Max Lucado Daily: TODAY’S POP QUIZ
Each day has a pop quiz. And some seasons are final exams. Brutal, sudden pitfalls of stress, sickness, or sadness. What is the purpose of the test? James 1:3-4 says, “For when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be strong in character and ready for anything.”
God hasn’t forgotten you. Just the opposite. He has chosen to train you. The Hebrew verb for test comes from a word that means “to take a keen look at; to choose.” Dismiss the notion that God does not see your struggle. On the contrary, God is fully engaged. He is the Teacher; we are the students. Trust His training. You’ll get through this. He can make something good out of your mess!
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezra 4
The Building Stopped: Cease Rebuilding in That City
1-2 Old enemies of Judah and Benjamin heard that the exiles were building The Temple of the God of Israel. They came to Zerubbabel and the family heads and said, “We’ll help you build. We worship your God the same as you. We’ve been offering sacrifices to him since Esarhaddon king of Assyria brought us here.”
3 Zerubbabel, Jeshua, and the rest of the family heads of Israel said to them, “Nothing doing. Building The Temple of our God is not the same thing to you as to us. We alone will build for the God of Israel. We’re the ones King Cyrus of Persia commanded to do it.”
4-5 So these people started beating down the morale of the people of Judah, harassing them as they built. They even hired propagandists to sap their resolve. They kept this up for about fifteen years, throughout the lifetime of Cyrus king of Persia and on into the reign of Darius king of Persia.
6 In fact, in the reign of Xerxes, at the beginning of his reign, they wrote an accusation against those living in Judah and Jerusalem.
7 Again later, in the time of Artaxerxes, Bishlam, Mithredath, Tabeel, and their associates wrote regarding the Jerusalem business to Artaxerxes king of Persia. The letter was written in Aramaic and translated. (What follows is written in Aramaic.)
8-16 Rehum the commanding officer and Shimshai the secretary wrote a letter against Jerusalem to Artaxerxes the king as follows:
From: Rehum the commanding officer and Shimshai the secretary, backed by the rest of their associates, the judges and officials over the people from Tripolis, Persia, Erech, and Babylon, Elamites of Susa, and all the others whom the great and honorable Ashurbanipal deported and settled in the city of Samaria and other places in the land across the Euphrates.
(This is the copy of the letter they sent to him.)
To: King Artaxerxes from your servants from the land across the Euphrates.
We are here to inform the king that the Jews who came from you to us have arrived in Jerusalem and have set about rebuilding that rebellious and evil city. They are busy at work finishing the walls and rebuilding the foundations. The king needs to know that once that city is rebuilt and the wall completed they will no longer pay a penny of tribute, tax, or duty. The royal treasury will feel the loss. We’re loyal to the king and cannot sit idly by while our king is being insulted—that’s why we are passing this information on. We suggest that you look into the court records of your ancestors; you’ll learn from those books that that city is a rebellious city, a thorn in the side to kings and provinces, a historic center of unrest and revolt. That’s why the city was wiped out. We are letting the king know that if that city gets rebuilt and its walls restored, you’ll end up with nothing in your province beyond the Euphrates.
17-22 The king sent his reply to Rehum the commanding officer, Shimshai the secretary, and the rest of their associates who lived in Samaria and other places beyond the Euphrates.
Peace be with you. The letter that you sent has been translated and read to me. I gave orders to search the records, and sure enough it turns out that this city has revolted against kings time and again—rebellion is an old story there. I find that they’ve had their share of strong kings who have taken over beyond the Euphrates and exacted taxes, tribute, and duty. So do this: Order these men to stop work immediately—not a lick of rebuilding in that city unless I order it. Act quickly and firmly; they’ve done enough damage to kings!
23 The letter of King Artaxerxes was read to Rehum and Shimshai the secretary and their associates. They lost no time. They went to the Jews in Jerusalem and made them quit work.
24 That put a stop to the work on The Temple of God in Jerusalem. Nothing more was done until the second year of the reign of Darius king of Persia.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Thursday, June 22, 2017
Read: Habakkuk 1:1–4; 2:20
Justice Is a Joke
1-4 The problem as God gave Habakkuk to see it:
God, how long do I have to cry out for help
before you listen?
How many times do I have to yell, “Help! Murder! Police!”
before you come to the rescue?
Why do you force me to look at evil,
stare trouble in the face day after day?
Anarchy and violence break out,
quarrels and fights all over the place.
Law and order fall to pieces.
Justice is a joke.
The wicked have the righteous hamstrung
and stand justice on its head.
“But oh! God is in his holy Temple!
Quiet everyone—a holy silence. Listen!”
INSIGHT:
We sometimes wonder why God allows the kind of pain and suffering that seems to rise above all reason. Six hundred years before Christ, the Jewish prophet Habakkuk wondered the same thing. He struggled to understand how a good God could appear to look the other way while the groaning of Jerusalem’s oppressed weak and poor went unanswered. His doubts deepened when the Lord answered his prayers by telling him that he was going to call in the cruel armies of Babylon to bring the “holy city” to its senses. But Habakkuk didn’t lose his faith. After being honest enough to express his doubts and questions to God, he learned there is a time to surrender in silence before a God who can restore trust to those who wait on Him (2:20)—even when we don’t understand.
In that place of quiet, after pouring out our doubts and complaints to God, we can learn what it means to quietly rest in the One who has in so many ways already shown Himself inexpressibly good and faithful (Hab. 3:17–19).
For further study on Habakkuk and other Old Testament books, check out this free resource at christianuniversity.org/OT128.
Silence
By Tim Gustafson
How long, Lord, must I call for help, but you do not listen? Habakkuk 1:2
Skittish chickens scattered as relief trucks clattered past the weathered huts of the village. Barefoot children stared. Traffic on this rain-ravaged “road” was rare.
Suddenly, a walled mansion loomed into view of the convoy. It was the mayor’s house—although he didn’t live in it. His people lacked basic necessities, while he lounged in luxury in a distant city.
Nothing is beyond God's control and timing.
Such unfairness angers us. It angered God’s prophet too. When Habakkuk saw rampant oppression he asked, “How long, Lord, must I call for help, but you do not listen?” (Hab. 1:2). But God had noticed, and He said, “Woe to him who piles up stolen goods . . . who builds his house by unjust gain!” (2:6, 9). Judgment was coming!
We welcome God’s judgment of others, but there’s a pivot point in Habakkuk that gives us pause: “The Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth be silent before him” (2:20). All the earth. The oppressed along with oppressors. Sometimes the appropriate response to God’s seeming silence is . . . silence!
Why silence? Because we easily overlook our own spiritual poverty. Silence allows us to recognize our sinfulness in the presence of a holy God.
Habakkuk learned to trust God, and we can too. We don’t know all His ways, but we do know that He is good. Nothing is beyond His control and timing.
Lord, when trouble comes we can pray like Habakkuk, “We have heard of your fame; we stand in awe of your deeds. Repeat them in our day; in our time make them known” (Hab. 3:2).
The righteous care about justice for the poor, but the wicked have no such concern. Proverbs 29:7
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, June 22, 2017
The Unchanging Law of Judgment
With what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. —Matthew 7:2
This statement is not some haphazard theory, but it is an eternal law of God. Whatever judgment you give will be the very way you are judged. There is a difference between retaliation and retribution. Jesus said that the basis of life is retribution— “with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.” If you have been shrewd in finding out the shortcomings of others, remember that will be exactly how you will be measured. The way you pay is the way life will pay you back. This eternal law works from God’s throne down to us (see Psalm 18:25-26).
Romans 2:1 applies it in even a more definite way by saying that the one who criticizes another is guilty of the very same thing. God looks not only at the act itself, but also at the possibility of committing it, which He sees by looking at our hearts. To begin with, we do not believe the statements of the Bible. For instance, do we really believe the statement that says we criticize in others the very things we are guilty of ourselves? The reason we see hypocrisy, deceit, and a lack of genuineness in others is that they are all in our own hearts. The greatest characteristic of a saint is humility, as evidenced by being able to say honestly and humbly, “Yes, all those, as well as other evils, would have been exhibited in me if it were not for the grace of God. Therefore, I have no right to judge.”
Jesus said, “Judge not, that you be not judged” (Matthew 7:1). He went on to say, in effect, “If you do judge, you will be judged in exactly the same way.” Who of us would dare to stand before God and say, “My God, judge me as I have judged others”? We have judged others as sinners— if God should judge us in the same way, we would be condemned to hell. Yet God judges us on the basis of the miraculous atonement by the Cross of Christ.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
We are apt to think that everything that happens to us is to be turned into useful teaching; it is to be turned into something better than teaching, viz. into character. We shall find that the spheres God brings us into are not meant to teach us something but to make us something. The Love of God—The Ministry of the Unnoticed, 664 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, June 22, 2017
Moving To Higher Ground - #7944
The Lakota Souix call them the Paha Sapa. We call them the Black Hills. The people who live in Keystone, South Dakota, call them their backyard. If you have ever visited Mt. Rushmore and the Black Hills, you probably drove by or through Keystone. But the Keystone you drive through now isn't where Keystone used to be – not since the flood of 1972. It was devastating. Back then, Keystone was in the valley by a lazy little creek which suddenly became a raging flood one day in '72, roaring through that valley, destroying the town, and claiming many lives in the area. Well, it was then that the folks of Keystone decided to make a change. When they rebuilt their business district and many of their homes, it wasn't on the ground they had always been on. No, the flood changed all that. They moved up the mountain to higher ground.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Moving To Higher Ground."
Life's floods come in many forms; those major crises or disasters that carry away a lot of what we had been depending on. An illness, or maybe a death can do that, a divorce can do it, a disaster, a broken relationship, the loss of your job. There are a lot of upheavals that come rushing in and they change the landscape forever. And they make you think, maybe for the first time, about where is the best place to build the rest of my life.
Our word for today from the Word of God comes from Psalm 46, "God is our refuge and strength; an ever present help in trouble. Therefore, we will not fear though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea; (Here come the floods.) though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging." (vs. 1-3) We're talking here about life's major upheavals; everything you used to count on getting washed away.
But remember, "God is our refuge and strength.", so we don't have to fear those things. Why? Because when you've lost everything, you haven't lost everything! Not if you have a deep, personal love relationship with the God who never leaves, never lets go of those who belong to Him.
The Psalm goes on to say, "The Lord Almighty is with us, come and see the works of the Lord." (vs. 7-8) And then a simple statement that may explain the reason the flood was allowed to happen, so you would finally, "Be still and know that I am God." (vs. 10) Maybe, for all practical purposes, you've been "God" in your life. You've been controlling things; you've been living life your way. And you've been building your life around someone or something here on earth – something or someone that the flood may be washing away, or maybe it already has.
God's message to you through all of your stress and your pain is, "It's time to move to higher ground." Having seen how fragile, how losable all your earth stuff is, are you ready to build on something you can never lose, no matter what hits you? You were created to build your life on the One who gave you your life – God Himself. But the Bible says we've built it on ourselves. And it took the brutal death of God's Son, Jesus on the cross, to pay the death penalty for all of our "I'll be God" choices.
The folks in Keystone, South Dakota, would never have considered moving to higher ground until that flood hit. And maybe you would have never considered turning your life over to Jesus Christ, but now the floods have hit. And you now know that nothing earth can offer you will give you what your heart is so hungry for. Isn't it time to move up the hill? It's the hill where Jesus died for you so you could finally have something that's called "ever-lasting"?
If that's what you want, would you tell Jesus you're done running your life and you want to put your trust in the One who died for your sin? Our website is there to help you take that journey, make that commitment, and know you've gone to higher ground and you are safe forever. The website's ANewStory.com where your new story can begin today.
The flood has done its damage, and maybe it's sent its message. The ground you've been on is not where you were meant to live. It's time to move to the higher ground that you were made for. And, Jesus is the higher ground where you will be safe...forever.
Thursday, June 22, 2017
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
Ezra 3 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals
Max Lucado Daily: GOD IS NOT SOMETIMES SOVEREIGN
This season in which you find yourself may puzzle you, but it does not bewilder God. He can and will use it for His purpose. God is not sometimes sovereign. He is not occasionally victorious. Jeremiah 30:24 reminds us, “The Lord shall not turn back until He has executed and accomplished the thoughts and intents of His mind.”
Case in point. Joseph in prison. From an earthly viewpoint the Egyptian jail was the tragic conclusion of Joseph’s life. The devil had Joseph just where he wanted him. But so did God. What Satan intended for evil, God used for testing. If you see your troubles as nothing more than isolated hassles and hurts, you’ll grow bitter and angry. If you see your troubles as tests used by God for His glory and your maturity—then even the smallest incidents take on significance!
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezra 3
The Building Begun: “The Foundation of the Temple Was Laid”
1-2 When the seventh month came and the Israelites had settled into their towns, the people assembled together in Jerusalem. Jeshua son of Jozadak and his brother priests, along with Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, and his relatives, went to work and built the Altar of the God of Israel to offer Whole-Burnt-Offerings on it as written in The Revelation of Moses the man of God.
3-5 Even though they were afraid of what their non-Israelite neighbors might do, they went ahead anyway and set up the Altar on its foundations and offered Whole-Burnt-Offerings on it morning and evening. They also celebrated the Festival of Booths as prescribed and the daily Whole-Burnt-Offerings set for each day. And they presented the regular Whole-Burnt-Offerings for Sabbaths, New Moons, and God’s Holy Festivals, as well as Freewill-Offerings for God.
6 They began offering Whole-Burnt-Offerings to God from the very first day of the seventh month, even though The Temple of God’s foundation had not yet been laid.
7 They gave money to hire masons and carpenters. They gave food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and Tyrians in exchange for the cedar lumber they had brought by sea from Lebanon to Joppa, a shipment authorized by Cyrus the king of Persia.
8-9 In the second month of the second year after their arrival at The Temple of God in Jerusalem, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua son of Jozadak, in company with their brother priests and Levites and everyone else who had come back to Jerusalem from captivity, got started. They appointed the Levites twenty years of age and older to direct the rebuilding of The Temple of God. Jeshua and his family joined Kadmiel, Binnui, and Hodaviah, along with the extended family of Henadad—all Levites—to direct the work crew on The Temple of God.
10-11 When the workers laid the foundation of The Temple of God, the priests in their robes stood up with trumpets, and the Levites, sons of Asaph, with cymbals, to praise God in the tradition of David king of Israel. They sang antiphonally praise and thanksgiving to God:
Yes! God is good!
Oh yes—he’ll never quit loving Israel!
11-13 All the people boomed out hurrahs, praising God as the foundation of The Temple of God was laid. As many were noisily shouting with joy, many of the older priests, Levites, and family heads who had seen the first Temple, when they saw the foundations of this Temple laid, wept loudly for joy. People couldn’t distinguish the shouting from the weeping. The sound of their voices reverberated for miles around.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
Read: 2 Corinthians 1:3–11
The Rescue
3-5 All praise to the God and Father of our Master, Jesus the Messiah! Father of all mercy! God of all healing counsel! He comes alongside us when we go through hard times, and before you know it, he brings us alongside someone else who is going through hard times so that we can be there for that person just as God was there for us. We have plenty of hard times that come from following the Messiah, but no more so than the good times of his healing comfort—we get a full measure of that, too.
6-7 When we suffer for Jesus, it works out for your healing and salvation. If we are treated well, given a helping hand and encouraging word, that also works to your benefit, spurring you on, face forward, unflinching. Your hard times are also our hard times. When we see that you’re just as willing to endure the hard times as to enjoy the good times, we know you’re going to make it, no doubt about it.
8-11 We don’t want you in the dark, friends, about how hard it was when all this came down on us in Asia province. It was so bad we didn’t think we were going to make it. We felt like we’d been sent to death row, that it was all over for us. As it turned out, it was the best thing that could have happened. Instead of trusting in our own strength or wits to get out of it, we were forced to trust God totally—not a bad idea since he’s the God who raises the dead! And he did it, rescued us from certain doom. And he’ll do it again, rescuing us as many times as we need rescuing. You and your prayers are part of the rescue operation—I don’t want you in the dark about that either. I can see your faces even now, lifted in praise for God’s deliverance of us, a rescue in which your prayers played such a crucial part.
INSIGHT:
The Greek word for comfort (paraklesis) means “to come alongside and help.” Jesus is called our parakletos (advocate) in 1 John 2:1. The Holy Spirit is another advocate or comforter (John 14:16). Paul asserts that God is “the God of all comfort” (2 Cor. 1:3). The triune Godhead—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—is there with us in our pain. By saying God is the "Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (vv. 2–3), Paul thereby reminds us that coming alongside to help each other is a family duty and privilege (v. 4).
To whom can you be a parakletos—a comforter—this coming week?
Sharing a Cup of Comfort
By Xochitl Dixon
Our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort. 2 Corinthians 1:7
A friend mailed me some of her homemade pottery. Upon opening the box, I discovered the precious items had been damaged during their journey. One of the cups had shattered into a few large pieces, a jumble of shards, and clumps of clay dust. After my husband glued the broken mess back together, I displayed the beautifully blemished cup on a shelf.
Like that pieced-together pottery, I have scars that prove I can still stand strong after the difficult times God’s brought me through. That cup of comfort reminds me that sharing how the Lord has worked in and through my life can help others during their times of suffering.
We can be comforted in knowing that the Lord redeems our trials for His glory.
The apostle Paul praises God because He is the “Father of compassion and the God of all comfort” (2 Cor. 1:3). The Lord uses our trials and sufferings to make us more like Him. His comfort in our troubles equips us to encourage others as we share what He did for us during our time of need (v. 4).
As we reflect on Christ’s suffering, we can be inspired to persevere in the midst of our own pain, trusting that God uses our experiences to strengthen us and others toward patient endurance (vv. 5–7). Like Paul, we can be comforted in knowing that the Lord redeems our trials for His glory. We can share His cups of comfort and bring reassuring hope to the hurting.
Lord, thank You for using us to provide comfort, encouragement, and hope to others who are suffering. We praise You for all You’ve done, are doing, and will continue to do to comfort us through our own afflictions.
God comforts others as we share how He comforted us.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
The Ministry of the Inner Life
You are…a royal priesthood… —1 Peter 2:9
By what right have we become “a royal priesthood”? It is by the right of the atonement by the Cross of Christ that this has been accomplished. Are we prepared to purposely disregard ourselves and to launch out into the priestly work of prayer? The continual inner-searching we do in an effort to see if we are what we ought to be generates a self-centered, sickly type of Christianity, not the vigorous and simple life of a child of God. Until we get into this right and proper relationship with God, it is simply a case of our “hanging on by the skin of our teeth,” although we say, “What a wonderful victory I have!” Yet there is nothing at all in that which indicates the miracle of redemption. Launch out in reckless, unrestrained belief that the redemption is complete. Then don’t worry anymore about yourself, but begin to do as Jesus Christ has said, in essence, “Pray for the friend who comes to you at midnight, pray for the saints of God, and pray for all men.” Pray with the realization that you are perfect only in Christ Jesus, not on the basis of this argument: “Oh, Lord, I have done my best; please hear me now.”
