Genesis 8 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

Max Lucado Daily: A SIMPLE PHILOSOPHY - May 3, 2021

Ninety-two-year-old Johnny Barnes stands on the edge of a roundabout in Hamilton, Bermuda, and he waves at people as they drive past. He’s not asking for money or begging for food. He’s making people happy. “I love you!” he shouts. “I’ll love you forever!” And they love him. Bermudans call him Mr. Happy Man. They route their morning commute to see him. If Johnny’s not standing in his spot, people call the radio station to check on him.

Johnny’s philosophy is simple: “We human beings gotta learn how to love one another,” he says. “One of the greatest joys that can come to an individual is when you’re doing something and helping others.” Wouldn’t you love to meet a person like him? Or better still, wouldn’t you love to be like him? This is how happiness happens.

Genesis 8

Then God turned his attention to Noah and all the wild animals and farm animals with him on the ship. God caused the wind to blow and the floodwaters began to go down. The underground springs were shut off, the windows of Heaven closed and the rain quit. Inch by inch the water lowered. After 150 days the worst was over.

4-6 On the seventeenth day of the seventh month, the ship landed on the Ararat mountain range. The water kept going down until the tenth month. On the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains came into view. After forty days Noah opened the window that he had built into the ship.

7-9 He sent out a raven; it flew back and forth waiting for the floodwaters to dry up. Then he sent a dove to check on the flood conditions, but it couldn’t even find a place to perch—water still covered the Earth. Noah reached out and caught it, brought it back into the ship.

10-11 He waited seven more days and sent out the dove again. It came back in the evening with a freshly picked olive leaf in its beak. Noah knew that the flood was about finished.

12 He waited another seven days and sent the dove out a third time. This time it didn’t come back.

13-14 In the six-hundred-first year of Noah’s life, on the first day of the first month, the flood had dried up. Noah opened the hatch of the ship and saw dry ground. By the twenty-seventh day of the second month, the Earth was completely dry.

15-17 God spoke to Noah: “Leave the ship, you and your wife and your sons and your sons’ wives. And take all the animals with you, the whole menagerie of birds and mammals and crawling creatures, all that swarming extravagance of life, so they can reproduce and flourish on the Earth.”

18-19 Noah disembarked with his sons and wife and his sons’ wives. Then all the animals, crawling creatures, birds—every creature on the face of the Earth—left the ship family by family.

20-21 Noah built an altar to God. He selected clean animals and birds from every species and offered them as burnt offerings on the altar. God smelled the sweet fragrance and thought to himself, “I’ll never again curse the ground because of people. I know they have this bent toward evil from an early age, but I’ll never again kill off everything living as I’ve just done.

22 For as long as Earth lasts,
    planting and harvest, cold and heat,
Summer and winter, day and night
    will never stop.”

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Monday, May 03, 2021

Eye for Eye
38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’[a] 39 But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. 40 And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. 41 If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles. 42 Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.

Love for Enemies
43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor[b] and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.

Footnotes
Matthew 5:38 Exodus 21:24; Lev. 24:20; Deut. 19:21
Matthew 5:43 Lev. 19:18

INSIGHT
The “law of retribution” (“lex talionis”), which teaches an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth (Exodus 21:24; Leviticus 24:20; Deuteronomy 19:21), is sometimes mistakenly understood to promote personal retaliation. But in its Old Testament legal context, the law isn’t intended to encourage personal retribution but instead to limit the human tendency to exact revenge. Rather than permit individual vigilante actions of retaliation, a court of law was to ensure that punishment should fit the crime. It gave the right for an offended person to take someone to court rather than seek revenge. Jesus doesn’t “correct” this Old Testament teaching—designed to preserve peace and justice—but calls those belonging to the kingdom of God to live by the principle of nonresistance or nonretaliation at the personal (not legal) level. This means that believers in Christ shouldn’t descend to the low standard of the perpetrator, returning evil for evil.

By Anne Cetas
Jesus’ Unpopular Ideas
Give to the one who asks you. Matthew 5:42

For fifteen years, Mike Burden held hate-filled meetings in the memorabilia shop he ran in his small town. But in 2012 when his wife began to question his involvement, his heart softened. He realized how wrong his racist views were and didn’t want to be that person any longer. The militant group retaliated by kicking his family out of the apartment they’d been renting from one of the members.

Where did he turn for help? Surprisingly, he went to a local black pastor with whom he’d clashed. The pastor and his church provided housing and groceries for Mike’s family for some time. When asked why he agreed to help, Pastor Kennedy explained, “Jesus Christ did some very unpopular things. When it’s time to help, you do what God wants you to do.” Later Mike spoke at Kennedy’s church and apologized to the black community for his part in spreading hatred.

Jesus taught some unpopular ideas in the Sermon on the Mount: “Give to the one who asks you . . . . Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:42, 44). That’s the upside-down way of thinking God calls us to follow. Though it looks like weakness, it’s actually acting out of God’s strength.

The One who teaches us is the One who gives the power to live out this upside-down life in whatever way He asks of us.

How are you living out Jesus’ words of giving to those who ask and loving your enemies? What would you like to change?

God, help me to love others as You love me. Show me how to do that today.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Monday, May 03, 2021
Vital Intercession

…praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit… —Ephesians 6:18

As we continue on in our intercession for others, we may find that our obedience to God in interceding is going to cost those for whom we intercede more than we ever thought. The danger in this is that we begin to intercede in sympathy with those whom God was gradually lifting up to a totally different level in direct answer to our prayers. Whenever we step back from our close identification with God’s interest and concern for others and step into having emotional sympathy with them, the vital connection with God is gone. We have then put our sympathy and concern for them in the way, and this is a deliberate rebuke to God.

It is impossible for us to have living and vital intercession unless we are perfectly and completely sure of God. And the greatest destroyer of that confident relationship to God, so necessary for intercession, is our own personal sympathy and preconceived bias. Identification with God is the key to intercession, and whenever we stop being identified with Him it is because of our sympathy with others, not because of sin. It is not likely that sin will interfere with our intercessory relationship with God, but sympathy will. It is sympathy with ourselves or with others that makes us say, “I will not allow that thing to happen.” And instantly we are out of that vital connection with God.

Vital intercession leaves you with neither the time nor the inclination to pray for your own “sad and pitiful self.” You do not have to struggle to keep thoughts of yourself out, because they are not even there to be kept out of your thinking. You are completely and entirely identified with God’s interests and concerns in other lives. God gives us discernment in the lives of others to call us to intercession for them, never so that we may find fault with them.
 

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

We all have the trick of saying—If only I were not where I am!—If only I had not got the kind of people I have to live with! If our faith or our religion does not help us in the conditions we are in, we have either a further struggle to go through, or we had better abandon that faith and religion.  The Shadow of an Agony, 1178 L

Bible in a Year: 1 Kings 14-15; Luke 22:21-46

A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Monday, May 03, 2021
How to Carry the People You Need to Carry - #8951

When our kids were growing up, we made a lot of memories hiking up mountains and through some really great forests. And then, of course, grandsons. They started making those same kinds of memories with their daddy. In fact, they were on one of those forest hikes with Dad, and the older brother had an idea. One that he had, no doubt, gotten from watching his father and what he had done with him. Little brother's legs started to tire out, and big brother said he wanted to carry little brother on his back. Well, there actually is now a photo showing big brother with little brother on his shoulders. Is he Super Boy? No. There's a third person in the picture. It's Daddy standing behind, supporting little brother on big brother's shoulders.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "How to Carry the People You Need to Carry."

So oldest grandson learned something that day in the woods: "I can carry my brother - with help from above." So can you. It may be that at this time in your life you've been assigned by God to carry someone who can't make it on their own. Or maybe you've got more than one person to carry - even a bunch of people.

You're living our word for today from the Word of God. It's in Galatians 6:2. Your Lord's command is: "Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ." See, when you pick up the burdens of someone God leads you to help, you're living out the life of your Savior and you're making Him proud.

That doesn't mean the load doesn't get pretty heavy sometimes, honestly even overwhelming and nearly unbearable. There's only one way you can do this. The only way our grandson could have his little brother on his shoulders. You have to depend on help from above. And since carrying someone else is a divine mission, you can release the weight to a Heavenly Father who is so much stronger. In fact, in Psalm 55:22, He gives you this invitation: "Cast your cares on the Lord and He will sustain you; He will never let the righteous fall." That means casting the cares of those you're carrying on Him, too.

Long-haul carriers learn the strange secret of what I call compassionate distance; offering yourself lovingly and wholeheartedly to that hurting person you're with, but leaving them completely in God's hands then, and especially when you're not with them. You're not supposed to carry them all the time. And they'll never learn to walk on their own if you get a "messiah complex" and act as if you're their Savior. That's called codependency, not burden-bearing.

Just as God enlarges the capacity of a single kidney, you know, to do the work of two kidneys when one is removed, well God will enlarge your capacity to carry a load you never thought you could handle. If you go to Him consistently for His sustaining grace, you're going to feel that miracle.

Daily, you need to download His promise in Isaiah 46:3-4 - anchor verses of mine. "I have upheld you since you were conceived and have carried you since your birth. Even to your old age and gray hairs I am He, I am He who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you." WOW! That is a promise of heaven's support that has no loopholes, it's without interruption, it's without limit. After all is said and done, you can carry someone else because someone stronger is carrying you.

Or as a great old Gospel song says, "When we have exhausted our store of endurance, when our strength has failed ere the day is half done; when we've reached the end of our hoarded resources, our Father's full giving has only begun. His love has no limit, His grace has no measure, His power has no boundary known unto men; for out of His infinite riches in Jesus, He giveth and giveth and giveth again."

