Max Lucado Daily: THE IMAGE OF A HERO - April 14, 2023
The apostle Paul shaped history, yet Paul would die in the jail of a despot. No headlines announced his execution. No observer recorded the events. Doesn’t look like a hero. The fellow who changes the oil in your car could be a hero. Maybe as he works he prays, asking God to do with the heart of the driver what he does with the engine. I know, I know, it doesn’t fit our image of a hero.
John Egglen, a deacon, stepped in and gave the sermon for a few folks who’d arrived before a snowstorm that prevented the pastor from getting there. In a moment of courage, he looked straight at a young boy in the service and said, “Look to Jesus. Look!” The boy’s name? Charles Haddon Spurgeon, England’s “prince of preachers.”
You never know. Tomorrow’s Spurgeon may be in your church or your neighbor. And the hero who inspires him might be in your mirror.
Galatians 2
What Is Central?
Fourteen years after that first visit, Barnabas and I went up to Jerusalem and took Titus with us. I went to clarify with them what had been revealed to me. At that time I placed before them exactly what I was preaching to the non-Jews. I did this in private with the leaders, those held in esteem by the church, so that our concern would not become a controversial public issue, marred by ethnic tensions, exposing my years of work to denigration and endangering my present ministry. Significantly, Titus, non-Jewish though he was, was not required to be circumcised. While we were in conference we were infiltrated by spies pretending to be Christians, who slipped in to find out just how free true Christians are. Their ulterior motive was to reduce us to their brand of servitude. We didn’t give them the time of day. We were determined to preserve the truth of the Message for you.
6-10 As for those who were considered important in the church, their reputation doesn’t concern me. God isn’t impressed with mere appearances, and neither am I. And of course these leaders were able to add nothing to the message I had been preaching. It was soon evident that God had entrusted me with the same message to the non-Jews as Peter had been preaching to the Jews. Recognizing that my calling had been given by God, James, Peter, and John—the pillars of the church—shook hands with me and Barnabas, assigning us to a ministry to the non-Jews, while they continued to be responsible for reaching out to the Jews. The only additional thing they asked was that we remember the poor, and I was already eager to do that.
11-13 Later, when Peter came to Antioch, I had a face-to-face confrontation with him because he was clearly out of line. Here’s the situation. Earlier, before certain persons had come from James, Peter regularly ate with the non-Jews. But when that conservative group came from Jerusalem, he cautiously pulled back and put as much distance as he could manage between himself and his non-Jewish friends. That’s how fearful he was of the conservative Jewish clique that’s been pushing the old system of circumcision. Unfortunately, the rest of the Jews in the Antioch church joined in that hypocrisy so that even Barnabas was swept along in the charade.
14 But when I saw that they were not maintaining a steady, straight course according to the Message, I spoke up to Peter in front of them all: “If you, a Jew, live like a non-Jew when you’re not being observed by the watchdogs from Jerusalem, what right do you have to require non-Jews to conform to Jewish customs just to make a favorable impression on your old Jerusalem buddies?”
15-16 We Jews know that we have no advantage of birth over “non-Jewish sinners.” We know very well that we are not set right with God by rule-keeping but only through personal faith in Jesus Christ. How do we know? We tried it—and we had the best system of rules the world has ever seen! Convinced that no human being can please God by self-improvement, we believed in Jesus as the Messiah so that we might be set right before God by trusting in the Messiah, not by trying to be good.
17-18 Have some of you noticed that we are not yet perfect? (No great surprise, right?) And are you ready to make the accusation that since people like me, who go through Christ in order to get things right with God, aren’t perfectly virtuous, Christ must therefore be an accessory to sin? The accusation is frivolous. If I was “trying to be good,” I would be rebuilding the same old barn that I tore down. I would be acting as a pretender.
19-21 What actually took place is this: I tried keeping rules and working my head off to please God, and it didn’t work. So I quit being a “law man” so that I could be God’s man. Christ’s life showed me how, and enabled me to do it. I identified myself completely with him. Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not “mine,” but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I am not going to go back on that.