How long is it going to take God to free us from the unhealthy habit of thinking only about ourselves? We must get to the point of being sick to death of ourselves, until there is no longer any surprise at anything God might tell us about ourselves. We cannot reach and understand the depths of our own meagerness. There is only one place where we are right with God, and that is in Christ Jesus. Once we are there, we have to pour out our lives for all we are worth in this ministry of the inner life.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Defenders of the faith are inclined to be bitter until they learn to walk in the light of the Lord. When you have learned to walk in the light of the Lord, bitterness and contention are impossible. Biblical Psychology, 199 R
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
Being There For the Garbage - #7943
Hundreds of thousands of Kurdish people had fled Saddam Hussein's Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War, and they were spread over miles of mountainside on the Turkish border. Christian agencies were flooding in with food, medical help and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But most of the Christian workers connected with the people there only from trucks and distribution points, where they handed out food and blankets. But the missionaries from one particular mission organization really broke through the barrier that others were encountering when they tried to talk about Jesus. They had a unique way of getting close to the people and winning their respect and their trust. You ready to hear their radical outreach strategy? These missionaries picked up the garbage. See, it was everywhere on those mountainsides, and it was getting pretty gross. Nobody wanted to do the garbage, but those who were willing to were the ones those people listened to.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Being There For the Garbage."
What opened doors and hearts among those needy people on that Iraqi mountainside is the same thing that will open doors and hearts where you are-a willingness to win the right to be heard by being there for people's garbage.
It's what Jesus did. In Philippians 2:5-7, our word for today from the Word of God, He tells us: "Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: who, being in the very nature of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death-even death on a cross."
This is the Jesus who touched the lepers that no one else would touch, who stopped for people that everyone else walked by, who washed the dirty feet of His followers, who defined His day by the needs of people who came to Him for help, and who allowed men He had made to beat Him and crucify Him. The King of heaven came to us as a servant and He stole our hearts away.
You have neighbors who really need your Jesus, coworkers, friends and family members. How are you ever going to get them interested in the Jesus who is their only hope? By serving them; by being there to help them with the garbage of their lives. In Jesus' name, be there when their health levels them, when their marriage is struggling or over, when they lose a loved one. Be there when all the funeral folks have gone home. Be there when they're struggling financially, when they don't have enough help, when their business is in trouble, when their kids are in trouble, or when they've lost their reputation and nobody wants to be around them any more.
Their moment of loss is your moment of loving opportunity to show them Jesus' love in action. When others walk out, you walk in. Then you will be ultimately in a position to explain to them where this love comes from. You're just loving them like you've been loved. By a Jesus who had poured everything out for you, because He died of a cross to clean up all the garbage of your life and the garbage of theirs.
First, you show them Jesus by serving them in the midst of their garbage. You win the right to be heard by being there to help pick up the pieces and pick up the garbage. Initially, they may not be interested in your message, but who can be against someone who picks up their heavy burden and helps them carry it; who is there when nobody else is? You can't be against that. It's that kind of love that will open their heart to the greatest love of all!
This season in which you find yourself may puzzle you, but it does not bewilder God. He can and will use it for His purpose. God is not sometimes sovereign. He is not occasionally victorious. Jeremiah 30:24 reminds us, “The Lord shall not turn back until He has executed and accomplished the thoughts and intents of His mind.”
Case in point. Joseph in prison. From an earthly viewpoint the Egyptian jail was the tragic conclusion of Joseph’s life. The devil had Joseph just where he wanted him. But so did God. What Satan intended for evil, God used for testing. If you see your troubles as nothing more than isolated hassles and hurts, you’ll grow bitter and angry. If you see your troubles as tests used by God for His glory and your maturity—then even the smallest incidents take on significance!
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezra 3
The Building Begun: “The Foundation of the Temple Was Laid”
1-2 When the seventh month came and the Israelites had settled into their towns, the people assembled together in Jerusalem. Jeshua son of Jozadak and his brother priests, along with Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, and his relatives, went to work and built the Altar of the God of Israel to offer Whole-Burnt-Offerings on it as written in The Revelation of Moses the man of God.
3-5 Even though they were afraid of what their non-Israelite neighbors might do, they went ahead anyway and set up the Altar on its foundations and offered Whole-Burnt-Offerings on it morning and evening. They also celebrated the Festival of Booths as prescribed and the daily Whole-Burnt-Offerings set for each day. And they presented the regular Whole-Burnt-Offerings for Sabbaths, New Moons, and God’s Holy Festivals, as well as Freewill-Offerings for God.
6 They began offering Whole-Burnt-Offerings to God from the very first day of the seventh month, even though The Temple of God’s foundation had not yet been laid.
7 They gave money to hire masons and carpenters. They gave food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and Tyrians in exchange for the cedar lumber they had brought by sea from Lebanon to Joppa, a shipment authorized by Cyrus the king of Persia.
8-9 In the second month of the second year after their arrival at The Temple of God in Jerusalem, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua son of Jozadak, in company with their brother priests and Levites and everyone else who had come back to Jerusalem from captivity, got started. They appointed the Levites twenty years of age and older to direct the rebuilding of The Temple of God. Jeshua and his family joined Kadmiel, Binnui, and Hodaviah, along with the extended family of Henadad—all Levites—to direct the work crew on The Temple of God.
10-11 When the workers laid the foundation of The Temple of God, the priests in their robes stood up with trumpets, and the Levites, sons of Asaph, with cymbals, to praise God in the tradition of David king of Israel. They sang antiphonally praise and thanksgiving to God:
Yes! God is good!
Oh yes—he’ll never quit loving Israel!
11-13 All the people boomed out hurrahs, praising God as the foundation of The Temple of God was laid. As many were noisily shouting with joy, many of the older priests, Levites, and family heads who had seen the first Temple, when they saw the foundations of this Temple laid, wept loudly for joy. People couldn’t distinguish the shouting from the weeping. The sound of their voices reverberated for miles around.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
Read: 2 Corinthians 1:3–11
The Rescue
3-5 All praise to the God and Father of our Master, Jesus the Messiah! Father of all mercy! God of all healing counsel! He comes alongside us when we go through hard times, and before you know it, he brings us alongside someone else who is going through hard times so that we can be there for that person just as God was there for us. We have plenty of hard times that come from following the Messiah, but no more so than the good times of his healing comfort—we get a full measure of that, too.
6-7 When we suffer for Jesus, it works out for your healing and salvation. If we are treated well, given a helping hand and encouraging word, that also works to your benefit, spurring you on, face forward, unflinching. Your hard times are also our hard times. When we see that you’re just as willing to endure the hard times as to enjoy the good times, we know you’re going to make it, no doubt about it.
8-11 We don’t want you in the dark, friends, about how hard it was when all this came down on us in Asia province. It was so bad we didn’t think we were going to make it. We felt like we’d been sent to death row, that it was all over for us. As it turned out, it was the best thing that could have happened. Instead of trusting in our own strength or wits to get out of it, we were forced to trust God totally—not a bad idea since he’s the God who raises the dead! And he did it, rescued us from certain doom. And he’ll do it again, rescuing us as many times as we need rescuing. You and your prayers are part of the rescue operation—I don’t want you in the dark about that either. I can see your faces even now, lifted in praise for God’s deliverance of us, a rescue in which your prayers played such a crucial part.
INSIGHT:
The Greek word for comfort (paraklesis) means “to come alongside and help.” Jesus is called our parakletos (advocate) in 1 John 2:1. The Holy Spirit is another advocate or comforter (John 14:16). Paul asserts that God is “the God of all comfort” (2 Cor. 1:3). The triune Godhead—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—is there with us in our pain. By saying God is the "Father of our Lord Jesus Christ” (vv. 2–3), Paul thereby reminds us that coming alongside to help each other is a family duty and privilege (v. 4).
To whom can you be a parakletos—a comforter—this coming week?
Sharing a Cup of Comfort
By Xochitl Dixon
Our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort. 2 Corinthians 1:7
A friend mailed me some of her homemade pottery. Upon opening the box, I discovered the precious items had been damaged during their journey. One of the cups had shattered into a few large pieces, a jumble of shards, and clumps of clay dust. After my husband glued the broken mess back together, I displayed the beautifully blemished cup on a shelf.
Like that pieced-together pottery, I have scars that prove I can still stand strong after the difficult times God’s brought me through. That cup of comfort reminds me that sharing how the Lord has worked in and through my life can help others during their times of suffering.
We can be comforted in knowing that the Lord redeems our trials for His glory.
The apostle Paul praises God because He is the “Father of compassion and the God of all comfort” (2 Cor. 1:3). The Lord uses our trials and sufferings to make us more like Him. His comfort in our troubles equips us to encourage others as we share what He did for us during our time of need (v. 4).
As we reflect on Christ’s suffering, we can be inspired to persevere in the midst of our own pain, trusting that God uses our experiences to strengthen us and others toward patient endurance (vv. 5–7). Like Paul, we can be comforted in knowing that the Lord redeems our trials for His glory. We can share His cups of comfort and bring reassuring hope to the hurting.
Lord, thank You for using us to provide comfort, encouragement, and hope to others who are suffering. We praise You for all You’ve done, are doing, and will continue to do to comfort us through our own afflictions.
God comforts others as we share how He comforted us.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
The Ministry of the Inner Life
You are…a royal priesthood… —1 Peter 2:9
By what right have we become “a royal priesthood”? It is by the right of the atonement by the Cross of Christ that this has been accomplished. Are we prepared to purposely disregard ourselves and to launch out into the priestly work of prayer? The continual inner-searching we do in an effort to see if we are what we ought to be generates a self-centered, sickly type of Christianity, not the vigorous and simple life of a child of God. Until we get into this right and proper relationship with God, it is simply a case of our “hanging on by the skin of our teeth,” although we say, “What a wonderful victory I have!” Yet there is nothing at all in that which indicates the miracle of redemption. Launch out in reckless, unrestrained belief that the redemption is complete. Then don’t worry anymore about yourself, but begin to do as Jesus Christ has said, in essence, “Pray for the friend who comes to you at midnight, pray for the saints of God, and pray for all men.” Pray with the realization that you are perfect only in Christ Jesus, not on the basis of this argument: “Oh, Lord, I have done my best; please hear me now.”
How long is it going to take God to free us from the unhealthy habit of thinking only about ourselves? We must get to the point of being sick to death of ourselves, until there is no longer any surprise at anything God might tell us about ourselves. We cannot reach and understand the depths of our own meagerness. There is only one place where we are right with God, and that is in Christ Jesus. Once we are there, we have to pour out our lives for all we are worth in this ministry of the inner life.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Defenders of the faith are inclined to be bitter until they learn to walk in the light of the Lord. When you have learned to walk in the light of the Lord, bitterness and contention are impossible. Biblical Psychology, 199 R
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Wednesday, June 21, 2017
Being There For the Garbage - #7943
Hundreds of thousands of Kurdish people had fled Saddam Hussein's Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War, and they were spread over miles of mountainside on the Turkish border. Christian agencies were flooding in with food, medical help and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. But most of the Christian workers connected with the people there only from trucks and distribution points, where they handed out food and blankets. But the missionaries from one particular mission organization really broke through the barrier that others were encountering when they tried to talk about Jesus. They had a unique way of getting close to the people and winning their respect and their trust. You ready to hear their radical outreach strategy? These missionaries picked up the garbage. See, it was everywhere on those mountainsides, and it was getting pretty gross. Nobody wanted to do the garbage, but those who were willing to were the ones those people listened to.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "Being There For the Garbage."
What opened doors and hearts among those needy people on that Iraqi mountainside is the same thing that will open doors and hearts where you are-a willingness to win the right to be heard by being there for people's garbage.
It's what Jesus did. In Philippians 2:5-7, our word for today from the Word of God, He tells us: "Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: who, being in the very nature of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness, He humbled Himself and became obedient to death-even death on a cross."
This is the Jesus who touched the lepers that no one else would touch, who stopped for people that everyone else walked by, who washed the dirty feet of His followers, who defined His day by the needs of people who came to Him for help, and who allowed men He had made to beat Him and crucify Him. The King of heaven came to us as a servant and He stole our hearts away.
You have neighbors who really need your Jesus, coworkers, friends and family members. How are you ever going to get them interested in the Jesus who is their only hope? By serving them; by being there to help them with the garbage of their lives. In Jesus' name, be there when their health levels them, when their marriage is struggling or over, when they lose a loved one. Be there when all the funeral folks have gone home. Be there when they're struggling financially, when they don't have enough help, when their business is in trouble, when their kids are in trouble, or when they've lost their reputation and nobody wants to be around them any more.
Their moment of loss is your moment of loving opportunity to show them Jesus' love in action. When others walk out, you walk in. Then you will be ultimately in a position to explain to them where this love comes from. You're just loving them like you've been loved. By a Jesus who had poured everything out for you, because He died of a cross to clean up all the garbage of your life and the garbage of theirs.
First, you show them Jesus by serving them in the midst of their garbage. You win the right to be heard by being there to help pick up the pieces and pick up the garbage. Initially, they may not be interested in your message, but who can be against someone who picks up their heavy burden and helps them carry it; who is there when nobody else is? You can't be against that. It's that kind of love that will open their heart to the greatest love of all!
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
Ezra 2, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals
Max Lucado Daily:A Dad’s Commitment
When I was seven years old, I’d had enough of my father’s rules and decided I could make it on my own. With my clothes in a paper bag, I stormed out the back gate. I didn’t go far. I got to the end of the alley and remembered I was hungry. I remember rather sheepishly taking my seat at the supper table across from the very father I had, only moments before, disowned.
Did Dad know? I suspect he did. Fathers usually do. Was I still his son? Apparently so. No one was sitting in my place at the table. Suppose you’d asked, “Mr. Lucado, your son says he has no need of a father. Do you still consider him your son?” I don’t have to guess at his answer. He called himself my father even when I didn’t call myself his son. His commitment to me was greater than my commitment to him! Does that sound familiar?
From Dad Time
Ezra 2
1-58 These are the people from the province who now returned from the captivity, exiles whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had carried off captive. They returned to Jerusalem and Judah, each to his hometown. They came in company with Zerubbabel, Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispar, Bigvai, Rehum, and Baanah.
The numbers of the returning Israelites by families of origin were as follows:
Parosh, 2,172
Shephatiah, 372
Arah, 775
Pahath-Moab (sons of Jeshua and Joab), 2,812
Elam, 1,254
Zattu, 945
Zaccai, 760
Bani, 642
Bebai, 623
Azgad, 1,222
Adonikam, 666
Bigvai, 2,056
Adin, 454
Ater (sons of Hezekiah), 98
Bezai, 323
Jorah, 112
Hashum, 223
Gibbar, 95.
Israelites identified by place of origin were as follows:
Bethlehem, 123
Netophah, 56
Anathoth, 128
Azmaveth, 42
Kiriath Jearim, Kephirah, and Beeroth, 743
Ramah and Geba, 621
Micmash, 122
Bethel and Ai, 223
Nebo, 52
Magbish, 156
Elam (the other one), 1,254
Harim, 320
Lod, Hadid, and Ono, 725
Jericho, 345
Senaah, 3,630.
Priestly families:
Jedaiah (sons of Jeshua), 973
Immer, 1,052
Pashhur, 1,247
Harim, 1,017.
Levitical families:
Jeshua and Kadmiel (sons of Hodaviah), 74.
Singers:
Asaph’s family line, 128.
Security guard families:
Shallum, Ater, Talmon, Akkub, Hatita, and Shobai, 139.
Families of temple support staff:
Ziha, Hasupha, Tabbaoth,
Keros, Siaha, Padon,
Lebanah, Hagabah, Akkub,
Hagab, Shalmai, Hanan,
Giddel, Gahar, Reaiah,
Rezin, Nekoda, Gazzam,
Uzza, Paseah, Besai,
Asnah, Meunim, Nephussim,
Bakbuk, Hakupha, Harhur,
Bazluth, Mehida, Harsha,
Barkos, Sisera, Temah,
Neziah, and Hatipha.
Families of Solomon’s servants:
Sotai, Hassophereth, Peruda,
Jaala, Darkon, Giddel,
Shephatiah, Hattil, Pokereth-Hazzebaim, and Ami.
Temple support staff and Solomon’s servants added up to 392.
59-60 These are those who came from Tel Melah, Tel Harsha, Kerub, Addon, and Immer. They weren’t able to prove their ancestry, whether they were true Israelites or not:
61 Delaiah, Tobiah, and Nekoda, 652 in all.
Likewise with these priestly families:
Hobaiah, Hakkoz, and Barzillai, who had married a daughter of Barzillai the Gileadite and took that name.
62-63 They had thoroughly searched for their family records but couldn’t find them. And so they were barred from priestly work as ritually unclean. The governor ruled that they could not eat from the holy food until a priest could determine their status with the Urim and Thummim.
64-67 The total count for the congregation was 42,360. That did not include the male and female slaves, which numbered 7,337. There were also 200 male and female singers, and they had 736 horses, 245 mules, 435 camels, and 6,720 donkeys.
68-69 Some of the heads of families, on arriving at The Temple of God in Jerusalem, made Freewill-Offerings toward the rebuilding of The Temple of God on its site. They gave to the building fund as they were able, about 1,100 pounds of gold, about three tons of silver, and 100 priestly robes.
70 The priests, Levites, and some of the people lived in Jerusalem. The singers, security guards, and temple support staff found places in their hometowns. All the Israelites found a place to live.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
Read: 1 Thessalonians 5:9–28
God didn’t set us up for an angry rejection but for salvation by our Master, Jesus Christ. He died for us, a death that triggered life. Whether we’re awake with the living or asleep with the dead, we’re alive with him! So speak encouraging words to one another. Build up hope so you’ll all be together in this, no one left out, no one left behind. I know you’re already doing this; just keep on doing it.
The Way He Wants You to Live
12-13 And now, friends, we ask you to honor those leaders who work so hard for you, who have been given the responsibility of urging and guiding you along in your obedience. Overwhelm them with appreciation and love!
13-15 Get along among yourselves, each of you doing your part. Our counsel is that you warn the freeloaders to get a move on. Gently encourage the stragglers, and reach out for the exhausted, pulling them to their feet. Be patient with each person, attentive to individual needs. And be careful that when you get on each other’s nerves you don’t snap at each other. Look for the best in each other, and always do your best to bring it out.
16-18 Be cheerful no matter what; pray all the time; thank God no matter what happens. This is the way God wants you who belong to Christ Jesus to live.
19-22 Don’t suppress the Spirit, and don’t stifle those who have a word from the Master. On the other hand, don’t be gullible. Check out everything, and keep only what’s good. Throw out anything tainted with evil.
23-24 May God himself, the God who makes everything holy and whole, make you holy and whole, put you together—spirit, soul, and body—and keep you fit for the coming of our Master, Jesus Christ. The One who called you is completely dependable. If he said it, he’ll do it!