Genesis 7, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

Max Lucado Daily: Drop Some Stuff

God has a great race for you to run. Under His care you'll go where you have never been and serve in ways you've never dreamed. But you have to drop some stuff.
How can you share grace if you're full of guilt? How can you offer comfort if you're disheartened. How can you lift someone else's load if your arms are full with your own? For the sake of those you love-travel light. For the sake of the God you serve, travel light. For the sake of your own joy, travel light.
There are weights in life you simply cannot carry. Set them down and trust Him. I can't overstate God's promise in 1 Peter 5:7: "Unload all your worries onto Him, since He is looking after you."
What do you say we take God up on His offer? We might find ourselves traveling a little lighter.
From Traveling Light

Genesis 7

Next God said to Noah, “Now board the ship, you and all your family—out of everyone in this generation, you’re the righteous one.

2-4 “Take on board with you seven pairs of every clean animal, a male and a female; one pair of every unclean animal, a male and a female; and seven pairs of every kind of bird, a male and a female, to insure their survival on Earth. In just seven days I will pour rain on Earth for forty days and forty nights. I’ll make a clean sweep of everything that I’ve made.”

5 Noah did everything God commanded him.

6-10 Noah was 600 years old when the floodwaters covered the Earth. Noah and his wife and sons and their wives boarded the ship to escape the flood. Clean and unclean animals, birds, and all the crawling creatures came in pairs to Noah and to the ship, male and female, just as God had commanded Noah. In seven days the floodwaters came.

11-12 It was the six-hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, on the seventeenth day of the month that it happened: all the underground springs erupted and all the windows of Heaven were thrown open. Rain poured for forty days and forty nights.

13-16 That’s the day Noah and his sons Shem, Ham, and Japheth, accompanied by his wife and his sons’ wives, boarded the ship. And with them every kind of wild and domestic animal, right down to all the kinds of creatures that crawl and all kinds of birds and anything that flies. They came to Noah and to the ship in pairs—everything and anything that had the breath of life in it, male and female of every creature came just as God had commanded Noah. Then God shut the door behind him.

17-23 The flood continued forty days and the waters rose and lifted the ship high over the Earth. The waters kept rising, the flood deepened on the Earth, the ship floated on the surface. The flood got worse until all the highest mountains were covered—the high-water mark reached twenty feet above the crest of the mountains. Everything died. Anything that moved—dead. Birds, farm animals, wild animals, the entire teeming exuberance of life—dead. And all people—dead. Every living, breathing creature that lived on dry land died; he wiped out the whole works—people and animals, crawling creatures and flying birds, every last one of them, gone. Only Noah and his company on the ship lived.

24 The floodwaters took over for 150 days.

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Sunday, May 02, 2021
Read: Hebrews 11:1–6

Faith in Action
11 Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. 2 This is what the ancients were commended for.

3 By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

4 By faith Abel brought God a better offering than Cain did. By faith he was commended as righteous, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith Abel still speaks, even though he is dead.

5 By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: “He could not be found, because God had taken him away.”[a] For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. 6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.

Footnotes
Hebrews 11:5 Gen. 5:24

INSIGHT
After a call to perseverance in the faith in Hebrews 10:23–25, the author begins chapter 11 with a definition—typical of a discourse on a particular subject—defining faith as “confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see” (v. 1). Both Greek words used to define faith—confidence (Greek hypostasis, “a giving of substance to”) and assurance (Greek elenchos, “a proving of”)—emphasize faith as an active way of life in response to what we know to be true. Though much of the future that faith hopes and longs for remains unfulfilled and unseen, people of faith move forward in response to God’s leading and their experience of His faithfulness. Hebrews 11 traces through Jewish history heroes who exemplify this lifestyle of active faith, culminating with Jesus, the ultimate Hero of faith (12:2–3).

By Bill Crowder
What Can’t Be Seen
Faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. Hebrews 11:1

Historians say the Atomic Age began on July 16, 1945, when the first nuclear weapon was detonated in a remote desert of New Mexico. But Greek philosopher Democritus (c. 460–370 bc) was exploring the existence and power of the atom long before the invention of anything that could even see these tiny building blocks of the universe. Democritus comprehended more than he could see and atomic theory was the result.

The Scriptures tell us that the essence of faith is embracing what can’t be seen. Hebrews 11:1 affirms, “Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” This assurance isn’t the result of wishful or positive thinking. It’s confidence in the God we can’t see but whose existence is the truest reality in the universe. His reality is displayed in His creative works (Psalm 19:1) and made visible by revealing His invisible character and ways in His Son, Jesus, who came to show the Father’s love to us (John 1:18).

This is the God in whom “we live and move and have our being,” as the apostle Paul put it (Acts 17:28). As such, “we live by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7). Yet we don’t walk alone. The unseen God walks with us every step of the way.

In a world where seeing is believing, in what ways do you struggle to live by faith in God? What has strengthened your faith, and in what areas do you need to rest in Him more fully?

Father, sometimes it’s a struggle to believe what I can’t see. Nevertheless, You’ve promised Your faithful love and that You’ll never leave me or forsake me. Help me to rest in that promise.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Sunday, May 02, 2021
The Patience To Wait for the Vision

Though it tarries, wait for it… —Habakkuk 2:3

Patience is not the same as indifference; patience conveys the idea of someone who is tremendously strong and able to withstand all assaults. Having the vision of God is the source of patience because it gives us God’s true and proper inspiration. Moses endured, not because of his devotion to his principles of what was right, nor because of his sense of duty to God, but because he had a vision of God. “…he endured as seeing Him who is invisible” (Hebrews 11:27). A person who has the vision of God is not devoted to a cause or to any particular issue— he is devoted to God Himself. You always know when the vision is of God because of the inspiration that comes with it. Things come to you with greatness and add vitality to your life because everything is energized by God. He may give you a time spiritually, with no word from Himself at all, just as His Son experienced during His time of temptation in the wilderness. When God does that, simply endure, and the power to endure will be there because you see God.

“Though it tarries, wait for it….” The proof that we have the vision is that we are reaching out for more than we have already grasped. It is a bad thing to be satisfied spiritually. The psalmist said, “What shall I render to the Lord…? I will take up the cup of salvation…” (Psalm 116:12-13). We are apt to look for satisfaction within ourselves and say, “Now I’ve got it! Now I am completely sanctified. Now I can endure.” Instantly we are on the road to ruin. Our reach must exceed our grasp. Paul said, “Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected; but I press on…” (Philippians 3:12). If we have only what we have experienced, we have nothing. But if we have the inspiration of the vision of God, we have more than we can experience. Beware of the danger of spiritual relaxation.

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

The attitude of a Christian towards the providential order in which he is placed is to recognize that God is behind it for purposes of His own.  Biblical Ethics, 99 R

Bible in a Year: 1 Kings 12-13; Luke 22:1-20

Matthew 2 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

 
Max Lucado Daily: Travel Light

I've never been one to travel light. I've tried. Believe me, I've tried. I'm prepared. I'm prepared for a baby dedication or costume party. Prepared to parachute behind enemy lines. And, if perchance, the Dalai Lama might be on my flight and invite me to dine in Tibet, I carry snowshoes. I need to learn to travel light!
Haven't you been known to pick up a few bags? The suitcase of guilt. A sack of discontent. An overnight bag of loneliness and a trunk of fear. A hanging bag of grief. No wonder you're so tired at the end of the day.
God's saying to you, "Set that stuff down.  You're carrying burdens you don't need to bear." "Come to Me," He invites, "all of you who're weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest."
If we let Him-God will lighten our loads!
From Traveling Light

Matthew 2

Scholars from the East
2 1-2 After Jesus was born in Bethlehem village, Judah territory—this was during Herod’s kingship—a band of scholars arrived in Jerusalem from the East. They asked around, “Where can we find and pay homage to the newborn King of the Jews? We observed a star in the eastern sky that signaled his birth. We’re on pilgrimage to worship him.”

3-4 When word of their inquiry got to Herod, he was terrified—and not Herod alone, but most of Jerusalem as well. Herod lost no time. He gathered all the high priests and religion scholars in the city together and asked, “Where is the Messiah supposed to be born?”

5-6 They told him, “Bethlehem, Judah territory. The prophet Micah wrote it plainly:

It’s you, Bethlehem, in Judah’s land,
    no longer bringing up the rear.
From you will come the leader
    who will shepherd-rule my people, my Israel.”

7-8 Herod then arranged a secret meeting with the scholars from the East. Pretending to be as devout as they were, he got them to tell him exactly when the birth-announcement star appeared. Then he told them the prophecy about Bethlehem, and said, “Go find this child. Leave no stone unturned. As soon as you find him, send word and I’ll join you at once in your worship.”

9-10 Instructed by the king, they set off. Then the star appeared again, the same star they had seen in the eastern skies. It led them on until it hovered over the place of the child. They could hardly contain themselves: They were in the right place! They had arrived at the right time!

11 They entered the house and saw the child in the arms of Mary, his mother. Overcome, they kneeled and worshiped him. Then they opened their luggage and presented gifts: gold, frankincense, myrrh.

12 In a dream, they were warned not to report back to Herod. So they worked out another route, left the territory without being seen, and returned to their own country.

* * *

13 After the scholars were gone, God’s angel showed up again in Joseph’s dream and commanded, “Get up. Take the child and his mother and flee to Egypt. Stay until further notice. Herod is on the hunt for this child, and wants to kill him.”

14-15 Joseph obeyed. He got up, took the child and his mother under cover of darkness. They were out of town and well on their way by daylight. They lived in Egypt until Herod’s death. This Egyptian exile fulfilled what Hosea had preached: “I called my son out of Egypt.”

16-18 Herod, when he realized that the scholars had tricked him, flew into a rage. He commanded the murder of every little boy two years old and under who lived in Bethlehem and its surrounding hills. (He determined that age from information he’d gotten from the scholars.) That’s when Jeremiah’s revelation was fulfilled:

A sound was heard in Ramah,
    weeping and much lament.
Rachel weeping for her children,
    Rachel refusing all solace,
Her children gone,
    dead and buried.