21 Is it not clear to you that to go back to that old rule-keeping, peer-pleasing religion would be an abandonment of everything personal and free in my relationship with God? I refuse to do that, to repudiate God’s grace. If a living relationship with God could come by rule-keeping, then Christ died unnecessarily.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Friday, April 14, 2023
Today's Scripture
2 Samuel 15:13–14, 23–26
Someone came to David with the report, “The whole country has taken up with Absalom!”
14 “Up and out of here!” called David to all his servants who were with him in Jerusalem. “We’ve got to run for our lives or none of us will escape Absalom! Hurry, he’s about to pull the city down around our ears and slaughter us all!”
23-24 The whole country was weeping in loud lament as all the people passed by. As the king crossed the Brook Kidron, the army headed for the road to the wilderness. Zadok was also there, the Levites with him, carrying God’s Chest of the Covenant. They set the Chest of God down, Abiathar standing by, until all the people had evacuated the city.
25-26 Then the king ordered Zadok, “Take the Chest back to the city. If I get back in God’s good graces, he’ll bring me back and show me where the Chest has been set down. But if he says, ‘I’m not pleased with you’—well, he can then do with me whatever he pleases.”
Insight
Psalm 3 is among a few psalms that include notes (superscriptions) that identify authors or other helpful information. The header reads: “A psalm of David. When he fled from his son Absalom.” This notation connects the psalm with 2 Samuel 15, where we see Absalom, the rival king, on the rise (vv. 1–12) and David, the rightful king, on the run (vv. 13–37). The rebellion of Absalom, along with other family challenges (see 2 Samuel 13), fulfilled the word of the prophet: “Out of your own household I am going to bring calamity on you” (12:11). Because the battered king didn’t equate the discipline of God with the abandonment of God, he could say, “But you, Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, the One who lifts my head high. I call out to the Lord, and he answers me from his holy mountain” (Psalm 3:3–4). By: Arthur Jackson
Uphill All the Way
Let him do to me whatever seems good to him. 2 Samuel 15:26
Christina Rossetti, a poet and devotional writer, found that nothing came easily for her. She suffered from depression and various illnesses throughout her life and endured broken engagements. Eventually she died of cancer.
When David burst into Israel’s national consciousness, it was as a triumphant warrior. Yet throughout his life, David faced hardship. Late in his reign, his own son, along with his trusted advisor and much of the country, turned against him (2 Samuel 15:1–12). So David took the priests Abiathar and Zadok and the sacred ark of God with him and fled Jerusalem (vv. 14, 24).
After Abiathar had offered sacrifices to God, David told the priests, “Take the ark of God back into the city. If I find favor in the Lord’s eyes, he will bring me back and let me see it and his dwelling place again” (v. 25). Despite the uncertainty, David said, “If [God] says, ‘I am not pleased with you,’ . . . let him do to me whatever seems good to him” (v. 26). He knew he could trust God.
Christina Rossetti trusted God too, and her life ended in hope. The road may indeed wind uphill all the way, but it leads to our heavenly Father, who awaits us with open arms. By: Tim Gustafson
Reflect & Pray
In what ways has life seemed uphill and winding to you? How will you trust God to lead you on the road you’re traveling?
Dear God, this life seems so hard sometimes. Yet I trust You to do what’s right, for me and for everyone. Help me live in Your hope, anticipating the day I’ll be with You.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, April 14, 2023
Inner Invincibility
Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me… —Matthew 11:29
“Whom the Lord loves He chastens…” (Hebrews 12:6). How petty our complaining is! Our Lord begins to bring us to the point where we can have fellowship with Him, only to hear us moan and groan, saying, “Oh Lord, just let me be like other people!” Jesus is asking us to get beside Him and take one end of the yoke, so that we can pull together. That’s why Jesus says to us, “My yoke is easy and My burden is light” (Matthew 11:30). Are you closely identified with the Lord Jesus like that? If so, you will thank God when you feel the pressure of His hand upon you.
