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Post by Obadiah on Jun 19, 2023 5:35:37 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 19TH
Old Natures Never Die
And Abimelech asked Abraham, What was your reason for doing this?
Genesis 20:10
Has anyone had to say to you, As a Christian, what were you thinking of when you did this thing? Have you ever had to say it to yourself: What got into me anyway? I thought I was further along in the Christian life than this. Here I have done this thing that I thought had long ago passed out of my life. Whatever got into me? If you have ever had to ask yourself that, you need to learn the lesson Abraham had to learn here.
You are still capable of the worst sin that you have ever committed—and more. Abraham has been a coward for thirty years, and he is still capable of being the same coward he was at the beginning, hiding behind his wife, subjecting her to dishonor and disgrace and shame in order to protect his own skin.
This old nature with which we are born, which is perverted and twisted so that it never operates as God intended it to, is totally depraved. That does not mean that it cannot do what appears to be nice things in the eyes of others and even of ourselves. There is something about the old self, the flesh, which is able to simulate righteousness. In the flesh's pursuit after pseudorighteousness, even if it succeeds in an outward demonstration of a sweet and lovely nature, it has never achieved anything but self-righteousness. Self-righteousness always demands self-praise, a longing to be admired and to win the attention of others. If you fail in your pursuit of self-righteousness, the result is self-pity. Either way, it is the flesh, and it can never please God. This is why when God comes into the human heart through Christ, He never tries to do anything about cleaning up that old nature. He writes it off as worthless. No matter how it looks in the eyes of others, if it comes from the self-advancing, self-centered core, it is worthless, and it always will be. What you now are in the flesh you always will be, if you live a hundred years. If you lay hold of that concept, you will find it one of the most encouraging truths in your Christian life, because it will release you from that awful burden of self-effort that tries to make the old nature behave itself. You must renounce self as the Word of God tells you to and quit feeding it, protecting it, polishing it up, trying to make it look good. Give it up. Accept all that Jesus Christ is in you and wants to be through you, for His nature is perfect.
Any dependence upon self always results in the kind of experience that Abraham had. After thirty years of walking with God and learning wonderful lessons in the spiritual life, the minute he steps out of a dependence upon God, he steps back into that same ugly nature he had in the beginning, and it is unchanged after thirty years. Old natures have to be kept under control by walking in the Spirit. Live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature, Paul tells us (Galatians 5:16).
Father, You have not called me to improve myself. Help me to recognize what I am, that in myself I can never be good enough, and to appropriate all that Christ can be to me and through me, for His life is satisfying to You.
Life Application
Our old natures never die and we can be confused by its deceptiveness. Are we choosing to die to all of that and live out our new identity in the Lord Jesus Christ?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 20, 2023 5:35:10 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 20TH
A Supernatural Birth
Now the LORD was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did for Sarah what he had promised.
Genesis 21:1
This verse pictures the joy of fulfillment. At last we have two sons of Abraham living side-by-side, Isaac and Ishmael. We don't need to wonder what this means in the life of faith, because in Galatians 4, Paul tells us. He says that Isaac is a picture of that which is born of the Spirit, and Ishmael is a picture of that which is born of the flesh. Isaac is the result of a life controlled by the Spirit. What does that mean to us? In that same letter he tells us, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5:22-23a). These are the Isaacs for which we have been waiting. Ishmael, on the other hand, stands for the works of the flesh that are outlined in that very same chapter.
Notice how that is confirmed in this passage. First, Isaac's birth was supernatural. He was not born until Abraham and Sarah had reached an advanced age. Sarah was ninety years old, and Abraham was one hundred. It occurred at the set time, some thirty years after God had first promised to give Abraham a son. In Romans 4:19a, Paul refers to this time and says, Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah's womb was also dead. This was a supernatural birth, where God quickened the natural processes again and a child was born.
Do you see now why God waited all this long time to fulfill the promise to Abraham? He was waiting until the ability and forces of natural man had ceased so His promise could definitely be a supernatural fulfillment. This is exactly what God says to us about the fruit of the Spirit in our lives. It will never come from the flesh. It will never come from self-effort or by positive thinking or by perpetual trying. Love, joy, and peace—those wonderful gifts of God—never come from any attempt on our part to imitate them. You can imitate them, but they will never be anything but an imitation. You cannot produce the fruit of the Spirit by the flesh, because that fruit is the supernatural gift from the life lived in the power of the Spirit of God, born as Isaac was here.
