Max Lucado Daily: AN ORDINARY LIFE - April 4, 2024
“God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise” (1 Corinthians 1:27 NLT).
I invite you to pray this prayer with me:
Loving Father, you made me, so you know very well that I am but dust. Yet you have called me into your kingdom to serve you at this specific place, at this specific time, for a very specific purpose.
Despite my ordinariness, I belong to you—and you are anything but ordinary! Help me pour out your grace and compassion upon others that they, too, may experience the richness of your love. Through me, my Father, show others how you can use an ordinary life to bring extraordinary blessing into the world. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.
Jeremiah 14
Time and Again We’ve Betrayed God
1–6 14 God’s Message that came to Jeremiah regarding the drought:
“Judah weeps,
her cities mourn.
The people fall to the ground, moaning,
while sounds of Jerusalem’s sobs rise up, up.
The rich people sent their servants for water.
They went to the cisterns, but the cisterns were dry.
They came back with empty buckets,
wringing their hands, shaking their heads.
All the farm work has stopped.
Not a drop of rain has fallen.
The farmers don’t know what to do.
They wring their hands, they shake their heads.
Even the doe abandons her fawn in the field
because there is no grass—
Eyes glazed over, on her last legs,
nothing but skin and bones.”
7–9 We know we’re guilty. We’ve lived bad lives—
but do something, God. Do it for your sake!
Time and time again we’ve betrayed you.
No doubt about it—we’ve sinned against you.
Hope of Israel! Our only hope!
Israel’s last chance in this trouble!
Why are you acting like a tourist,
taking in the sights, here today and gone tomorrow?
Why do you just stand there and stare,
like someone who doesn’t know what to do in a crisis?
But God, you are, in fact, here, here with us!
You know who we are—you named us!
Don’t leave us in the lurch.
10 Then God said of these people:
“Since they loved to wander this way and that,
never giving a thought to where they were going,
I will now have nothing more to do with them—
except to note their guilt and punish their sins.”
The Killing Fields
11–12 God said to me, “Don’t pray that everything will turn out all right for this people. When they skip their meals in order to pray, I won’t listen to a thing they say. When they redouble their prayers, bringing all kinds of offerings from their herds and crops, I’ll not accept them. I’m finishing them off with war and famine and disease.”
13 I said, “But Master, God! Their preachers have been telling them that everything is going to be all right—no war and no famine—that there’s nothing to worry about.”
14 Then God said, “These preachers are liars, and they use my name to cover their lies. I never sent them, I never commanded them, and I don’t talk with them. The sermons they’ve been handing out are sheer illusion, tissues of lies, whistlings in the dark.
15–16 “So this is my verdict on them: All the preachers who preach using my name as their text, preachers I never sent in the first place, preachers who say, ‘War and famine will never come here’—these preachers will die in war and by starvation. And the people to whom they’ve been preaching will end up as corpses, victims of war and starvation, thrown out in the streets of Jerusalem unburied—no funerals for them or their wives or their children! I’ll make sure they get the full brunt of all their evil.
17–18 “And you, Jeremiah, will say this to them:
“ ‘My eyes pour out tears.
Day and night, the tears never quit.
My dear, dear people are battered and bruised,
hopelessly and cruelly wounded.
I walk out into the fields,
shocked by the killing fields strewn with corpses.
I walk into the city,
shocked by the sight of starving bodies.
And I watch the preachers and priests
going about their business as if nothing’s happened!’ ”
19–22 God, have you said your final No to Judah?
Can you simply not stand Zion any longer?
If not, why have you treated us like this,
beaten us nearly to death?
We hoped for peace—
nothing good came from it;
We looked for healing—
and got kicked in the stomach.
We admit, O God, how badly we’ve lived,
and our ancestors, how bad they were.
We’ve sinned, they’ve sinned,
we’ve all sinned against you!
Your reputation is at stake! Don’t quit on us!