19-20 Later, when Herod died, God’s angel appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt: “Up, take the child and his mother and return to Israel. All those out to murder the child are dead.”

21-23 Joseph obeyed. He got up, took the child and his mother, and reentered Israel. When he heard, though, that Archelaus had succeeded his father, Herod, as king in Judea, he was afraid to go there. But then Joseph was directed in a dream to go to the hills of Galilee. On arrival, he settled in the village of Nazareth. This move was a fulfillment of the prophetic words, “He shall be called a Nazarene.”

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Saturday, May 01, 2021

Read: Ephesians 3:14–21

A Prayer for the Ephesians
14 For this reason I kneel before the Father, 15 from whom every family[a] in heaven and on earth derives its name. 16 I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

INSIGHT
Paul’s typical pattern in his church letters was to include a section of teaching (doctrine) followed by a section of practice (application). In his Ephesian letter, chapters 1–3 form the doctrinal instruction, and chapters 4–6 apply that teaching to everyday living. Today’s reading (Ephesians 3:14–21) bridges those two sections and is one of the magnificent benediction/doxology portions of Scripture. In the benediction (a statement of blessing; vv. 14–19), the apostle prays that the Ephesian believers might comprehend the immeasurable love, greatness, faithfulness, and power of the living God. This benediction then becomes a doxology (a statement of praise; vv. 20–21) that finishes with “to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.” What an appropriate way for Paul to conclude the doctrinal section of Ephesians by reminding us how blessed we are and how great God is!

By Amy Boucher Pye

Dwelling in Our Hearts

I pray that . . . he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. Ephesians 3:16–17

Sometimes the words of children can jolt us into a deeper understanding of God’s truth. One evening when my daughter was young, I told her about one of the great mysteries of the Christian faith—that God through His Son and Spirit dwells in His children. As I tucked her into bed, I said that Jesus was with her and in her. “He’s in my tummy?” she asked. “Well, you haven’t swallowed Him,” I replied. “But He’s right there with you.”

My daughter’s literal translation of Jesus being “in her tummy” made me stop and consider how when I asked Jesus to be my Savior, He came and took residence within me.

The apostle Paul referred to this mystery when he prayed that the Holy Spirit would strengthen the believers in Ephesus so that Christ would “dwell in [their] hearts through faith” (Ephesians 3:17). With Jesus living within, they could grasp how deeply He loved them. Fueled by this love, they would mature in their faith and love others with humility and gentleness while speaking the truth in love (4:2, 25).

Jesus dwelling inside His followers means that His love never leaves those who’ve welcomed Him into their lives. His love that surpasses knowledge (3:19) roots us to Him, helping us to understand how deeply He loves us.

Words written for children can say it best: “Yes, Jesus loves me!”

How does Jesus dwelling inside you give you great comfort? How can you grow closer to God knowing that His power gives you strength?

God, You’re not far off, but are close to me. May I delight in Your love and share it with others.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Saturday, May 01, 2021

Faith— Not Emotion

We walk by faith, not by sight. —2 Corinthians 5:7

For a while, we are fully aware of God’s concern for us. But then, when God begins to use us in His work, we begin to take on a pitiful look and talk only of our trials and difficulties. And all the while God is trying to make us do our work as hidden people who are not in the spotlight. None of us would be hidden spiritually if we could help it. Can we do our work when it seems that God has sealed up heaven? Some of us always want to be brightly illuminated saints with golden halos and with the continual glow of inspiration, and to have other saints of God dealing with us all the time. A self-assured saint is of no value to God. He is abnormal, unfit for daily life, and completely unlike God. We are here, not as immature angels, but as men and women, to do the work of this world. And we are to do it with an infinitely greater power to withstand the struggle because we have been born from above.

If we continually try to bring back those exceptional moments of inspiration, it is a sign that it is not God we want. We are becoming obsessed with the moments when God did come and speak with us, and we are insisting that He do it again. But what God wants us to do is to “walk by faith.” How many of us have set ourselves aside as if to say, “I cannot do anything else until God appears to me”? He will never do it. We will have to get up on our own, without any inspiration and without any sudden touch from God. Then comes our surprise and we find ourselves exclaiming, “Why, He was there all the time, and I never knew it!” Never live for those exceptional moments— they are surprises. God will give us His touches of inspiration only when He sees that we are not in danger of being led away by them. We must never consider our moments of inspiration as the standard way of life— our work is our standard.

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

We are in danger of being stern where God is tender, and of being tender where God is stern.  The Love of God—The Message of Invincible Consolation, 673 L

Bible in a Year: 1 Kings 10-11; Luke 21:20-38

Genesis 6, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

Max Lucado Daily: BEST DAYS ARE AHEAD - April 30, 2021

Perhaps you can relate to the deflated little fellow I saw in an airport terminal. Everything about the dad’s expression said, “Hurry up! We have to run if we’re going to make the connection.” Can the little fellow keep up? Mom could. The big brothers could. But the little guy? He tried to match his parents’ pace, but he just couldn’t.

Can you relate? Sometimes the challenge is just too much. It’s not that you don’t try, you just run out of fight. The story of Joshua in the Bible dares us to believe our best days are ahead of us. A life in which the Bible says we are “anxious for nothing,” in which we’re “praying always.” A life in which Paul says we’re “giving thanks to God the Father through Him.” We may stumble but we don’t collapse. God has a Promised Land for us to take.

Genesis 6

Giants in the Land

 When the human race began to increase, with more and more daughters being born, the sons of God noticed that the daughters of men were beautiful. They looked them over and picked out wives for themselves.

3 Then God said, “I’m not going to breathe life into men and women endlessly. Eventually they’re going to die; from now on they can expect a life span of 120 years.”

4 This was back in the days (and also later) when there were giants in the land. The giants came from the union of the sons of God and the daughters of men. These were the mighty men of ancient lore, the famous ones.

Noah and His Sons
5-7 God saw that human evil was out of control. People thought evil, imagined evil—evil, evil, evil from morning to night. God was sorry that he had made the human race in the first place; it broke his heart. God said, “I’ll get rid of my ruined creation, make a clean sweep: people, animals, snakes and bugs, birds—the works. I’m sorry I made them.”

8 But Noah was different. God liked what he saw in Noah.

9-10 This is the story of Noah: Noah was a good man, a man of integrity in his community. Noah walked with God. Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

11-12 As far as God was concerned, the Earth had become a sewer; there was violence everywhere. God took one look and saw how bad it was, everyone corrupt and corrupting—life itself corrupt to the core.

13 God said to Noah, “It’s all over. It’s the end of the human race. The violence is everywhere; I’m making a clean sweep.

14-16 “Build yourself a ship from teakwood. Make rooms in it. Coat it with pitch inside and out. Make it 450 feet long, seventy-five feet wide, and forty-five feet high. Build a roof for it and put in a window eighteen inches from the top; put in a door on the side of the ship; and make three decks, lower, middle, and upper.

17 “I’m going to bring a flood on the Earth that will destroy everything alive under Heaven. Total destruction.

18-21 “But I’m going to establish a covenant with you: You’ll board the ship, and your sons, your wife and your sons’ wives will come on board with you. You are also to take two of each living creature, a male and a female, on board the ship, to preserve their lives with you: two of every species of bird, mammal, and reptile—two of everything so as to preserve their lives along with yours. Also get all the food you’ll need and store it up for you and them.”

22 Noah did everything God commanded him to do.

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Friday, April 30, 2021

Read: Hebrews 5:11–6:2

Warning Against Falling Away
11 We have much to say about this, but it is hard to make it clear to you because you no longer try to understand. 12 In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! 13 Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. 14 But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.

6 Therefore let us move beyond the elementary teachings about Christ and be taken forward to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death,[a] and of faith in God, 2 instruction about cleansing rites,[b] the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment.

Footnotes
Hebrews 6:1 Or from useless rituals
Hebrews 6:2 Or about baptisms

INSIGHT
It’s important for believers in Jesus to be able to explain their faith in easily understood terms, but the writer of Hebrews was in fact urging his readers to “move beyond the elementary teachings about Christ and be taken forward to maturity” (6:1). This section of the letter contains a hint of exasperation with these believers. They had stagnated. Yet there’s a strong thread of encouragement throughout Hebrews. The writer is laying out the case for Jesus as superior to everything else (chs. 1–5); now he wants to build up these believers. “We are convinced of better things in your case,” he wrote, “the things that have to do with salvation” (6:9). Later, he exhorts his readers to emulate the faithful who’d gone before them (ch. 11) and to “run with perseverance the race marked out for us, fixing our eyes on Jesus” (12:1–2).

By Sheridan Voysey
Milk Comes First

Solid food is for the mature. Hebrews 5:14

In the seventh century, what is now called the United Kingdom was many kingdoms often at war. When one king, Oswald of Northumbria, became a believer in Jesus, he called for a missionary to bring the gospel to his region. A man named Corman was sent, but things didn’t go well. Finding the English “stubborn,” “barbarous,” and uninterested in his preaching, he returned home frustrated.

“I am of the opinion,” a monk named Aidan told Corman, “that you were more severe to your unlearned hearers than you ought to have been.” Instead of giving the Northumbrians “the milk of more easy doctrine,” Corman had given them teaching they couldn’t yet grasp. Aidan went to Northumbria, adapted his preaching to the people’s understanding, and thousands became believers in Jesus.

Aidan got this sensitive approach to mission from Scripture. “I gave you milk, not solid food,” Paul told the Corinthians, “for you were not yet ready for it” (1 Corinthians 3:2). Before right living can be expected from people, Hebrews says, basic teaching about Jesus, repentance, and baptism must be grasped (Hebrews 5:13–6:2). While maturity should follow (5:14), let’s not miss the order. Milk comes before meat. People can’t obey teaching they don’t understand.

The faith of the Northumbrians ultimately spread to the rest of the country and beyond. Like Aidan, when sharing the gospel with others, we meet people where they are.