Lord, I see both Isaac and Ishmael within me. Produce in me those Isaac-like qualities that I cannot generate in myself.
Life Application
Are we trying our best to imitate the nourishing and life-giving fruit that can be produced only by God's Spirit? Do we see the difference between trying and trusting?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 21, 2023 5:15:30 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 21ST
Ishmael Must Go!
But God said to him, Do not be so distressed about the boy and your maidservant. Listen to whatever Sarah tells you, because it is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned. Genesis 21:12
If Isaac represents the gladsome fullness of the fruit of the Spirit, then Ishmael represents some pet manifestation of our self-life in which we find comfort and delight and that we do not want to surrender. Some place value on what they have long suspected is not what God would have but that they were reluctant to give up. Perhaps it is some long-standing habit that we have been defending. There can be habits or values in our lives that are really some form of self-indulgence. God may allow them for a while, but the time comes when He says, Now, these have to go.
God says that Ishmael could never share in the inheritance with Isaac. This is exactly what Jesus meant when He said, Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit (John 3:6). When the time comes for us to stand before our Lord at the judgment seat of Christ, our lives will be classified into two areas: works of wood, hay, and straw, which are of the flesh; and those of gold, silver, and precious stones, which are of the Spirit (see 1 Corinthians 3:10-15). The Lord says to us as he says to Abraham, Ishmael must go. If you refuse to expose, examine, and remove that which is born of the flesh, even though God has said that it hurts you and He has shown you the peace, joy, and love that is the fruit of the Spirit, then you must face this choice as Abraham did.
Dr. Barnhouse once wrote, Early in my ministry, I had the idea that I must strike out against all error wherever I saw it... if error was in some fundamental leader with whom I was in 95% agreement, I swung hard at the 5%. This made Dr. Barnhouse a highly controversial figure, often unmercifully sharp and dogmatic. This zeal for truth became an Ishmael in his life. Then he tells how there came a time when the Spirit of God taught him to love, and he faced the choice—Ishmael had to go. He had to learn to be more understanding and more tolerant of some of the variant views of others.
He wrote, Some time ago, I published a New Year's resolution expressing regret that I had had differences with men who are truly born again. The results of that resolution were astounding. In the years that followed its publication, my ministry has been transformed. The closing years of his life show much of his mellowing and of the sweetness of the fruit of the Spirit in one who before had been so harsh, critical, and demanding.
I don't know what form Ishmael may be taking in your life, but I know there are times when God says to us, simply, this must go. There can be no manifestation of the life of the Spirit any longer until this is dealt with. Abraham obeyed. Early in the morning, he got up and took bread and a skin of water and, though it cost him heartbreak to do it, sent Hagar and Ishmael out, so that he might have the fullness of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus.
Lord, I ask that I would sincerely long to be a completely yielded vessel of Your joy and strength and peace. May I have the grace to cast out Ishmael and find the fullness and joy of Isaac.
Life Application
Old habits and thought patterns can become comfortable. Do we respond obediently when God asks us to put them away so our inner healing can bring lasting joy?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 22, 2023 5:15:04 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 22ND
When Wandering Stops
Then God opened her eyes and she saw a well of water. So she went and filled the skin with water and gave the boy a drink.
Genesis 21:19
The well around which this story occurs is the central theme. The spiritual significance of this well is easy for us to identify, since it occurs frequently in the Bible to picture the Word of God. The water in the well is often Christ as the source of refreshment to the thirsty soul. Remember how the Lord said to the woman of Samaria as she came down to the well, The water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life (John 4:14b). Wells in Scripture often picture that relationship.
In Galatians Paul tells us how to interpret Hagar and Ishmael, what they mean to us in the program of God. He says that Hagar stands for Mount Sinai in Arabia (Galatians 4:25), from which the law was given. She and Ishmael are a picture of the present Jerusalem, which is the nation of Israel that refused Christ and yet retained the promises and God's preserving care in their lives. Israel persecuted all those within the nation who turned to Christ in the early days of the church. In Romans Paul tells us that after Israel rejected Christ, a blindness came upon a part of the nation, which would last until all the Gentiles who would believe had come (Romans 11:25-26). Here in the Old Testament, two thousand years before our Lord came, this was shown to us in the life of Abraham.
