Max Lucado Daily: Sight Restored - May 24, 2022
Christians love to sing, “Amazing grace! How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found; was blind, but now I see.”
Blind. Blind to the promise of eternal life. Blind to the provider of life. We relate to the words of the was-blind beggar. “One thing I do know. I was blind but now I see!” (John 9:25 NIV). His story is our story. Perhaps that’s why John was in no hurry to tell it. He needed only twelve verses to describe how water became wine. But he dedicated a whopping forty-one verses to depicting how Jesus found, and cured, and matured the blind man.
Why? Among the explanations is this one: what Jesus did physically for the blind beggar, he desires to do spiritually for all people—to restore our sight. Remember my friends, you are never alone.
Luke 15:1-10
The Story of the Lost Sheep
By this time a lot of men and women of questionable reputation were hanging around Jesus, listening intently. The Pharisees and religion scholars were not pleased, not at all pleased. They growled, “He takes in sinners and eats meals with them, treating them like old friends.” Their grumbling triggered this story.
4-7 “Suppose one of you had a hundred sheep and lost one. Wouldn’t you leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness and go after the lost one until you found it? When found, you can be sure you would put it across your shoulders, rejoicing, and when you got home call in your friends and neighbors, saying, ‘Celebrate with me! I’ve found my lost sheep!’ Count on it—there’s more joy in heaven over one sinner’s rescued life than over ninety-nine good people in no need of rescue.
The Story of the Lost Coin
8-10 “Or imagine a woman who has ten coins and loses one. Won’t she light a lamp and scour the house, looking in every nook and cranny until she finds it? And when she finds it you can be sure she’ll call her friends and neighbors: ‘Celebrate with me! I found my lost coin!’ Count on it—that’s the kind of party God’s angels throw every time one lost soul turns to God.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Tuesday, May 24, 2022
Today's Scripture
Leviticus 19:9–10
“When you harvest your land, don’t harvest right up to the edges of your field or gather the gleanings from the harvest. Don’t strip your vineyard bare or go back and pick up the fallen grapes. Leave them for the poor and the foreigner. I am God, your God.
Insight
Leviticus 19 instructs landowners in Israel to allow the poor and foreigners to harvest the edges of their fields and vineyards. It might seem like a strange law, but the book of Ruth shows how important it was in Israel. Ruth was the Moabite wife of a deceased Israelite husband, left only with her Israelite mother-in-law, Naomi. Their lands were under the ancient equivalent of foreclosure, so they had to glean in the corners of someone else’s field. That someone was Boaz. He demonstrated his love for God by not only following the law and allowing Ruth to gather in his fields, but also by redeeming her and her family’s land. One strange law opened the door for Ruth and Naomi to survive and for Boaz to show faithfulness. In the end, they joined in the family tree of Jesus Himself, whose obedience would one day redeem the world. By: Jed Ostoich
Generous Giving
Do not go over your vineyard a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and the foreigner.
Leviticus 19:10
General Charles Gordon (1833–1885) served Queen Victoria in China and elsewhere, but when living in England he’d give away 90 percent of his income. When he heard about a famine in Lancashire, he scratched off the inscription from a pure gold medal he’d received from a world leader and sent it up north, saying they should melt it down and use the money to buy bread for the poor. That day he wrote in his diary: “The last earthly thing I had in this world that I valued I have given to the Lord Jesus.”
General Gordon’s level of generosity might seem above and beyond what we’re able to extend, but God has always called His people to look out for those in need. In some of the laws He delivered through Moses, God instructed the people not to reap to the edges of their field nor gather the entire crop. Instead, when harvesting a vineyard, He said to leave the grapes that had fallen “for the poor and the foreigner” (Leviticus 19:10). God wanted His people to be aware of and provide for the vulnerable in their midst.
However generous we may feel, we can ask God to increase our desire to give to others and to seek His wisdom for creative ways to do so. He loves to help us show His love to others. By: Amy Boucher Pye
Reflect & Pray
How might you extend generosity today, whether through practical help, a listening ear, or some other way? When have you been on the receiving end of someone’s generosity? How did that feel?
Giving Father, thank You for sending Jesus to live as one of us and to die for us. Fill my heart with love and thanks for this amazing gift.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Tuesday, May 24, 2022
The Delight of Despair
When I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. —Revelation 1:17
It may be that, like the apostle John, you know Jesus Christ intimately. Yet when He suddenly appears to you with totally unfamiliar characteristics, the only thing you can do is fall “at His feet as dead.” There are times when God cannot reveal Himself in any other way than in His majesty, and it is the awesomeness of the vision which brings you to the delight of despair. You experience this joy in hopelessness, realizing that if you are ever to be raised up it must be by the hand of God.