Don’t walk out and abandon your glorious Temple!
Remember your covenant.
Don’t break faith with us!
Can the no-gods of the godless nations cause rain?
Can the sky water the earth by itself?
You’re the one, O God, who does this.
So you’re the one for whom we wait.
You made it all,
you do it all.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Thursday, April 04, 2024
Today's Scripture
Psalm 91:1-2, 14-16
1 You who sit down in the High God’s presence,
spend the night in Shaddai’s shadow,
Say this: “God, you’re my refuge.
I trust in you and I’m safe!”
“Because heb loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him;
I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.
15 He will call on me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in trouble,
I will deliver him and honor him.n
16 With long lifeo I will satisfy him
and show him my salvation.p”
Insight
Psalm 91 includes three names for God in the first two verses: Elyon—“Most High” (v. 1), Shaddai—“Almighty” (v. 1), and Yahweh—“Lord” (v. 2). These names reveal who God is. After rescuing his nephew Lot, Abraham is blessed by the “God Most High” (Elyon, Genesis 14:19). Later, when God establishes His covenant with Abraham (17:1-5), God claims the name Shaddai, “God Almighty” (v. 1).
It’s when God meets Moses on Horeb, “the mountain of God” (Exodus 3:1), that He names Himself Yahweh, containing the verb “I am” (v. 14), rendered in English as “the Lord” (6:3). He used other names with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, but not Yahweh. This new name marks the beginning of God’s deliverance of the Israelites from slavery.
Psalm 91 moves the reader through these names—“Most High,” “Almighty,” and then "I am,” reminding us of God’s protection, provision, and deliverance long ago and calling us to trust that same God today. By: Jed Ostoich
In God’s Arms
I will be with him in trouble. Psalm 91:15
The sound of the drill terrified five-year-old Sarah. She leaped out of the dentist’s chair and refused to get back in. Nodding understandingly, the dentist told her father, “Daddy, get into the chair.” Jason thought he was meant to show his daughter how easy it was. But then the dentist turned to the little girl and said, “Now, climb up and sit in Daddy’s lap.” With her father now cradling her in his reassuring arms, Sarah relaxed completely, and the dentist was able to continue.
That day, Jason learned a great lesson about the comfort of the presence of his heavenly Father. “Sometimes, God [chooses not to] take over what we have to go through,” he said. “But God was showing me, ‘I will be there with you.’ ”
Psalm 91 speaks of the comforting presence and power of God that gives us the strength to face our trials. Knowing that we can rest in His powerful arms gives us great assurance, as does His promise to those who love Him: “He will call on me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble” (v. 15).
There are many unavoidable challenges and trials in life, and we will inevitably have to go through pain and suffering. But with God’s reassuring arms wrapped around us, we’ll be able to bear our crises and circumstances, and let Him strengthen our faith as we grow through them. By: Leslie Koh
Reflect & Pray
What trials are you going through now? How can you remind yourself that God is always with you?
Gracious Father, thank You for Your reassuring presence in my circumstances. Please help me through them, knowing that You’re always with me.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, April 04, 2024
The Way to Permanent Faith
Indeed the hour is coming…that you will be scattered… —John 16:32
Jesus was not rebuking the disciples in this passage. Their faith was real, but it was disordered and unfocused, and was not at work in the important realities of life. The disciples were scattered to their own concerns and they had interests apart from Jesus Christ. After we have the perfect relationship with God, through the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit, our faith must be exercised in the realities of everyday life. We will be scattered, not into service but into the emptiness of our lives where we will see ruin and barrenness, to know what internal death to God’s blessings means. Are we prepared for this? It is certainly not of our own choosing, but God engineers our circumstances to take us there. Until we have been through that experience, our faith is sustained only by feelings and by blessings. But once we get there, no matter where God may place us or what inner emptiness we experience, we can praise God that all is well. That is what is meant by faith being exercised in the realities of life.
