Max Lucado Daily: THE SHEPHERD KNOWS YOU - April 12, 2023
When I see a flock of sheep I see exactly that – a flock. A rabble of wool. I don’t see a sheep; I see sheep. All alike, none different. But not so with the shepherd. To him every sheep is different. Every face has a story. John 10:3 says, “The sheep listen to the voice of the shepherd. He calls his own sheep by name.”
When we see a crowd we see exactly that – a crowd. We see people, not persons. A herd of humans. But not so with the Shepherd. To him every face is different. Every face is a story. The Shepherd knows you. He knows your name, and he will never forget it. God said in Isaiah 49, “I have written your name on my hand.” Quite a thought isn’t it? Your name on God’s lips. My, could it be?
Amos 8
You Who Give Little and Take Much
My Master God showed me this vision: A bowl of fresh fruit.
2 He said, “What do you see, Amos?”
I said, “A bowl of fresh, ripe fruit.”
God said, “Right. So, I’m calling it quits with my people Israel. I’m no longer acting as if everything is just fine.”
3 “The royal singers will wail when it happens.”
My Master God said so.
“Corpses will be strewn here, there, and everywhere.
Hush!”
4-6 Listen to this, you who walk all over the weak,
you who treat poor people as less than nothing,
Who say, “When’s my next paycheck coming
so I can go out and live it up?
How long till the weekend
when I can go out and have a good time?”
Who give little and take much,
and never do an honest day’s work.
You exploit the poor, using them—
and then, when they’re used up, you discard them.
7-8 God swears against the arrogance of Jacob:
“I’m keeping track of their every last sin.”
God’s oath will shake earth’s foundations,
dissolve the whole world into tears.
God’s oath will sweep in like a river that rises,
flooding houses and lands,
And then recedes,
leaving behind a sea of mud.
9-10 “On Judgment Day, watch out!”
These are the words of God, my Master.
“I’ll turn off the sun at noon.
In the middle of the day the earth will go black.
I’ll turn your parties into funerals
and make every song you sing a dirge.
Everyone will walk around in rags,
with sunken eyes and bald heads.
Think of the worst that could happen
—your only son, say, murdered.
That’s a hint of Judgment Day
—that and much more.
11-12 “Oh yes, Judgment Day is coming!”
These are the words of my Master God.
“I’ll send a famine through the whole country.
It won’t be food or water that’s lacking, but my Word.
People will drift from one end of the country to the other,
roam to the north, wander to the east.
They’ll go anywhere, listen to anyone,
hoping to hear God’s Word—but they won’t hear it.
13-14 “On Judgment Day,
lovely young girls will faint of Word-thirst,
robust young men will faint of God-thirst,
Along with those who take oaths at the Samaria Sin-and-Sex Center,
saying, ‘As the lord god of Dan is my witness!’
and ‘The lady goddess of Beer-sheba bless you!’
Their lives will fall to pieces.
They’ll never put it together again.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Wednesday, April 12, 2023
Today's Scripture
1 Samuel 3:3–10
“Speak, God. I’m Ready to Listen”
The boy Samuel was serving God under Eli’s direction. This was at a time when the revelation of God was rarely heard or seen. One night Eli was sound asleep (his eyesight was very bad—he could hardly see). It was well before dawn; the sanctuary lamp was still burning. Samuel was still in bed in the Temple of God, where the Chest of God rested.
4-5 Then God called out, “Samuel, Samuel!”
Samuel answered, “Yes? I’m here.” Then he ran to Eli saying, “I heard you call. Here I am.”
Eli said, “I didn’t call you. Go back to bed.” And so he did.
6-7 God called again, “Samuel, Samuel!”
Samuel got up and went to Eli, “I heard you call. Here I am.”
Again Eli said, “Son, I didn’t call you. Go back to bed.” (This all happened before Samuel knew God for himself. It was before the revelation of God had been given to him personally.)
8-9 God called again, “Samuel!”—the third time! Yet again Samuel got up and went to Eli, “Yes? I heard you call me. Here I am.”
That’s when it dawned on Eli that God was calling the boy. So Eli directed Samuel, “Go back and lie down. If the voice calls again, say, ‘Speak, God. I’m your servant, ready to listen.’” Samuel returned to his bed.
10 Then God came and stood before him exactly as before, calling out, “Samuel! Samuel!”
Samuel answered, “Speak. I’m your servant, ready to listen.”
Insight
Eli was a priest in Israel and, as such, a valuable mentor to young Samuel. Unfortunately, Eli’s struggles as a dad are pictured in the failings of his sons Hophni and Phinehas. These men followed in their father’s footsteps as priests but defiled the sacrifices (1 Samuel 2:12–17) and even engaged in sexual acts with women at the very gate of the tabernacle—Israel’s tent of meeting and primary place of worship (v. 22). Verse 12 describes them as “scoundrels” and verse 17 adds that “this sin of the young men was very great in the Lord’s sight.” So severe was their activity that a “man of God” later came to Eli and chastened him for honoring his sons more than God, pronouncing a verdict of judgment upon the house of Eli (vv. 27–36). By: Bill Crowder
God Speaking to Us
Then Samuel said, “Speak, for your servant is listening.” 1 Samuel 3:10
I received a phone call from an unknown number. Often, I let those calls go to voicemail, but this time I picked up. The random caller asked politely if I had just a minute for him to share a short Bible passage. He quoted Revelation 21:3–5 about how God “will wipe every tear from their eyes.” He talked about Jesus, how he was our assurance and hope. I told him I already know Jesus as my personal Savior. But the caller wasn’t aiming to “witness” to me. Instead, he simply asked if he could pray with me. And he did, asking God to give me encouragement and strength.