Like Ishmael, the nation of Israel has wandered in the wilderness of the world ever since Passion Week, when the people gathered before Pilate and said, We don't want this man to be our king, (Luke 19:14) and Let his blood be on us and on our children! (Matthew 27:25b). Shortly afterwards the city of Jerusalem was destroyed and the temple ransacked and demolished, and Israel was driven out into the nations. They wandered like Ishmael in the desert for centuries, without any central place of gathering, without any of the real worship of God they once knew back in the Old Testament days. They have been wandering in the wilderness ever since, perishing with thirst.
But the New Testament tells us a day is coming when their eyes will be opened, just as Hagar's eyes were opened here, and she saw the well. The well is the Word of God, portraying Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Perhaps we are nearing the very hour when Israel, the nation that has been wandering in unbelief around the earth ever since that time, will have their eyes opened and behold Christ once again in their own Scriptures. Many have asked why the Jews do not believe in Christ if the Old Testament is so full of Jesus Christ. The answer is that Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in (Romans 11:25b). Not all Jews refuse to believe, but many of them, even with the testimony of their own Scriptures, do not believe Jesus is the Messiah. But God says that a day will come at last when their eyes will be opened. They will be refreshed with blessing. God will be with them, and, just as He made Ishmael great, He will make them a great nation again.
Thank You, Father, that all the things you have written in Your Word will come to pass. You are the sovereign God of history, and I praise You that You fulfill all Your promises to Your people.
Life Application
Do we think of prayer as merely an emergency hot line? Are we missing the amazing privilege of partnering with God through habitual, confident, dependent prayer?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 23, 2023 9:32:40 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 23RD
This Thirsty World
Abraham planted a tamarisk tree in Beersheba, and there he called upon the name of the LORD, the Eternal God. Genesis 21:33
Here is old Abraham just planting a tree and living by his well. Why are we told this? It is symbolic of what is taking place in his heart and life. The tree immediately brings to mind Psalm 1, which says the man of God will be like a tree planted by rivers of living water, bringing forth its fruit in season. Here is a life that is fruitful, that is concerned about those immediately around and is pouring out blessing into their lives and hearts.
Abraham calls on the name of Jehovah, the Eternal God. If the church desires to do anything to help this poor, blind, bleeding, struggling world in which we live, it will only be as Christian people rediscover what it means to live daily in the strength, the power, the purpose, and the glory of calling upon the Eternal God. This is what writes joy in our hearts, joy that the world is so vainly seeking to find. Abraham found joy, and thus he was the center of blessing to the land of the Philistines. In finding and rediscovering those springs of spiritual strength, he did more to advance the cause of social justice and welfare in the land of the Philistines than any of their programs and plans could have done.
The world about us today is looking for reality more than it ever has before. The world is desperately searching for men and women of conviction who will stand for what they believe and who will not hesitate to declare it and to say no when it means involvement with something they believe is wrong. The world is looking for men and women who have convictions, and convictions come only from a life that is involved in a living fellowship with a living God. This is what sent that new church in New Testament days out with such triumphant victory over every obstacle. They swept everything before them because they were in daily fellowship with the living God.
But if we are not in fellowship with the Lord, we will have nothing to offer. We would be like a crowd of waiters in a restaurant going back to the kitchen and saying to the cook, Look, we are having problems in getting this food out to these people. Why don't you leave the stove and come out here and help us? If the cook is wise, he will say to them, Fellows, the worst thing I could do would be to go out to help you. It is true that you have a problem, and you have to work it out, but if someone is not here cooking, there will not be anything to distribute. If there is no fountain of morality in the church, if there are not lives that are discovering the strength and inner peace and power that come from fellowship with Christ and a living God, there will not be anything to distribute! With that in mind, let us give ourselves anew to this supreme task of the church of Christ, which is the declaring of the good news of Jesus Christ, that people may be saved and their lives transformed by coming to know a living God.
Father, I pray that I may rediscover with Abraham the secret of being a friend of God, a man or woman of God, by which lives are changed.
Life Application
Is it enough to accept ideology and doctrine simply because it sounds spiritual? Are we staying alert to the many & varied deceptions taught by wolves clothed as sheep?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 24, 2023 7:12:53 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 24TH
Life's Hardest Trial
[Abraham] said to his servants, Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you. Genesis 22:5
The word is silent about the emotional reaction of Abraham here, but we have only to put ourselves in his place to sense what he felt, how his heart was torn, how he avoids telling Isaac the fearful truth until the very last possible moment, how he perhaps trembles within when Isaac asks the question, Where is the lamb? We know there is no real answer to Isaac's question until we run through intervening centuries and listen in the New Testament to John the Baptist standing before the people of Israel saying, Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29).