25-27 Friends, keep up your prayers for us. Greet all the followers of Jesus there with a holy embrace. And make sure this letter gets read to all the brothers and sisters. Don’t leave anyone out.
28 The amazing grace of Jesus Christ be with you!
Reason to Smile
By Mart DeHaan
Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. 1 Thessalonians 5:11
In the workplace, words of encouragement matter. How employees talk to one another has a bearing on customer satisfaction, company profits, and co-worker appreciation. Studies show that members of the most effective work groups give one another six times more affirmation than disapproval, disagreement, or sarcasm. Least productive teams tend to use almost three negative comments for every helpful word.
Paul learned by experience about the value of words in shaping relationships and outcomes. Before meeting Christ on the road to Damascus, his words and actions terrorized followers of Jesus. But by the time he wrote his letter to the Thessalonians, he had become a great encourager because of God’s work in his heart. Now by his own example he urged his readers to cheer one another on. While being careful to avoid flattery, he showed how to affirm others and reflect the Spirit of Christ.
Encouraging one another is a way of helping one another get a taste of the patience and goodness of God.
In the process, Paul reminded his readers where encouragement comes from. He saw that entrusting ourselves to God, who loved us enough to die for us, gives us reason to comfort, forgive, inspire, and lovingly challenge one another (1 Thess. 5:10–11).
Paul shows us that encouraging one another is a way of helping one another get a taste of the patience and goodness of God.
Father in heaven, please help us to give others a small taste of the mercy and kindness You are forever offering us.
What could be better than working to bring out the best in one another?
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
Have You Come to “When” Yet?
The Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends. —Job 42:10
A pitiful, sickly, and self-centered kind of prayer and a determined effort and selfish desire to be right with God are never found in the New Testament. The fact that I am trying to be right with God is actually a sign that I am rebelling against the atonement by the Cross of Christ. I pray, “Lord, I will purify my heart if You will answer my prayer— I will walk rightly before You if You will help me.” But I cannot make myself right with God; I cannot make my life perfect. I can only be right with God if I accept the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ as an absolute gift. Am I humble enough to accept it? I have to surrender all my rights and demands, and cease from every self-effort. I must leave myself completely alone in His hands, and then I can begin to pour my life out in the priestly work of intercession. There is a great deal of prayer that comes from actual disbelief in the atonement. Jesus is not just beginning to save us— He has already saved us completely. It is an accomplished fact, and it is an insult to Him for us to ask Him to do what He has already done.
If you are not now receiving the “hundredfold” which Jesus promised (see Matthew 19:29), and not getting insight into God’s Word, then start praying for your friends— enter into the ministry of the inner life. “The Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends.” As a saved soul, the real business of your life is intercessory prayer. Whatever circumstances God may place you in, always pray immediately that His atonement may be recognized and as fully understood in the lives of others as it has been in yours. Pray for your friends now, and pray for those with whom you come in contact now.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
We never enter into the Kingdom of God by having our head questions answered, but only by commitment.
The Highest Good—Thy Great Redemption
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
The Secret That Keeps You From Singing - #7942
"Family Secrets" that was the bold headline on a Newsweek magazine. The story was inspired by what happened in the life of then Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who was, as she was being considered for that position, learned a secret her family had kept for decades. She thought her grandparents had been Czechoslovakian Catholics who died peaceful deaths. But they were, in fact, Jews who'd been murdered in a Nazi concentration camp. But Newsweek was using that incident to point out how many families have secrets in their closets, from hidden adoptions to hushed-up romances, sometimes with painful consequences. Like one lady the story told about, a lady named Deborah. She was a student at a music conservatory when she married an African-American man. She's white and she had two sons. Later that marriage ended in divorce.
When Deborah moved back to her parents' white neighborhood, her sons were not accepted there, so she decided they'd be better off living with an African-American family. She put them up for adoption and tried to resume her life. But she was tormented by that decision. In fact, she lost her trained lyric-soprano voice. She said, "I was never able to sing after that." When she remarried, she kept her past a secret for ten years. When she finally confessed it to her husband, he responded compassionately, they went on a search for her sons and there's a happy ending. In Newsweek's words, "The family was reunited, the secrets were told, and almost miraculously, her singing voice came back."
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Secret That Keeps You From Singing."
It's amazing the torment that can come from a dark secret. Maybe you know that firsthand. In a sense, it can keep you from singing, from experiencing all the joy and all the freedom that you were created to have. It's even more amazing the release that can come from dealing with the dark secret.
Maybe there's a dark secret or more than one secret that are tying you up inside. It may be your secret sins, or the sins of someone else against you. But as long as it's a secret, you're a prisoner to it. And even though others may not know the dark secrets you carry, they're feeling the effects of your secrets. They feel it in your anger, your depression, or some other way it comes out in your personality. Usually when you continue to store a dark secret, it just continues to multiply the pain and keep you from singing.
Well, our word for today from the Word of God, it's got hope in it! John 8:32, "You will know the truth and the truth will set you free." Now we live like this: "the truth will scare you to death, or the truth will ruin you." Jesus said no, it will "Set you free." Like that woman who could no longer sing, you can't be free until you face and deal with the dark secrets. Jesus goes on to say, "Everyone who sins is a slave to sin, if the son sets you free, you will be free indeed." Jesus is the Liberator from the bondage of your past! Maybe it's time for you to open up your hurting heart to the Liberator so He can do what only He can do.
If you're going to face the dark secret, you need someone to go with you there who will not condemn you, and that would be Jesus. He's known your secret all along. He died to pay for all that sin. He died to forgive it. You need someone who is also strong enough to carry that secret, to heal its wounds, to restore you. Isaiah 53 says of Jesus, "He took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him." That actually happened on Jesus' cross where every sin and every secret of your life was dealt with and paid for.
And today, through these few minutes, Jesus is trying to move in close to you. He's saying, "I'm ready to help you face it, to make you clean, to become your personal Savior." Aren't you ready to be forgiven and ready to be free? To leave all that junk at the foot of Jesus' cross?
You ready for that? Then, I pray you will tell Jesus that this day you want to belong to Him. You want to ask Him to forgive the sin of your life based on His death for that sin. If you'd like to begin that relationship with Jesus, our website is for you. I hope you'll go there - ANewStory.com.
You've been a slave to those secrets long enough, haven't you? Maybe this is your day to finally be free and to finally to sing again.
When I was seven years old, I’d had enough of my father’s rules and decided I could make it on my own. With my clothes in a paper bag, I stormed out the back gate. I didn’t go far. I got to the end of the alley and remembered I was hungry. I remember rather sheepishly taking my seat at the supper table across from the very father I had, only moments before, disowned.
Did Dad know? I suspect he did. Fathers usually do. Was I still his son? Apparently so. No one was sitting in my place at the table. Suppose you’d asked, “Mr. Lucado, your son says he has no need of a father. Do you still consider him your son?” I don’t have to guess at his answer. He called himself my father even when I didn’t call myself his son. His commitment to me was greater than my commitment to him! Does that sound familiar?
From Dad Time
Ezra 2
1-58 These are the people from the province who now returned from the captivity, exiles whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had carried off captive. They returned to Jerusalem and Judah, each to his hometown. They came in company with Zerubbabel, Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispar, Bigvai, Rehum, and Baanah.
The numbers of the returning Israelites by families of origin were as follows:
Parosh, 2,172
Shephatiah, 372
Arah, 775
Pahath-Moab (sons of Jeshua and Joab), 2,812
Elam, 1,254
Zattu, 945
Zaccai, 760
Bani, 642
Bebai, 623
Azgad, 1,222
Adonikam, 666
Bigvai, 2,056
Adin, 454
Ater (sons of Hezekiah), 98
Bezai, 323
Jorah, 112
Hashum, 223
Gibbar, 95.
Israelites identified by place of origin were as follows:
Bethlehem, 123
Netophah, 56
Anathoth, 128
Azmaveth, 42
Kiriath Jearim, Kephirah, and Beeroth, 743
Ramah and Geba, 621
Micmash, 122
Bethel and Ai, 223
Nebo, 52
Magbish, 156
Elam (the other one), 1,254
Harim, 320
Lod, Hadid, and Ono, 725
Jericho, 345
Senaah, 3,630.
Priestly families:
Jedaiah (sons of Jeshua), 973
Immer, 1,052
Pashhur, 1,247
Harim, 1,017.
Levitical families:
Jeshua and Kadmiel (sons of Hodaviah), 74.
Singers:
Asaph’s family line, 128.
Security guard families:
Shallum, Ater, Talmon, Akkub, Hatita, and Shobai, 139.
Families of temple support staff:
Ziha, Hasupha, Tabbaoth,
Keros, Siaha, Padon,
Lebanah, Hagabah, Akkub,
Hagab, Shalmai, Hanan,
Giddel, Gahar, Reaiah,
Rezin, Nekoda, Gazzam,
Uzza, Paseah, Besai,
Asnah, Meunim, Nephussim,
Bakbuk, Hakupha, Harhur,
Bazluth, Mehida, Harsha,
Barkos, Sisera, Temah,
Neziah, and Hatipha.
Families of Solomon’s servants:
Sotai, Hassophereth, Peruda,
Jaala, Darkon, Giddel,
Shephatiah, Hattil, Pokereth-Hazzebaim, and Ami.
Temple support staff and Solomon’s servants added up to 392.
59-60 These are those who came from Tel Melah, Tel Harsha, Kerub, Addon, and Immer. They weren’t able to prove their ancestry, whether they were true Israelites or not:
61 Delaiah, Tobiah, and Nekoda, 652 in all.
Likewise with these priestly families:
Hobaiah, Hakkoz, and Barzillai, who had married a daughter of Barzillai the Gileadite and took that name.
62-63 They had thoroughly searched for their family records but couldn’t find them. And so they were barred from priestly work as ritually unclean. The governor ruled that they could not eat from the holy food until a priest could determine their status with the Urim and Thummim.
64-67 The total count for the congregation was 42,360. That did not include the male and female slaves, which numbered 7,337. There were also 200 male and female singers, and they had 736 horses, 245 mules, 435 camels, and 6,720 donkeys.
68-69 Some of the heads of families, on arriving at The Temple of God in Jerusalem, made Freewill-Offerings toward the rebuilding of The Temple of God on its site. They gave to the building fund as they were able, about 1,100 pounds of gold, about three tons of silver, and 100 priestly robes.
70 The priests, Levites, and some of the people lived in Jerusalem. The singers, security guards, and temple support staff found places in their hometowns. All the Israelites found a place to live.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
Read: 1 Thessalonians 5:9–28
God didn’t set us up for an angry rejection but for salvation by our Master, Jesus Christ. He died for us, a death that triggered life. Whether we’re awake with the living or asleep with the dead, we’re alive with him! So speak encouraging words to one another. Build up hope so you’ll all be together in this, no one left out, no one left behind. I know you’re already doing this; just keep on doing it.
The Way He Wants You to Live
12-13 And now, friends, we ask you to honor those leaders who work so hard for you, who have been given the responsibility of urging and guiding you along in your obedience. Overwhelm them with appreciation and love!
13-15 Get along among yourselves, each of you doing your part. Our counsel is that you warn the freeloaders to get a move on. Gently encourage the stragglers, and reach out for the exhausted, pulling them to their feet. Be patient with each person, attentive to individual needs. And be careful that when you get on each other’s nerves you don’t snap at each other. Look for the best in each other, and always do your best to bring it out.
16-18 Be cheerful no matter what; pray all the time; thank God no matter what happens. This is the way God wants you who belong to Christ Jesus to live.
19-22 Don’t suppress the Spirit, and don’t stifle those who have a word from the Master. On the other hand, don’t be gullible. Check out everything, and keep only what’s good. Throw out anything tainted with evil.
23-24 May God himself, the God who makes everything holy and whole, make you holy and whole, put you together—spirit, soul, and body—and keep you fit for the coming of our Master, Jesus Christ. The One who called you is completely dependable. If he said it, he’ll do it!
25-27 Friends, keep up your prayers for us. Greet all the followers of Jesus there with a holy embrace. And make sure this letter gets read to all the brothers and sisters. Don’t leave anyone out.
28 The amazing grace of Jesus Christ be with you!
Reason to Smile
By Mart DeHaan
Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. 1 Thessalonians 5:11
In the workplace, words of encouragement matter. How employees talk to one another has a bearing on customer satisfaction, company profits, and co-worker appreciation. Studies show that members of the most effective work groups give one another six times more affirmation than disapproval, disagreement, or sarcasm. Least productive teams tend to use almost three negative comments for every helpful word.
Paul learned by experience about the value of words in shaping relationships and outcomes. Before meeting Christ on the road to Damascus, his words and actions terrorized followers of Jesus. But by the time he wrote his letter to the Thessalonians, he had become a great encourager because of God’s work in his heart. Now by his own example he urged his readers to cheer one another on. While being careful to avoid flattery, he showed how to affirm others and reflect the Spirit of Christ.
Encouraging one another is a way of helping one another get a taste of the patience and goodness of God.
In the process, Paul reminded his readers where encouragement comes from. He saw that entrusting ourselves to God, who loved us enough to die for us, gives us reason to comfort, forgive, inspire, and lovingly challenge one another (1 Thess. 5:10–11).
Paul shows us that encouraging one another is a way of helping one another get a taste of the patience and goodness of God.
Father in heaven, please help us to give others a small taste of the mercy and kindness You are forever offering us.
What could be better than working to bring out the best in one another?
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
Have You Come to “When” Yet?
The Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends. —Job 42:10
A pitiful, sickly, and self-centered kind of prayer and a determined effort and selfish desire to be right with God are never found in the New Testament. The fact that I am trying to be right with God is actually a sign that I am rebelling against the atonement by the Cross of Christ. I pray, “Lord, I will purify my heart if You will answer my prayer— I will walk rightly before You if You will help me.” But I cannot make myself right with God; I cannot make my life perfect. I can only be right with God if I accept the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ as an absolute gift. Am I humble enough to accept it? I have to surrender all my rights and demands, and cease from every self-effort. I must leave myself completely alone in His hands, and then I can begin to pour my life out in the priestly work of intercession. There is a great deal of prayer that comes from actual disbelief in the atonement. Jesus is not just beginning to save us— He has already saved us completely. It is an accomplished fact, and it is an insult to Him for us to ask Him to do what He has already done.
If you are not now receiving the “hundredfold” which Jesus promised (see Matthew 19:29), and not getting insight into God’s Word, then start praying for your friends— enter into the ministry of the inner life. “The Lord restored Job’s losses when he prayed for his friends.” As a saved soul, the real business of your life is intercessory prayer. Whatever circumstances God may place you in, always pray immediately that His atonement may be recognized and as fully understood in the lives of others as it has been in yours. Pray for your friends now, and pray for those with whom you come in contact now.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
We never enter into the Kingdom of God by having our head questions answered, but only by commitment.
The Highest Good—Thy Great Redemption
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
The Secret That Keeps You From Singing - #7942
"Family Secrets" that was the bold headline on a Newsweek magazine. The story was inspired by what happened in the life of then Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who was, as she was being considered for that position, learned a secret her family had kept for decades. She thought her grandparents had been Czechoslovakian Catholics who died peaceful deaths. But they were, in fact, Jews who'd been murdered in a Nazi concentration camp. But Newsweek was using that incident to point out how many families have secrets in their closets, from hidden adoptions to hushed-up romances, sometimes with painful consequences. Like one lady the story told about, a lady named Deborah. She was a student at a music conservatory when she married an African-American man. She's white and she had two sons. Later that marriage ended in divorce.
When Deborah moved back to her parents' white neighborhood, her sons were not accepted there, so she decided they'd be better off living with an African-American family. She put them up for adoption and tried to resume her life. But she was tormented by that decision. In fact, she lost her trained lyric-soprano voice. She said, "I was never able to sing after that." When she remarried, she kept her past a secret for ten years. When she finally confessed it to her husband, he responded compassionately, they went on a search for her sons and there's a happy ending. In Newsweek's words, "The family was reunited, the secrets were told, and almost miraculously, her singing voice came back."
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Secret That Keeps You From Singing."
It's amazing the torment that can come from a dark secret. Maybe you know that firsthand. In a sense, it can keep you from singing, from experiencing all the joy and all the freedom that you were created to have. It's even more amazing the release that can come from dealing with the dark secret.
Maybe there's a dark secret or more than one secret that are tying you up inside. It may be your secret sins, or the sins of someone else against you. But as long as it's a secret, you're a prisoner to it. And even though others may not know the dark secrets you carry, they're feeling the effects of your secrets. They feel it in your anger, your depression, or some other way it comes out in your personality. Usually when you continue to store a dark secret, it just continues to multiply the pain and keep you from singing.
Well, our word for today from the Word of God, it's got hope in it! John 8:32, "You will know the truth and the truth will set you free." Now we live like this: "the truth will scare you to death, or the truth will ruin you." Jesus said no, it will "Set you free." Like that woman who could no longer sing, you can't be free until you face and deal with the dark secrets. Jesus goes on to say, "Everyone who sins is a slave to sin, if the son sets you free, you will be free indeed." Jesus is the Liberator from the bondage of your past! Maybe it's time for you to open up your hurting heart to the Liberator so He can do what only He can do.
If you're going to face the dark secret, you need someone to go with you there who will not condemn you, and that would be Jesus. He's known your secret all along. He died to pay for all that sin. He died to forgive it. You need someone who is also strong enough to carry that secret, to heal its wounds, to restore you. Isaiah 53 says of Jesus, "He took up our infirmities and carried our sorrows, He was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was upon Him." That actually happened on Jesus' cross where every sin and every secret of your life was dealt with and paid for.
And today, through these few minutes, Jesus is trying to move in close to you. He's saying, "I'm ready to help you face it, to make you clean, to become your personal Savior." Aren't you ready to be forgiven and ready to be free? To leave all that junk at the foot of Jesus' cross?
You ready for that? Then, I pray you will tell Jesus that this day you want to belong to Him. You want to ask Him to forgive the sin of your life based on His death for that sin. If you'd like to begin that relationship with Jesus, our website is for you. I hope you'll go there - ANewStory.com.
You've been a slave to those secrets long enough, haven't you? Maybe this is your day to finally be free and to finally to sing again.
Monday, June 19, 2017
Ezra 1, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals
Max Lucado Daily: Quarry the Deep Qualities of God
Don’t equate the presence of God with a good mood or a pleasant temperament. God is near whether you are happy or not. But do quarry from your Bible a list of the deep qualities of God, and press them to your heart. My list reads like this:
He is still sovereign. He still knows my name.
Angels still respond to His call.
God is still faithful. He is not caught off guard.
He uses everything for His glory and my ultimate good.
Lay hold of the unchanging character of God. Pray your pain out. Pound the table. Even Jesus offered up prayers with what Hebrews 5:7 describes as “loud cries and tears.” Your family may be gone. Your supporters may have left. But God has not budged! His promise still stands: “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go” (Gen. 28:15).
