Max Lucado Daily: SPEAK WORDS OF LIFE - February 29, 2024
Nathaniel Hawthorne came home heartbroken. He had just been fired from his job in the customhouse. His wife, rather than responding with anxiety, surprised him with joy. “Now you can write your book!” He wasn’t so positive. “And what shall we live on while I’m writing it?” To his amazement she opened a drawer and revealed a wad of money she’d saved out of her housekeeping budget. “I always knew you were a man of genius,” she told him. “I always knew you’d write a masterpiece”
She believed in her husband. And because she did, he wrote. And because he wrote, every library in America has a copy of The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Proverbs 18:21 (NKJV) says, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue.” You have the power to change someone’s life simply by the words you speak.
Micah 6
What God Is Looking For
1–2 6 Listen now, listen to God:
“Take your stand in court.
If you have a complaint, tell the mountains;
make your case to the hills.
And now, Mountains, hear God’s case;
listen, Jury Earth—
For I am bringing charges against my people.
I am building a case against Israel.
3–5 “Dear people, how have I done you wrong?
Have I burdened you, worn you out? Answer!
I delivered you from a bad life in Egypt;
I paid a good price to get you out of slavery.
I sent Moses to lead you—
and Aaron and Miriam to boot!
Remember what Balak king of Moab tried to pull,
and how Balaam son of Beor turned the tables on him.
Remember all those stories about Shittim and Gilgal.
Keep all God’s salvation stories fresh and present.”
6–7 How can I stand up before God
and show proper respect to the high God?
Should I bring an armload of offerings
topped off with yearling calves?
Would God be impressed with thousands of rams,
with buckets and barrels of olive oil?
Would he be moved if I sacrificed my firstborn child,
my precious baby, to cancel my sin?
8 But he’s already made it plain how to live, what to do,
what God is looking for in men and women.
It’s quite simple: Do what is fair and just to your neighbor,
be compassionate and loyal in your love,
And don’t take yourself too seriously—
take God seriously.
9 Attention! God calls out to the city!
If you know what’s good for you, you’ll listen.
So listen, all of you!
This is serious business.
10–16 “Do you expect me to overlook obscene wealth
you’ve piled up by cheating and fraud?
Do you think I’ll tolerate shady deals
and shifty scheming?
I’m tired of the violent rich
bullying their way with bluffs and lies.
I’m fed up. Beginning now, you’re finished.
You’ll pay for your sins down to your last cent.
No matter how much you get, it will never be enough—
hollow stomachs, empty hearts.
No matter how hard you work, you’ll have nothing to show for it—
bankrupt lives, wasted souls.
You’ll plant grass
but never get a lawn.
You’ll make jelly
but never spread it on your bread.
You’ll press apples
but never drink the cider.
You have lived by the standards of your king, Omri,
the decadent lifestyle of the family of Ahab.
Because you’ve slavishly followed their fashions,
I’m forcing you into bankruptcy.
Your way of life will be laughed at, a tasteless joke.
Your lives will be derided as futile and fake.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Thursday, February 29, 2024
Today's Scripture
Leviticus 13:1–8
Infections
1–3 13 God spoke to Moses and Aaron: “When someone has a swelling or a blister or a shiny spot on the skin that might signal a serious skin disease on the body, bring him to Aaron the priest or to one of his priest sons. The priest will examine the sore on the skin. If the hair in the sore has turned white and the sore appears more than skin deep, it is a serious skin disease and infectious. After the priest has examined it, he will pronounce the person unclean.
4–8 “If the shiny spot on the skin is white but appears to be only on the surface and the hair has not turned white, the priest will quarantine the person for seven days. On the seventh day the priest will examine it again; if, in his judgment, the sore is the same and has not spread, the priest will keep him in quarantine for another seven days. On the seventh day the priest will examine him a second time; if the sore has faded and hasn’t spread, the priest will declare him clean—it is a harmless rash. The person can go home and wash his clothes; he is clean. But if the sore spreads after he has shown himself to the priest and been declared clean, he must come back again to the priest who will conduct another examination. If the sore has spread, the priest will pronounce him unclean—it is a serious skin disease and infectious.
Insight
The book of Leviticus gives the account of events that took place after God delivered His people from slavery in Egypt and describes how His people could live in His presence. At that time, Israel’s priests were entrusted with great responsibility in guiding the Israelites in how to live. In chapter 13, we find this includes taking great care regarding those with infectious skin diseases. The priests were trained how to recognize contagious conditions and to require those with such diseases to isolate themselves until there was evidence of healing (vv. 4, 8). Minor, noncontagious skin conditions wouldn’t require being quarantined (vv. 7, 11). By: Monica La Rose
Even Leviticus
You are to be holy to me because I, the Lord, am holy.
Leviticus 20:26
The topic was Leviticus, and I had a confession to make. “I skipped a lot of the reading,” I told my Bible study group. “I’m not reading about skin diseases again.”
That’s when my friend Dave spoke up. “I know a guy who believed in Jesus because of that passage,” he said. Dave explained that his friend—a doctor—had been an atheist. He decided that before he completely rejected the Bible, he’d better read it for himself. The section on skin diseases in Leviticus fascinated him. It contained surprising details about contagious and noncontagious sores (13:1–46) and how to treat them (14:8–9). He knew this far surpassed the medical knowledge of that day—yet there it was in Leviticus. There’s no way Moses could have known all this, he thought. The doctor began to consider that Moses really did receive his information from God. Eventually he put his faith in Jesus.