Where did this stricken father find the strength to carry through this fearsome task? The answer is found here in one brief phrase in verse 5, Abraham said to his servants, 'Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.' Abraham is not trying to deceive these men, but somewhere in the quiet meditations of that awful night when this word first came to him, there came the consciousness that God could do something to raise this boy from the dead, and Abraham believed in resurrection. That is where he found the peace to follow God's command. In the struggles of that night, he began to reason and to reckon on God.
He must have thought something like this: God has given me promises, and I have lived with God long enough to know that when God gives a promise, He carries it through. God has said that in my son Isaac all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. Isaac is necessary to the fulfillment of the promise. It can't be any other; He has said this boy is the one who is going to be the fulfillment of the promise. Well then, if God has asked me now to offer him up as a sacrifice, there is only one explanation. God intends to raise him from the dead.
Abraham had never had, as we have today, the experience or the record of anyone having risen from the dead. Yet so firm is his faith in the character of God that he comes to a realization of the resurrection. This is confirmed in Hebrews 11: By faith Abraham offered Isaac. . . Abraham reasoned that God could raise the dead... (Hebrews 11:17,19). Abraham risked everything he owned and loved on the character of God and found Him to be a God of resurrection.
Because of this wonderful triumph in his life, Abraham calls this place, God will provide, And based on this miracle there sprang up a little saying in Israel, a proverb: When you get to the mount, it will be provided. God's ways with people are such that it seems as though deliverance will never come. It seems that you will never be delivered. But if you go on, when you get to the mount, it will be provided. People's disappointments are God's appointments. It is never too late for God. Even if Abraham had been required to carry the bloody business through to its end, his father's heart was quiet in restful peace because he knew God would raise his son from the dead.
God, thank You that regardless of what You call me to lay on the altar in obedience to You, You always know what is best, and You always have a plan.
Life Application
Our world is filled with corruption and suffering that seems to certify the triumph of the evil one. Do we view it all through the lens of God's character and Sovereign power?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 25, 2023 6:17:28 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 25TH
What God Gives Back
I swear by myself declares the LORD, that because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you Genesis 22:16-17
When Abraham gave his son back to God, then God said the promise of fruitfulness would be immediately fulfilled. The rivers of living waters would now begin to flow out from him to bless all the nations of the earth as God had promised. It was when Isaac came back from the dead, so to speak, in resurrection power that God said, Now the fruitfulness of your life will be manifest.
Even God's gifts to us are of no value until we are willing, if necessary, to lose them so that God might reign without a rival in our hearts. When we have to come to that place to which the Spirit of God wants to bring us, that perfect relationship with the Father when God means more to us than anything, and we are even willing to give up the very gift that God has given, then in resurrection power that gift will be a blessing to everyone it touches.
We all have been given gifts from God. Maybe God has given you a special talent, and you are asked to take a job where perhaps you can't use that talent. You wonder about it and perhaps rebel over it. But remember Abraham, and give it back to God. Face the possibility of not using that talent, and the God of resurrection will take that talent and return it to you and make it a blessing to many hearts. Perhaps you have a loved one, and a situation arises in which you have to part from that one or break that relationship. This is a struggle, but Abraham's faith says that if God asks you to do it, then there is blessing beyond if you obey. Maybe you are living in a situation of comfort and happiness, but you are needed in another place that is not as pleasant, and you say, Lord, why do I have to give up my home and my relationships that I enjoy and go there? Remember, however, that if God calls, you must obey.
Beyond the apparent heartbreak and death lies resurrection. In the resurrection of that experience, God will give you back that gift and make it a blessing. Is not this the record of every man and woman whose life has ever counted for God, who have been willing to give up the very areas they thought were God's choice blessing for them when God called? In so doing, God made them a blessing. It can be in minor or major areas. This is the principle of the cross throughout all our lives. This is what makes resurrection life possible. When it looks as though we are throwing away every chance of blessing, God transforms in a moment the very thing we give up into the most richly rewarding and meaningful experience we have ever had.
I dare you to act upon this! I don't know what this sacrifice might be for you, but I know this is true, and God has written this account so we may know that this is His way in the affairs of people.
Thank You, Father, that beyond the heartbreak, there is resurrection. Give me the grace to act on this great promise.