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezra 1
Cyrus King of Persia: “Build The Temple of God!”
1-4 In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia—this fulfilled the Message of God preached by Jeremiah—God prodded Cyrus king of Persia to make an official announcement throughout his kingdom. He wrote it out as follows:
From Cyrus king of Persia, a Proclamation: God, the God of the heavens, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth. He has also assigned me to build him a Temple of worship in Jerusalem, Judah. Who among you belongs to his people? God be with you! Go to Jerusalem which is in Judah and build The Temple of God, the God of Israel, Jerusalem’s God. Those who stay behind, wherever they happen to live, will support them with silver, gold, tools, and pack animals, along with Freewill-Offerings for The Temple of God in Jerusalem.
5-6 The heads of the families of Judah and Benjamin, along with the priests and Levites—everyone, in fact, God prodded—set out to build The Temple of God in Jerusalem. Their neighbors rallied behind them enthusiastically with silver, gold, tools, pack animals, expensive gifts, and, over and above these, Freewill-Offerings.
7-10 Also, King Cyrus turned over to them all the vessels and utensils from The Temple of God that Nebuchadnezzar had hauled from Jerusalem and put in the temple of his gods. Cyrus king of Persia put Mithredath the treasurer in charge of the transfer; he provided a full inventory for Sheshbazzar the prince of Judah, including the following:
30 gold dishes
1,000 silver dishes
29 silver pans
30 gold bowls
410 duplicate silver bowls
1,000 miscellaneous items.
11 All told, there were 5,400 gold and silver articles that Sheshbazzar took with him when he brought the exiles back from Babylon to Jerusalem.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Monday, June 19, 2017
Read: 1 Kings 8:54–63
Having finished praying to God—all these bold and passionate prayers—Solomon stood up before God’s Altar where he had been kneeling all this time, his arms stretched upward to heaven. Standing, he blessed the whole congregation of Israel, blessing them at the top of his lungs:
56-58 “Blessed be God, who has given peace to his people Israel just as he said he’d do. Not one of all those good and wonderful words that he spoke through Moses has misfired. May God, our very own God, continue to be with us just as he was with our ancestors—may he never give up and walk out on us. May he keep us centered and devoted to him, following the life path he has cleared, watching the signposts, walking at the pace and rhythms he laid down for our ancestors.
59-61 “And let these words that I’ve prayed in the presence of God be always right there before him, day and night, so that he’ll do what is right for me, to guarantee justice for his people Israel day after day after day. Then all the people on earth will know God is the true God; there is no other God. And you, your lives must be totally obedient to God, our personal God, following the life path he has cleared, alert and attentive to everything he has made plain this day.”
62-63 The king and all Israel with him then worshiped, offering sacrifices to God. Solomon offered Peace-Offerings, sacrificing to God 22,000 cattle and 120,000 sheep. This is how the king and all Israel dedicated The Temple of God.
INSIGHT:
As you work hard to achieve your goals, ask God to give you a humble and obedient heart that is fully committed to Him.
Driven by God
By Keila Ochoa
May he turn our hearts to him, to walk in obedience to him. 1 Kings 8:58
A few months ago I received an email inviting me to join a community of “driven people.” I decided to look up the word driven, and I learned that a driven person is someone highly motivated to succeed and who will work hard to achieve his goals.
Is it good to be a driven person? There is a test that never fails: “Do it all for the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). Many times we do things for self-glory. After the flood in Noah’s day, a group of people decided to build a tower in order to “make a name” for themselves (Gen. 11:4). They wanted to be famous and avoid being scattered all over the world. Because they were not doing it for God's glory, though, they were erroneously driven.
Father, give me the desire to obey You and do everything for Your glory.
In contrast, when King Solomon dedicated the ark of the covenant and the newly constructed temple, he said, “I have built the temple for the Name of the Lord” (1 Kings 8:20). Then he prayed, “May he turn our hearts to him, to walk in obedience to him and keep the commands” (v. 58).
When our greatest desire is to bring glory to God and walk in obedience, we become driven people who seek to love and serve Jesus in the power of the Spirit. Let our prayer echo Solomon’s. May our “hearts be fully committed to the Lord our God, to live by his decrees and obey his commands” (v. 61).
Father, give me the desire to obey You and do everything for Your glory.
For help in your spiritual growth, read God at the Center at discoveryseries.org/hp152.
Do everything for the glory of God.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Monday, June 19, 2017
The Service of Passionate Devotion
…do you love Me?…Tend My sheep. —John 21:16
esus did not say to make converts to your way of thinking, but He said to look after His sheep, to see that they get nourished in the knowledge of Him. We consider what we do in the way of Christian work as service, yet Jesus Christ calls service to be what we are to Him, not what we do for Him. Discipleship is based solely on devotion to Jesus Christ, not on following after a particular belief or doctrine. “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate…, he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:26). In this verse, there is no argument and no pressure from Jesus to follow Him; He is simply saying, in effect, “If you want to be My disciple, you must be devoted solely to Me.” A person touched by the Spirit of God suddenly says, “Now I see who Jesus is!”— that is the source of devotion.
Today we have substituted doctrinal belief for personal belief, and that is why so many people are devoted to causes and so few are devoted to Jesus Christ. People do not really want to be devoted to Jesus, but only to the cause He started. Jesus Christ is deeply offensive to the educated minds of today, to those who only want Him to be their Friend, and who are unwilling to accept Him in any other way. Our Lord’s primary obedience was to the will of His Father, not to the needs of people— the saving of people was the natural outcome of His obedience to the Father. If I am devoted solely to the cause of humanity, I will soon be exhausted and come to the point where my love will waver and stumble. But if I love Jesus Christ personally and passionately, I can serve humanity, even though people may treat me like a “doormat.” The secret of a disciple’s life is devotion to Jesus Christ, and the characteristic of that life is its seeming insignificance and its meekness. Yet it is like a grain of wheat that “falls into the ground and dies”— it will spring up and change the entire landscape (John 12:24).
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
The root of faith is the knowledge of a Person, and one of the biggest snares is the idea that God is sure to lead us to success. My Utmost for His Highest, March 19, 761 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Monday, June 19, 2017
The Names That Tell the Story - #7941
Karen and I had some of the most exciting summers of our life spending a lot of time on Indian res¬ervations and making some wonderful friends in Native America. Some have even honored us with Indian names. My friend, Joe, gave me the Lakota name for "traveler". That figures. I re¬member the night Karen got into a snowball fight with some junior high girls that she'd met on the Lakota reservation. I think they were surprised that a mature woman would take them on in a snow battle in which she was outnumbered 4 to 1. Actually, Karen started it to break the ice. Of course, I would never intend to pun. Later, she called it the Little Bighorn II. But those girls were so im¬pressed, they gave Karen a name, which they still called her years later - Snowball. Then there was the night Karen picked up a mop handle to try to bring down the bat that was flying all over the dining hall where our mission team girls were trying to sleep. At breakfast the next morning one Native team leader gave Karen another Indian name - Kills With One Swing. Our experiences mirror what has long happened among Native Americans on a much more serious level, having experiences with a person and then celebrating it by giving them a name.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Names That Tell the Story."
Among another tribal people, God's ancient people the Jews, names were important there, too. Especially the ones they gave God based on how they had experienced His love and power and holiness. The psalmist talked about it in our word for today from the Word of God, Psalm 89:15-16, "Blessed are those who have learned to acclaim You, who walk in the light of Your presence, O Lord. They rejoice in Your name all day long; they exalt in Your glory and strength. For You are their glory and strength." He's talking here about people who walked with God through life situations and they learned to celebrate what God has meant to them there by "rejoicing in Your name."
But like our Indian friends, they often gave God a name that captured their experiences with Him. Think about the 23rd Psalm, after years of being led by the Lord and provided for faithfully, David says, "The Lord is my Shepherd." When Moses watched the Lord defeat a dreaded enemy army, he called the Lord "The Lord is my Banner." An army's banner was the standard under which they fought their battles. For Moses from that day on, the banner was Jehovah God.
What if you were to summarize and celebrate your daily walk with God by giving Him a name that sums up how you've experienced Him that day, or maybe you can use one of the many names He already has in the Bible. It's a powerful way to praise Him, to draw close to Him, to bring some life into your worship of your great Savior.
For example, the other day in a team prayer time, I asked some of our team members this question, "If you were to give God a name based on how you saw Him in your life yesterday, what name would you give Him?" One said, "The 'Way-Maker" and explained how God had gone ahead of him and opened doors. Another said, "Divine Matchmaker" because of how God had connected some people to get His work done. My administrative assistant said, "My Protector" because of the way the Lord had protected her in a near-accident.
What about you? If you were to sum up in a name how God worked in your life yesterday, what name would you give Him? Think about it, tell Him about it, and worship Him for how He has been that for you.
Walk in His presence, acclaim Him for how you experience Him and rejoice in your name for Him all day long. When Native Americans want to honor a person and capture their character in a word, they honor them with a name. Our Lord deserves no less.
Praise God each day with a Name that tells how He was God for you today.
Don’t equate the presence of God with a good mood or a pleasant temperament. God is near whether you are happy or not. But do quarry from your Bible a list of the deep qualities of God, and press them to your heart. My list reads like this:
He is still sovereign. He still knows my name.
Angels still respond to His call.
God is still faithful. He is not caught off guard.
He uses everything for His glory and my ultimate good.
Lay hold of the unchanging character of God. Pray your pain out. Pound the table. Even Jesus offered up prayers with what Hebrews 5:7 describes as “loud cries and tears.” Your family may be gone. Your supporters may have left. But God has not budged! His promise still stands: “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go” (Gen. 28:15).
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezra 1
Cyrus King of Persia: “Build The Temple of God!”
1-4 In the first year of Cyrus king of Persia—this fulfilled the Message of God preached by Jeremiah—God prodded Cyrus king of Persia to make an official announcement throughout his kingdom. He wrote it out as follows:
From Cyrus king of Persia, a Proclamation: God, the God of the heavens, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth. He has also assigned me to build him a Temple of worship in Jerusalem, Judah. Who among you belongs to his people? God be with you! Go to Jerusalem which is in Judah and build The Temple of God, the God of Israel, Jerusalem’s God. Those who stay behind, wherever they happen to live, will support them with silver, gold, tools, and pack animals, along with Freewill-Offerings for The Temple of God in Jerusalem.
5-6 The heads of the families of Judah and Benjamin, along with the priests and Levites—everyone, in fact, God prodded—set out to build The Temple of God in Jerusalem. Their neighbors rallied behind them enthusiastically with silver, gold, tools, pack animals, expensive gifts, and, over and above these, Freewill-Offerings.
7-10 Also, King Cyrus turned over to them all the vessels and utensils from The Temple of God that Nebuchadnezzar had hauled from Jerusalem and put in the temple of his gods. Cyrus king of Persia put Mithredath the treasurer in charge of the transfer; he provided a full inventory for Sheshbazzar the prince of Judah, including the following:
30 gold dishes
1,000 silver dishes
29 silver pans
30 gold bowls
410 duplicate silver bowls
1,000 miscellaneous items.
11 All told, there were 5,400 gold and silver articles that Sheshbazzar took with him when he brought the exiles back from Babylon to Jerusalem.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Monday, June 19, 2017
Read: 1 Kings 8:54–63
Having finished praying to God—all these bold and passionate prayers—Solomon stood up before God’s Altar where he had been kneeling all this time, his arms stretched upward to heaven. Standing, he blessed the whole congregation of Israel, blessing them at the top of his lungs:
56-58 “Blessed be God, who has given peace to his people Israel just as he said he’d do. Not one of all those good and wonderful words that he spoke through Moses has misfired. May God, our very own God, continue to be with us just as he was with our ancestors—may he never give up and walk out on us. May he keep us centered and devoted to him, following the life path he has cleared, watching the signposts, walking at the pace and rhythms he laid down for our ancestors.
59-61 “And let these words that I’ve prayed in the presence of God be always right there before him, day and night, so that he’ll do what is right for me, to guarantee justice for his people Israel day after day after day. Then all the people on earth will know God is the true God; there is no other God. And you, your lives must be totally obedient to God, our personal God, following the life path he has cleared, alert and attentive to everything he has made plain this day.”
62-63 The king and all Israel with him then worshiped, offering sacrifices to God. Solomon offered Peace-Offerings, sacrificing to God 22,000 cattle and 120,000 sheep. This is how the king and all Israel dedicated The Temple of God.
INSIGHT:
As you work hard to achieve your goals, ask God to give you a humble and obedient heart that is fully committed to Him.
Driven by God
By Keila Ochoa
May he turn our hearts to him, to walk in obedience to him. 1 Kings 8:58
A few months ago I received an email inviting me to join a community of “driven people.” I decided to look up the word driven, and I learned that a driven person is someone highly motivated to succeed and who will work hard to achieve his goals.
Is it good to be a driven person? There is a test that never fails: “Do it all for the glory of God” (1 Cor. 10:31). Many times we do things for self-glory. After the flood in Noah’s day, a group of people decided to build a tower in order to “make a name” for themselves (Gen. 11:4). They wanted to be famous and avoid being scattered all over the world. Because they were not doing it for God's glory, though, they were erroneously driven.
Father, give me the desire to obey You and do everything for Your glory.
In contrast, when King Solomon dedicated the ark of the covenant and the newly constructed temple, he said, “I have built the temple for the Name of the Lord” (1 Kings 8:20). Then he prayed, “May he turn our hearts to him, to walk in obedience to him and keep the commands” (v. 58).
When our greatest desire is to bring glory to God and walk in obedience, we become driven people who seek to love and serve Jesus in the power of the Spirit. Let our prayer echo Solomon’s. May our “hearts be fully committed to the Lord our God, to live by his decrees and obey his commands” (v. 61).
Father, give me the desire to obey You and do everything for Your glory.
For help in your spiritual growth, read God at the Center at discoveryseries.org/hp152.
Do everything for the glory of God.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Monday, June 19, 2017
The Service of Passionate Devotion
…do you love Me?…Tend My sheep. —John 21:16
esus did not say to make converts to your way of thinking, but He said to look after His sheep, to see that they get nourished in the knowledge of Him. We consider what we do in the way of Christian work as service, yet Jesus Christ calls service to be what we are to Him, not what we do for Him. Discipleship is based solely on devotion to Jesus Christ, not on following after a particular belief or doctrine. “If anyone comes to Me and does not hate…, he cannot be My disciple” (Luke 14:26). In this verse, there is no argument and no pressure from Jesus to follow Him; He is simply saying, in effect, “If you want to be My disciple, you must be devoted solely to Me.” A person touched by the Spirit of God suddenly says, “Now I see who Jesus is!”— that is the source of devotion.
Today we have substituted doctrinal belief for personal belief, and that is why so many people are devoted to causes and so few are devoted to Jesus Christ. People do not really want to be devoted to Jesus, but only to the cause He started. Jesus Christ is deeply offensive to the educated minds of today, to those who only want Him to be their Friend, and who are unwilling to accept Him in any other way. Our Lord’s primary obedience was to the will of His Father, not to the needs of people— the saving of people was the natural outcome of His obedience to the Father. If I am devoted solely to the cause of humanity, I will soon be exhausted and come to the point where my love will waver and stumble. But if I love Jesus Christ personally and passionately, I can serve humanity, even though people may treat me like a “doormat.” The secret of a disciple’s life is devotion to Jesus Christ, and the characteristic of that life is its seeming insignificance and its meekness. Yet it is like a grain of wheat that “falls into the ground and dies”— it will spring up and change the entire landscape (John 12:24).
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
The root of faith is the knowledge of a Person, and one of the biggest snares is the idea that God is sure to lead us to success. My Utmost for His Highest, March 19, 761 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Monday, June 19, 2017
The Names That Tell the Story - #7941
Karen and I had some of the most exciting summers of our life spending a lot of time on Indian res¬ervations and making some wonderful friends in Native America. Some have even honored us with Indian names. My friend, Joe, gave me the Lakota name for "traveler". That figures. I re¬member the night Karen got into a snowball fight with some junior high girls that she'd met on the Lakota reservation. I think they were surprised that a mature woman would take them on in a snow battle in which she was outnumbered 4 to 1. Actually, Karen started it to break the ice. Of course, I would never intend to pun. Later, she called it the Little Bighorn II. But those girls were so im¬pressed, they gave Karen a name, which they still called her years later - Snowball. Then there was the night Karen picked up a mop handle to try to bring down the bat that was flying all over the dining hall where our mission team girls were trying to sleep. At breakfast the next morning one Native team leader gave Karen another Indian name - Kills With One Swing. Our experiences mirror what has long happened among Native Americans on a much more serious level, having experiences with a person and then celebrating it by giving them a name.
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "The Names That Tell the Story."
Among another tribal people, God's ancient people the Jews, names were important there, too. Especially the ones they gave God based on how they had experienced His love and power and holiness. The psalmist talked about it in our word for today from the Word of God, Psalm 89:15-16, "Blessed are those who have learned to acclaim You, who walk in the light of Your presence, O Lord. They rejoice in Your name all day long; they exalt in Your glory and strength. For You are their glory and strength." He's talking here about people who walked with God through life situations and they learned to celebrate what God has meant to them there by "rejoicing in Your name."
But like our Indian friends, they often gave God a name that captured their experiences with Him. Think about the 23rd Psalm, after years of being led by the Lord and provided for faithfully, David says, "The Lord is my Shepherd." When Moses watched the Lord defeat a dreaded enemy army, he called the Lord "The Lord is my Banner." An army's banner was the standard under which they fought their battles. For Moses from that day on, the banner was Jehovah God.
What if you were to summarize and celebrate your daily walk with God by giving Him a name that sums up how you've experienced Him that day, or maybe you can use one of the many names He already has in the Bible. It's a powerful way to praise Him, to draw close to Him, to bring some life into your worship of your great Savior.
For example, the other day in a team prayer time, I asked some of our team members this question, "If you were to give God a name based on how you saw Him in your life yesterday, what name would you give Him?" One said, "The 'Way-Maker" and explained how God had gone ahead of him and opened doors. Another said, "Divine Matchmaker" because of how God had connected some people to get His work done. My administrative assistant said, "My Protector" because of the way the Lord had protected her in a near-accident.
What about you? If you were to sum up in a name how God worked in your life yesterday, what name would you give Him? Think about it, tell Him about it, and worship Him for how He has been that for you.
Walk in His presence, acclaim Him for how you experience Him and rejoice in your name for Him all day long. When Native Americans want to honor a person and capture their character in a word, they honor them with a name. Our Lord deserves no less.
Praise God each day with a Name that tells how He was God for you today.
Sunday, June 18, 2017
1 John 4, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals
Max Lucado Daily: Actions Have Consequences
Actions have consequences! In the book of Genesis we read how Joseph placed his loyalty above lust when he was tempted by Potiphar’s wife. His primary concern was the preference of God when he said, “How can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God” (Genesis 39:9)?