In simple terms, how would you explain the gospel? How can you avoid expecting people who aren’t believers in Jesus to think or behave as you do?

Jesus, thank You for reaching me in ways I could understand.


My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, April 30, 2021
Spontaneous Love

Love suffers long and is kind… —1 Corinthians 13:4

Love is not premeditated– it is spontaneous; that is, it bursts forth in extraordinary ways. There is nothing of precise certainty in Paul’s description of love. We cannot predetermine our thoughts and actions by saying, “Now I will never think any evil thoughts, and I will believe everything that Jesus would have me to believe.” No, the characteristic of love is spontaneity. We don’t deliberately set the statements of Jesus before us as our standard, but when His Spirit is having His way with us, we live according to His standard without even realizing it. And when we look back, we are amazed at how unconcerned we have been over our emotions, which is the very evidence that real spontaneous love was there. The nature of everything involved in the life of God in us is only discerned when we have been through it and it is in our past.

The fountains from which love flows are in God, not in us. It is absurd to think that the love of God is naturally in our hearts, as a result of our own nature. His love is there only because it “has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit…” (Romans 5:5).

If we try to prove to God how much we love Him, it is a sure sign that we really don’t love Him. The evidence of our love for Him is the absolute spontaneity of our love, which flows naturally from His nature within us. And when we look back, we will not be able to determine why we did certain things, but we can know that we did them according to the spontaneous nature of His love in us. The life of God exhibits itself in this spontaneous way because the fountains of His love are in the Holy Spirit.

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

The great point of Abraham’s faith in God was that he was prepared to do anything for God.
Not Knowing Whither

Bible in a Year: 1 Kings 8-9; Luke 21:1-19

A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, April 30, 2021

Another Eternity Moment - #8950

Jonesboro. Paducah. Columbine. The list goes on. Another school shooting after another school shooting. One was in Chardon, Ohio. And, you know, having spent so much of my life on high school campuses, my heart sinks every time. I see these all-too-familiar scenes; students running, crying, parents desperately seeking information, SWAT teams moving in, law enforcement briefings, shooter profiles, ambulances converging, and then those heartbreaking candlelight vigils.

And, you know, when those happen, once again for a very brief window in time, there's an eternity moment. After the Chardon shootings, one national reporter said, "These students are talking way beyond their years today." See, suddenly checking Facebook, and sweating the test, and talking about everyone's social "drama" seems so unimportant. Because, well, there's been a brush with eternity that changes everything. At least for a little while.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Another Eternity Moment."

You know, for those traumatized teenagers in a shocked and grieving town where there had been a school shooting, the eternity moment came with gunshots in the cafeteria. But we all have those moments. I mean, that narrow miss, like in traffic, or in a natural disaster when we know how close we were to no tomorrow. The sudden death of someone we didn't expect to lose, then the unwelcome, insistent reminder of our own mortality.

It's hard. It's slightly unnatural to imagine ourselves as being the name and the picture on that funeral home memorial card. But then comes that brush with eternity when we realize, "It could have been me."

It's not something to dwell on, but it's something to be ready for. After all, we go to a lot of effort to be ready for a job interview, a date, a financial future, our own retirement. None of which holds a candle to eternity; that vast forever that's just beyond our final breath.

The circumstances that bring our mortality close are often painful. They're even tragic like the wrenching events of the school shooting. But those brushes with eternity can also serve to help save our soul.

A Biblical prophet once warned us to "...prepare to meet your God" in our word today from the Word of God. That's Amos 4:12, because that's what's on the other side of our last heartbeat - our unpostponable appointment with God. The Bible says, "Man is destined to die once and after that to face judgment" (Hebrews 9:27). Bank accounts and "to do'' lists and earth stuff? In an instant, they're going to matter no more. All that will matter is whether we're right with God. In a moment, we're suddenly facing destination time; where I'm going to spend my forever.

Surveys show that most Americans think they'll go to heaven when they die. But Jesus talked about "the road that leads to life, and only a few find it" (Matthew 7:14). That's not His fault. He did everything He could to clear away the curse that disqualifies all of us from God's heaven - our sin. Our arrogant control of a life that God gave us and He was supposed to run. All those lying things, and hurting things, and selfish things, and dirty things, the God-ignoring things we've done. The verdict is clear: "Nothing impure will ever enter" God's heaven (Revelation 21:27), the Bible says.

No religion can get us in, because my sin carries an eternal death penalty, "the soul who sins will die" (Ezekiel 18:4) the Bible says. And no religion can die for me. A perfect God can't welcome me into His perfect heaven with my sin.

And a death penalty can't be paid by being a good boy. Somebody has to die, and somebody did. Jesus did. God's one and only Son. The Bible calls Him, "the Lamb of God, w

ho takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29). Listen, when you give your heart to Jesus, every sin you've ever committed is erased from God's book forever. And what would keep you out of heaven is removed.

It's awesome to know that because of Jesus, you're ready for eternity whenever and however it comes. You're not sure you are? Get it settled today. Tell Jesus, "You died for me. I'm yours." Listen, go to our website. It will help you get all the way home. It's ANewStory.com.

The Bible describes "eternal life" as a gift that becomes yours at the point you take it for yourself. My friend, this could be your day!

Genesis 5 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

Max Lucado Daily: GOD’S PLAN IN GOD’S LAND - April 29, 2021

Joshua 21:45 says, “Not a word failed of any good thing which the Lord had spoken to the house of Israel. All came to pass.” Joshua and his men went from dry land to the Promised Land. From manna to feasts. From arid deserts to fertile fields. They inherited their inheritance: the glory days of Israel.

This is God’s vision for your life. You at full throttle. You as victor over the Jerichos and giants. Paul describes it as a life in which “Christ’s love has the first and last word in everything we do.” A life in which Paul says, “We do not lose heart.” A life defined by grace, refined by challenge, and aligned with a heavenly call. In God’s plan in God’s land, God’s promises outweigh personal problems, and victory becomes a way of life. Your glory days await you!

Genesis 5

The Family Tree of the Human Race
5 1-2 This is the family tree of the human race: When God created the human race, he made it godlike, with a nature akin to God. He created both male and female and blessed them, the whole human race.

3-5 When Adam was 130 years old, he had a son who was just like him, his very spirit and image, and named him Seth. After the birth of Seth, Adam lived another 800 years, having more sons and daughters. Adam lived a total of 930 years. And he died.

6-8 When Seth was 105 years old, he had Enosh. After Seth had Enosh, he lived another 807 years, having more sons and daughters. Seth lived a total of 912 years. And he died.

9-11 When Enosh was ninety years old, he had Kenan. After he had Kenan, he lived another 815 years, having more sons and daughters. Enosh lived a total of 905 years. And he died.

12-14 When Kenan was seventy years old, he had Mahalalel. After he had Mahalalel, he lived another 840 years, having more sons and daughters. Kenan lived a total of 910 years. And he died.

15-17 When Mahalalel was sixty-five years old, he had Jared. After he had Jared, he lived another 830 years, having more sons and daughters. Mahalalel lived a total of 895 years. And he died.

18-20 When Jared was 162 years old, he had Enoch. After he had Enoch, he lived another 800 years, having more sons and daughters. Jared lived a total of 962 years. And he died.

21-23 When Enoch was sixty-five years old, he had Methuselah. Enoch walked steadily with God. After he had Methuselah, he lived another 300 years, having more sons and daughters. Enoch lived a total of 365 years.

24 Enoch walked steadily with God. And then one day he was simply gone: God took him.

25-27 When Methuselah was 187 years old, he had Lamech. After he had Lamech, he lived another 782 years. Methuselah lived a total of 969 years. And he died.

28-31 When Lamech was 182 years old, he had a son. He named him Noah, saying, “This one will give us a break from the hard work of farming the ground that God cursed.” After Lamech had Noah, he lived another 595 years, having more sons and daughters. Lamech lived a total of 777 years. And he died.

32 When Noah was 500 years old, he had Shem, Ham, and Japheth.

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Thursday, April 29, 2021

Read: Exodus 18:13–23

The next day Moses took his seat to serve as judge for the people, and they stood around him from morning till evening. 14 When his father-in-law saw all that Moses was doing for the people, he said, “What is this you are doing for the people? Why do you alone sit as judge, while all these people stand around you from morning till evening?”

15 Moses answered him, “Because the people come to me to seek God’s will. 16 Whenever they have a dispute, it is brought to me, and I decide between the parties and inform them of God’s decrees and instructions.”

17 Moses’ father-in-law replied, “What you are doing is not good. 18 You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone. 19 Listen now to me and I will give you some advice, and may God be with you. You must be the people’s representative before God and bring their disputes to him. 20 Teach them his decrees and instructions, and show them the way they are to live and how they are to behave. 21 But select capable men from all the people—men who fear God, trustworthy men who hate dishonest gain—and appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens. 22 Have them serve as judges for the people at all times, but have them bring every difficult case to you; the simple cases they can decide themselves. That will make your load lighter, because they will share it with you. 23 If you do this and God so commands, you will be able to stand the strain, and all these people will go home satisfied.”

INSIGHT
In the first half of Exodus 18, Moses’ father-in-law is called Jethro (vv. 1, 5, 9, 12). But in Exodus 2, when we first meet the man who will become Moses’ father-in law, he’s called Reuel (vv. 18, 20). Then, Numbers 10:29 refers to “Hobab son of Reuel the Midianite, Moses’ father-in-law.” Are Jethro and Reuel two different people? Scholars believe that Jethro may have been a title, or that Moses’ father-in-law went by two different names. Exodus 2:18, 20 and 3:1 use the names interchangeably. And in 2:16 and 3:1 the man is referred to as a “priest of Midian.” This is the man who advises Moses in Exodus 18.