That call reminded me of another “call” in Scripture—God called out to the young boy Samuel in the middle of the night (1 Samuel 3:4–10). Three times Samuel heard the voice, thinking it was the elderly priest Eli. The final time, following Eli’s instruction, Samuel realized that God was calling him: “Speak, for your servant is listening” (v. 10). Likewise, through our days and nights, God may be speaking to us. We need to “pick up,” which might mean spending more time in His presence and listening for His voice.
I then thought of “the call” in another way. What if we sometimes are the messenger of God’s words to someone else? We might feel we have no way of helping others. But as God guides us, we could phone a friend and ask, “Would it be okay if I just prayed with you today?” By: Kenneth Petersen
Reflect & Pray
What message of encouragement did someone recently share with you? Who might be encouraged by a phone call from you?
Dear God, prompt me to think of others whom I can encourage with Your wisdom.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Wednesday, April 12, 2023
Complete and Effective Dominion
Death no longer has dominion over Him.…the life that He lives, He lives to God. Likewise you also, reckon yourselves to be dead indeed to sin, but alive to God… —Romans 6:9-11
Co-Eternal Life. Eternal life is the life which Jesus Christ exhibited on the human level. And it is this same life, not simply a copy of it, which is made evident in our mortal flesh when we are born again. Eternal life is not a gift from God; eternal life is the gift of God. The energy and the power which was so very evident in Jesus will be exhibited in us by an act of the absolute sovereign grace of God, once we have made that complete and effective decision about sin.
“You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you…” (Acts 1:8)— not power as a gift from the Holy Spirit; the power is the Holy Spirit, not something that He gives us. The life that was in Jesus becomes ours because of His Cross, once we make the decision to be identified with Him. If it is difficult to get right with God, it is because we refuse to make this moral decision about sin. But once we do decide, the full life of God comes in immediately. Jesus came to give us an endless supply of life— “…that you may be filled with all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:19). Eternal life has nothing to do with time. It is the life which Jesus lived when He was down here, and the only Source of life is the Lord Jesus Christ.
Even the weakest saint can experience the power of the deity of the Son of God, when he is willing to “let go.” But any effort to “hang on” to the least bit of our own power will only diminish the life of Jesus in us. We have to keep letting go, and slowly, but surely, the great full life of God will invade us, penetrating every part. Then Jesus will have complete and effective dominion in us, and people will take notice that we have been with Him.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
When we no longer seek God for His blessings, we have time to seek Him for Himself. The Moral Foundations of Life, 728 L
Bible in a Year: 1 Samuel 19-21; Luke 11:29-54
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Wednesday, April 12, 2023
YOUR STRETCH OF THE BEACH - #9458
Two words that will inevitably cause a lot of excitement to appear on any face in our family - Ocean City. That's the name of this charming town on the Jersey shore where our family has got a lot of memories over the years. There was this one trip where several of us rendezvoused there for a couple of days making a few more memories.
I was riding my bike along the boardwalk there, and I passed some Herculean young men jogging the boards. Their shirts had four letters on them: OCBP. That's Ocean City Beach Patrol. Over a century ago, as Ocean City was becoming a tourist mecca, the number of drownings began to increase. So, the Beach Patrol was formed. As of the last time I was there, they had a record to be proud of. In 100 years, they had never lost anyone at a guarded beach. I remember a time some years ago when a young Amish woman drowned in the Atlantic Ocean, but that was on an unguarded beach.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Your Stretch of the Beach."
I've seen those lifeguards in action. They concentrate on their stretch of the water and the people that are in it almost as if it's a life-or-death matter. Because it is! Just like the rescue responsibility God has entrusted to you.
Our word for today from the Word of God; Proverbs 24:11-12. As you listen, would you try to picture some of the people on the stretch of beach God has given you to guard. He says, "Rescue those being led away to death; hold back those staggering toward slaughter. If you say, 'But we knew nothing about this,' does not He who weighs the heart perceive it? Does not He who guards your life know it? Will He not repay each person according to what he has done?" God's saying here, "If you have a rescue responsibility, there is no excuse for you letting people die without your trying to do something about it."
The awful tragedy is that so many Christless lives are being lost forever because one of God's spiritual lifeguards is leaving their beach unguarded. Your beach? It's that circle of influence God has given you - the people you work with, live near, go to school with or recreate with. But too many of us lifeguards, we stay in the lifeguard station, enjoying the fellowship of the other lifeguards, singing our lifeguard songs, planning our lifeguard meetings while people are dying in the surf.
Maybe we leave our stretch of the beach unguarded because we forget that telling people about Jesus really is life-or-death. The people around you may not look or sound like they're dying spiritually, but listen to a few of the words God uses in the Bible to describe the lost people around you. They are called in the Bible, "Those being led away to death" (Proverbs 24:11). They're called "lost" in Luke 19:10. In Ephesians 2:12, they are "without God, without hope." In John 3:36, "Whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God's wrath remains on him." Second Thessalonians 1:9 says those who don't know God "will be punished with everlasting destruction and shut out from the presence of the Lord." And in Revelation 20:15, God says, "If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire."
These are people you know, or ought to know. And you carry in your heart the one message that can change all this; the message of a Savior who loved them enough to die so they don't have to. Your job isn't to persuade them to come to Jesus, but it is to present Jesus. If you haven't done that, then they don't know they're dying and they don't know who to grab to rescue them.
You may think there's someone better to rescue the people around you, but it's you that God put in the middle of them. This is your stretch of the beach. The people there are your responsibility. Please don't leave your beach unguarded. Too many people are dying on unguarded beaches.