“…to those who have no might He increases strength” (Isaiah 40:29). God comes and takes us out of our emotionalism, and then our complaining turns into a hymn of praise. The only way to know the strength of God is to take the yoke of Jesus upon us and to learn from Him.
“…the joy of the Lord is your strength” (Nehemiah 8:10). Where do the saints get their joy? If we did not know some Christians well, we might think from just observing them that they have no burdens at all to bear. But we must lift the veil from our eyes. The fact that the peace, light, and joy of God is in them is proof that a burden is there as well. The burden that God places on us squeezes the grapes in our lives and produces the wine, but most of us see only the wine and not the burden. No power on earth or in hell can conquer the Spirit of God living within the human spirit; it creates an inner invincibility.
If your life is producing only a whine, instead of the wine, then ruthlessly kick it out. It is definitely a crime for a Christian to be weak in God’s strength.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Jesus Christ can afford to be misunderstood; we cannot. Our weakness lies in always wanting to vindicate ourselves.
The Place of Help
Bible in a Year: 1 Samuel 25-26; Luke 12:32-59
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, April 14, 2023
THE TAPESTRY OF YOUR LIFE - #9460
There are many kinds of artists. My friend, Martha, she made her masterpieces out of thread. She lived in a tiny, sparsely furnished house in a remote corner of the Navajo reservation. It hadn't been an easy life with 11 children and a husband who blew most of his meager income on alcohol. But she found a way to provide at least enough money for her family to eat. She wove Navajo rugs. Now, I've had the privilege actually of being there when she was working on one. She had a loom in her living room where she worked for hours on end, pulling thread from one side to the other. In some ways, it didn't look like it had much promise; no pattern could be seen anywhere. It was all in her mind. But there was something beautiful in her mind that only she could see as she patiently wove those threads back and forth. And when she was finished, she'd produced a masterpiece for which a tourist would pay thousands of dollars in a nearby store. She'd only get a fraction of that, but shame on anyone who ever questioned what she was doing on that loom.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Tapestry of Your Life."
When I watched that Navajo woman weaving something beautiful from those seemingly random threads, I was looking at a picture of the ways of God, because He's the original Artist, and He only does masterpieces. He is, in a sense, the Master Weaver on the loom of your life. You can't see what He's making from the threads in front of you, but He can. And it's something beautiful. It's something valuable.
His working is powerfully described in our word for today from the Word of God in Ephesians 1:11. As you listen, take this as a guarantee about your life. Speaking of those who belong to Jesus Christ, it says, "In Him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of Him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of His will."
God's saying here that He has had a plan for your life since before there was a you. Like someone watching that Navajo mother weaving her rug, you can't see the plan. It's in the mind of the artist. But you can be sure that He is weaving the tapestry you were made for. He's weaving it today - and every day.
The threads you can see right now? They may be dark. Some of the threads don't seem to fit. But God is still at the loom. He's still going somewhere. He's making something in your life.
And no matter how random, even how senseless it all seems right now, you have this promise: "'I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord, 'plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.'" And He's bringing into your life those people, those experiences that will help accomplish His grand design for you - to be like His Son, Jesus. The Bible says He is working everything together for you who were "predestined to be conformed to the likeness of His Son" (Romans 8:29).
Many times when I couldn't see the plan, and only what seemed to be tangled threads, I have found myself saying, "Father, I don't understand You, but I always trust You." After all, would someone who gave His Son to die for you ever do you wrong? The Bible says, "He spared not His own Son, but offered Him up for us all. Will He not also with Him freely give us all things?" (Romans 8:32)
You can trust the weaver who's at that heavenly loom right now. He knows exactly what He's doing. Trust the plan, even though you can't see it. He is making your life into something very beautiful and very valuable.