Max Lucado Daily: BRIEF TRUTH - April 17, 2023
I believe in brevity. And since you’ve given me your time, I shouldn’t take more than my share. Over the years I’ve collected some “brief” statements of truth.
Number 1: Pray all the time. If necessary, use words.
Number 2: God forgets the past. Imitate Him.
Number 3: Greed I’ve often regretted. Generosity—never.
Number 4: In buying a gift for your wife, practicality can be more expensive than extravagance.
Here’s another: Don’t ask God to do what you want. Ask God to do what is right.
How about this one: You’ll give up on yourself before God will.
Flattery is fancy dishonesty.
You’ll regret opening your mouth. You’ll rarely regret keeping it shut.
And I’ll close with this one: To see sin without grace is despair. To see grace without sin is arrogance. To see them in tandem is conversion!
Galatians 3
Trust in Christ, Not the Law
You crazy Galatians! Did someone put a spell on you? Have you taken leave of your senses? Something crazy has happened, for it’s obvious that you no longer have the crucified Jesus in clear focus in your lives. His sacrifice on the cross was certainly set before you clearly enough.
2-4 Let me put this question to you: How did your new life begin? Was it by working your heads off to please God? Or was it by responding to God’s Message to you? Are you going to continue this craziness? For only crazy people would think they could complete by their own efforts what was begun by God. If you weren’t smart enough or strong enough to begin it, how do you suppose you could perfect it? Did you go through this whole painful learning process for nothing? It is not yet a total loss, but it certainly will be if you keep this up!
5-6 Answer this question: Does the God who lavishly provides you with his own presence, his Holy Spirit, working things in your lives you could never do for yourselves, does he do these things because of your strenuous moral striving or because you trust him to do them in you? Don’t these things happen among you just as they happened with Abraham? He believed God, and that act of belief was turned into a life that was right with God.
7-8 Is it not obvious to you that persons who put their trust in Christ (not persons who put their trust in the law!) are like Abraham: children of faith? It was all laid out beforehand in Scripture that God would set things right with non-Jews by faith. Scripture anticipated this in the promise to Abraham: “All nations will be blessed in you.”
9-10 So those now who live by faith are blessed along with Abraham, who lived by faith—this is no new doctrine! And that means that anyone who tries to live by his own effort, independent of God, is doomed to failure. Scripture backs this up: “Utterly cursed is every person who fails to carry out every detail written in the Book of the law.”
11-12 The obvious impossibility of carrying out such a moral program should make it plain that no one can sustain a relationship with God that way. The person who lives in right relationship with God does it by embracing what God arranges for him. Doing things for God is the opposite of entering into what God does for you. Habakkuk had it right: “The person who believes God, is set right by God—and that’s the real life.” Rule-keeping does not naturally evolve into living by faith, but only perpetuates itself in more and more rule-keeping, a fact observed in Scripture: “The one who does these things [rule-keeping] continues to live by them.”
13-14 Christ redeemed us from that self-defeating, cursed life by absorbing it completely into himself. Do you remember the Scripture that says, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”? That is what happened when Jesus was nailed to the cross: He became a curse, and at the same time dissolved the curse. And now, because of that, the air is cleared and we can see that Abraham’s blessing is present and available for non-Jews, too. We are all able to receive God’s life, his Spirit, in and with us by believing—just the way Abraham received it.
* * *
15-18 Friends, let me give you an example from everyday affairs of the free life I am talking about. Once a person’s will has been signed, no one else can annul it or add to it. Now, the promises were made to Abraham and to his descendant. You will observe that Scripture, in the careful language of a legal document, does not say “to descendants,” referring to everybody in general, but “to your descendant” (the noun, note, is singular), referring to Christ. This is the way I interpret this: A will, earlier signed by God, is not annulled by an addendum attached 430 years later, thereby negating the promise of the will. No, this addendum, with its instructions and regulations, has nothing to do with the promised inheritance in the will.
18-20 What is the point, then, of the law, the attached addendum? It was a thoughtful addition to the original covenant promises made to Abraham. The purpose of the law was to keep a sinful people in the way of salvation until Christ (the descendant) came, inheriting the promises and distributing them to us. Obviously this law was not a firsthand encounter with God. It was arranged by angelic messengers through a middleman, Moses. But if there is a middleman as there was at Sinai, then the people are not dealing directly with God, are they? But the original promise is the direct blessing of God, received by faith.