The lesson we learn from Joseph is surprisingly simple: Do what pleases God. Your co-workers want to include a trip to a gentleman’s club on the evening agenda. What do you do? Do what pleases God. Your date invites you to conclude the evening with drinks at his place. How should you reply? Do what pleases God.
You don’t fix a struggling marriage with an affair, a drug problem with more drugs, debt with more debt. You don’t get out of a mess by making another one. You’ll never go wrong doing what is right. Just do what pleases God.
From You’ll Get Through This
1 John 4
Don’t Believe Everything You Hear
My dear friends, don’t believe everything you hear. Carefully weigh and examine what people tell you. Not everyone who talks about God comes from God. There are a lot of lying preachers loose in the world.
2-3 Here’s how you test for the genuine Spirit of God. Everyone who confesses openly his faith in Jesus Christ—the Son of God, who came as an actual flesh-and-blood person—comes from God and belongs to God. And everyone who refuses to confess faith in Jesus has nothing in common with God. This is the spirit of antichrist that you heard was coming. Well, here it is, sooner than we thought!
4-6 My dear children, you come from God and belong to God. You have already won a big victory over those false teachers, for the Spirit in you is far stronger than anything in the world. These people belong to the Christ-denying world. They talk the world’s language and the world eats it up. But we come from God and belong to God. Anyone who knows God understands us and listens. The person who has nothing to do with God will, of course, not listen to us. This is another test for telling the Spirit of Truth from the spirit of deception.
God Is Love
7-10 My beloved friends, let us continue to love each other since love comes from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and experiences a relationship with God. The person who refuses to love doesn’t know the first thing about God, because God is love—so you can’t know him if you don’t love. This is how God showed his love for us: God sent his only Son into the world so we might live through him. This is the kind of love we are talking about—not that we once upon a time loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to clear away our sins and the damage they’ve done to our relationship with God.
11-12 My dear, dear friends, if God loved us like this, we certainly ought to love each other. No one has seen God, ever. But if we love one another, God dwells deeply within us, and his love becomes complete in us—perfect love!
13-16 This is how we know we’re living steadily and deeply in him, and he in us: He’s given us life from his life, from his very own Spirit. Also, we’ve seen for ourselves and continue to state openly that the Father sent his Son as Savior of the world. Everyone who confesses that Jesus is God’s Son participates continuously in an intimate relationship with God. We know it so well, we’ve embraced it heart and soul, this love that comes from God.
To Love, to Be Loved
17-18 God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we’re free of worry on Judgment Day—our standing in the world is identical with Christ’s. There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life—fear of death, fear of judgment—is one not yet fully formed in love.
19 We, though, are going to love—love and be loved. First we were loved, now we love. He loved us first.
20-21 If anyone boasts, “I love God,” and goes right on hating his brother or sister, thinking nothing of it, he is a liar. If he won’t love the person he can see, how can he love the God he can’t see? The command we have from Christ is blunt: Loving God includes loving people. You’ve got to love both.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Sunday, June 18, 2017
Read: Proverbs 20:3–7
It’s a mark of good character to avert quarrels,
but fools love to pick fights.
4 A farmer too lazy to plant in the spring
has nothing to harvest in the fall.
5 Knowing what is right is like deep water in the heart;
a wise person draws from the well within.
6 Lots of people claim to be loyal and loving,
but where on earth can you find one?
7 God-loyal people, living honest lives,
make it much easier for their children.
INSIGHT:
Proverbs 20:7 challenges parents to model righteousness. In contrast to earthly parents who may disappoint, however, our heavenly Father loves us perfectly. Psalm 103 describes God’s loving character and asks the reader to remember the gracious benefits He gives His people—forgiveness, healing, redemption, love, and compassion (vv. 3–5). These benefits are rooted in God’s character described in verse 8: “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.” This verse reminds the reader of God’s own description of His character in Exodus 34:6: “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.” Ask God to help you model His faithful love to others.
A Perfect Father
By Cindy Hess Kasper
The righteous lead blameless lives; blessed are their children after them. Proverbs 20:7
My father once admitted to me, “When you were growing up, I was gone a lot.”
I don’t remember that. Besides working his full-time job, he was gone some evenings to direct choir practice at church, and he occasionally traveled for a week or two with a men’s quartet. But for all the significant (and many small) moments of my life—he was there.
Heavenly Father, thank You for Your faithfulness that I can always count on.
For instance, when I was eight, I had a tiny part in an afternoon play at school. All the mothers came, but only one dad—mine. In many little ways, he has always let my sisters and me know that we are important to him and that he loves us. And seeing him tenderly caring for my mom in the last few years of her life taught me exactly what unselfish love looks like. Dad isn’t perfect, but he’s always been a dad who gives me a good glimpse of my heavenly Father. And ideally, that’s what a Christian dad should do.
At times earthly fathers disappoint or hurt their children. But our Father in heaven is “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love” (Ps. 103:8). When a dad who loves the Lord corrects, comforts, instructs, and provides for the needs of his children, he models for them our perfect Father in heaven.
Heavenly Father, thank You for Your faithfulness that I can always count on. Please help me to live today in a way that leaves behind a legacy of faithfulness and love.
A life lived for Christ is the best inheritance we can leave our children.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Sunday, June 18, 2017
Keep Recognizing Jesus
…Peter…walked on the water to go to Jesus. But when he saw that the wind was boisterous, he was afraid… —Matthew 14:29-30
The wind really was boisterous and the waves really were high, but Peter didn’t see them at first. He didn’t consider them at all; he simply recognized his Lord, stepped out in recognition of Him, and “walked on the water.” Then he began to take those things around him into account, and instantly, down he went. Why couldn’t our Lord have enabled him to walk at the bottom of the waves, as well as on top of them? He could have, yet neither could be done without Peter’s continuing recognition of the Lord Jesus.
We step right out with recognition of God in some things, then self-consideration enters our lives and down we go. If you are truly recognizing your Lord, you have no business being concerned about how and where He engineers your circumstances. The things surrounding you are real, but when you look at them you are immediately overwhelmed, and even unable to recognize Jesus. Then comes His rebuke, “…why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31). Let your actual circumstances be what they may, but keep recognizing Jesus, maintaining complete reliance upon Him.
If you debate for even one second when God has spoken, it is all over for you. Never start to say, “Well, I wonder if He really did speak to me?” Be reckless immediately— totally unrestrained and willing to risk everything— by casting your all upon Him. You do not know when His voice will come to you, but whenever the realization of God comes, even in the faintest way imaginable, be determined to recklessly abandon yourself, surrendering everything to Him. It is only through abandonment of yourself and your circumstances that you will recognize Him. You will only recognize His voice more clearly through recklessness— being willing to risk your all.
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
Actions have consequences! In the book of Genesis we read how Joseph placed his loyalty above lust when he was tempted by Potiphar’s wife. His primary concern was the preference of God when he said, “How can I do this great wickedness, and sin against God” (Genesis 39:9)?
The lesson we learn from Joseph is surprisingly simple: Do what pleases God. Your co-workers want to include a trip to a gentleman’s club on the evening agenda. What do you do? Do what pleases God. Your date invites you to conclude the evening with drinks at his place. How should you reply? Do what pleases God.
You don’t fix a struggling marriage with an affair, a drug problem with more drugs, debt with more debt. You don’t get out of a mess by making another one. You’ll never go wrong doing what is right. Just do what pleases God.
From You’ll Get Through This
1 John 4
Don’t Believe Everything You Hear
My dear friends, don’t believe everything you hear. Carefully weigh and examine what people tell you. Not everyone who talks about God comes from God. There are a lot of lying preachers loose in the world.
2-3 Here’s how you test for the genuine Spirit of God. Everyone who confesses openly his faith in Jesus Christ—the Son of God, who came as an actual flesh-and-blood person—comes from God and belongs to God. And everyone who refuses to confess faith in Jesus has nothing in common with God. This is the spirit of antichrist that you heard was coming. Well, here it is, sooner than we thought!
4-6 My dear children, you come from God and belong to God. You have already won a big victory over those false teachers, for the Spirit in you is far stronger than anything in the world. These people belong to the Christ-denying world. They talk the world’s language and the world eats it up. But we come from God and belong to God. Anyone who knows God understands us and listens. The person who has nothing to do with God will, of course, not listen to us. This is another test for telling the Spirit of Truth from the spirit of deception.
God Is Love
7-10 My beloved friends, let us continue to love each other since love comes from God. Everyone who loves is born of God and experiences a relationship with God. The person who refuses to love doesn’t know the first thing about God, because God is love—so you can’t know him if you don’t love. This is how God showed his love for us: God sent his only Son into the world so we might live through him. This is the kind of love we are talking about—not that we once upon a time loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to clear away our sins and the damage they’ve done to our relationship with God.
11-12 My dear, dear friends, if God loved us like this, we certainly ought to love each other. No one has seen God, ever. But if we love one another, God dwells deeply within us, and his love becomes complete in us—perfect love!
13-16 This is how we know we’re living steadily and deeply in him, and he in us: He’s given us life from his life, from his very own Spirit. Also, we’ve seen for ourselves and continue to state openly that the Father sent his Son as Savior of the world. Everyone who confesses that Jesus is God’s Son participates continuously in an intimate relationship with God. We know it so well, we’ve embraced it heart and soul, this love that comes from God.
To Love, to Be Loved
17-18 God is love. When we take up permanent residence in a life of love, we live in God and God lives in us. This way, love has the run of the house, becomes at home and mature in us, so that we’re free of worry on Judgment Day—our standing in the world is identical with Christ’s. There is no room in love for fear. Well-formed love banishes fear. Since fear is crippling, a fearful life—fear of death, fear of judgment—is one not yet fully formed in love.
19 We, though, are going to love—love and be loved. First we were loved, now we love. He loved us first.
20-21 If anyone boasts, “I love God,” and goes right on hating his brother or sister, thinking nothing of it, he is a liar. If he won’t love the person he can see, how can he love the God he can’t see? The command we have from Christ is blunt: Loving God includes loving people. You’ve got to love both.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Sunday, June 18, 2017
Read: Proverbs 20:3–7
It’s a mark of good character to avert quarrels,
but fools love to pick fights.
4 A farmer too lazy to plant in the spring
has nothing to harvest in the fall.
5 Knowing what is right is like deep water in the heart;
a wise person draws from the well within.
6 Lots of people claim to be loyal and loving,
but where on earth can you find one?
7 God-loyal people, living honest lives,
make it much easier for their children.
INSIGHT:
Proverbs 20:7 challenges parents to model righteousness. In contrast to earthly parents who may disappoint, however, our heavenly Father loves us perfectly. Psalm 103 describes God’s loving character and asks the reader to remember the gracious benefits He gives His people—forgiveness, healing, redemption, love, and compassion (vv. 3–5). These benefits are rooted in God’s character described in verse 8: “The Lord is compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love.” This verse reminds the reader of God’s own description of His character in Exodus 34:6: “The Lord, the Lord, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.” Ask God to help you model His faithful love to others.
A Perfect Father
By Cindy Hess Kasper
The righteous lead blameless lives; blessed are their children after them. Proverbs 20:7
My father once admitted to me, “When you were growing up, I was gone a lot.”
I don’t remember that. Besides working his full-time job, he was gone some evenings to direct choir practice at church, and he occasionally traveled for a week or two with a men’s quartet. But for all the significant (and many small) moments of my life—he was there.
Heavenly Father, thank You for Your faithfulness that I can always count on.
For instance, when I was eight, I had a tiny part in an afternoon play at school. All the mothers came, but only one dad—mine. In many little ways, he has always let my sisters and me know that we are important to him and that he loves us. And seeing him tenderly caring for my mom in the last few years of her life taught me exactly what unselfish love looks like. Dad isn’t perfect, but he’s always been a dad who gives me a good glimpse of my heavenly Father. And ideally, that’s what a Christian dad should do.
At times earthly fathers disappoint or hurt their children. But our Father in heaven is “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, abounding in love” (Ps. 103:8). When a dad who loves the Lord corrects, comforts, instructs, and provides for the needs of his children, he models for them our perfect Father in heaven.
Heavenly Father, thank You for Your faithfulness that I can always count on. Please help me to live today in a way that leaves behind a legacy of faithfulness and love.
A life lived for Christ is the best inheritance we can leave our children.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Sunday, June 18, 2017
Keep Recognizing Jesus
…Peter…walked on the water to go to Jesus. But when he saw that the wind was boisterous, he was afraid… —Matthew 14:29-30
The wind really was boisterous and the waves really were high, but Peter didn’t see them at first. He didn’t consider them at all; he simply recognized his Lord, stepped out in recognition of Him, and “walked on the water.” Then he began to take those things around him into account, and instantly, down he went. Why couldn’t our Lord have enabled him to walk at the bottom of the waves, as well as on top of them? He could have, yet neither could be done without Peter’s continuing recognition of the Lord Jesus.
We step right out with recognition of God in some things, then self-consideration enters our lives and down we go. If you are truly recognizing your Lord, you have no business being concerned about how and where He engineers your circumstances. The things surrounding you are real, but when you look at them you are immediately overwhelmed, and even unable to recognize Jesus. Then comes His rebuke, “…why did you doubt?” (Matthew 14:31). Let your actual circumstances be what they may, but keep recognizing Jesus, maintaining complete reliance upon Him.
If you debate for even one second when God has spoken, it is all over for you. Never start to say, “Well, I wonder if He really did speak to me?” Be reckless immediately— totally unrestrained and willing to risk everything— by casting your all upon Him. You do not know when His voice will come to you, but whenever the realization of God comes, even in the faintest way imaginable, be determined to recklessly abandon yourself, surrendering everything to Him. It is only through abandonment of yourself and your circumstances that you will recognize Him. You will only recognize His voice more clearly through recklessness— being willing to risk your all.
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
Saturday, June 17, 2017
1 John 3 , Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals
Max Lucado Daily: Do What Pleases God
Years ago a friend gave me this counsel: Make a list of all the lives you would affect by your sexual immorality. I did. The list includes Denalyn, my three daughters, my sons-in-law, and my grandchild. Every so often, I reread it. And the list reminds me that one act of carnality is a poor exchange for a lifetime of lost legacy.
Dads, would you intentionally break the arm of your child? Of course not. Such an action would violate every fiber of your moral being. Yet if you engage in sexual activity outside your marriage, you’ll bring much more pain into the life of your child than would a broken bone.
In 1 Corinthians 6:19, Paul asked the rhetorical question: “Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you?”
Actions have consequences. So what do you do? Do what pleases God!
From You’ll Get Through This
1 John 3
What marvelous love the Father has extended to us! Just look at it—we’re called children of God! That’s who we really are. But that’s also why the world doesn’t recognize us or take us seriously, because it has no idea who he is or what he’s up to.
2-3 But friends, that’s exactly who we are: children of God. And that’s only the beginning. Who knows how we’ll end up! What we know is that when Christ is openly revealed, we’ll see him—and in seeing him, become like him. All of us who look forward to his Coming stay ready, with the glistening purity of Jesus’ life as a model for our own.
4-6 All who indulge in a sinful life are dangerously lawless, for sin is a major disruption of God’s order. Surely you know that Christ showed up in order to get rid of sin. There is no sin in him, and sin is not part of his program. No one who lives deeply in Christ makes a practice of sin. None of those who do practice sin have taken a good look at Christ. They’ve got him all backward.
7-8 So, my dear children, don’t let anyone divert you from the truth. It’s the person who acts right who is right, just as we see it lived out in our righteous Messiah. Those who make a practice of sin are straight from the Devil, the pioneer in the practice of sin. The Son of God entered the scene to abolish the Devil’s ways.
9-10 People conceived and brought into life by God don’t make a practice of sin. How could they? God’s seed is deep within them, making them who they are. It’s not in the nature of the God-begotten to practice and parade sin. Here’s how you tell the difference between God’s children and the Devil’s children: The one who won’t practice righteous ways isn’t from God, nor is the one who won’t love brother or sister. A simple test.
11 For this is the original message we heard: We should love each other.
12-13 We must not be like Cain, who joined the Evil One and then killed his brother. And why did he kill him? Because he was deep in the practice of evil, while the acts of his brother were righteous. So don’t be surprised, friends, when the world hates you. This has been going on a long time.
14-15 The way we know we’ve been transferred from death to life is that we love our brothers and sisters. Anyone who doesn’t love is as good as dead. Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know very well that eternal life and murder don’t go together.
16-17 This is how we’ve come to understand and experience love: Christ sacrificed his life for us. This is why we ought to live sacrificially for our fellow believers, and not just be out for ourselves. If you see some brother or sister in need and have the means to do something about it but turn a cold shoulder and do nothing, what happens to God’s love? It disappears. And you made it disappear.
When We Practice Real Love
18-20 My dear children, let’s not just talk about love; let’s practice real love. This is the only way we’ll know we’re living truly, living in God’s reality. It’s also the way to shut down debilitating self-criticism, even when there is something to it. For God is greater than our worried hearts and knows more about us than we do ourselves.
21-24 And friends, once that’s taken care of and we’re no longer accusing or condemning ourselves, we’re bold and free before God! We’re able to stretch our hands out and receive what we asked for because we’re doing what he said, doing what pleases him. Again, this is God’s command: to believe in his personally named Son, Jesus Christ. He told us to love each other, in line with the original command. As we keep his commands, we live deeply and surely in him, and he lives in us. And this is how we experience his deep and abiding presence in us: by the Spirit he gave us.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Saturday, June 17, 2017
Read: Psalm 147:1–11
Hallelujah!
It’s a good thing to sing praise to our God;
praise is beautiful, praise is fitting.
2-6 God’s the one who rebuilds Jerusalem,
who regathers Israel’s scattered exiles.
He heals the heartbroken
and bandages their wounds.
He counts the stars
and assigns each a name.
Our Lord is great, with limitless strength;
we’ll never comprehend what he knows and does.
God puts the fallen on their feet again
and pushes the wicked into the ditch.
7-11 Sing to God a thanksgiving hymn,
play music on your instruments to God,
Who fills the sky with clouds,
preparing rain for the earth,
Then turning the mountains green with grass,
feeding both cattle and crows.
He’s not impressed with horsepower;
the size of our muscles means little to him.
Those who fear God get God’s attention;
they can depend on his strength.
INSIGHT:
Psalm 147 is the second of five hymns of praise in Psalms 146–150 that begin and end with the refrain “Praise the Lord” (Hebrew, Hallelujah). The psalmist invites us to “sing to the Lord with grateful praise” (v. 7), celebrating His goodness as He draws us to Himself, heals us of our brokenness, sustains us, and builds us up (vv. 2–3, 6). Clearly we are much loved and cared for. We are also to praise His greatness in creation for it displays His mighty power (vv. 4–5) and His care for His creatures (vv. 8–9). Focusing not only on God’s glory but also on His grace, the psalmist tells us that we need not be afraid to draw near to God. On the contrary, God wants us to come to Him. For “the Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love” (v. 11).
