Max Lucado Daily: GOD CAN USE YOU - February 11, 2025
If God chose only righteous people to change the world, you could count them all on one finger—Jesus! Instead he included others in his plan—sinners, the ungodly, the imperfect. God used and uses people to change the world. People! Crooks, creeps, lovers, and liars—he uses them all! If you ever wonder how God can use you to make a difference in your world, just look at those he has already used, and take heart.
No matter who you are or what you’ve done, God can use you. Because you’re imperfect, you can speak of making mistakes. Because you’re a sinner, you can speak of forgiveness. God restores the broken and the brittle, then parades them before the world as trophies of his love and strength. And when the world sees the ungodly turn godly, they know God must love them too. God can use you, my friend.
Max on Life: Answers and Insights to Your Most Important Questions
Matthew 5:27-48
Adultery and Divorce
27–28 “You know the next commandment pretty well, too: ‘Don’t go to bed with another’s spouse.’ But don’t think you’ve preserved your virtue simply by staying out of bed. Your heart can be corrupted by lust even quicker than your body. Those leering looks you think nobody notices—they also corrupt.
29–30 “Let’s not pretend this is easier than it really is. If you want to live a morally pure life, here’s what you have to do: You have to blind your right eye the moment you catch it in a lustful leer. You have to choose to live one-eyed or else be dumped on a moral trash pile. And you have to chop off your right hand the moment you notice it raised threateningly. Better a bloody stump than your entire being discarded for good in the dump.
31–32 “Remember the Scripture that says, ‘Whoever divorces his wife, let him do it legally, giving her divorce papers and her legal rights’? Too many of you are using that as a cover for selfishness and whim, pretending to be righteous just because you are ‘legal.’ Please, no more pretending. If you divorce your wife, you’re responsible for making her an adulteress (unless she has already made herself that by sexual promiscuity). And if you marry such a divorced adulteress, you’re automatically an adulterer yourself. You can’t use legal cover to mask a moral failure.
Empty Promises
33–37 “And don’t say anything you don’t mean. This counsel is embedded deep in our traditions. You only make things worse when you lay down a smoke screen of pious talk, saying, ‘I’ll pray for you,’ and never doing it, or saying, ‘God be with you,’ and not meaning it. You don’t make your words true by embellishing them with religious lace. In making your speech sound more religious, it becomes less true. Just say ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ When you manipulate words to get your own way, you go wrong.
Love Your Enemies
38–42 “Here’s another old saying that deserves a second look: ‘Eye for eye, tooth for tooth.’ Is that going to get us anywhere? Here’s what I propose: ‘Don’t hit back at all.’ If someone strikes you, stand there and take it. If someone drags you into court and sues for the shirt off your back, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it. And if someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life. No more tit-for-tat stuff. Live generously.
43–47 “You’re familiar with the old written law, ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion, ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. When someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that.
48 “In a word, what I’m saying is, Grow up. You’re kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Tuesday, February 11, 2025
by Leslie Koh
TODAY'S SCRIPTURE
Ezekiel 34:11-16
‘God, the Master, says: From now on, I myself am the shepherd. I’m going looking for them. As shepherds go after their flocks when they get scattered, I’m going after my sheep. I’ll rescue them from all the places they’ve been scattered to in the storms. I’ll bring them back from foreign peoples, gather them from foreign countries, and bring them back to their home country. I’ll feed them on the mountains of Israel, along the streams, among their own people. I’ll lead them into lush pasture so they can roam the mountain pastures of Israel, graze at leisure, feed in the rich pastures on the mountains of Israel. And I myself will be the shepherd of my sheep. I myself will make sure they get plenty of rest. I’ll go after the lost, I’ll collect the strays, I’ll doctor the injured, I’ll build up the weak ones and oversee the strong ones so they’re not exploited.
Today's Insights
Ezekiel was both a priest and a prophet, prophesying from 593 to 571 bc. He was among the ten thousand captives brought out of Judea to Babylon in 597 bc, which included officers, soldiers, skilled workers, artisans, and eighteen-year-old King Jehoiachin and his family (2 Kings 24:10-15; 2 Chronicles 36:9). In Babylon, Ezekiel had his first vision at age thirty by the Kebar River (Ezekiel 1:1-3). He prophesied to a people who desperately needed to hear from God. The book’s main themes include the holiness of God and the sin of the people (36:22-23), which included judgment on those who turn away from God and mercy and hope for those who repent and trust in Him. During Ezekiel’s captivity (586 bc), Babylon besieged Jerusalem, destroyed the temple, and burned down the city, carrying away the remnant of the people. The captivity lasted seventy years (2 Kings 25; 2 Chronicles 36:21).
God Runs After Us
The Sovereign Lord says: I myself will search for my sheep and look after them. Ezekiel 34:11
For years, Evan struggled with an addiction that kept him from drawing close to God. How can I be worthy of His love? he wondered. So, while he kept going to church, he felt that there was an unbridgeable chasm that kept him separated from God.
Yet, whenever Evan prayed earnestly for something, God seemed to answer him. God also sent people to encourage and comfort him in difficult times. After some years, Evan realized God was constantly pursuing him and showing that He’d always loved and cared for him, and that’s when he began to trust in God’s forgiveness and love. “Now, I know that I’m forgiven and can let God draw me close to Him, even though I’m still struggling with my addiction,” he said.