21-22 If such is the case, is the law, then, an anti-promise, a negation of God’s will for us? Not at all. Its purpose was to make obvious to everyone that we are, in ourselves, out of right relationship with God, and therefore to show us the futility of devising some religious system for getting by our own efforts what we can only get by waiting in faith for God to complete his promise. For if any kind of rule-keeping had power to create life in us, we would certainly have gotten it by this time.
23-24 Until the time when we were mature enough to respond freely in faith to the living God, we were carefully surrounded and protected by the Mosaic law. The law was like those Greek tutors, with which you are familiar, who escort children to school and protect them from danger or distraction, making sure the children will really get to the place they set out for.
25-27 But now you have arrived at your destination: By faith in Christ you are in direct relationship with God. Your baptism in Christ was not just washing you up for a fresh start. It also involved dressing you in an adult faith wardrobe—Christ’s life, the fulfillment of God’s original promise.
In Christ’s Family
28-29 In Christ’s family there can be no division into Jew and non-Jew, slave and free, male and female. Among us you are all equal. That is, we are all in a common relationship with Jesus Christ. Also, since you are Christ’s family, then you are Abraham’s famous “descendant,” heirs according to the covenant promises.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Monday, April 17, 2023
Today's Scripture
Isaiah 63:7–9
All the Things God Has Done That Need Praising
7-9 I’ll make a list of God’s gracious dealings,
all the things God has done that need praising,
All the generous bounties of God,
his great goodness to the family of Israel—
Compassion lavished,
love extravagant.
He said, “Without question these are my people,
children who would never betray me.”
So he became their Savior.
In all their troubles,
he was troubled, too.
He didn’t send someone else to help them.
He did it himself, in person.
Out of his own love and pity
he redeemed them.
He rescued them and carried them along
for a long, long time.
Insight
Isaiah 63:7–9 form the first part of the prophet Isaiah’s prayer. It follows the pattern of thanksgiving, confession, and supplication (making a request of our heavenly Father). The thanksgiving portion recounts God’s history of caring for Israel. He’s done “many good things” and bestowed “many kindnesses” on them (v. 7). He calls them “my people, children who will be true to me” (v. 8). Verse 10 begins the confession segment of the prayer. “Yet they rebelled and grieved [God’s] Holy Spirit,” laments Isaiah, and he poetically wonders, “Where is he who set his Holy Spirit among [Israel] . . . who divided the waters before them, to gain for himself everlasting renown?” (vv. 11–12). All this is a prelude to Isaiah’s plea for God to again show Himself strong. “Look down from heaven and see,” he says (v. 15). “Return for the sake of your servants” (v. 17). By: Tim Gustafson
Remembering to Praise
I will tell of the kindnesses of the Lord. Isaiah 63:7
When our congregation built our first building, people wrote thankful reminders on the wall studs and concrete floors before the interior of the building was finished. Pull back the drywall from the studs and you’ll find them there. Verse after verse from Scripture, written beside prayers of praise like “You are so good!” We left them there as a witness to future generations that regardless of our challenges, God had been kind and taken care of us.
We need to remember what God has done for us and tell others about it. Isaiah exemplified this when he wrote, “I will tell of the kindnesses of the Lord, the deeds for which he is to be praised, according to all the Lord has done for us” (Isaiah 63:7). Later, the prophet also recounts God’s compassion for His people throughout history, even telling how “in all their distress he too was distressed” (v. 9). But if you keep reading the chapter, you’ll notice Israel is again in a time of trouble, and the prophet longs for God’s intervention.
Remembering God’s past kindnesses helps when times are hard. Challenging seasons come and go, but His faithful character never changes. As we turn to Him with grateful hearts in remembrance of all He’s done, we discover afresh that He’s always worthy of our praise. By: James Banks
Reflect & Pray
What kindnesses has God shown you in the past? How does praising Him for them help you when you’re going through challenging times?
Father, You’re sovereign over all creation. I praise You because Your goodness doesn’t change, and You’re always with me.
For further study, read Worshipping God Means More than Singing.
https://discoveryseries.org/courses/worshipping-god-means-more-than-singing/
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Monday, April 17, 2023
All or Nothing?