“He laid His right hand on me…” (Revelation 1:17). In the midst of the awesomeness, a touch comes, and you know it is the right hand of Jesus Christ. You know it is not the hand of restraint, correction, nor chastisement, but the right hand of the Everlasting Father. Whenever His hand is laid upon you, it gives inexpressible peace and comfort, and the sense that “underneath are the everlasting arms” (Deuteronomy 33:27), full of support, provision, comfort, and strength. And once His touch comes, nothing at all can throw you into fear again. In the midst of all His ascended glory, the Lord Jesus comes to speak to an insignificant disciple, saying, “Do not be afraid” (Revelation 1:17). His tenderness is inexpressibly sweet. Do I know Him like that?
Take a look at some of the things that cause despair. There is despair which has no delight, no limits whatsoever, and no hope of anything brighter. But the delight of despair comes when “I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells…” (Romans 7:18). I delight in knowing that there is something in me which must fall prostrate before God when He reveals Himself to me, and also in knowing that if I am ever to be raised up it must be by the hand of God. God can do nothing for me until I recognize the limits of what is humanly possible, allowing Him to do the impossible.
Wisdom From Oswald Chambers
Faith never knows where it is being led, but it loves and knows the One Who is leading. My Utmost for His Highest, March 19, 761 L
Bible in a Year: 1 Chronicles 22-24; John 8:28-59
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Tuesday, May 24, 2022
How Church Folks Miss Heaven - #9227
Ah, the lost art of tying a tie. I experienced it I remember one time as the man doing the marrying at a young couple's wedding.
It was fairly amusing watching the helpless look on the groomsmen's faces as they were handed their necktie to put on for the ceremony. There they stood, wondering what to do with it. So I suggested to the guys my theory as to how ties came to be. I said they were invented by a woman who had a big time grudge against men. And she's been gloating over the thought that every time men have to dress up, they would strangle themselves. (That's not true. So much for my little tirade.)
I can do my tie easily enough. I just can't think backwards enough to tie it on someone else. I just couldn't leave these guys hangin'. So I tied each of their ties on myself, I loosened it and put it on them. Now, they were ready for the self-choking maneuver and the wedding.
That was on Saturday. Friday night, we all went tieless, but it did look a lot like a wedding. The bridesmaid/groomsmen couples came down that aisle, her arm in his. Beautiful music was playing and the groom and I were at the front. Then, the big moment! The bride and her father made that stately march down the aisle as people stood for the grand entrance. The father "gave away" his daughter...the bride and groom stood before the minister, and ultimately the young couple - all smiles now - marched out of that sanctuary together.
But they still weren't married. Yeah, that was only the rehearsal. So on Friday night, they entered that church not married. And they left, uh-huh, not married. But Saturday, they entered that church not married and they left married! The difference? Well, on Friday, they were just going through the motions. On Saturday, they committed their lives to each other.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "How Church Folks Miss Heaven."
There are a lot of people who walk into church Sunday after Sunday, looking all Christian but without Jesus. And they walk out the same way they came in, without Jesus, because they're only going through the motions.
It's all too easy to do. You go through all the motions of belonging to Him, believing all the right beliefs, doing all the right things, saying all the right words like a person who knows Jesus for real. But you're missing Him.
That's why God gives this warning to all us church folks in our word for today from the Word of God, 2 Corinthians 13:5. Listen carefully: "Examine yourselves to see whether you are in the faith; test yourselves. Do you not realize that Christ Jesus is in you - unless, of course, you fail the test?"
There's something very sobering about a Judgment Day tragedy that Jesus described. "Not everyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven...Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you'" (Matthew 7:21-23).
Those are some of the most chilling words in the Bible, "You knew all about Me, but I never knew you." Because they had Jesus in their head, but somehow never asked Him into their heart. So, it's possible to know all about Jesus, but not really know Jesus, because you've missed the one step that makes the Savior your Savior.
"Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life" (John 3:36), the Bible says. When God says "believe," He's talking about grabbing Jesus like He's your only hope. Pinning all your hopes on Him and what He did when He died on the cross to pay for every sin you've ever done. If you ask me, "Ron, married guy?" I'd say, "Well, I'm not sure," then I'm not married because I'm not sure? Now, if you don't know you've given yourself to Jesus, you probably haven't, because it's a conscious commitment.
If you've missed that step of committing your life to Him, then you've missed Jesus, and you'll miss heaven, because you're just going through the motions. If you're not sure you belong to Him, today please say, "Jesus, I'm yours. I claim what you did on the cross for me; for my sin. You are my Savior beginning today."
Our website is there for you, and at a moment like this I hope you'll go there today. It's ANewStory.com. It will feel so good to finally have this thing settled once and for all.