Life Application
Have you ever received a gift from God that He is asking you to release back to Him? Are you willing for God to be in control of timing as you use His gifts?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 26, 2023 5:23:14 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 26TH
Till Death Do Us Part
Then Abraham rose from beside his dead wife and spoke to the Hittites. He said, I am an alien and a stranger among you
Genesis 23:3-4
I love the phrase Abraham rose from beside his dead wife. That signified squaring his shoulder, lifting up his eye, firming his step, and facing life again, and it is followed by a wonderful confession of faith: I am an alien and a stranger among you This is the word of a man who looks beyond all that earth has to offer and once more sees the city that has foundations whose builder and maker is God.
Although Abraham has been weeping in the valley of the shadow of death, he somehow senses there can be no shadow without a light somewhere. Have you learned that? When shadows come into your life, it is a sign that there must be light somewhere. Of course, if we turn our back on the light, then we ourselves are the ones who cause the shadow. I think people today are living in a constant shadow because their back is turned toward the light, and they themselves cast a pall upon their own existence. But if we face the light, looking at that light streaming from the city whose builder and maker is God, then the only shadow comes temporarily when some object obscures the light for a moment.
After all, that is what death is; it is simply a temporary obscuring of the light. But the man of faith lifts his eyes and looks beyond the shadow and sees the light still shining, and he says to these people, I am an alien and a stranger among you. Nothing satisfies me down here. I can never settle down among you. The whole land had been given to him by the promise of God, but the dead body of his wife before him reminds him that it is not yet God's time. His faith is not weakened by Sarah's death; rather, it is strengthened by it.
If Abraham had not remembered that he was a pilgrim and a stranger, his heart would have been crushed to despair by the death of his beloved life's companion. But Abraham lifts his eyes beyond this to the light from the city beyond. He remembers that nothing in this life was ever intended to fully meet the needs of the heart of the pilgrim stranger passing through.
Dr. Barnhouse told of a young woman whose husband had been killed in action during the war. When the telegram came, this Christian woman read it through and then said to her mother, I am going up to my room, and please don't disturb me. Her mother called her father at work and told him what had happened, and he came hurrying home and immediately went up to the room. His daughter didn't hear him come in, and he saw her kneeling beside her bed. The telegram was spread open on the bed before her. She was bowed over it. And as he stood there, he heard her say, Oh, my Father, my heavenly Father, The man turned around and went back down the stairs and said to his wife, She is in better hands than mine.
This is what faith does in the hour of grief. The very strength of Abraham's faith in the midst of anguish is that he is an alien and a stranger, a pilgrim passing through to that city that can alone satisfy the human heart.
Father, I know life can often strike with terrible blows. May I be captured by One who said that I can never be fully satisfied with what is here, and may my eyes be caught by the light that streams from the city beyond, that I may be here fitted for that place.
Life Application
Are we living in shadows created by turning our backs on the Truth and Life that are ours in Christ Jesus? To whom do we go when life tumbles in?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 27, 2023 7:13:26 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 26TH
Till Death Do Us Part
Then Abraham rose from beside his dead wife and spoke to the Hittites. He said, I am an alien and a stranger among you
Genesis 23:3-4
I love the phrase Abraham rose from beside his dead wife. That signified squaring his shoulder, lifting up his eye, firming his step, and facing life again, and it is followed by a wonderful confession of faith: I am an alien and a stranger among you This is the word of a man who looks beyond all that earth has to offer and once more sees the city that has foundations whose builder and maker is God.
Although Abraham has been weeping in the valley of the shadow of death, he somehow senses there can be no shadow without a light somewhere. Have you learned that? When shadows come into your life, it is a sign that there must be light somewhere. Of course, if we turn our back on the light, then we ourselves are the ones who cause the shadow. I think people today are living in a constant shadow because their back is turned toward the light, and they themselves cast a pall upon their own existence. But if we face the light, looking at that light streaming from the city whose builder and maker is God, then the only shadow comes temporarily when some object obscures the light for a moment.
After all, that is what death is; it is simply a temporary obscuring of the light. But the man of faith lifts his eyes and looks beyond the shadow and sees the light still shining, and he says to these people, I am an alien and a stranger among you. Nothing satisfies me down here. I can never settle down among you. The whole land had been given to him by the promise of God, but the dead body of his wife before him reminds him that it is not yet God's time. His faith is not weakened by Sarah's death; rather, it is strengthened by it.
