Max Lucado Daily: HEAVENLY HELPERS - May 29, 2024
The prophet Daniel discovered how seriously God takes our prayers. Daniel was troubled. He resolved to pray. After three weeks, Daniel saw a man with a belt of gold around his waist. His face was like lightning, his eyes on fire. Daniel was so stunned he fell to the ground. The angel said, “Don’t be afraid, Daniel. Since the first day you began to pray for understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your request has been heard in heaven…” (Daniel 10:12 NLT).
The moment Daniel began praying, the answer was issued. Demonic forces blocked the pathway of the angel, and the impasse lasted a full three weeks. Have you prayed and heard nothing? If so, I beg you, don’t give up. You have been heard in heaven. Angelic armies have been dispatched. Just keep praying. Heaven has helpers for you.
Jeremiah 42
What You Fear Will Catch Up with You
1–3 42 All the army officers, led by Johanan son of Kareah and Jezaniah son of Hoshaiah, accompanied by all the people, small and great, came to Jeremiah the prophet and said, “We have a request. Please listen. Pray to your God for us, what’s left of us. You can see for yourself how few we are! Pray that your God will tell us the way we should go and what we should do.”
4 Jeremiah the prophet said, “I hear your request. And I will pray to your God as you have asked. Whatever God says, I’ll pass on to you. I’ll tell you everything, holding nothing back.”
5–6 They said to Jeremiah, “Let God be our witness, a true and faithful witness against us, if we don’t do everything that your God directs you to tell us. Whether we like it or not, we’ll do it. We’ll obey whatever our God tells us. Yes, count on us. We’ll do it.”
7–8 Ten days later God’s Message came to Jeremiah. He called together Johanan son of Kareah and all the army officers with him, including all the people, regardless of how much clout they had.
9–12 He then spoke: “This is the Message from God, the God of Israel, to whom you sent me to present your prayer. He says, ‘If you are ready to stick it out in this land, I will build you up and not drag you down, I will plant you and not pull you up like a weed. I feel deep compassion on account of the doom I have visited on you. You don’t have to fear the king of Babylon. Your fears are for nothing. I’m on your side, ready to save and deliver you from anything he might do. I’ll pour mercy on you. What’s more, he will show you mercy! He’ll let you come back to your very own land.’
13–17 “But do not say, ‘We’re not staying around this place,’ refusing to obey the command of your God and saying instead, ‘No! We’re off to Egypt, where things are peaceful—no wars, no attacking armies, plenty of food. We’re going to live there.’ If what’s left of Judah is headed down that road, then listen to God’s Message. This is what God-of-the-Angel-Armies says: ‘If you have determined to go to Egypt and make that your home, then the very wars you fear will catch up with you in Egypt and the starvation you dread will track you down in Egypt. You’ll die there! Every last one of you who is determined to go to Egypt and make it your home will either be killed, starve, or get sick and die. No survivors, not one! No one will escape the doom that I’ll bring upon you.’
18 “This is the Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, the God of Israel: ‘In the same way that I swept the citizens of Jerusalem away with my anger and wrath, I’ll do the same thing all over again in Egypt. You’ll end up being cursed, reviled, ridiculed, and mocked. And you’ll never see your homeland again.’
19–20 “God has plainly told you, you leftovers from Judah, ‘Don’t go to Egypt.’ Could anything be plainer? I warn you this day that you are living out a fantasy. You’re making a fatal mistake.
“Didn’t you just now send me to your God, saying, ‘Pray for us to our God. Tell us everything that God says and we’ll do it all’?
21–22 “Well, now I’ve told you, told you everything he said, and you haven’t obeyed a word of it, not a single word of what your God sent me to tell you. So now let me tell you what will happen next: You’ll be killed, you’ll starve to death, you’ll get sick and die in the wonderful country where you’ve determined to go and live.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Wednesday, May 29, 2024
Today's Scripture
Ephesians 4:29-32
Watch the way you talk. Let nothing foul or dirty come out of your mouth. Say only what helps, each word a gift.
30 Don’t grieve God. Don’t break his heart. His Holy Spirit, moving and breathing in you, is the most intimate part of your life, making you fit for himself. Don’t take such a gift for granted.
31–32 Make a clean break with all cutting, backbiting, profane talk. Be gentle with one another, sensitive. Forgive one another as quickly and thoroughly as God in Christ forgave you.
Insight
Paul admonishes the Ephesian believers in Jesus to “not let any unwholesome talk come out of [their] mouths” (4:29). The word for “unwholesome” is sapros, which means “rotten” or “worthless.” The same word is used to describe bad or spoiled produce (“a bad tree bears bad fruit,” Matthew 7:17) or decaying meat and fish (they “threw the bad [fish] away,” 13:48). It indicates something is of poor quality or unfit for use. The apostle is telling the Ephesians that in the same way that one wouldn’t put rotten food into their mouths, they shouldn’t let anything rotten come out. This teaching is reminiscent of what Jesus said in Mark 7:20-23: “What comes out of a person is what defiles them. For it is from within, out of a person’s heart, that evil thoughts come—sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, lewdness, envy, slander, arrogance and folly. All these evils come from inside and defile a person.” By: J.R. Hudberg
Advice from One Older
Be kind and compassionate to one another. Ephesians 4:32
“What do I regret?” That was the question New York Times bestselling writer George Saunders answered in his 2013 commencement speech at Syracuse University. His approach was that of an older person (Saunders) who shared one or two regrets he’d had in life with the younger people (graduates) who could learn something from his examples. He listed a few things people might assume he regretted, like being poor and working terrible jobs. But Saunders said he really didn’t regret those at all. What he did regret, however, were failures of kindness—those opportunities he had to be kind to someone, and he let them pass.
