human race can enter into the life of God; by His resurrection He has the right to give eternal life to anyone, and by His ascension our Lord entered heaven, keeping the door open for humanity.

The transfiguration was completed on the Mount of Ascension. If Jesus had gone to heaven directly from the Mount of Transfiguration, He would have gone alone. He would have been nothing more to us than a glorious Figure. But He turned His back on the glory, and came down from the mountain to identify Himself with fallen humanity.

The ascension is the complete fulfillment of the transfiguration. Our Lord returned to His original glory, but not simply as the Son of God— He returned to His father as the Son of Man as well. There is now freedom of access for anyone straight to the very throne of God because of the ascension of the Son of Man. As the Son of Man, Jesus Christ deliberately limited His omnipotence, omnipresence, and omniscience. But now they are His in absolute, full power. As the Son of Man, Jesus Christ now has all the power at the throne of God. From His ascension forward He is the King of kings and Lord of lords.

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

Christianity is not consistency to conscience or to convictions; Christianity is being true to Jesus Christ.  Biblical Ethics, 111 L

Bible in a Year: 1 Chronicles 1-3; John 5:25-47


A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Monday, May 17, 2021

It Really is "How You Play the Game" - #8961

When you're five years old, you have a number of those milestone experiences - a lot of "firsts." Like your first soccer game. Yeah, our five-year-old grandson had that. I reminded our daughter that she had joined that much-talked about tribe called "soccer moms." Yeah, our grandson had never played soccer before, and he didn't have an older brother or sister to learn from. So his first game was, shall we say, a great learning experience. And he did a good job. But not good enough for the kind of performance most firstborns expect of themselves. Though he got the ball several times for his team and moved it down the field, he didn't score any goals, and he was bothered that he missed one. Right after the game, he gave his mom his two-word summary of how he thought he did. He just said, "I tried."

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "It Really is 'How You Play the Game.'"

Well, at least on God's team. That's why Jesus' finish line commendation for His players will be, "Well done, good and faithful servant" (Matthew 25:21), not "Well done, good and successful servant." What God cares about - what God rewards - is an all-out effort. The results are in His hands. The effort - that's you.

What impresses God about His players is clear in our word for today from the Word of God, when He says in Colossians 3:23-24: "Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving." So you're not playing for the applause of the crowd or even the approval of your teammates. As far as you're concerned, there's one person in that stadium - your Coach, Jesus. If you've got His smile, you're winning; not if you're winning, you've got His smile. He wants you to be able to honestly say, "Coach, I really tried."

If you're playing your position with all your heart, you are pleasing Jesus. Your wholehearted effort may mean you get A's or it may mean you get C's, that you're the best one they've got or just average. Maybe you'll get amazing results or you'll seldom see results. You can't give any more than all your heart. And though we live in a world that cares only if you score, only if you look good, only if you win, you could be free inside knowing you're playing for the One who gives the biggest rewards. And Jesus rewards relentless faithfulness. That means you're still in there fighting when everybody else has dropped out.

Maybe God's assigned you to play a position on His team that's behind the scenes, doing things for Him that few people ever notice or value. And even you feel like what you do doesn't matter much - even to God maybe. Surely it doesn't matter as much as the big, public things some of your brothers and sisters are doing for God. But remember who gets the Super Bowl ring - every member of the team, not just the guys who scored the points. That's how God looks at all of us. Your part, your reward, matters just as much to Him as that of some great pastor or evangelist. In fact, the less glory you get on earth, I think the more He'll give you in heaven for your all-out effort for Him.

So hold your head high, no matter what position you play. Don't let that discouragement wear you down any more - not if you're giving it all you've got. If you are, then in God's eyes, and the only opinion that is that really matters, you are a champion.

Earth may not have many rewards for you. But one day, God's gold medal will hang around your neck!