By Xochitl Dixon
Working Together

If you do this and God so commands, you will be able to stand the strain, and all these people will go home satisfied. Exodus 18:23

Joe worked more than twelve hours a day, often without taking breaks. Starting a charitable business demanded so much time and energy that he had little left to offer his wife and children when he got home. After the toll of chronic stress landed Joe in the hospital, a friend offered to organize a team to help him. Though he dreaded giving up control, Joe knew he couldn’t keep up his current pace. He agreed to trust his friend—and God—as he delegated responsibilities to the group of people they chose together. A year later, Joe admitted that the charity and his family could never have prospered if he’d refused the help God had sent him.

God didn’t design people to thrive without the support of a loving community. In Exodus 18, Moses led the Israelites through the wilderness. He tried serving God’s people as a teacher, a counselor, and a judge all on his own. When his father-in-law visited, he offered Moses advice: “You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out,” said Jethro. “The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone” (Exodus 18:18). He encouraged Moses to share the workload with faithful people. Moses accepted help and the whole community benefited.

When we trust that God works in and through all His people as we work together, we can find true rest.

How can you trust God by asking for help or offering help to someone in leadership this week? How has He provided you the support of trustworthy people?

Father God, thank You for never asking me to handle life without Your help or the support of others.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, April 29, 2021
Gracious Uncertainty

…it has not yet been revealed what we shall be… —1 John 3:2

Our natural inclination is to be so precise– trying always to forecast accurately what will happen next– that we look upon uncertainty as a bad thing. We think that we must reach some predetermined goal, but that is not the nature of the spiritual life. The nature of the spiritual life is that we are certain in our uncertainty. Consequently, we do not put down roots. Our common sense says, “Well, what if I were in that circumstance?” We cannot presume to see ourselves in any circumstance in which we have never been.

Certainty is the mark of the commonsense life– gracious uncertainty is the mark of the spiritual life. To be certain of God means that we are uncertain in all our ways, not knowing what tomorrow may bring. This is generally expressed with a sigh of sadness, but it should be an expression of breathless expectation. We are uncertain of the next step, but we are certain of God. As soon as we abandon ourselves to God and do the task He has placed closest to us, He begins to fill our lives with surprises. When we become simply a promoter or a defender of a particular belief, something within us dies. That is not believing God– it is only believing our belief about Him. Jesus said, “…unless you…become as little children…” (Matthew 18:3). The spiritual life is the life of a child. We are not uncertain of God, just uncertain of what He is going to do next. If our certainty is only in our beliefs, we develop a sense of self-righteousness, become overly critical, and are limited by the view that our beliefs are complete and settled. But when we have the right relationship with God, life is full of spontaneous, joyful uncertainty and expectancy. Jesus said, “…believe also in Me” (John 14:1), not, “Believe certain things about Me”. Leave everything to Him and it will be gloriously and graciously uncertain how He will come in– but you can be certain that He will come. Remain faithful to Him.

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

Am I becoming more and more in love with God as a holy God, or with the conception of an amiable Being who says, “Oh well, sin doesn’t matter much”?  Disciples Indeed, 389 L

Bible in a Year: 1 Kings 6-7; Luke 20:27-47

A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, April 29, 2021
Fighting the Right Enemy - #8949

We've always been big Winnie-the-Pooh fans at our house. Our kids always enjoyed having that read to them, and now they read it to their kids. There's one scene from Winnie-the-Pooh I really remember.

You know, I'm really big into classical literature like this, and I remember when Winnie-the-Pooh was trying to pursue an animal he called the "Heffalump." He saw his tracks in the snow, and so he started to pursue the "Heffalump." He went around this tree, and then around this bush, and came back around again, and he said, "Oh, look at these tracks. I think this is where he is." And he went, well, several times he made a circle around that tree and that bush, continually hoping he would find the "Heffalump," and taking quite a while to realize he was actually following himself and there was no "Heffalump" to follow.

I remember a classic from the comic strip Pogo some years ago where one of the characters says, "We have found the enemy and they is us!" You know, I actually believe that the single greatest tool the devil tries to use against God's work is often following that very same line of thinking, "We have found the enemy, and they is us." Wouldn't it be something to realize that we are actually helping the enemy use his greatest weapon against God's work?

I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have A Word With You today about "Fighting the Right Enemy."

Our word for today from the Word of God is from Genesis 13. I'm going to begin at verse 7. We're taking an incident out of the life of Abram; his name before it was changed to Abraham, and his experience with his nephew, Lot. Both Abram and Lot have developed fairly large flocks and holdings, and they had a lot of herdsmen working for them. And there was this dispute about who would have what land. Of course, grazing land was a very important issue in that kind of a culture.

Here's what it says, "Quarreling arose between Abram's herdsmen and the herdsmen of Lot. Now the Canaanites and Perizzites were also living in the land at that time. So, Abram said to Lot, "Let's not have any quarreling between you and me, or between your herdsmen and mine, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Let's part company, and if you go to the left, I'll go to the right. If you go to the right, I'll go to the left."

Now, here's what it seems Abram realized here, that when you're surrounded by Canaanites, you don't waste time shooting at each other; you have no ammunition to spare. He looked around and he said, "Look, we've got people who don't like us being here. They think we're aliens. We have people who don't believe in our God, Lot. Let's you and me keep our act together, because we can't afford to waste any ammunition on each other."

You know, the devil has always operated with his favorite strategy I think - divide and conquer. He would never divide his kingdom, but he tries to divide the Lord's kingdom and weaken it. It's interesting that when they were in famine in Egypt that Abram and Lot never had any quarreling. See, when you're in hard times you usually don't. It's like banding together like the Christians in China. They actually got rid of all the denominations. They got rid of all the labels. You know, just knowing Christ brings you together. It seems like sometimes it's only in comfortable times, in easy places like America that we can afford the luxury of quarreling with each other.

I wonder, is there a brother that maybe you've been shooting at, maybe somebody at church, or another Christian, somebody in your own family? But they're a brother or sister in Christ, and you've been wasting ammunition on them. Somebody said, "Christians are the only army on earth that form their firing squads in a circle." Maybe the devil has succeeded in getting you to start criticizing and wasting ammunition on another church, another denomination, another Christian movement, an organization, or on a brother or sister in Christ.

Listen, save your ammunition for the real enemy and fight side-by-side with your brother.

Genesis 4 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

 
Max Lucado Daily: POSSESS THE LAND - April 28, 2021

Nearly 9 out of 10 believers say they are saved, yes. But empowered? No. Like the children of Israel, they are out of Egypt but not yet possessing the Promised Land. That’s about 2 billion people who call themselves Christians chugging along on a fraction of their horsepower. What would happen if they got a tune-up? How would the world be different if 2 billion people came out of the wilderness? How many marriages would be saved? How many wars would be prevented?

If every Christian began to live the Promised Land life, how would the world be different? With God’s help you can close the gap between the person you are and the person you want to be. Indeed, the person God made you to be. The Bible says you can live “from glory to glory.” You just need to possess the land.

Genesis 4

Adam slept with Eve his wife. She conceived and had Cain. She said, “I’ve gotten a man, with God’s help!”

2 Then she had another baby, Abel. Abel was a herdsman and Cain a farmer.

3-5 Time passed. Cain brought an offering to God from the produce of his farm. Abel also brought an offering, but from the firstborn animals of his herd, choice cuts of meat. God liked Abel and his offering, but Cain and his offering didn’t get his approval. Cain lost his temper and went into a sulk.

6-7 God spoke to Cain: “Why this tantrum? Why the sulking? If you do well, won’t you be accepted? And if you don’t do well, sin is lying in wait for you, ready to pounce; it’s out to get you, you’ve got to master it.”

8 Cain had words with his brother. They were out in the field; Cain came at Abel his brother and killed him.

9 God said to Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?”

He said, “How should I know? Am I his babysitter?”

10-12 God said, “What have you done! The voice of your brother’s blood is calling to me from the ground. From now on you’ll get nothing but curses from this ground; you’ll be driven from this ground that has opened its arms to receive the blood of your murdered brother. You’ll farm this ground, but it will no longer give you its best. You’ll be a homeless wanderer on Earth.”

13-14 Cain said to God, “My punishment is too much. I can’t take it! You’ve thrown me off the land and I can never again face you. I’m a homeless wanderer on Earth and whoever finds me will kill me.”

15 God told him, “No. Anyone who kills Cain will pay for it seven times over.” God put a mark on Cain to protect him so that no one who met him would kill him.

16 Cain left the presence of God and lived in No-Man’s-Land, east of Eden.

17-18 Cain slept with his wife. She conceived and had Enoch. He then built a city and named it after his son, Enoch.

Enoch had Irad,

Irad had Mehujael,

Mehujael had Methushael,

Methushael had Lamech.

19-22 Lamech married two wives, Adah and Zillah. Adah gave birth to Jabal, the ancestor of all who live in tents and herd cattle. His brother’s name was Jubal, the ancestor of all who play the lyre and flute. Zillah gave birth to Tubal-Cain, who worked at the forge making bronze and iron tools. Tubal-Cain’s sister was Naamah.

23-24     Lamech said to his wives,
Adah and Zillah, listen to me;
    you wives of Lamech, hear me out:
I killed a man for wounding me,
    a young man who attacked me.
If Cain is avenged seven times,
    for Lamech it’s seventy-seven!

25-26 Adam slept with his wife again. She had a son whom she named Seth. She said, “God has given me another child in place of Abel whom Cain killed.” And then Seth had a son whom he named Enosh.

That’s when men and women began praying and worshiping in the name of God.

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Wednesday, April 28, 2021

Read: Psalm 116:1–7

1 I love the Lord, for he heard my voice;
    he heard my cry for mercy.
2 Because he turned his ear to me,
    I will call on him as long as I live.

3 The cords of death entangled me,
    the anguish of the grave came over me;
    I was overcome by distress and sorrow.
4 Then I called on the name of the Lord:
    “Lord, save me!”