When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment…and plunged into the sea. —John 21:7
Have you ever had a crisis in your life in which you deliberately, earnestly, and recklessly abandoned everything? It is a crisis of the will. You may come to that point many times externally, but it will amount to nothing. The true deep crisis of abandonment, or total surrender, is reached internally, not externally. The giving up of only external things may actually be an indication of your being in total bondage.
Have you deliberately committed your will to Jesus Christ? It is a transaction of the will, not of emotion; any positive emotion that results is simply a superficial blessing arising out of the transaction. If you focus your attention on the emotion, you will never make the transaction. Do not ask God what the transaction is to be, but make the determination to surrender your will regarding whatever you see, whether it is in the shallow or the deep, profound places internally.
If you have heard Jesus Christ’s voice on the waves of the sea, you can let your convictions and your consistency take care of themselves by concentrating on maintaining your intimate relationship to Him.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
We can understand the attributes of God in other ways, but we can only understand the Father’s heart in the Cross of Christ. The Highest Good—Thy Great Redemption, 558 L
Bible in a Year: 2 Samuel 1-2; Luke 14:1-24
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Monday, April 17, 2023
WHAT YOU'LL HAVE TO SHOW FOR THE LIFE YOU LIVE - #9461
The headlines that day were about a movie star dying. But Paul Walker had been a lot more. For those familiar with the "Fast and Furious" movies that he was famous for, his death was especially jarring. Because of the way he died - a high-speed accident, the exotic race car that he was in exploding in flames; eerily reminiscent of the movies that made him famous. But in the days that followed that initial shock, people were actually focusing on Paul Walker the man, not just the movie star.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "What You'll Have to Show for the Life You Live."
Well, Paul was remembered as a humanitarian. I guess he used his wealth to start a charity that provided disaster relief around the world: in tornado-ravaged Alabama, in Indonesia after that great tsunami. He was on the ground personally right after the Haiti earthquake. When he died, he was returning from his charity's fundraiser to help victims of a Filipino typhoon. And since his then 15-year-old daughter came to live with him, he was learning to love what was becoming the best role of his life - Dad.
I was reminded of what it says on my own dad's grave, actually, by this. To most, my dad was known for the leadership positions that he rose to in his life. But his headstone only has two words on it besides his name - "Husband," "Father." After all is said and done, that's what lasted. Other people could have held the positions he had, but no one else could have been my Dad, and he was a good one.
Soon after Paul Walker's death, I watched a wife and three sons pay tribute to their husband and father who had just died in another high-speed crash. This time it was a speeding train in New York City. They said, "We just wanted everyone to know what a great husband and dad and person he was."
It's all made me think again about what really matters. And it's underscored what may be the two greatest issues in our life. Which, strangely, we seldom think about: legacy and eternity. The Lakota Sioux have a proverb that's tattooed in my mind: "We will be known forever by the tracks we leave behind." For the most part, those tracks won't be accomplishments. It will be people.
Like Paul Walker's daughter and those three sons of the man in the train wreck. The seeds we plant in the souls of our family will blossom long after we're gone; seeds of love and integrity and character, or seeds of selfishness, anger, and hardness too.
As philosopher William James said, "The purpose of life is to live it for something that will outlast it." That's the lives we invest in, not the loot we accumulate or the lists of our achievements. And then there's that issue of eternity. See, often, death comes suddenly without time to prepare. And the Bible reveals what's on the other side. Hebrews 9:27, our word for today from the Word of God puts it this way, "People are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment."
Some of my worst nightmares have taken me into important situations where I was caught unprepared. A test, a speech, a major event; those were dreams. What's far more significant is the reality of being prepared for whatever's on the other side of my last heartbeat, because that's going to last forever.
Legacy. Eternity. The things that will matter after we're gone should be what matters while we're here. How do we prepare for judgment on the other side of our last breath? Well, the Bible says that we all face the judgment; the death penalty we've earned for running our lives and hijacking our life and doing it our way instead of our Creator's way. But then, that's why Jesus came. Because the Bible says, "He carried our sins in His own body on the tree." He went there to die my death penalty; to take my hell so I could go to His heaven.
The only way to be prepared for the final exam before God is to ask this Jesus to be your rescuer from your sin and to put all your trust in Him. If you've never done that, would you tell Him today, "Jesus, I'm yours." Please go to our website. It's ANewStory.com, and you'll see there how you can get this settled this very day.
There is no greater peace than knowing that you are ready for eternity however it comes and whenever it comes.