How has God shown His greatness and goodness to you this week? Thank Him through grateful praise.
Time Together
By Alyson Kieda
The Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love. Psalm 147:11
On the two-hour drive home from a family member’s wedding, my mom asked me for the third time what was new in my job. I once again repeated some of the details as if telling her for the first time, while wondering what might possibly make my words more memorable. My mom has Alzheimer’s, a disease that progressively destroys the memory, can adversely affect behavior, and eventually leads to the loss of speech—and more.
I grieve because of my mom’s disease but am thankful she is still here and we can spend time together—and even converse. It thrills me that whenever I go to see her she lights up with joy and exclaims, “Alyson, what a pleasant surprise!” We enjoy each other’s company; and even in the silences when words escape her, we commune together.
Although we may make the same requests over and over again or lack for words, He is patient with us.
This perhaps is a small picture of our relationship with God. Scripture tells us, “The Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love” (Ps. 147:11). God calls those who believe in Jesus as their Savior His children (John 1:12). And although we may make the same requests over and over again or lack for words, He is patient with us because He has a loving relationship with us. He is happy when we converse with Him in prayer—even when the words escape us.
Dear Lord, it thrills us that You want to have a relationship with us! Thank You for the opportunity to learn of You through the Bible and to talk with You in prayer.
God delights to hear from us!
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Saturday, June 17, 2017
Beware of Criticizing Others
Judge not, that you be not judged. —Matthew 7:1
Jesus’ instructions with regard to judging others is very simply put; He says, “Don’t.” The average Christian is the most piercingly critical individual known. Criticism is one of the ordinary activities of people, but in the spiritual realm nothing is accomplished by it. The effect of criticism is the dividing up of the strengths of the one being criticized. The Holy Spirit is the only one in the proper position to criticize, and He alone is able to show what is wrong without hurting and wounding. It is impossible to enter into fellowship with God when you are in a critical mood. Criticism serves to make you harsh, vindictive, and cruel, and leaves you with the soothing and flattering idea that you are somehow superior to others. Jesus says that as His disciple you should cultivate a temperament that is never critical. This will not happen quickly but must be developed over a span of time. You must constantly beware of anything that causes you to think of yourself as a superior person.
There is no escaping the penetrating search of my life by Jesus. If I see the little speck in your eye, it means that I have a plank of timber in my own (see Matthew 7:3-5). Every wrong thing that I see in you, God finds in me. Every time I judge, I condemn myself (see Romans 2:17-24). Stop having a measuring stick for other people. There is always at least one more fact, which we know nothing about, in every person’s situation. The first thing God does is to give us a thorough spiritual cleaning. After that, there is no possibility of pride remaining in us. I have never met a person I could despair of, or lose all hope for, after discerning what lies in me apart from the grace of God.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
There is nothing, naturally speaking, that makes us lose heart quicker than decay—the decay of bodily beauty, of natural life, of friendship, of associations, all these things make a man lose heart; but Paul says when we are trusting in Jesus Christ these things do not find us discouraged, light comes through them. The Place of Help, 1032 L
Years ago a friend gave me this counsel: Make a list of all the lives you would affect by your sexual immorality. I did. The list includes Denalyn, my three daughters, my sons-in-law, and my grandchild. Every so often, I reread it. And the list reminds me that one act of carnality is a poor exchange for a lifetime of lost legacy.
Dads, would you intentionally break the arm of your child? Of course not. Such an action would violate every fiber of your moral being. Yet if you engage in sexual activity outside your marriage, you’ll bring much more pain into the life of your child than would a broken bone.
In 1 Corinthians 6:19, Paul asked the rhetorical question: “Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you?”
Actions have consequences. So what do you do? Do what pleases God!
From You’ll Get Through This
1 John 3
What marvelous love the Father has extended to us! Just look at it—we’re called children of God! That’s who we really are. But that’s also why the world doesn’t recognize us or take us seriously, because it has no idea who he is or what he’s up to.
2-3 But friends, that’s exactly who we are: children of God. And that’s only the beginning. Who knows how we’ll end up! What we know is that when Christ is openly revealed, we’ll see him—and in seeing him, become like him. All of us who look forward to his Coming stay ready, with the glistening purity of Jesus’ life as a model for our own.
4-6 All who indulge in a sinful life are dangerously lawless, for sin is a major disruption of God’s order. Surely you know that Christ showed up in order to get rid of sin. There is no sin in him, and sin is not part of his program. No one who lives deeply in Christ makes a practice of sin. None of those who do practice sin have taken a good look at Christ. They’ve got him all backward.
7-8 So, my dear children, don’t let anyone divert you from the truth. It’s the person who acts right who is right, just as we see it lived out in our righteous Messiah. Those who make a practice of sin are straight from the Devil, the pioneer in the practice of sin. The Son of God entered the scene to abolish the Devil’s ways.
9-10 People conceived and brought into life by God don’t make a practice of sin. How could they? God’s seed is deep within them, making them who they are. It’s not in the nature of the God-begotten to practice and parade sin. Here’s how you tell the difference between God’s children and the Devil’s children: The one who won’t practice righteous ways isn’t from God, nor is the one who won’t love brother or sister. A simple test.
11 For this is the original message we heard: We should love each other.
12-13 We must not be like Cain, who joined the Evil One and then killed his brother. And why did he kill him? Because he was deep in the practice of evil, while the acts of his brother were righteous. So don’t be surprised, friends, when the world hates you. This has been going on a long time.
14-15 The way we know we’ve been transferred from death to life is that we love our brothers and sisters. Anyone who doesn’t love is as good as dead. Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know very well that eternal life and murder don’t go together.
16-17 This is how we’ve come to understand and experience love: Christ sacrificed his life for us. This is why we ought to live sacrificially for our fellow believers, and not just be out for ourselves. If you see some brother or sister in need and have the means to do something about it but turn a cold shoulder and do nothing, what happens to God’s love? It disappears. And you made it disappear.
When We Practice Real Love
18-20 My dear children, let’s not just talk about love; let’s practice real love. This is the only way we’ll know we’re living truly, living in God’s reality. It’s also the way to shut down debilitating self-criticism, even when there is something to it. For God is greater than our worried hearts and knows more about us than we do ourselves.
21-24 And friends, once that’s taken care of and we’re no longer accusing or condemning ourselves, we’re bold and free before God! We’re able to stretch our hands out and receive what we asked for because we’re doing what he said, doing what pleases him. Again, this is God’s command: to believe in his personally named Son, Jesus Christ. He told us to love each other, in line with the original command. As we keep his commands, we live deeply and surely in him, and he lives in us. And this is how we experience his deep and abiding presence in us: by the Spirit he gave us.
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Saturday, June 17, 2017
Read: Psalm 147:1–11
Hallelujah!
It’s a good thing to sing praise to our God;
praise is beautiful, praise is fitting.
2-6 God’s the one who rebuilds Jerusalem,
who regathers Israel’s scattered exiles.
He heals the heartbroken
and bandages their wounds.
He counts the stars
and assigns each a name.
Our Lord is great, with limitless strength;
we’ll never comprehend what he knows and does.
God puts the fallen on their feet again
and pushes the wicked into the ditch.
7-11 Sing to God a thanksgiving hymn,
play music on your instruments to God,
Who fills the sky with clouds,
preparing rain for the earth,
Then turning the mountains green with grass,
feeding both cattle and crows.
He’s not impressed with horsepower;
the size of our muscles means little to him.
Those who fear God get God’s attention;
they can depend on his strength.
INSIGHT:
Psalm 147 is the second of five hymns of praise in Psalms 146–150 that begin and end with the refrain “Praise the Lord” (Hebrew, Hallelujah). The psalmist invites us to “sing to the Lord with grateful praise” (v. 7), celebrating His goodness as He draws us to Himself, heals us of our brokenness, sustains us, and builds us up (vv. 2–3, 6). Clearly we are much loved and cared for. We are also to praise His greatness in creation for it displays His mighty power (vv. 4–5) and His care for His creatures (vv. 8–9). Focusing not only on God’s glory but also on His grace, the psalmist tells us that we need not be afraid to draw near to God. On the contrary, God wants us to come to Him. For “the Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love” (v. 11).
How has God shown His greatness and goodness to you this week? Thank Him through grateful praise.
Time Together
By Alyson Kieda
The Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love. Psalm 147:11
On the two-hour drive home from a family member’s wedding, my mom asked me for the third time what was new in my job. I once again repeated some of the details as if telling her for the first time, while wondering what might possibly make my words more memorable. My mom has Alzheimer’s, a disease that progressively destroys the memory, can adversely affect behavior, and eventually leads to the loss of speech—and more.
I grieve because of my mom’s disease but am thankful she is still here and we can spend time together—and even converse. It thrills me that whenever I go to see her she lights up with joy and exclaims, “Alyson, what a pleasant surprise!” We enjoy each other’s company; and even in the silences when words escape her, we commune together.
Although we may make the same requests over and over again or lack for words, He is patient with us.
This perhaps is a small picture of our relationship with God. Scripture tells us, “The Lord delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love” (Ps. 147:11). God calls those who believe in Jesus as their Savior His children (John 1:12). And although we may make the same requests over and over again or lack for words, He is patient with us because He has a loving relationship with us. He is happy when we converse with Him in prayer—even when the words escape us.
Dear Lord, it thrills us that You want to have a relationship with us! Thank You for the opportunity to learn of You through the Bible and to talk with You in prayer.
God delights to hear from us!
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Saturday, June 17, 2017
Beware of Criticizing Others
Judge not, that you be not judged. —Matthew 7:1
Jesus’ instructions with regard to judging others is very simply put; He says, “Don’t.” The average Christian is the most piercingly critical individual known. Criticism is one of the ordinary activities of people, but in the spiritual realm nothing is accomplished by it. The effect of criticism is the dividing up of the strengths of the one being criticized. The Holy Spirit is the only one in the proper position to criticize, and He alone is able to show what is wrong without hurting and wounding. It is impossible to enter into fellowship with God when you are in a critical mood. Criticism serves to make you harsh, vindictive, and cruel, and leaves you with the soothing and flattering idea that you are somehow superior to others. Jesus says that as His disciple you should cultivate a temperament that is never critical. This will not happen quickly but must be developed over a span of time. You must constantly beware of anything that causes you to think of yourself as a superior person.
There is no escaping the penetrating search of my life by Jesus. If I see the little speck in your eye, it means that I have a plank of timber in my own (see Matthew 7:3-5). Every wrong thing that I see in you, God finds in me. Every time I judge, I condemn myself (see Romans 2:17-24). Stop having a measuring stick for other people. There is always at least one more fact, which we know nothing about, in every person’s situation. The first thing God does is to give us a thorough spiritual cleaning. After that, there is no possibility of pride remaining in us. I have never met a person I could despair of, or lose all hope for, after discerning what lies in me apart from the grace of God.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
There is nothing, naturally speaking, that makes us lose heart quicker than decay—the decay of bodily beauty, of natural life, of friendship, of associations, all these things make a man lose heart; but Paul says when we are trusting in Jesus Christ these things do not find us discouraged, light comes through them. The Place of Help, 1032 L
Friday, June 16, 2017
Ezekiel 48, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals
Max Lucado Daily: QUARRY THE DEEP QUALITIES OF GOD
Don’t equate the presence of God with a good mood or a pleasant temperament. God is near whether you’re happy or not. But do quarry from your Bible a list of the deep qualities of God, and press them to your heart. My list reads like this:
He is still sovereign.
He still knows my name.
Angels still respond to His call.
God is still faithful.
He is not caught off guard.
He uses everything for His glory and my ultimate good.
Lay hold of the unchanging character of God. Pray your pain out. Pound the table. Even Jesus offered up prayers with what Hebrews 5:7 describes as “loud cries and tears.” Your family may be gone. Your supporters may have left. But God has not budged! His promise still stands,“I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go.”
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezekiel 48
The Sanctuary of God at the Center
“These are the tribes:
“Dan: one portion, along the northern boundary, following the Hethlon road that turns off to the entrance of Hamath as far as Hazor-enon so that the territory of Damascus lies to the north alongside Hamath, the northern border stretching from east to west.
2 “Asher: one portion, bordering Dan from east to west.
3 “Naphtali: one portion, bordering Asher from east to west.
4 “Manasseh: one portion, bordering Naphtali from east to west.
5 “Ephraim: one portion, bordering Manasseh from east to west.
6 “Reuben: one portion, bordering Ephraim from east to west.
7 “Judah: one portion, bordering Reuben from east to west.
8-9 “Bordering Judah from east to west is the consecrated area that you will set aside as holy: a square approximately seven by seven miles, with the Sanctuary set at the center. The consecrated area reserved for God is to be seven miles long and a little less than three miles wide.
10-12 “This is how it will be parceled out. The priest will get the area measuring seven miles on the north and south boundaries, with a width of a little more than three miles at the east and west boundaries. The Sanctuary of God will be at the center. This is for the consecrated priests, the Zadokites who stayed true in their service to me and didn’t get off track as the Levites did when Israel wandered off the main road. This is their special gift, a gift from the land itself, most holy ground, bordering the section of the Levites.
13-14 “The Levites get a section equal in size to that of the priests, roughly seven by three miles. They are not permitted to sell or trade any of it. It’s the choice part of the land, to say nothing of being holy to God.
15-19 “What’s left of the ‘sacred square’—each side measures out at seven miles by a mile and a half—is for ordinary use: the city and its buildings with open country around it, but the city at the center. The north, south, east, and west sides of the city are each about a mile and a half in length. A strip of pasture, one hundred twenty-five yards wide, will border the city on all sides. The remainder of this portion, three miles of countryside to the east and to the west of the sacred precinct, is for farming. It will supply food for the city. Workers from all the tribes of Israel will serve as field hands to farm the land.
20 “This dedicated area, set apart for holy purposes, will be a square, seven miles by seven miles, a ‘holy square,’ which includes the part set aside for the city.
21-22 “The rest of this land, the country stretching east to the Jordan and west to the Mediterranean from the seven-mile sides of the ‘holy square,’ belongs to the prince. His land is sandwiched between the tribal portions north and south, and goes out both east and west from the ‘sacred square’ with its Temple at the center. The land set aside for the Levites on one side and the city on the other is in the middle of the territory assigned to the prince. The ‘sacred square’ is flanked east and west by the prince’s land and bordered on the north and south by the territories of Judah and Benjamin, respectively.
23 “And then the rest of the tribes:
“Benjamin: one portion, stretching from the eastern to the western boundary.
24 “Simeon: one portion, bordering Benjamin from east to west.
25 “Issachar: one portion, bordering Simeon from east to west.
26 “Zebulun: one portion, bordering Issachar from east to west.
27 “Gad: one portion, bordering Zebulun from east to west.
28 “The southern boundary of Gad will run south from Tamar to the waters of Meribah-kadesh, along the Brook of Egypt and then out to the Great Mediterranean Sea.
29 “This is the land that you are to divide up among the tribes of Israel as their inheritance. These are their portions.” Decree of God, the Master.
30-31 “These are the gates of the city. On the north side, which is 2,250 yards long (the gates of the city are named after the tribes of Israel), three gates: the gate of Reuben, the gate of Judah, the gate of Levi.
32 “On the east side, measuring 2,250 yards, three gates: the gate of Joseph, the gate of Benjamin, the gate of Dan.
33 “On the south side, measuring 2,250 yards, three gates: the gate of Simeon, the gate of Issachar, the gate of Zebulun.
34 “On the west side, measuring 2,250 yards, three gates: the gate of Gad, the gate of Asher, the gate of Naphtali.
35 “The four sides of the city measure to a total of nearly six miles.
“From now on the name of the city will be Yahweh-Shammah:
“God-Is-There.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Friday, June 16, 2017
Read: Ephesians 2:1–10
He Tore Down the Wall
1-6 It wasn’t so long ago that you were mired in that old stagnant life of sin. You let the world, which doesn’t know the first thing about living, tell you how to live. You filled your lungs with polluted unbelief, and then exhaled disobedience. We all did it, all of us doing what we felt like doing, when we felt like doing it, all of us in the same boat. It’s a wonder God didn’t lose his temper and do away with the whole lot of us. Instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, he embraced us. He took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ. He did all this on his own, with no help from us! Then he picked us up and set us down in highest heaven in company with Jesus, our Messiah.
7-10 Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish! We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing.
INSIGHT:
In most world religions, people seek to gain favor from a deity—whether offering a sacrifice or promising to change one’s ways, the emphasis on human works is central. Yet in the writings of Paul we see that through Christ’s sacrifice we are saved by God’s grace and not by works. This is the central theme of the gospel. What is so extraordinary about the free gift of salvation by faith is its eternal impact. Although we will someday have to face physical death, the spiritual death of eternal separation from God has been replaced with eternal life.
Have you received this gift of new spiritual life that Christ offers?
Made Alive
By Bill Crowder
You were dead in your transgressions and sins. Ephesians 2:1
As a young man, my dad was traveling with a group of friends to an out-of-town sporting event when the tires of their car slipped on the rain-soaked roads. They had an accident—a bad accident. One of his friends was paralyzed and another was killed. My dad was declared dead and taken to the morgue. His shocked and grief-stricken parents came to identify him. But my dad revived from what turned out to be a deep coma. Their mourning turned to joy.
In Ephesians 2, the apostle Paul reminds us that apart from Christ we are “dead in [our] transgressions and sins” (v. 1). But because of His great love for us, “God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions” (vv. 4–5). Through Christ we have been brought from death to life.
Thank You, Father, for love that conquers sin, life that conquers death, and grace that has conquered my heart
So in every sense, we all owe our life to the Father in heaven. Through His great love, He has made it possible for those of us who were dead in sin to have life and purpose through His Son.
Thank You, Father, for love that conquers sin, life that conquers death, and grace that has conquered my heart. May my life be a sweet aroma of praise to You.
We owed a debt we could not pay, but Jesus paid the debt He did not owe.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, June 16, 2017
“Will You Lay Down Your Life?”
Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends….I have called you friends… —John 15:13, 15
Jesus does not ask me to die for Him, but to lay down my life for Him. Peter said to the Lord, “I will lay down my life for Your sake,” and he meant it (John 13:37). He had a magnificent sense of the heroic. For us to be incapable of making this same statement Peter made would be a bad thing— our sense of duty is only fully realized through our sense of heroism. Has the Lord ever asked you, “Will you lay down your life for My sake?” (John 13:38). It is much easier to die than to lay down your life day in and day out with the sense of the high calling of God. We are not made for the bright-shining moments of life, but we have to walk in the light of them in our everyday ways. There was only one bright-shining moment in the life of Jesus, and that was on the Mount of Transfiguration. It was there that He emptied Himself of His glory for the second time, and then came down into the demon-possessed valley (seeMark 9:1-29). For thirty-three years Jesus laid down His life to do the will of His Father. “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). Yet it is contrary to our human nature to do so.