5 The Lord is gracious and righteous;
    our God is full of compassion.
6 The Lord protects the unwary;
    when I was brought low, he saved me.

7 Return to your rest, my soul,
    for the Lord has been good to you.

INSIGHT
Psalm 116 is part of a collection of six psalms (Psalms 113–118) known as the “Egyptian Hallel,” so called because the element of praising God (Hebrew halal) occurs throughout. These praise songs were sung during the Passover remembrance of the Israelites’ deliverance from Egyptian slavery: Psalms 113–114 were recited before the Passover meal and Psalms 115–118 afterward. The hymn that Jesus and the disciples sang after the Last Supper could’ve been one of these psalms (Matthew 26:30). In Psalm 116, the author thanks God for delivering him from the jaws of death (vv. 3, 8). Assured of God’s sovereignty over his life even in death, he writes, “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his faithful servants” (v. 15). The grateful psalmist asks: “What can I offer the Lord for all he has done for me?” (v. 12 nlt). He committed himself to “walk before the Lord” (v. 9) and to serve Him (v. 16).

By Adam Holz
Cuddling In

Return to your rest, my soul, for the Lord has been good to you. Psalm 116:7

“Daddy, will you read to me?” my daughter asked. It’s not an unusual question for a child to make of a parent. But my daughter is eleven now. These days, such requests are fewer than they were when she was younger. “Yes,” I said happily, and she curled up next to me on the couch.

As I read to her (from The Fellowship of the Ring), she practically melted into me. It was one of those glorious moments as a parent, when we feel perhaps just an inkling of the perfect love our Father has for us and His deep desire for us to “cuddle in” to His presence and love.

I realized in that moment that I’m a lot like my eleven-year-old. Much of the time, I’m focused on being independent. It’s so easy to lose touch with God’s love for us, a tender and protective love that Psalm 116 describes as “gracious and righteous . . . full of compassion” (v. 5). It’s a love where, like my daughter, I can curl up in God’s lap, at home in His delight for me.

Psalm 116:7 suggests that we might need to regularly remind ourselves of God’s good love, and then crawl up into His waiting arms: “Return to your rest, my soul, for the Lord has been good to you.” And indeed, He has.

When was the last time you rested quietly in God’s love? What barriers, if any, might keep you from experiencing the Father’s delight for you?

Father, thank You for Your perfect love for me. Help me to remember that love and to rest in Your goodness and delight in me.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Wednesday, April 28, 2021
What You Will Get

I will give your life to you as a prize in all places, wherever you go. —Jeremiah 45:5

This is the firm and immovable secret of the Lord to those who trust Him– “I will give your life to you….” What more does a man want than his life? It is the essential thing. “…your life…as a prize…” means that wherever you may go, even if it is into hell, you will come out with your life and nothing can harm it. So many of us are caught up in exhibiting things for others to see, not showing off property and possessions, but our blessings. All these things that we so proudly show have to go. But there is something greater that can never go– the life that “is hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:3).

Are you prepared to let God take you into total oneness with Himself, paying no more attention to what you call the great things of life? Are you prepared to surrender totally and let go? The true test of abandonment or surrender is in refusing to say, “Well, what about this?” Beware of your own ideas and speculations. The moment you allow yourself to think, “What about this?” you show that you have not surrendered and that you do not really trust God. But once you do surrender, you will no longer think about what God is going to do. Abandonment means to refuse yourself the luxury of asking any questions. If you totally abandon yourself to God, He immediately says to you, “I will give your life to you as a prize….” The reason people are tired of life is that God has not given them anything— they have not been given their life “as a prize.” The way to get out of that condition is to abandon yourself to God. And once you do get to the point of total surrender to Him, you will be the most surprised and delighted person on earth. God will have you absolutely, without any limitations, and He will have given you your life. If you are not there, it is either because of disobedience in your life or your refusal to be simple enough.

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

We can understand the attributes of God in other ways, but we can only understand the Father’s heart in the Cross of Christ.  The Highest Good—Thy Great Redemption, 558 L

Bible in a Year: 1 Kings 3-5; Luke 20:1-26


A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Wednesday, April 28, 2021

Turn Off Your Cruise Control - #8948

Over our long trips, my wife and I would take turns at the wheel, and we'd have two different approaches to observing the speed limit. In her case, she would like to set it on cruise control, and that's a great invention. You can set your speed, and stay at that speed indefinitely. Not so much for me. See, I'd rather be able to really accelerate for a hill and keep up with the traffic sometimes as they say; to vary my speed. I know I can just break and reset the cruise control, but I would rather not bother with it. In a sense, not so much about driving, but I just want to discourage you from setting your personal cruise control.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Turn Off Your Cruise Control."

Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Ephesians 3, and let me begin reading at verse 16. It's really a magnificent passage that almost exhausts all of Paul's great vocabulary. "I pray that out of His glorious riches He may strengthen you with power through His Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge - that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. Now to Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations."

What a passage! He's saying here there's strength you haven't touched yet, there's love you haven't felt yet, there's power you haven't released yet, and there are riches you haven't appropriated yet. And he sums them all up in these words "immeasurably more." See, a healthy Christian is one who's restless for that more. The problem is, too many of us are on spiritual cruise control. "I'm at kind of at a nice speed right now, I think I'll just kind of stay there till I get to heaven."

Don is a fellow who's been around the church a long time, much of it in leadership roles. He told me after I spoke at his church, "Ron, I was on cruise control; just feeling like, 'Man, I've been president of this and chairman of that, until I heard messages on revival and repentance.' And I wanted that more. I knew there was more." He came forward and he said, "You know, we don't do that a lot in my church as Christians."

Then he was having lunch with Marty. He regularly had lunch with Marty. They worked together in business and Marty said to Don, "Hey, Don, there's something different about you, man. You usually come in and talk about business. All you've talked about today is the Lord." Marty said that though he was raised as a Christian he hadn't had a Bible of his own for twenty years. Don gave him one. Then after that, they were involved in an early morning prayer meeting together. And Marty, because he's been renewed, drove to his daughter's college campus and apologized to her for not raising her in a more spiritual atmosphere. Do you know what that's a taste of? That's contagious revival. It started with one spiritual veteran who said, "There must be more."

Don't you feel that holy restlessness? Don't you want the immeasurably more? Maybe your life, your conversation has gradually filled up with some other things - wit

h earth stuff. How about being so full of your Lord that your Christian friends are going to say, "Hey, man, there's something different about you. You're all about the Lord all of a sudden."

Jesus has so much more. But you'll never experience it if you've set your spiritual speed and you just plan to keep rolling on at that same speed. Isn't it time to get your life with Christ out of cruise control and into high gear?

Matthew 1 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

Max Lucado Daily: A PROMISED LAND LIFE - April 27, 2021

God spoke, Joshua listened, and Israel’s glory days began. The Jordan River opened up and Jericho’s walls fell down and evil was booted and hope rebooted. Joshua 21:43-44 says, “So the Lord gave to Israel all the land of which He had sworn to give their fathers, and they took possession of it…The Lord gave them rest all around. Not a man of all their enemies stood against them.”

Perhaps you need a new season. You don’t need to cross the Jordan River, but you need to get through the week. And you aren’t facing Jericho, but you’re facing rejection or heartache. The story of Joshua dares us to believe God has a Promised Land for us to take. It’s not real estate, but a real state of the heart and mind: a Promised Land. A Promised Land life.

Matthew 1

The family tree of Jesus Christ, David’s son, Abraham’s son:

2-6 Abraham had Isaac,

Isaac had Jacob,

Jacob had Judah and his brothers,

Judah had Perez and Zerah (the mother was Tamar),

Perez had Hezron,

Hezron had Aram,

Aram had Amminadab,

Amminadab had Nahshon,

Nahshon had Salmon,

Salmon had Boaz (his mother was Rahab),

Boaz had Obed (Ruth was the mother),

Obed had Jesse,

Jesse had David,

and David became king.

6-11 David had Solomon (Uriah’s wife was the mother),

Solomon had Rehoboam,

Rehoboam had Abijah,

Abijah had Asa,

Asa had Jehoshaphat,

Jehoshaphat had Joram,

Joram had Uzziah,

Uzziah had Jotham,

Jotham had Ahaz,

Ahaz had Hezekiah,

Hezekiah had Manasseh,

Manasseh had Amon,

Amon had Josiah,

Josiah had Jehoiachin and his brothers,

and then the people were taken into the Babylonian exile.

12-16 When the Babylonian exile ended,

Jeconiah had Shealtiel,

Shealtiel had Zerubbabel,

Zerubbabel had Abiud,

Abiud had Eliakim,

Eliakim had Azor,

Azor had Zadok,

Zadok had Achim,

Achim had Eliud,

Eliud had Eleazar,

Eleazar had Matthan,

Matthan had Jacob,

Jacob had Joseph, Mary’s husband,

the Mary who gave birth to Jesus,

the Jesus who was called Christ.

17 There were fourteen generations from Abraham to David,

another fourteen from David to the Babylonian exile,

and yet another fourteen from the Babylonian exile to Christ.

The Birth of Jesus
18-19 The birth of Jesus took place like this. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be married to Joseph. Before they enjoyed their wedding night, Joseph discovered she was pregnant. (It was by the Holy Spirit, but he didn’t know that.) Joseph, chagrined but noble, determined to take care of things quietly so Mary would not be disgraced.

20-23 While he was trying to figure a way out, he had a dream. God’s angel spoke in the dream: “Joseph, son of David, don’t hesitate to get married. Mary’s pregnancy is Spirit-conceived. God’s Holy Spirit has made her pregnant. She will bring a son to birth, and when she does, you, Joseph, will name him Jesus—‘God saves’—because he will save his people from their sins.” This would bring the prophet’s embryonic revelation to full term:

Watch for this—a virgin will get pregnant and bear a son;
They will name him Immanuel (Hebrew for “God is with us”).

