Max Lucado Daily: Heaven’s Throne Room
You sleep alone in a double bed. You walk the hallways of a silent house. You catch yourself calling out his name or reaching for her hand. Good-bye is the challenge of your life! To get through this is to get through this raging loneliness, this strength-draining grief. Just the separation has exhausted your spirit. You feel quarantined, isolated.
May I give you some hope? If heaven’s throne room has a calendar, one day is circled in red and highlighted in yellow. The Bible says that the The Master himself will give the command. Archangel thunder! God’s trumpet blast! He will come down from heaven and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then the rest of us who are still alive will be caught up with them into the clouds to meet the Master. (I Thessalonians 4:15-17).
Oh, what a day that will be! We’ll be walking on air! And there will be one huge family reunion. I leave you with this reminder: You will get through this!
From You’ll Get Through This
Jude 1
I, Jude, am a slave to Jesus Christ and brother to James, writing to those loved by God the Father, called and kept safe by Jesus Christ.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Saturday, October 26, 2024
Today's Scripture
2 Corinthians 5:1-10
For instance, we know that when these bodies of ours are taken down like tents and folded away, they will be replaced by resurrection bodies in heaven—God-made, not hand-made—and we’ll never have to relocate our “tents” again. Sometimes we can hardly wait to move—and so we cry out in frustration. Compared to what’s coming, living conditions around here seem like a stopover in an unfurnished shack, and we’re tired of it! We’ve been given a glimpse of the real thing, our true home, our resurrection bodies! The Spirit of God whets our appetite by giving us a taste of what’s ahead. He puts a little of heaven in our hearts so that we’ll never settle for less.
6–8 That’s why we live with such good cheer. You won’t see us drooping our heads or dragging our feet! Cramped conditions here don’t get us down. They only remind us of the spacious living conditions ahead. It’s what we trust in but don’t yet see that keeps us going. Do you suppose a few ruts in the road or rocks in the path are going to stop us? When the time comes, we’ll be plenty ready to exchange exile for homecoming.
9–10 But neither exile nor homecoming is the main thing. Cheerfully pleasing God is the main thing, and that’s what we aim to do, regardless of our conditions. Sooner or later we’ll all have to face God, regardless of our conditions. We will appear before Christ and take what’s coming to us as a result of our actions, either good or bad.
Insight
During the Last Supper, Jesus told His disciples He was leaving soon. But He assured them they’d be with Him again in heaven (John 14:1-4). He was going there to prepare a place for them in His “Father’s house” (v. 2), where they’d live eternally with Him (2 Corinthians 5:1). In that glorious place “there will be no more night. [We] will not need the light of a lamp or the light of the sun, for the Lord God will give [us] light” (Revelation 22:5). And “there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away” (21:4). We’ll be with Christ and all “whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life” (v. 27). By: Alyson Kieda
Hope in God
Our goal [is] to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. 2 Corinthians 5:9
Jeremy didn’t realize what he was getting into when he arrived at the university for his three-year course and asked for the cheapest dorm room available. “It was awful,” he recounted. “The room and its bathroom were terrible.” But he had little money and little choice. “All I could do,” he said, “was think, I have a nice home to go back to in three years’ time, so I’ll stick with this and make the most of my time here.”
Jeremy’s story mirrors the everyday challenges of living in an “earthly tent”—a human body that will die (2 Corinthians 5:1), operating in a world that is passing away (1 John 2:17). Thus we “groan and are burdened” (2 Corinthians 5:4) as we struggle to cope with the many difficulties life throws at us.
What keeps us going is the certain hope that one day we’ll have an immortal, resurrected body—a “heavenly dwelling” (v. 4)—and be living in a world free of its present groaning and frustration (Romans 8:19-22). This hope enables us to make the most of this present life God has lovingly provided. He’ll also help us to use the resources and talents He’s given us, so we can serve Him and others. And that’s why “we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it” (2 Corinthians 5:9). By: Leslie Koh
Reflect & Pray
How can you start each day reminding yourself of the hope you have because of God? How can you encourage others with this hope?
Father, I look forward to being with You in Your heavenly home. Thank You for the promise and strength this hope gives me each day.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Saturday, October 26, 2024
What Is a Missionary?
As the Father has sent me, I am sending you. —John 20:21
A missionary is one sent by Jesus Christ as Jesus Christ was sent by God. A missionary’s purpose isn’t serving the needs of humanity; it’s obeying the command of Jesus: “Go and make disciples of all nations” (Matthew 28:19).
The inspiration for the missionary’s work lies behind, not before. Today, the tendency is to put the inspiration out front; we look forward to our own success. In the New Testament, the inspiration for doing God’s work is found in Jesus Christ, in what he has already accomplished. The missionary’s ideal is to be true to the Lord and to carry out his enterprises.
Personal attachment to Jesus and his point of view is the one thing that must not be overlooked in the missionary’s work. The great danger is in getting so wrapped up in people’s needs that our sympathy drowns out God’s call and overwhelms the meaning of being sent by Jesus. Humanity’s needs are so enormous, and the conditions of human life so perplexing, that every power of mind falters and fails when confronted with them. It’s easy to forget that the great reason for the missionary enterprise isn’t educating people or meeting their needs but first and foremost obeying the command of Jesus Christ.
When looking back on the lives of missionaries who seem to have risen to every challenge and perplexity, we have the tendency to say, “What wonderful wisdom they had! How perfectly they understood what God wanted!” It wasn’t human wisdom at all; the astute mind behind what they did was the mind of God. We give credit to human wisdom when we should give credit to divine guidance. If any man or woman seems to possess divine wisdom, it’s because they were childlike and simple enough to trust the supernatural guidance of God.
Jeremiah 9-11; 1 Timothy 6
WISDOM FROM OSWALD
“I have chosen you” (John 15:16). Keep that note of greatness in your creed. It is not that you have got God, but that He has got you.
My Utmost for His Highest, October 25, 837 R