If Abraham had not remembered that he was a pilgrim and a stranger, his heart would have been crushed to despair by the death of his beloved life's companion. But Abraham lifts his eyes beyond this to the light from the city beyond. He remembers that nothing in this life was ever intended to fully meet the needs of the heart of the pilgrim stranger passing through.
Dr. Barnhouse told of a young woman whose husband had been killed in action during the war. When the telegram came, this Christian woman read it through and then said to her mother, I am going up to my room, and please don't disturb me. Her mother called her father at work and told him what had happened, and he came hurrying home and immediately went up to the room. His daughter didn't hear him come in, and he saw her kneeling beside her bed. The telegram was spread open on the bed before her. She was bowed over it. And as he stood there, he heard her say, Oh, my Father, my heavenly Father, The man turned around and went back down the stairs and said to his wife, She is in better hands than mine.
This is what faith does in the hour of grief. The very strength of Abraham's faith in the midst of anguish is that he is an alien and a stranger, a pilgrim passing through to that city that can alone satisfy the human heart.
Father, I know life can often strike with terrible blows. May I be captured by One who said that I can never be fully satisfied with what is here, and may my eyes be caught by the light that streams from the city beyond, that I may be here fitted for that place.
Life Application
Are we living in shadows created by turning our backs on the Truth and Life that are ours in Christ Jesus? To whom do we go when life tumbles in?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 28, 2023 10:32:25 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 28TH
Here Comes The Bride
He said to the chief servant in his household, the one in charge of all that he had, Put your hand under my thigh. I want you to swear by the LORD, the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you will not get a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I am living, but will go to my country and my own relatives and get a wife for my son Isaac.
Genesis 24:2-4
If you read this chapter through carefully, you will find that the central character is not Rebekah, the bride. Little of her reaction is recorded here; she has a secondary part. The spotlight of the story really follows Abraham's servant, the central character. This is a picture of the Holy Spirit's work. But remember, the Spirit of God chooses to do His work largely through men and women, through those of us who are His. This is especially true in the work of calling out a people for God's name. God has given us the responsibility and the privilege of being His instruments to call His bride out of the world. So this story becomes a beautiful picture of the whole process of personal evangelism.
The process of bringing others to Christ begins with the command of God the Father. The initiative here is with Abraham. He sends his servant to do this work and binds him to the task with an oath. When the servant puts his hand under Abraham's thigh, he is simply practicing an oriental custom that recognized that the loins of the thigh were the source of life. For the servant, it was a representation of being bound in a solemn oath.
As we apply this to our own situation and see God the Father standing in the place of Abraham here, He is asking every servant to give himself to this task. The servant is unnamed here so that you and I can put our names here. The Father calls us and commands us to go and take a wife for His Son.
This is not an option for a believer in Jesus Christ. God has said, not only in the fashion we see here but also in direct statements in the Word of God, that the obligation rests upon believers to give themselves to the task of reaching others for Jesus Christ. God has said, Take a wife for my Son. And to this end, the Spirit of God has come into our hearts to dwell. His whole purpose of coming into your life and mine is that He might be what He is and do what He came to do. Our Lord Jesus is the one dwelling within, and we are told what He came to do. He said, For the Son of Man came to seek and to save what was lost (Luke 19:10). If this is what He came to do, we will find Him doing it in our lives if we give Him the opportunity.
Lord, help me to be responsive to the Spirit of God as He leads me to those He has prepared to hear about Your Son.
Life Application
Do we recognize and live by our mandate as disciples of the Lord Jesus? Are we responsive to the prompting of the Holy Spirit?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jun 29, 2023 6:53:54 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 29TH
Great Expectations
Then he prayed, O LORD, God of my master Abraham, give me success today, and show kindness to my master Abraham.
Genesis 24:12
The major emphasis of this passage is centered on what we might call the cooperation of the Spirit. This is the missing note in much personal evangelism. Many men and women have heard the command of God, Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation (Mark 16:15). They have recognized this is a command, but then they go out, acting as though it all depends upon them. This is where the grim-faced, fever-eyed fanatic comes from, on the one hand and, on the other, the timid, blushing, flustered Christian who hardly ever dares to utter a word. There is a failure to recognize that not only has God commanded us to do this, but he has also provided the Spirit by which to do it.