24-25 Then Joseph woke up. He did exactly what God’s angel commanded in the dream: He married Mary. But he did not consummate the marriage until she had the baby. He named the baby Jesus.


Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Tuesday, April 27, 2021

Read: Ecclesiastes 10:1–14

As dead flies give perfume a bad smell,
    so a little folly outweighs wisdom and honor.
2 The heart of the wise inclines to the right,
    but the heart of the fool to the left.
3 Even as fools walk along the road,
    they lack sense
    and show everyone how stupid they are.
4 If a ruler’s anger rises against you,
    do not leave your post;
    calmness can lay great offenses to rest.

5 There is an evil I have seen under the sun,
    the sort of error that arises from a ruler:
6 Fools are put in many high positions,
    while the rich occupy the low ones.
7 I have seen slaves on horseback,
    while princes go on foot like slaves.

8 Whoever digs a pit may fall into it;
    whoever breaks through a wall may be bitten by a snake.
9 Whoever quarries stones may be injured by them;
    whoever splits logs may be endangered by them.

10 If the ax is dull
    and its edge unsharpened,
more strength is needed,
    but skill will bring success.

11 If a snake bites before it is charmed,
    the charmer receives no fee.

12 Words from the mouth of the wise are gracious,
    but fools are consumed by their own lips.
13 At the beginning their words are folly;
    at the end they are wicked madness—
14     and fools multiply words.

No one knows what is coming—
    who can tell someone else what will happen after them?

INSIGHT
In Ecclesiastes, wisdom and folly are often set in sharp contrast. Folly (or the fool) is tied to wickedness (7:17; 10:12) and is the opposite of wisdom (2:19). As Michael Eaton in his commentary on Ecclesiastes states, “[Folly] results from an inner deficiency of the personality (10:2) which becomes obvious to observers (v. 3), especially in the fool’s speech (v. 14).” In Jeremiah we read that the foolish are “skilled in doing evil” (4:22) and lack moral sensitivity: They’re “senseless people, who have eyes but do not see, who have ears but do not hear” (5:21).

By Con Campbell
Learning from Foolishness

The heart of the wise inclines to the right, but the heart of the fool to the left. Even as fools walk along the road, they lack sense. Ecclesiastes 10:2–3

A man walked into a convenience store in Wollongong, Australia, put a $20 bill on the counter and asked for change. When the clerk opened the cash drawer, the man pulled a gun and asked for all the cash in the register, which the clerk promptly provided. The man took the cash from the clerk and fled, leaving the $20 bill on the counter. The total amount of cash he got from the drawer? Fifteen dollars.

We all act foolishly at times—even if, unlike this thief, we’re trying to do the right thing. The key is how we learn from our foolish behavior. Without correction, our poor choices can become habits, which will negatively shape our character. We’ll become “fools . . . [who] lack sense” (Ecclesiastes 10:3).

Sometimes it’s hard to admit our foolishness because of the extra work it requires. Perhaps we need to reflect on a particular character flaw, and that’s painful. Or maybe we need to admit that a decision was made hastily and next time we should take more care. Whatever the reason, it never pays to ignore our foolish ways.

Thankfully, God can use our foolishness to discipline and shape us. Discipline isn’t “pleasant at the time,” but its training yields good fruit in the long run (Hebrews 12:11). Let’s accept our Father’s discipline for our foolish behavior and ask Him to make us more like the sons and daughters He intends us to be.

What’s a recent foolish choice you’ve made? What do you think God wants you to learn from it?

Thank You, Father, for using my foolishness to train me. May I accept Your discipline graciously as You continue to work in me.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Tuesday, April 27, 2021
What Do You Want?

Do you seek great things for yourself? —Jeremiah 45:5

Are you seeking great things for yourself, instead of seeking to be a great person? God wants you to be in a much closer relationship with Himself than simply receiving His gifts— He wants you to get to know Him. Even some large thing we want is only incidental; it comes and it goes. But God never gives us anything incidental. There is nothing easier than getting into the right relationship with God, unless it is not God you seek, but only what He can give you.

If you have only come as far as asking God for things, you have never come to the point of understanding the least bit of what surrender really means. You have become a Christian based on your own terms. You protest, saying, “I asked God for the Holy Spirit, but He didn’t give me the rest and the peace I expected.” And instantly God puts His finger on the reason– you are not seeking the Lord at all; you are seeking something for yourself. Jesus said, “Ask, and it will be given to you…” (Matthew 7:7). Ask God for what you want and do not be concerned about asking for the wrong thing, because as you draw ever closer to Him, you will cease asking for things altogether. “Your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him” (Matthew 6:8). Then why should you ask? So that you may get to know Him.

Are you seeking great things for yourself? Have you said, “Oh, Lord, completely fill me with your Holy Spirit”? If God does not, it is because you are not totally surrendered to Him; there is something you still refuse to do. Are you prepared to ask yourself what it is you want from God and why you want it? God always ignores your present level of completeness in favor of your ultimate future completeness. He is not concerned about making you blessed and happy right now, but He’s continually working out His ultimate perfection for you— “…that they may be one just as We are one…” (John 17:22).

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

Jesus Christ can afford to be misunderstood; we cannot. Our weakness lies in always wanting to vindicate ourselves.  The Place of Help, 1051 L

Bible in a Year: 1 Kings 1-2; Luke 19:28-48

A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Tuesday, April 27, 2021

Paper Trunks and Permanent Wardrobe - #8947

I think it had to be one of the most like insecure afternoons of my life. Our committee had been meeting for two days at this hotel. Two days straight! We had a slave-driving chairman, and finally he said, "All right, guys, how about a couple of hours in the pool?" "All right! The pool! The sauna! We deserve a break today."

There was this one problem. My best friend and me? We had come totally unprepared; we had no swimwear whatsoever. And we really didn't want to pass up the pool and the sun and all that good stuff. So I went down to the gift shop and I said, "Do you have any swim trucks here?" And the lady said, "Well, I have some paper trunks." She said, "Yeah, they're reinforced and they're paper trunks. It's only $2." Yeah. Well, it was my only choice, so I went for it. I mean, I guess I could spend $2 on it.

I want to tell you, it was an insecure afternoon sitting there in those paper trunks in the sauna. Now, I'm happy to report there was... well, no modesty crisis... no wardrobe malfunction, but I did not keep them to wear for other occasions. No, I used them, and believe me, I threw them away. Because I know there's a difference between what you wear for a little while and what you're going to be wearing for a long time. Paper trunks may be worth $2, probably not much more.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Paper Trunks and Permanent Wardrobe."

Now, there are a lot of things you can base your identity on, but most of those roles, I would call them "paper trunks" you wear a little while and then you throw them away. There is one identity that is your permanent wardrobe; only one identity that you will always be, that is if you've ever made a commitment of your life to Jesus Christ. Paul talks about it in Ephesians 1, where we find our word for today from the Word of God. I'll begin at verse 11.

Notice the two words that are repeated four times in this passage. "In Christ we were chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of Him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of His will, in order that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be for the praise of His glory and you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth - the gospel of your salvation. Having believed you were marked in Christ with the seal - the promised Holy Spirit."

Okay, unless you dozed off, you probably know where your identity is supposed to be from those repeated two words, "In Christ." Yeah, that's your location. Where are you? You're in Christ. There are a lot of identities where you might say, "I'm in something or other." You're in high school, or "I'm in college." You could say, "Man, is there life after high school?" You're in college at one period in your life. I know guys who are in professional football and they'll say, "Is there life after football?" Is there life after whatever company or organization you work for, after retirement, after you lose your mate or your parents?

See, life is a series of new starts. What happens after the children are gone? Those new starts last from starting kindergarten, to college, to marriage, the empty nest, job changes, retirement, the funeral. And we wear those identities for a period of time. But if you're ever going to find personal security, you need a transcendent identity - someone you can be forever. And Paul gave it to us, "In Christ." You will always belong to Jesus Christ after high school, when college is a memory, when you're single, when you're married, when you're widowed, when you're raising kids, after the kids leave.

But here's the problem: We tend to pay a very high price for our temporary identities; our paper trunks. You'll never see most of your high school friends again, but we compromise. We hide our eternal relationship with Christ because we're scared of them. We play by whatever rules we have to play to be accepted in school, in the dorm, in our job, and we sacrifice our loyalty to Christ in the process.

Look, you'll belong to Christ forever. Why not really be what you'll always be? Don't waste a lot of your life on paper trunks. Put your best into the permanent wardrobe that you will never risk losing - who you will be for all eternity - "In Christ."

Genesis 3 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals

Max Lucado Daily: GLORY DAYS AWAIT - April 26, 2021

God has a promised land for you to take. I sat across the table from a man in midlife misery. He described his life with words like stuck and rut and stalled. He’s a Christian, but he can’t tell you the last time he defeated a temptation or experienced an answered prayer. Twenty years into his faith he fights the same battles he was fighting the day he came to Christ. It’s as if the door to spiritual growth has a lock and everyone has a key but him.

Joshua 21:43 says, “So the Lord gave Israel all the land of which He had sworn to give…and they took possession of it and dwelt in it.” The Promised Land! God’s vision for your life. Yours for the taking. Expect to be challenged—the enemy won’t go down without a fight. But your glory days await you.

Genesis 3

The serpent was clever, more clever than any wild animal God had made. He spoke to the Woman: “Do I understand that God told you not to eat from any tree in the garden?”

2-3 The Woman said to the serpent, “Not at all. We can eat from the trees in the garden. It’s only about the tree in the middle of the garden that God said, ‘Don’t eat from it; don’t even touch it or you’ll die.’”

4-5 The serpent told the Woman, “You won’t die. God knows that the moment you eat from that tree, you’ll see what’s really going on. You’ll be just like God, knowing everything, ranging all the way from good to evil.”

6 When the Woman saw that the tree looked like good eating and realized what she would get out of it—she’d know everything!—she took and ate the fruit and then gave some to her husband, and he ate.