Ezekiel 34:11-16 tells us of a God who pursued His people. “I myself will search for my sheep and look after them,” He said, vowing to rescue them and provide for them abundantly (v. 11). This was after their human leaders had abandoned them, and they themselves disobeyed their true Shepherd (vv. 1-6). Whether we’re helpless victims of circumstances or struggling with the consequences of our own sin, God pursues us in love. In His mercy and grace, He draws us back to Him. If you’ve forgotten God, turn back to Him. Then, as He leads, continue to walk with Him each day.
Reflect & Pray
How has God shown you that He cares for you and loves you? How can you let Him draw you closer to Him?
Dear God, thank You for always loving me despite my struggles and doubts. Please teach me to trust in Your love anew.
Learn more about God's Dependable Faithfulness.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Tuesday, February 11, 2025
Is Your Hope in God Faint and Dying?
Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee. — Isaiah 26:3 (kjv)
Is your imagination stayed on God, or is it starved? A starved imagination is one of the greatest sources of exhaustion in a disciple’s life. To attain the perfect peace Isaiah describes, we must set our minds steadfastly on God, trusting entirely in him.
If you have never used your imagination to put yourself deliberately before God, begin to do it now. It is no use waiting for God to come to you: you must go to him, turning your gaze away from the faces of idols. Imagination is the greatest gift God has given us, and it ought to be devoted entirely to him. If you learn to bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ, it will be one of the greatest assets to your faith when the time of trial comes, because your faith and the Spirit of God will work together.
“We have sinned, even as our ancestors did. . . . They did not remember your many kindnesses” (Psalm 106:6–7). If you find that your mind is not steadfastly set on God, if you cannot remember his kindness and love, drive a stake through the heart of your forgetfulness. Remember whose you are and whom you serve. If you do, your affection for God will increase tenfold, your imagination will be quick and enthusiastic, and your hope will be inexpressibly bright.
Leviticus 11-12; Matthew 26:1-25
WISDOM FROM OSWALD
Defenders of the faith are inclined to be bitter until they learn to walk in the light of the Lord. When you have learned to walk in the light of the Lord, bitterness and contention are impossible.
Biblical Psychology, 199 R
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Tuesday, February 11, 2025
When God's Messenger Messes Up the Message - #9937
There are five Gospels - Matthew, Mark, Luke, John - and the Christian. Most people never read the first four. That observation, made a long time ago, could not be more true today.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "When God's Messenger Messes Up the Message."
If our world's getting darker, then something must be wrong with what folks are "reading," in the Christians - the messengers - they know. We talked about that yesterday. And then there must be something wrong with their message. No, wait! Actually, with the way they represent the message.
That message is, as the Bible says, the "good news about Jesus" - the love that died for us, the power that crushed death. So the problem sure isn't the message. But the Good News doesn't sound as good when it's obscured by three mistakes that we messengers make.
Number one, our tone. So many unbelievers I know use some unwelcome words to describe Christians. You may have heard them: "angry," "you're judgmental," "you're condemning." Did you know up to 80% of communication is tone? Not what we say, but how we say it. So is our tone drowning out our message?
Jesus' main man, Simon Peter, seemed to learn that over time. Earlier, he was brash, he was explosive. But later, he said we should "always be prepared to give an answer to everyone...with gentleness and respect" (1 Peter 3:15). Is that how people feel when they're with us - "gentled" and "respected?" Is it our message folks are rejecting or our tone? This isn't about winning an argument. It's about winning a heart.
Then secondly, our retreat may be part of the problem. Our message gets obscured. We Jesus-followers have one authority for the message that changes eternities. It's God's Word. "All Scripture" the Bible calls it. He says it is "God-breathed" (2 Timothy 3:16).
But as our culture moves, Christians tend to move with it. Always keeping an apparently "righteous distance" but quickly ending up where non-believers were as little as ten years ago. And reinterpreting, rationalizing, diluting their source, the Bible, to justify their flexible "truth."
When we adjust our beliefs to placate our culture, we are no longer the choice Jesus called us to be. We're just an echo of our culture; losing the power of God's voice for some wimpy blend of Christianity and cultural appeasement.
As Martin Luther essentially stood against the whole world in his day, here was his anchor verse: "Your word, O Lord, is eternal; it stands firm in the heavens" (Psalm 119:89). If it stands firm in the heavens, I can't change it on earth.
Thirdly, I think our message can be obscured by our baggage. The Gospel is compelling when it's just the Gospel. But some people never get to the Gospel because of the baggage we encumber it with: politics, church, denomination, culture wars, rules, condemning people's lifestyles.
It's all about Jesus. Jesus made it all about Jesus with His simple invitation, "Follow Me" (Mark 1:17). "Come to Me" (Matthew 11:28). "Trust in Me" (John 14:1). That's why Paul, Jesus' greatest ambassador, said in our word for today from the Word of God in 1 Corinthians 2:2, "I resolved when I was among you to know nothing except Jesus Christ and Him crucified." Charles Spurgeon said the Cross is God's "magnificent magnet." Because "if they perceive, "Spurgeon said, "that He loved them and gave Himself for them, their hearts are stolen away."
That message, uncompromised, unencumbered, delivered with love, is what it has always been. According to Romans 1:16, "The power of God at work, saving everyone who believes." It's all about Jesus and His Cross. Stick to that my friend!
Messengers who act like Jesus, a message that's all about Jesus. That is a bright light on an otherwise dark and dangerous stretch of beach.
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