The apostle Paul wrote to the believers at Ephesus answering this question: What does the Christian life look like? It’s tempting to rush in with our answers, like possessing a particular political view, avoiding certain books or films, worshiping in a particular manner. But Paul’s approach didn’t limit him to contemporary issues. He does mention abstaining from “unwholesome talk” (Ephesians 4:29) and ridding ourselves of things like bitterness and anger (v. 31). Then to conclude his “speech,” in essence, he says to the Ephesians as well as to us, “Don’t fail to be kind” (v. 32). And the reason behind that is because in Christ, God has been kind to you.
Of all the things we believe the life in Jesus to be, one of them, surely, is to be kind. By: John Blase
Reflect & Pray
Where have you recently failed to be kind? What’s one way you can succeed in kindness today?
Dear Jesus, as You’ve been kind to me, let me be kind to others.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Wednesday, May 29, 2024
Undisturbed Relationship
In that day you will ask in my name. . . . The Father himself loves you because you have loved me.— John 16:26-27
“You will ask in my name.” By “name,” Jesus means “nature.” He isn’t saying, “You will use my name as a magic word to get what you want from the Father.” He’s saying, “You will be so intimate with me that you will be one with me.”
“In that day . . .” The day Jesus is speaking of isn’t a day in the future; it’s here and now. It’s a day of undisturbed relationship between God and his child. Just as Jesus stood blameless in the presence of his Father, so by the baptism of the Spirit are we lifted into relationship with him: “. . . that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us” (John 17:21).
“The Father himself loves you.” The union is complete and absolute. Our Lord doesn’t mean that your external life will be free of complexity and confusion, but that just as he knew the Father’s heart and mind, you too will know it. By the baptism of the Holy Spirit, he will lift you into the heavenly places, where he can reveal God’s counsels to you.
“My Father will give you whatever you ask in my name” (16:23). Jesus is saying that God will recognize our prayers. What a challenge! By the power of the resurrection and the ascension, by the sent-down Holy Spirit, we can be lifted into such a relationship with the Father that we are at one with his sovereign will, just as Jesus was. In this wonderful position, we can pray to God in his name—in his nature—which is gifted to us by the Holy Spirit, and whatever we ask will be given.
2 Chronicles 7-9; John 11:1-29
WISDOM FROM OSWALD
There is no condition of life in which we cannot abide in Jesus. We have to learn to abide in Him wherever we are placed.
Our Brilliant Heritage, 946 R
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Wednesday, May 29, 2024
The Fatal Fear and How to Beat It - #9753
I get to spend my summers with some of the most courageous young people I've ever known. They're the Native American young people who go to reservations each summer to bring the hope they have found in Christ to young people who are where they once were.
Stepping out on that court with a microphone to tell about your Jesus is pretty intimidating. This night it was Tricia's turn - and, yes, she was scared. This reservation was especially hard. She came for prayer, and she got it. Minutes later she was at center court with the mic. I listened from the bus as she went out there and literally took charge! She commanded the attention of everyone there. And God used her that night to really open hearts and prepare the way for a harvest of those young people choosing Jesus.
Later, I asked her, "Tricia! What happened to that fear you told me about? That was so powerful!" She had prayed a prayer that I taught her, "Lord help me see what You see when You see these young people. And break my heart for what breaks Yours." She went out on that court and saw "lost" in their eyes, she said. Her mission was bigger than her fear.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Fatal Fear and How to Beat It."
We know the people around us need our Jesus. That He's their only hope of an eternity in heaven. We try to live our faith before them. But no matter how good we are, they're not going to guess Jesus died on the cross to pay for their sins. We have to tell them. But so often, we don't.
There's often one thing that stops us. Fear. Fear of what they'll think of us, fear of failing, fear of rejection, fear of messing it up - and so on. Notice what those fears have in common - they're all about me.
We're at that Moses moment where God said He was calling Moses to join Him in rescuing his people. Moses' reaction? "Who am I?" Parts of that conversation are our word for today from the Word of God in Exodus 3 and 4, beginning with chapter 3, verse 4. Moses asks "who am I?" "And God said, 'I will be with you." God says, "Who am I, Moses?" That's the right question. This isn't about who Moses is, it's about who God is. In chapter 4, verse 12, God promises: "Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say."
So how do we move past the fear that's keeping us from sharing Jesus' Good News?
First, realize that you are the glove, not the hand. My glove can't do anything - it's powerless. But when I put my hand in that glove, it can do all kinds of things gloves can't do! So when you open your mouth to share your Jesus, you are God's glove! He will give you the courage, the opening, the words, the tone. You don't rescue people - He does!
Second, pray the 3-open prayer. Lord, open a door - a natural opportunity to tell the difference Jesus is making. Then, Lord open their heart. And then the big one - Lord, open my mouth! He'll do it!
And finally, let a bigger fear win! You've been hesitant to go in for the rescue because of what might happen to you if you do. But shouldn't we be more afraid of what will happen to them if we don't? We just can't leave them lost. See, courage is not the absence of fear. It's the disregard of it. Yes, I'm afraid. But I will not let my fear decide what I do any more!
Pray the prayer Tricia prayed on that reservation - "Help me see what You see, Jesus, when you see this person I need to tell. And go ahead, Lord, break my heart for them."
As God said to Moses, "I have come down to rescue them. Now, go. I am sending you."