7 Immediately the two of them did “see what’s really going on”—saw themselves naked! They sewed fig leaves together as makeshift clothes for themselves.

8 When they heard the sound of God strolling in the garden in the evening breeze, the Man and his Wife hid in the trees of the garden, hid from God.

9 God called to the Man: “Where are you?”

10 He said, “I heard you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked. And I hid.”

11 God said, “Who told you that you were naked? Did you eat from that tree I told you not to eat from?”

12 The Man said, “The Woman you gave me as a companion, she gave me fruit from the tree, and, yes, I ate it.”

God said to the Woman, “What is this that you’ve done?”

13 “The serpent seduced me,” she said, “and I ate.”

14-15     God told the serpent:
“Because you’ve done this, you’re cursed,
    cursed beyond all cattle and wild animals,
Cursed to slink on your belly
    and eat dirt all your life.
I’m declaring war between you and the Woman,
    between your offspring and hers.
He’ll wound your head,
    you’ll wound his heel.”

16     He told the Woman:
“I’ll multiply your pains in childbirth;
    you’ll give birth to your babies in pain.
You’ll want to please your husband,
    but he’ll lord it over you.”

17-19     He told the Man:
“Because you listened to your wife
    and ate from the tree
That I commanded you not to eat from,
    ‘Don’t eat from this tree,’
The very ground is cursed because of you;
    getting food from the ground
Will be as painful as having babies is for your wife;
    you’ll be working in pain all your life long.
The ground will sprout thorns and weeds,
    you’ll get your food the hard way,
Planting and tilling and harvesting,
    sweating in the fields from dawn to dusk,
Until you return to that ground yourself, dead and buried;
    you started out as dirt, you’ll end up dirt.”

20 The Man, known as Adam, named his wife Eve because she was the mother of all the living.

21 God made leather clothing for Adam and his wife and dressed them.

22 God said, “The Man has become like one of us, capable of knowing everything, ranging from good to evil. What if he now should reach out and take fruit from the Tree-of-Life and eat, and live forever? Never—this cannot happen!”

23-24 So God expelled them from the Garden of Eden and sent them to work the ground, the same dirt out of which they’d been made. He threw them out of the garden and stationed angel-cherubim and a revolving sword of fire east of it, guarding the path to the Tree-of-Life.

Our Daily Bread reading and devotion    
Monday, April 26, 2021

Read: Ephesians 4:20–32

That, however, is not the way of life you learned 21 when you heard about Christ and were taught in him in accordance with the truth that is in Jesus. 22 You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; 23 to be made new in the attitude of your minds; 24 and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

25 Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body. 26 “In your anger do not sin”[a]: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27 and do not give the devil a foothold. 28 Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with their own hands, that they may have something to share with those in need.

29 Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. 32 Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

INSIGHT
Living worthy of the calling believers have received (Ephesians 4:1) involves character. Humility puts the needs of others ahead of ourselves (Philippians 2:3–4). Gentleness resists self-importance and offers courtesy. Patience resists self-gratification. And bearing with one another in love is acceptance without conditions. These are necessary for believers to “keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:3), which is essential for the mature life of the body of Christ, the church (vv. 15–16). Unity of the Spirit is lived out by believers embracing Christlike characteristics that promote healthy relationships in love, as described in verses 20–32.

By Monica La Rose
At Our Worst
Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Ephesians 4:2

“She is tolerable, but not handsome enough to tempt me.” This sentence, pronounced by Mr. Darcy in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, is the reason I will never forget that novel and its impact on me. Because after reading that one sentence, I firmly decided I would never like Mr. Darcy.

But I was wrong. Like Austen’s character Elizabeth Bennet, I had the humbling experience of slowly—and quite reluctantly—changing my mind. Like her, I’d been unwilling to get to know Darcy’s character as a whole; I preferred to hang onto my reaction to one of his worst moments. After finishing the novel, I wondered who I’d made that same mistake with in the real world. What friendships had I missed because I wouldn’t let go of a snap judgment?

At the heart of faith in Jesus is the experience of being seen, loved, and embraced by our Savior—at our worst (Romans 5:8; 1 John 4:19). It’s the wonder of realizing we can surrender our old, false selves for who we truly are in Christ (Ephesians 4:23–24). And it’s the joy of understanding that we are no longer alone but part of a family, a “body” of those learning to walk the “way of love”—real, unconditional love (5:2).

When we remember what Christ has done for us (v. 2), how can we not long to see others the way He sees us?

Why do you think you sometimes cling to negative judgments about others? What experiences have you had of “being wrong” about someone?

God, it’s really hard, sometimes, to let go of that impulse to judge and compare, to resist that need to see myself as better than others. Help me to grasp, deep in my heart, the truth that I don’t need to compete and that I am loved.

My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Monday, April 26, 2021
The Supreme Climb
Take now your son…and offer him…as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you. —Genesis 22:2

A person’s character determines how he interprets God’s will (see Psalm 18:25-26). Abraham interpreted God’s command to mean that he had to kill his son, and he could only leave this traditional belief behind through the pain of a tremendous ordeal. God could purify his faith in no other way. If we obey what God says according to our sincere belief, God will break us from those traditional beliefs that misrepresent Him. There are many such beliefs which must be removed– for example, that God removes a child because his mother loves him too much. That is the devil’s lie and a travesty on the true nature of God! If the devil can hinder us from taking the supreme climb and getting rid of our wrong traditional beliefs about God, he will do so. But if we will stay true to God, God will take us through an ordeal that will serve to bring us into a better knowledge of Himself.

The great lesson to be learned from Abraham’s faith in God is that he was prepared to do anything for God. He was there to obey God, no matter what contrary belief of his might be violated by his obedience. Abraham was not devoted to his own convictions or else he would have slain Isaac and said that the voice of the angel was actually the voice of the devil. That is the attitude of a fanatic. If you will remain true to God, God will lead you directly through every barrier and right into the inner chamber of the knowledge of Himself. But you must always be willing to come to the point of giving up your own convictions and traditional beliefs. Don’t ask God to test you. Never declare as Peter did that you are willing to do anything, even “to go …both to prison and to death” (Luke 22:33). Abraham did not make any such statement— he simply remained true to God, and God purified his faith.

WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS

The main characteristic which is the proof of the indwelling Spirit is an amazing tenderness in personal dealing, and a blazing truthfulness with regard to God’s Word. Disciples Indeed, 386 R

Bible in a Year: 2 Samuel 23-24; Luke 19:1-27

A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Monday, April 26, 2021

The Dark Crossroads - #8946

After Whitney Houston's sudden death some years ago, the world was fixated on replaying her iconic and now more poignant performances of her signature songs. And what stuck in my mind was a video they showed of one of her first performances and the video of one of her last.

The early video actually showed her as a young girl, singing in her Newark, New Jersey church, belting out "just a little talk with Jesus makes it right." The other video was called "Whitney's last public performance." It appeared to be an impromptu duet. The song "Yes, Jesus Loves Me." I thought, "Man, bookends of her life."

Clearly, Jesus was part of the life of this legendary performer whose singular way with a song brought people to call her simply "The Voice." But the effusive tributes and the flashbacks of Whitney's unforgettable musical mountaintops were punctuated with the disturbing images of her personal life spinning tragically out of control. Her "turbulent marriage" they said, her battles with admitted drug addiction, and then the troubling pictures of a beautiful woman in disarray and decline.

I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Dark Crossroads."

Now, according to Whitney's own public statements and numerous reports from the news and personal friends, things went very wrong in a life that lit up stages around the world. And none of us knows what went on in the heart and soul of this tormented diva. But what we can know is what's going on in our own, in light of the lessons that we've learned as we look at someone like Whitney Houston. The big question that comes to me as I sort through this sadness is, "Where do you turn when you hit the dark crossroads?"

We all get there. It's that point of desperation where the hurt is so great and the answers so few, and you've got to decide where to turn. Many roads lead to that crossroads: a marriage that promised happiness but it's just delivering hurt, a soul-ripping tragedy, bad news from the doctor, from the boss, the betrayal, the breakup, the broken heart.

At the dark crossroads, you've got to choose which way you're going to go - toward the darkness or toward the light. You choose the darkness when you go to the drugs or the drinking, a sexual affair or sexual fantasies for relief, a "solution" that isn't one. It only creates more problems. It's darkness when you descend into the pit of harbored bitterness, or anger, or self-pity. Emotional cancer, that's what it is. It doesn't do anything to the person who hurt you, but it slowly destroys you.

I've found there's one choice that you make at the dark crossroads that's the difference between hope and despair, between a healed heart and a hard heart, between being free or being shackled, between character-growing choices or life-scarring mistakes. It's what you do with Jesus at the dark crossroads.

Some people find Jesus when everything else has failed them. But sadly, some people walk away from Him, thus abandoning the only hope of finding meaning and strength in their trouble. No one stays in the same place with Jesus when the tsunami hits. You end up either closer to Him or farther from Him. You choose.

See, God's posted a sign at the dark crossroads. It's our word for today from the Word of God in Deuteronomy 30:19-20. It says, "I have set before you life and death...Now choose life, so that you and your children may live...the Lord is your life." Jesus illuminated the two directions when He contrasted the devil's plans for you with His plans, "The thief comes only to steal, kill and destroy, but I have come that they might have life and have it to the full" (John 10:10).

The song is so right, "Jesus loves me." The one Whitney sang as a girl, "Just a little talk with Jesus makes it right." Especially if that talk is to say, "Jesus, I need Your love; that love You sho

wed me when You poured out Your life for my sin on the cross. So Jesus, I'm all Yours." You can have a Jesus-upbringing, Jesus-beliefs, Jesus-words and still not know Him. But today is your day at the crossroads to give yourself to Him.

I invite you today, maybe at your dark crossroads, to grab the One who said, "I will be for you the light of your life." Because it's often at the dark crossroads where the Light finally comes in.