“…you…will leave Me alone.” Have we been scattered and have we left Jesus alone by not seeing His providential care for us? Do we not see God at work in our circumstances? Dark times are allowed and come to us through the sovereignty of God. Are we prepared to let God do what He wants with us? Are we prepared to be separated from the outward, evident blessings of God? Until Jesus Christ is truly our Lord, we each have goals of our own which we serve. Our faith is real, but it is not yet permanent. And God is never in a hurry. If we are willing to wait, we will see God pointing out that we have been interested only in His blessings, instead of in God Himself. The sense of God’s blessings is fundamental.
“…be of good cheer, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). Unyielding spiritual fortitude is what we need.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
A fanatic is one who entrenches himself in invincible ignorance. Baffled to Fight Better, 59 R
Bible in a Year: Ruth 1-4; Luke 8:1-25
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, April 04, 2024
The Sign on the Door of Your Heart - #9714
My wife and I got a late start for our drive to North Carolina this one particular trip, and we had a 12-hour drive from New Jersey to cover. So we thought we'd make a motel reservation somewhere in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia. We got there pretty late and saw this disgruntled looking man leaving the lobby, heading for his car. And it was not the look of a man who had just received good news. When I walked up to the check-in desk - nobody home, just a sign that read, "Back in a few minutes."
Well, while I was waiting, several more weary travelers rolled in, and they started forming a line behind me. The clerk, of course, finally reappeared, only to be greeted by a line of Interstate zombies in urgent need of a room. I had a guaranteed reservation so it was okay. But when she asked and found out that no one else did, she uttered those dreaded words, "I'm sorry, no vacancy."
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Sign on the Door of Your Heart."
Those two words are tough words to be welcomed with. Just ask Jesus. Our word for today from the Word of God comes from John 1:12. It says, "Jesus came to His own but His own did not receive Him." Jesus comes to people He created and they have no room for Him in their lives. That started the night He was born. His earthly Father and His about-to-deliver Mother were desperate for a room. But remember the innkeeper put out that sign that said No Vacancy. That sign has greeted Jesus many times when He's knocked on the door of a human heart - maybe yours.
This verse says, "His own did not receive Him." He has a double claim to our hearts. First, because He made us, He's got the right of creation. But secondly, He paid for us. The Bible says there is an eternal death penalty hanging over each of our heads. The Bible says, "The soul that sins, it will die." We're all that soul that sins. We've all taken charge of a life that God gave us and that He was supposed to run. We've earned the death penalty for that sin.
And God could have left it that way. But instead, in the incredible act of total love for you and me, in the Bible's words, "God loved the world so much that He gave His one and only Son that whoever believes in Him will not die but have eternal life." And now the One who died for you knocks on the door of your heart again, but not forever.
One day you will, in a sense, be knocking on the door of heaven. And if you have never opened your heart for Jesus to become your own Savior from your own sin, there'll be no vacancy there for those who had no vacancy for Him here.
I pray the rest of this verse in John 1:12 will be about you today. It says, "Yet to all who received Him, to those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God." Look, if you've left Jesus outside, and you don't want to risk turning Him away one more time, please this very day realize that the knocking at the door is from Jesus himself. The Bible says of Him, "I am standing at the door and knocking. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in." But the handle on the door of your heart is on the inside. You open up to Jesus and He will bring into your life all the love, all the forgiveness, all the heaven, all the meaning you've never had before.
Our website is to help you be sure you know this Jesus, that you belong to Him. To make this your Jesus day. Would you tell Him, "Jesus, this is the day you are welcomed into my heart, the one you died to save. I'm Yours." And then go to our website ANewStory.com.
The Son of God has waited in line for a long time. Maybe He has knocked many times, but every time He's knocked you've been busy, you've been distracted. He's been greeted with "Sorry, no vacancy." Don't risk that one more day. Today open your heart to Jesus and say, "Lord, you died for me. Come in."