If parts of the Bible bore you, well, I’m with you. But everything it says is there for a reason. Leviticus was written so the Israelites would know how to live for and with God. As we learn more about this relationship between God and His people, we learn about God Himself.
“All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness,” wrote the apostle Paul (2 Timothy 3:16). Let’s read on. Even Leviticus. By: Tim Gustafson
Reflect & Pray
What sections of the Bible bore you or seem irrelevant? How can you learn to recognize their value?
Father, teach me how to appreciate the Bible. Let every part speak to me.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, February 29, 2024
What Do You Want The Lord to Do for You?
"What do you want Me to do for you?" He said, "Lord, that I may receive my sight." —Luke 18:41
Is there something in your life that not only disturbs you, but makes you a disturbance to others? If so, it is always something you cannot handle yourself. “Then those who went before warned him that he should be quiet; but he cried out all the more…” (Luke 18:39). Be persistent with your disturbance until you get face to face with the Lord Himself. Don’t deify common sense. To sit calmly by, instead of creating a disturbance, serves only to deify our common sense. When Jesus asks what we want Him to do for us about the incredible problem that is confronting us, remember that He doesn’t work in commonsense ways, but only in supernatural ways.
Look at how we limit the Lord by only remembering what we have allowed Him to do for us in the past. We say, “I always failed there, and I always will.” Consequently, we don’t ask for what we want. Instead, we think, “It is ridiculous to ask God to do this.” If it is an impossibility, it is the very thing for which we have to ask. If it is not an impossible thing, it is not a real disturbance. And God will do what is absolutely impossible.
This man received his sight. But the most impossible thing for you is to be so closely identified with the Lord that there is literally nothing of your old life remaining. God will do it if you will ask Him. But you have to come to the point of believing Him to be almighty. We find faith by not only believing what Jesus says, but, even more, by trusting Jesus Himself. If we only look at what He says, we will never believe. Once we see Jesus, the impossible things He does in our lives become as natural as breathing. The agony we suffer is only the result of the deliberate shallowness of our own heart. We won’t believe; we won’t let go by severing the line that secures the boat to the shore— we prefer to worry.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
There is no allowance whatever in the New Testament for the man who says he is saved by grace but who does not produce the graceful goods. Jesus Christ by His Redemption can make our actual life in keeping with our religious profession. Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, 1465 R
Bible in a Year: Numbers 20-22; Mark 7:1-13
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, February 29, 2024
Twisting the Bible to Match Your Life - #9689
One of the most challenging and graceful track and field events has got to be the pole vault. There's this athlete running, then he's airborne on that pole, now he's gliding up and over that bar. Can't you picture it? Well, up at least! Oh, no! The bar comes crashing down; the "vaulter" didn't clear the bar. But wait! Here come the officials! Listen to what they're saying to the unsuccessful "vaulter," "Oh, that was a little high for you wasn't it? Listen, why don't we lower the bar a couple of notches? We'll just keep lowering it until you can clear it."
Don't hold your breath looking for a scene like that on the Olympics or any other sports program. They're never going to lower the bar in a track meet. Of course, it's happening all too often in the church.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Twisting the Bible to Match Your Life."
There's an interesting trend among God's people today to sort of re-write God's laws when someone I love has violated them. So, if a friend or family member of yours hasn't cleared God's standards, we suddenly find justification for lowering the bar.
In our word for today from the Word of God, 1 Samuel 13:14, David was the one who was described as "a man after God's own heart." And yet we know that by 2 Samuel 12, he has committed a gross sin of adultery with Bathsheba, and then setting up her husband to die on the front lines. Here is the man God loves; the man after God's heart. But listen to what God says through the prophet Nathan. "Now, therefore, the sword will never depart from your house, David, because you despised me and took the wife of Uriah to be your own."
This is what the Lord says: "out of your own household I'm going to bring calamity upon you. Before your very eyes I will take your wives and give them to one who is close to you, and he will lie with your wives in broad daylight. You did it in secret, but I will do this in broad daylight before all Israel." See, the man God loved didn't clear the bar. Did God lower it? No. He can't. But apparently we can when it's a choice between the laws of God and our love for someone close to us, we tend to rewrite the laws to fit the one we love; to find a loophole that they can squeeze through.
We can be very clear as to what the Bible says about sex, about abortion, about divorce, about marrying an unbeliever, about revenge, until someone close to us steps outside those boundaries. It's amazing how we suddenly start twisting verses, finding loopholes, re-interpreting Scripture, playing theological games that satisfy our logic but not God's holiness, and we accept some unacceptable compromises.
It's understandable, but it's wrong. When sin gets close to home, it can teach us how to be more merciful than we've been before, and that's good. How to be less judgmental, and that's good. And it can give us a wonderful opportunity to show God's unconditional love for people whether they clear the bar or not, and that's good. But we can't, in the process when we're loving and forgiving and accepting people in a sinful moment, we can't dare to try to lower God's standard. He didn't even for the man He loved deeply, and we can't either.
To be sure, God picks us up when we fail and when we collapse on the other side of our sin, He won't bend His laws for anyone. He can't, and neither can we. We love them, we pray for them, we embrace them...but the bar must stay where it is.