If I am a friend of Jesus, I must deliberately and carefully lay down my life for Him. It is a difficult thing to do, and thank God that it is. Salvation is easy for us, because it cost God so much. But the exhibiting of salvation in my life is difficult. God saves a person, fills him with the Holy Spirit, and then says, in effect, “Now you work it out in your life, and be faithful to Me, even though the nature of everything around you is to cause you to be unfaithful.” And Jesus says to us, “…I have called you friends….” Remain faithful to your Friend, and remember that His honor is at stake in your bodily life.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Am I learning how to use my Bible? The way to become complete for the Master’s service is to be well soaked in the Bible; some of us only exploit certain passages. Our Lord wants to give us continuous instruction out of His word; continuous instruction turns hearers into disciples. Approved Unto God, 11 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, June 16, 2017
No Substitute For a Daddy - #7940
Disney World. The Magic Kingdom. How can a four-year-old girl be a little cranky in that dream destination for kids her age? Our granddaughter had been having a great day there with her mom and her cousins while her daddy was busy in meetings. She'd done all the princess stuff she loved, she'd gotten the autographs of Disney characters that she loved, she'd gone on rides she'd been looking forward to. But for some reason, by early afternoon she was just a little out of sorts. By that time, her dad was available, and he showed up to take her on some rides. And suddenly, it was like the clouds had blown away and the sun came out. She was the bouncy, happy little girl we all know again. In retrospect, I guess it was easy to diagnose why the clouds had rolled in. Even in the middle of all the excitement a child could ever want, she was missing her Daddy!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "No Substitute For a Daddy."
It's true of every one of us, even if our childhood is way behind us. There's a spot in our heart and in our life that was meant to be filled by a father. And it doesn't matter how much of a "Magic Kingdom" a person's life becomes, there's still no substitute for a father. If you've been trusted by God with the awesome assignment of being a father, don't ever forget there's nothing that can take your place in the life of your son or daughter. No matter how young or how old they are.
In Ephesians 6:4, our word for today from the Word of God, He speaks directly to dads: "Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord." We fail our children, and we fail the God who gave them to us when we continually "exasperate" them.
We exasperate them by our absence. We're so busy they just get our leftovers while everyone else gets our best. And that's wrong priorities. We exasperate our children by our unavailability. We're around them, but we're not with them. We're all tied up with sports on TV or some website, checking something out, we're doing our "chores" or we're involved in our hobby or our work. We're there, but they can't have us-because from the way it looks to them, there's something always more important than they are.
We exasperate our children by our criticism, too. How many of us have been wounded by the feeling that we could never be good enough for our dad? If you're always harping on what they need to improve, on what's wrong with them, that child is going to have a hard time believing they have a lot of value. The praise and encouragement of a dad is one of the most powerful life-shaping forces on earth.
Our kids are also exasperated by a father's silence-he doesn't express his feelings, he doesn't show or speak his love for them. So they're never sure where they stand. And a dad can exasperate a child with just passivity-a failure to lead, to set and enforce consistent boundaries, to provide spiritual leadership for them.
Maybe you're thinking about the hole you have in your life because of what your father never was for you. I call it the daddy deficit. I've got a wonderful promise from God for you in Psalm 68:4-5, "His name is the Lord...a father to the fatherless." And Psalm 10:14 declares that "You, O God...are the helper of the fatherless." God is already your Creator. He wants to be your Father-to love you, to care for you, not like the earthly father you had, but like the father you always wished you had.
But first you've got to have the sins forgiven that stand between you and Him. God the Father sent His only Son, Jesus, to die to pay for those sins so you can belong to the ultimate Father you were made for. The day you put your total trust in Jesus to forgive your sins, you get a personal Savior and you get the Father that your heart is missing.
You ready for that? Tell Him that today. It's time for a new story in your life to begin. You know, our website is called that - ANewStory.com. It's why it's there is to help you get that new beginning that only Jesus can give you. I hope you'll go there today.
You know, as a Dad, there's a lot of regrets. He'll forgive every mistake, every sin we've ever committed. All the hurts we've inflicted, He died to pay for them. This is your new beginning today.
God's waiting to welcome you into His big ole' Father's arms this very day.
Don’t equate the presence of God with a good mood or a pleasant temperament. God is near whether you’re happy or not. But do quarry from your Bible a list of the deep qualities of God, and press them to your heart. My list reads like this:
He is still sovereign.
He still knows my name.
Angels still respond to His call.
God is still faithful.
He is not caught off guard.
He uses everything for His glory and my ultimate good.
Lay hold of the unchanging character of God. Pray your pain out. Pound the table. Even Jesus offered up prayers with what Hebrews 5:7 describes as “loud cries and tears.” Your family may be gone. Your supporters may have left. But God has not budged! His promise still stands,“I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go.”
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezekiel 48
The Sanctuary of God at the Center
“These are the tribes:
“Dan: one portion, along the northern boundary, following the Hethlon road that turns off to the entrance of Hamath as far as Hazor-enon so that the territory of Damascus lies to the north alongside Hamath, the northern border stretching from east to west.
2 “Asher: one portion, bordering Dan from east to west.
3 “Naphtali: one portion, bordering Asher from east to west.
4 “Manasseh: one portion, bordering Naphtali from east to west.
5 “Ephraim: one portion, bordering Manasseh from east to west.
6 “Reuben: one portion, bordering Ephraim from east to west.
7 “Judah: one portion, bordering Reuben from east to west.
8-9 “Bordering Judah from east to west is the consecrated area that you will set aside as holy: a square approximately seven by seven miles, with the Sanctuary set at the center. The consecrated area reserved for God is to be seven miles long and a little less than three miles wide.
10-12 “This is how it will be parceled out. The priest will get the area measuring seven miles on the north and south boundaries, with a width of a little more than three miles at the east and west boundaries. The Sanctuary of God will be at the center. This is for the consecrated priests, the Zadokites who stayed true in their service to me and didn’t get off track as the Levites did when Israel wandered off the main road. This is their special gift, a gift from the land itself, most holy ground, bordering the section of the Levites.
13-14 “The Levites get a section equal in size to that of the priests, roughly seven by three miles. They are not permitted to sell or trade any of it. It’s the choice part of the land, to say nothing of being holy to God.
15-19 “What’s left of the ‘sacred square’—each side measures out at seven miles by a mile and a half—is for ordinary use: the city and its buildings with open country around it, but the city at the center. The north, south, east, and west sides of the city are each about a mile and a half in length. A strip of pasture, one hundred twenty-five yards wide, will border the city on all sides. The remainder of this portion, three miles of countryside to the east and to the west of the sacred precinct, is for farming. It will supply food for the city. Workers from all the tribes of Israel will serve as field hands to farm the land.
20 “This dedicated area, set apart for holy purposes, will be a square, seven miles by seven miles, a ‘holy square,’ which includes the part set aside for the city.
21-22 “The rest of this land, the country stretching east to the Jordan and west to the Mediterranean from the seven-mile sides of the ‘holy square,’ belongs to the prince. His land is sandwiched between the tribal portions north and south, and goes out both east and west from the ‘sacred square’ with its Temple at the center. The land set aside for the Levites on one side and the city on the other is in the middle of the territory assigned to the prince. The ‘sacred square’ is flanked east and west by the prince’s land and bordered on the north and south by the territories of Judah and Benjamin, respectively.
23 “And then the rest of the tribes:
“Benjamin: one portion, stretching from the eastern to the western boundary.
24 “Simeon: one portion, bordering Benjamin from east to west.
25 “Issachar: one portion, bordering Simeon from east to west.
26 “Zebulun: one portion, bordering Issachar from east to west.
27 “Gad: one portion, bordering Zebulun from east to west.
28 “The southern boundary of Gad will run south from Tamar to the waters of Meribah-kadesh, along the Brook of Egypt and then out to the Great Mediterranean Sea.
29 “This is the land that you are to divide up among the tribes of Israel as their inheritance. These are their portions.” Decree of God, the Master.
30-31 “These are the gates of the city. On the north side, which is 2,250 yards long (the gates of the city are named after the tribes of Israel), three gates: the gate of Reuben, the gate of Judah, the gate of Levi.
32 “On the east side, measuring 2,250 yards, three gates: the gate of Joseph, the gate of Benjamin, the gate of Dan.
33 “On the south side, measuring 2,250 yards, three gates: the gate of Simeon, the gate of Issachar, the gate of Zebulun.
34 “On the west side, measuring 2,250 yards, three gates: the gate of Gad, the gate of Asher, the gate of Naphtali.
35 “The four sides of the city measure to a total of nearly six miles.
“From now on the name of the city will be Yahweh-Shammah:
“God-Is-There.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Friday, June 16, 2017
Read: Ephesians 2:1–10
He Tore Down the Wall
1-6 It wasn’t so long ago that you were mired in that old stagnant life of sin. You let the world, which doesn’t know the first thing about living, tell you how to live. You filled your lungs with polluted unbelief, and then exhaled disobedience. We all did it, all of us doing what we felt like doing, when we felt like doing it, all of us in the same boat. It’s a wonder God didn’t lose his temper and do away with the whole lot of us. Instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, he embraced us. He took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ. He did all this on his own, with no help from us! Then he picked us up and set us down in highest heaven in company with Jesus, our Messiah.
7-10 Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish! We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing.
INSIGHT:
In most world religions, people seek to gain favor from a deity—whether offering a sacrifice or promising to change one’s ways, the emphasis on human works is central. Yet in the writings of Paul we see that through Christ’s sacrifice we are saved by God’s grace and not by works. This is the central theme of the gospel. What is so extraordinary about the free gift of salvation by faith is its eternal impact. Although we will someday have to face physical death, the spiritual death of eternal separation from God has been replaced with eternal life.
Have you received this gift of new spiritual life that Christ offers?
Made Alive
By Bill Crowder
You were dead in your transgressions and sins. Ephesians 2:1
As a young man, my dad was traveling with a group of friends to an out-of-town sporting event when the tires of their car slipped on the rain-soaked roads. They had an accident—a bad accident. One of his friends was paralyzed and another was killed. My dad was declared dead and taken to the morgue. His shocked and grief-stricken parents came to identify him. But my dad revived from what turned out to be a deep coma. Their mourning turned to joy.
In Ephesians 2, the apostle Paul reminds us that apart from Christ we are “dead in [our] transgressions and sins” (v. 1). But because of His great love for us, “God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions” (vv. 4–5). Through Christ we have been brought from death to life.
Thank You, Father, for love that conquers sin, life that conquers death, and grace that has conquered my heart
So in every sense, we all owe our life to the Father in heaven. Through His great love, He has made it possible for those of us who were dead in sin to have life and purpose through His Son.
Thank You, Father, for love that conquers sin, life that conquers death, and grace that has conquered my heart. May my life be a sweet aroma of praise to You.
We owed a debt we could not pay, but Jesus paid the debt He did not owe.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Friday, June 16, 2017
“Will You Lay Down Your Life?”
Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends….I have called you friends… —John 15:13, 15
Jesus does not ask me to die for Him, but to lay down my life for Him. Peter said to the Lord, “I will lay down my life for Your sake,” and he meant it (John 13:37). He had a magnificent sense of the heroic. For us to be incapable of making this same statement Peter made would be a bad thing— our sense of duty is only fully realized through our sense of heroism. Has the Lord ever asked you, “Will you lay down your life for My sake?” (John 13:38). It is much easier to die than to lay down your life day in and day out with the sense of the high calling of God. We are not made for the bright-shining moments of life, but we have to walk in the light of them in our everyday ways. There was only one bright-shining moment in the life of Jesus, and that was on the Mount of Transfiguration. It was there that He emptied Himself of His glory for the second time, and then came down into the demon-possessed valley (seeMark 9:1-29). For thirty-three years Jesus laid down His life to do the will of His Father. “By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren” (1 John 3:16). Yet it is contrary to our human nature to do so.
If I am a friend of Jesus, I must deliberately and carefully lay down my life for Him. It is a difficult thing to do, and thank God that it is. Salvation is easy for us, because it cost God so much. But the exhibiting of salvation in my life is difficult. God saves a person, fills him with the Holy Spirit, and then says, in effect, “Now you work it out in your life, and be faithful to Me, even though the nature of everything around you is to cause you to be unfaithful.” And Jesus says to us, “…I have called you friends….” Remain faithful to your Friend, and remember that His honor is at stake in your bodily life.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Am I learning how to use my Bible? The way to become complete for the Master’s service is to be well soaked in the Bible; some of us only exploit certain passages. Our Lord wants to give us continuous instruction out of His word; continuous instruction turns hearers into disciples. Approved Unto God, 11 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Friday, June 16, 2017
No Substitute For a Daddy - #7940
Disney World. The Magic Kingdom. How can a four-year-old girl be a little cranky in that dream destination for kids her age? Our granddaughter had been having a great day there with her mom and her cousins while her daddy was busy in meetings. She'd done all the princess stuff she loved, she'd gotten the autographs of Disney characters that she loved, she'd gone on rides she'd been looking forward to. But for some reason, by early afternoon she was just a little out of sorts. By that time, her dad was available, and he showed up to take her on some rides. And suddenly, it was like the clouds had blown away and the sun came out. She was the bouncy, happy little girl we all know again. In retrospect, I guess it was easy to diagnose why the clouds had rolled in. Even in the middle of all the excitement a child could ever want, she was missing her Daddy!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft and I want to have A Word With You today about "No Substitute For a Daddy."
It's true of every one of us, even if our childhood is way behind us. There's a spot in our heart and in our life that was meant to be filled by a father. And it doesn't matter how much of a "Magic Kingdom" a person's life becomes, there's still no substitute for a father. If you've been trusted by God with the awesome assignment of being a father, don't ever forget there's nothing that can take your place in the life of your son or daughter. No matter how young or how old they are.
In Ephesians 6:4, our word for today from the Word of God, He speaks directly to dads: "Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord." We fail our children, and we fail the God who gave them to us when we continually "exasperate" them.
We exasperate them by our absence. We're so busy they just get our leftovers while everyone else gets our best. And that's wrong priorities. We exasperate our children by our unavailability. We're around them, but we're not with them. We're all tied up with sports on TV or some website, checking something out, we're doing our "chores" or we're involved in our hobby or our work. We're there, but they can't have us-because from the way it looks to them, there's something always more important than they are.
We exasperate our children by our criticism, too. How many of us have been wounded by the feeling that we could never be good enough for our dad? If you're always harping on what they need to improve, on what's wrong with them, that child is going to have a hard time believing they have a lot of value. The praise and encouragement of a dad is one of the most powerful life-shaping forces on earth.
Our kids are also exasperated by a father's silence-he doesn't express his feelings, he doesn't show or speak his love for them. So they're never sure where they stand. And a dad can exasperate a child with just passivity-a failure to lead, to set and enforce consistent boundaries, to provide spiritual leadership for them.
Maybe you're thinking about the hole you have in your life because of what your father never was for you. I call it the daddy deficit. I've got a wonderful promise from God for you in Psalm 68:4-5, "His name is the Lord...a father to the fatherless." And Psalm 10:14 declares that "You, O God...are the helper of the fatherless." God is already your Creator. He wants to be your Father-to love you, to care for you, not like the earthly father you had, but like the father you always wished you had.
But first you've got to have the sins forgiven that stand between you and Him. God the Father sent His only Son, Jesus, to die to pay for those sins so you can belong to the ultimate Father you were made for. The day you put your total trust in Jesus to forgive your sins, you get a personal Savior and you get the Father that your heart is missing.
You ready for that? Tell Him that today. It's time for a new story in your life to begin. You know, our website is called that - ANewStory.com. It's why it's there is to help you get that new beginning that only Jesus can give you. I hope you'll go there today.
You know, as a Dad, there's a lot of regrets. He'll forgive every mistake, every sin we've ever committed. All the hurts we've inflicted, He died to pay for them. This is your new beginning today.
God's waiting to welcome you into His big ole' Father's arms this very day.
Thursday, June 15, 2017
Ezekiel 47, Bible Reading and Daily Devotionals
Max Lucado Daily:MORE SPONGE, LESS ROCK - June 15, 2017
Make God’s presence your passion. How? Be more sponge and less rock. Put a rock in the ocean, and what happens? It’s surface gets wet. The exterior may change color, but the interior remains untouched. Yet place a sponge in the ocean, and notice the change. It absorbs the water. The ocean penetrates every pore and alters the essence of the sponge. God surrounds us in the same way the Pacific surrounds an ocean floor pebble. He is everywhere—above, below, on all sides.
We choose our response—rock or sponge? Resist or receive? Everything within you says harden the heart. Run from God; resist God; blame God. But be careful. Hard hearts never heal. Spongy ones do. The Psalmist determined, “When I am afraid, I will trust in You.” Open every pore of your soul to God’s presence!
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezekiel 47
Trees on Both Sides of the River
1-2 Now he brought me back to the entrance to the Temple. I saw water pouring out from under the Temple porch to the east (the Temple faced east). The water poured from the south side of the Temple, south of the altar. He then took me out through the north gate and led me around the outside to the gate complex on the east. The water was gushing from under the south front of the Temple.
3-5 He walked to the east with a measuring tape and measured off fifteen hundred feet, leading me through water that was ankle-deep. He measured off another fifteen hundred feet, leading me through water that was knee-deep. He measured off another fifteen hundred feet, leading me through water waist-deep. He measured off another fifteen hundred feet. By now it was a river over my head, water to swim in, water no one could possibly walk through.
6-7 He said, “Son of man, have you had a good look?”
Then he took me back to the riverbank. While sitting on the bank, I noticed a lot of trees on both sides of the river.
8-10 He told me, “This water flows east, descends to the Arabah and then into the sea, the sea of stagnant waters. When it empties into those waters, the sea will become fresh. Wherever the river flows, life will flourish—great schools of fish—because the river is turning the salt sea into fresh water. Where the river flows, life abounds. Fishermen will stand shoulder to shoulder along the shore from En-gedi all the way north to En-eglaim, casting their nets. The sea will teem with fish of all kinds, like the fish of the Great Mediterranean.
11 “The swamps and marshes won’t become fresh. They’ll stay salty.
12 “But the river itself, on both banks, will grow fruit trees of all kinds. Their leaves won’t wither, the fruit won’t fail. Every month they’ll bear fresh fruit because the river from the Sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will be for food and their leaves for healing.”
Divide Up This Land
13-14 A Message from God, the Master: “These are the boundaries by which you are to divide up the inheritance of the land for the twelve tribes of Israel, with Joseph getting two parcels. It is to be divided up equally. I swore in a solemn oath to give it to your ancestors, swore that this land would be your inheritance.
15-17 “These are the boundaries of the land:
“The northern boundary runs from the Great Mediterranean Sea along the Hethlon road to where you turn off to the entrance of Hamath, Zedad, Berothah, and Sibraim, which lies between the territory of Damascus and the territory of Hamath, and on to Hazor-hatticon on the border of Hauran. The boundary runs from the Sea to Hazor-enon, with the territories of Damascus and Hamath to the north. That is the northern boundary.
18 “The eastern boundary runs between Damascus and Hauran, down along the Jordan between Gilead and the land of Israel to the Eastern Sea as far as Tamar. This is the eastern boundary.
19 “The southern boundary runs west from Tamar to the waters of Meribah-kadesh, along the Brook of Egypt, and out to the Great Mediterranean Sea. This is the southern boundary.
20 “The western boundary is formed by the Great Mediterranean Sea north to where the road turns east toward the entrance to Hamath. This is the western boundary.
21-23 “Divide up this land among the twelve tribes of Israel. Divide it up as your inheritance, and include in it the resident aliens who have made themselves at home among you and now have children. Treat them as if they were born there, just like yourselves. They also get an inheritance among the tribes of Israel. In whatever tribe the resident alien lives, there he gets his inheritance. Decree of God, the Master.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Thursday, June 15, 2017
Read: Ephesians 4:1–6
To Be Mature
1-3 In light of all this, here’s what I want you to do. While I’m locked up here, a prisoner for the Master, I want you to get out there and walk—better yet, run!—on the road God called you to travel. I don’t want any of you sitting around on your hands. I don’t want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes nowhere. And mark that you do this with humility and discipline—not in fits and starts, but steadily, pouring yourselves out for each other in acts of love, alert at noticing differences and quick at mending fences.
4-6 You were all called to travel on the same road and in the same direction, so stay together, both outwardly and inwardly. You have one Master, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who rules over all, works through all, and is present in all. Everything you are and think and do is permeated with Oneness.
INSIGHT:
When Paul wrote his New Testament letter to followers of Christ in Ephesus, he wrote out of his own experience. When he urged his readers to work through their disagreements with humility, gentleness, and patience, he knew that it takes more than personal resolve. He had once lived with a head full of knowledge and a heart running on empty. As Paul wrote to men and women who had hurt one another with anger, lies, and bitterness (Eph. 4:25–32), he helped them see beyond their own blind spots. He wanted them to know that learning to love one another isn’t something we can do through our own ability. He asked the Spirit of God to reach deep into their hearts and open their eyes to God’s immeasurable love for them (3:14–19) and reminded them that even when we can’t see the way forward—and back to one another—there is a Spirit who can do far more for us than we could ever ask or think (v. 20).
The Bond of Peace
By Amy Boucher Pye
Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. Ephesians 4:3
After I confronted my friend by email over a matter on which we had differed, she didn’t respond. Had I overstepped? I didn’t want to worsen the situation by pestering her, but neither did I want to leave things unresolved before she went on a trip overseas. As she popped into my mind throughout the following days, I prayed for her, unsure of the way forward. Then one morning I went for a walk in our local park and saw her, pain etched on her face as she glimpsed me. “Thank You, Lord, that I can talk to her,” I breathed as I approached her with a welcoming smile. We talked openly and were able to resolve matters.
Sometimes when hurt or silence intrudes on our relationships, mending them seems out of our control. But as the apostle Paul says in his letter to the church at Ephesus, we are called to work for peace and unity through God’s Spirit, donning the garments of gentleness, humility, and patience as we seek God’s healing in our relationships. The Lord yearns for us to be united, and through His Spirit He can bring His people together—even unexpectedly when we go walking in the park.
God desires unity among believers.
Have you experienced an unexpected encounter that revealed God working in a situation? How might you work toward peace and unity today?
Share your comments on our Facebook page: Facebook.com/ourdailybread.
God desires unity among believers.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, June 15, 2017
Get Moving! (2)
Also…add to your faith… —2 Peter 1:5
In the matter of drudgery. Peter said in this passage that we have become “partakers of the divine nature” and that we should now be “giving all diligence,” concentrating on forming godly habits (2 Peter 1:4-5). We are to “add” to our lives all that character means. No one is born either naturally or supernaturally with character; it must be developed. Nor are we born with habits— we have to form godly habits on the basis of the new life God has placed within us. We are not meant to be seen as God’s perfect, bright-shining examples, but to be seen as the everyday essence of ordinary life exhibiting the miracle of His grace. Drudgery is the test of genuine character. The greatest hindrance in our spiritual life is that we will only look for big things to do. Yet, “Jesus…took a towel and…began to wash the disciples’ feet…” (John 13:3-5).
We all have those times when there are no flashes of light and no apparent thrill to life, where we experience nothing but the daily routine with its common everyday tasks. The routine of life is actually God’s way of saving us between our times of great inspiration which come from Him. Don’t always expect God to give you His thrilling moments, but learn to live in those common times of the drudgery of life by the power of God.
It is difficult for us to do the “adding” that Peter mentioned here. We say we do not expect God to take us to heaven on flowery beds of ease, and yet we act as if we do! I must realize that my obedience even in the smallest detail of life has all of the omnipotent power of the grace of God behind it. If I will do my duty, not for duty’s sake but because I believe God is engineering my circumstances, then at the very point of my obedience all of the magnificent grace of God is mine through the glorious atonement by the Cross of Christ.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Awe is the condition of a man’s spirit realizing Who God is and what He has done for him personally. Our Lord emphasizes the attitude of a child; no attitude can express such solemn awe and familiarity as that of a child. Not Knowing Whither, 882 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, June 15, 2017
When The Captain Is Not At The Helm - #7939
It was the largest oil spill in American history and in a sense, it was largely the fault of one man. The tanker Exxon Valdez, you might remember, ran aground on a reef in Alaska's Prince William Sound. The resulting oil spill did incalculable damage to the local fishing industry, to the environment in that very majestic piece of America, and to a lot of wildlife. The Commander of the Coast Guard said the passage there is ten miles across. He said, "so wide your children could pilot a tanker through there!" So how did this happen? Well, an unlicensed third-mate was on the bridge that day, piloting the vessel. He was where the captain should have been. The captain was down below! That disaster happened largely because the man who should have been on the bridge – wasn't!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have A Word With You today about "When The Captain Is Not At The Helm."
In our word for today from the Word of God, we see what happens when the captain of a family forfeits the helm. As we look at the story in Genesis 16:1, remember that God has promised the captain of this family, Abram, that he and his wife Sarai are going to miraculously have a son in their old age. A son from whom a nation will come, and the son who they have been waiting for a while.
The Bible says, "Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar; so she said to Abram, ‘The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her.' Abram agreed to what Sarai said."
Well, in essence, the captain of this family abandoned the helm and he let his wife call the shots. Thus, Ishmael was conceived and born – and from him, the Arabic people in the world today. Thirteen years later, elderly Sarai is miraculously pregnant (just as predicted) – with Isaac, the child God promised in His time, and the child from whom the Jews have come. The result of Abram's forfeiture of leadership has been ongoing conflict and bitter wars in his own family, and then throughout the centuries and right into our world today.
There is a Biblical principle underscored in this negative example from scripture and it's this: the buck for the family stops with the man. You can see it in Ephesians 5 where the husband is portrayed as the Christ-figure in the family, who leads with self-sacrificing love. You can see it in the Garden of Eden when God holds Adam responsible for the sin his wife initiated. You can see it when Sarah laughs at God's promise of a son – and God comes asking Abram, "Why did your wife react in unbelief?"
When you stand before the Lord, you can be sure who the Lord will ask about what happened in your family – the husband, the father, the captain. Oh, sure, of course Mom's going to bear some responsibility too. But ultimately the buck stops with the man.
In our world, a lot of families are drifting because the captain is down below, forfeiting the leadership that God insists he is responsible for. If you're the man of the family, take stock: Are you taking the lead in keeping your family focused on the Lord? Are you leading your family in making decisions, or are you avoiding the tough choices? Are you facing the fact that many of the things that frustrate you in your wife might be because of needs you're not meeting?
In family finances, in decision-making, in spiritual things, in keeping communication going – God says the husband, the Dad, is the captain. When the captain is not at the helm – families go aground, and the results are very costly.
Make God’s presence your passion. How? Be more sponge and less rock. Put a rock in the ocean, and what happens? It’s surface gets wet. The exterior may change color, but the interior remains untouched. Yet place a sponge in the ocean, and notice the change. It absorbs the water. The ocean penetrates every pore and alters the essence of the sponge. God surrounds us in the same way the Pacific surrounds an ocean floor pebble. He is everywhere—above, below, on all sides.
We choose our response—rock or sponge? Resist or receive? Everything within you says harden the heart. Run from God; resist God; blame God. But be careful. Hard hearts never heal. Spongy ones do. The Psalmist determined, “When I am afraid, I will trust in You.” Open every pore of your soul to God’s presence!
From You’ll Get Through This
Ezekiel 47
Trees on Both Sides of the River
1-2 Now he brought me back to the entrance to the Temple. I saw water pouring out from under the Temple porch to the east (the Temple faced east). The water poured from the south side of the Temple, south of the altar. He then took me out through the north gate and led me around the outside to the gate complex on the east. The water was gushing from under the south front of the Temple.
3-5 He walked to the east with a measuring tape and measured off fifteen hundred feet, leading me through water that was ankle-deep. He measured off another fifteen hundred feet, leading me through water that was knee-deep. He measured off another fifteen hundred feet, leading me through water waist-deep. He measured off another fifteen hundred feet. By now it was a river over my head, water to swim in, water no one could possibly walk through.
6-7 He said, “Son of man, have you had a good look?”
Then he took me back to the riverbank. While sitting on the bank, I noticed a lot of trees on both sides of the river.
8-10 He told me, “This water flows east, descends to the Arabah and then into the sea, the sea of stagnant waters. When it empties into those waters, the sea will become fresh. Wherever the river flows, life will flourish—great schools of fish—because the river is turning the salt sea into fresh water. Where the river flows, life abounds. Fishermen will stand shoulder to shoulder along the shore from En-gedi all the way north to En-eglaim, casting their nets. The sea will teem with fish of all kinds, like the fish of the Great Mediterranean.
11 “The swamps and marshes won’t become fresh. They’ll stay salty.
12 “But the river itself, on both banks, will grow fruit trees of all kinds. Their leaves won’t wither, the fruit won’t fail. Every month they’ll bear fresh fruit because the river from the Sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will be for food and their leaves for healing.”
Divide Up This Land
13-14 A Message from God, the Master: “These are the boundaries by which you are to divide up the inheritance of the land for the twelve tribes of Israel, with Joseph getting two parcels. It is to be divided up equally. I swore in a solemn oath to give it to your ancestors, swore that this land would be your inheritance.
15-17 “These are the boundaries of the land:
“The northern boundary runs from the Great Mediterranean Sea along the Hethlon road to where you turn off to the entrance of Hamath, Zedad, Berothah, and Sibraim, which lies between the territory of Damascus and the territory of Hamath, and on to Hazor-hatticon on the border of Hauran. The boundary runs from the Sea to Hazor-enon, with the territories of Damascus and Hamath to the north. That is the northern boundary.
18 “The eastern boundary runs between Damascus and Hauran, down along the Jordan between Gilead and the land of Israel to the Eastern Sea as far as Tamar. This is the eastern boundary.
19 “The southern boundary runs west from Tamar to the waters of Meribah-kadesh, along the Brook of Egypt, and out to the Great Mediterranean Sea. This is the southern boundary.
20 “The western boundary is formed by the Great Mediterranean Sea north to where the road turns east toward the entrance to Hamath. This is the western boundary.
21-23 “Divide up this land among the twelve tribes of Israel. Divide it up as your inheritance, and include in it the resident aliens who have made themselves at home among you and now have children. Treat them as if they were born there, just like yourselves. They also get an inheritance among the tribes of Israel. In whatever tribe the resident alien lives, there he gets his inheritance. Decree of God, the Master.”
Our Daily Bread reading and devotion
Thursday, June 15, 2017
Read: Ephesians 4:1–6
To Be Mature
1-3 In light of all this, here’s what I want you to do. While I’m locked up here, a prisoner for the Master, I want you to get out there and walk—better yet, run!—on the road God called you to travel. I don’t want any of you sitting around on your hands. I don’t want anyone strolling off, down some path that goes nowhere. And mark that you do this with humility and discipline—not in fits and starts, but steadily, pouring yourselves out for each other in acts of love, alert at noticing differences and quick at mending fences.
4-6 You were all called to travel on the same road and in the same direction, so stay together, both outwardly and inwardly. You have one Master, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who rules over all, works through all, and is present in all. Everything you are and think and do is permeated with Oneness.
INSIGHT:
When Paul wrote his New Testament letter to followers of Christ in Ephesus, he wrote out of his own experience. When he urged his readers to work through their disagreements with humility, gentleness, and patience, he knew that it takes more than personal resolve. He had once lived with a head full of knowledge and a heart running on empty. As Paul wrote to men and women who had hurt one another with anger, lies, and bitterness (Eph. 4:25–32), he helped them see beyond their own blind spots. He wanted them to know that learning to love one another isn’t something we can do through our own ability. He asked the Spirit of God to reach deep into their hearts and open their eyes to God’s immeasurable love for them (3:14–19) and reminded them that even when we can’t see the way forward—and back to one another—there is a Spirit who can do far more for us than we could ever ask or think (v. 20).
The Bond of Peace
By Amy Boucher Pye
Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. Ephesians 4:3
After I confronted my friend by email over a matter on which we had differed, she didn’t respond. Had I overstepped? I didn’t want to worsen the situation by pestering her, but neither did I want to leave things unresolved before she went on a trip overseas. As she popped into my mind throughout the following days, I prayed for her, unsure of the way forward. Then one morning I went for a walk in our local park and saw her, pain etched on her face as she glimpsed me. “Thank You, Lord, that I can talk to her,” I breathed as I approached her with a welcoming smile. We talked openly and were able to resolve matters.
Sometimes when hurt or silence intrudes on our relationships, mending them seems out of our control. But as the apostle Paul says in his letter to the church at Ephesus, we are called to work for peace and unity through God’s Spirit, donning the garments of gentleness, humility, and patience as we seek God’s healing in our relationships. The Lord yearns for us to be united, and through His Spirit He can bring His people together—even unexpectedly when we go walking in the park.
God desires unity among believers.
Have you experienced an unexpected encounter that revealed God working in a situation? How might you work toward peace and unity today?
Share your comments on our Facebook page: Facebook.com/ourdailybread.
God desires unity among believers.
My Utmost for His Highest, by Oswald Chambers
Thursday, June 15, 2017
Get Moving! (2)
Also…add to your faith… —2 Peter 1:5
In the matter of drudgery. Peter said in this passage that we have become “partakers of the divine nature” and that we should now be “giving all diligence,” concentrating on forming godly habits (2 Peter 1:4-5). We are to “add” to our lives all that character means. No one is born either naturally or supernaturally with character; it must be developed. Nor are we born with habits— we have to form godly habits on the basis of the new life God has placed within us. We are not meant to be seen as God’s perfect, bright-shining examples, but to be seen as the everyday essence of ordinary life exhibiting the miracle of His grace. Drudgery is the test of genuine character. The greatest hindrance in our spiritual life is that we will only look for big things to do. Yet, “Jesus…took a towel and…began to wash the disciples’ feet…” (John 13:3-5).
We all have those times when there are no flashes of light and no apparent thrill to life, where we experience nothing but the daily routine with its common everyday tasks. The routine of life is actually God’s way of saving us between our times of great inspiration which come from Him. Don’t always expect God to give you His thrilling moments, but learn to live in those common times of the drudgery of life by the power of God.
It is difficult for us to do the “adding” that Peter mentioned here. We say we do not expect God to take us to heaven on flowery beds of ease, and yet we act as if we do! I must realize that my obedience even in the smallest detail of life has all of the omnipotent power of the grace of God behind it. If I will do my duty, not for duty’s sake but because I believe God is engineering my circumstances, then at the very point of my obedience all of the magnificent grace of God is mine through the glorious atonement by the Cross of Christ.
WISDOM FROM OSWALD CHAMBERS
Awe is the condition of a man’s spirit realizing Who God is and what He has done for him personally. Our Lord emphasizes the attitude of a child; no attitude can express such solemn awe and familiarity as that of a child. Not Knowing Whither, 882 L
A Word with You, by Ron Hutchcraft
Thursday, June 15, 2017
When The Captain Is Not At The Helm - #7939
It was the largest oil spill in American history and in a sense, it was largely the fault of one man. The tanker Exxon Valdez, you might remember, ran aground on a reef in Alaska's Prince William Sound. The resulting oil spill did incalculable damage to the local fishing industry, to the environment in that very majestic piece of America, and to a lot of wildlife. The Commander of the Coast Guard said the passage there is ten miles across. He said, "so wide your children could pilot a tanker through there!" So how did this happen? Well, an unlicensed third-mate was on the bridge that day, piloting the vessel. He was where the captain should have been. The captain was down below! That disaster happened largely because the man who should have been on the bridge – wasn't!
I'm Ron Hutchcraft, and I want to have A Word With You today about "When The Captain Is Not At The Helm."
In our word for today from the Word of God, we see what happens when the captain of a family forfeits the helm. As we look at the story in Genesis 16:1, remember that God has promised the captain of this family, Abram, that he and his wife Sarai are going to miraculously have a son in their old age. A son from whom a nation will come, and the son who they have been waiting for a while.
The Bible says, "Now Sarai, Abram's wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian maidservant named Hagar; so she said to Abram, ‘The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my maidservant; perhaps I can build a family through her.' Abram agreed to what Sarai said."
Well, in essence, the captain of this family abandoned the helm and he let his wife call the shots. Thus, Ishmael was conceived and born – and from him, the Arabic people in the world today. Thirteen years later, elderly Sarai is miraculously pregnant (just as predicted) – with Isaac, the child God promised in His time, and the child from whom the Jews have come. The result of Abram's forfeiture of leadership has been ongoing conflict and bitter wars in his own family, and then throughout the centuries and right into our world today.
There is a Biblical principle underscored in this negative example from scripture and it's this: the buck for the family stops with the man. You can see it in Ephesians 5 where the husband is portrayed as the Christ-figure in the family, who leads with self-sacrificing love. You can see it in the Garden of Eden when God holds Adam responsible for the sin his wife initiated. You can see it when Sarah laughs at God's promise of a son – and God comes asking Abram, "Why did your wife react in unbelief?"
When you stand before the Lord, you can be sure who the Lord will ask about what happened in your family – the husband, the father, the captain. Oh, sure, of course Mom's going to bear some responsibility too. But ultimately the buck stops with the man.
In our world, a lot of families are drifting because the captain is down below, forfeiting the leadership that God insists he is responsible for. If you're the man of the family, take stock: Are you taking the lead in keeping your family focused on the Lord? Are you leading your family in making decisions, or are you avoiding the tough choices? Are you facing the fact that many of the things that frustrate you in your wife might be because of needs you're not meeting?
In family finances, in decision-making, in spiritual things, in keeping communication going – God says the husband, the Dad, is the captain. When the captain is not at the helm – families go aground, and the results are very costly.
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