This is what we see as the story progresses. Here is a man expecting God to work. He does not go into this land and say to himself, Well now, the whole job is up to me. I have to find this girl, and how in the world am I going to find the right one? And after that, I must persuade her to come. How am I going to do that? It is very simple for this man, because he knows he is not left alone to do this task. An invisible partner is at work, preparing the way for him. I wish we would learn this lesson about our own witness. God has not left it to us to do alone. The work of reaching men and women for Christ is not a matter of human persuasion, but it is a divine call. God is at work to move, shape, and develop the lives and hearts of all.
Do you notice how Abraham's servant does it? First, he prays, revealing his expectation that God is at work. In his simple prayer he asks God to make the way clear, to indicate the one to whom God would have him speak. As he prays about his problem, he expects God to answer. This is a wonderful concept to remember when witnessing. When I get aboard a plane or train or go someplace where I may be in contact with someone who doesn't know the Lord, I ask God to indicate who is the one He wants me to talk with. Maybe there is no one; maybe the Lord wants me to spend my time reading or studying. But very likely He does have someone. I don't know with whom God is working, but I know that He will direct me through ways of which I am hardly conscious.
Teach me, Father, to be expectant of Your leading me to those people who are ready to hear Your Word.
Life Application
Are we expectant of God to minister through us to accomplish His purposes? Are we reckoning on our own ingenuity or resourcefulness to reach others with the Gospel?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jul 1, 2023 4:28:05 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JUNE 30TH
Gathered To His People
Altogether, Abraham lived a hundred and seventy-five years. Then Abraham breathed his last and died at a good old age, an old man and full of years; and he was gathered to his people. Genesis 25: 7-8
If you and I had been with Abraham at the moments of decision in his life, we might often have pitied him: When he left Ur, we might have said, Abraham, you poor fool, do you mean you are going to wander out there in the desert and perhaps live in a tent the rest your life, when you could have the enjoyment of the city and all of its blessings?
When he allowed Lot to choose the best of the land, perhaps some of us might have thought, Abraham, don't throw away your rights like that! You are the older one. You have the right to choose. Why let Lot take that choice piece while you are left with this dry old pasture? You are throwing away your rights. Abraham let Lot choose, and God chose for him.
And do you remember when the king of Sodom offered all the riches of his city to him, Abraham said, I'll not take even one of your shoelaces; I don't want any of it. Some of us would have been tempted to say, Now wait, Abraham, you are carrying this a little too far. You could have deducted this from your income tax, and just think what you are missing. You could have all the riches of Sodom. Think how you could use it in the Lord's work.
But Abraham chose God every time, and his was a life of fullness. He lived 175 years, and every one was packed full, spiced with excitement and adventure, filled with challenge and interest, rich in faith and blessing. He died an old man, full of days. There is the promise of a full life to those who live in the Spirit.
In verse 8 there is an indication that our pattern man of faith had divine fellowship; he was gathered to his people. What does that mean? It means that he was gathered to those before him who had exercised faith in God. He was with those righteous ones who all through that intervening time of history had been walking with God. Enoch and Noah were examples of such men who learned to know the living God. Those are Abraham's people, just as the people who are ours are not the fleshly people, but the ones to whom we are spiritually bound.
By no means did his life end four thousand years ago. In Matthew, when the Sadducees—who did not believe in the resurrection of the dead—asked Jesus a question, He answered them: Have you not read what God said to you, 'I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob?' He is not the God of the dead, but of the living (Matthew 22:31b-32). By this He was answering those who did not believe in life after death. He was saying that Abraham is living.
What a picture Abraham's life is! His was a life like yours and mine! There was nothing unusual about him; nevertheless, God made him an extraordinary person whose life reaches far beyond the realms of earth, out into eternity. His life is one of blessing, fellowship, and fullness. Abraham stands as a living testimony to anyone who takes the path of faith and walks this way. In so doing, we will find the same blessing.
Father, what a blessing the life of Abraham has been to me. May I imitate his faith until the day that I too, am gathered to my fathers.
Life Application
To live well is to end well. Are we daily making choices consistent with the Grand Adventure to which we are called when we are Christ's disciples?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jul 1, 2023 4:29:54 GMT -8
DEVOTION FOR TODAY — JULY 1ST
A Living Parable
It was just before the Passover Feast. Jesus knew that the time had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he now showed them the full extent of his love. John 13:1
The passage begins with a parable in action rather than a discourse or a message. It begins with Jesus' washing the disciples' feet. And in that remarkable event, simple as it was and yet strange in many ways, John sees some very deep and remarkable meanings. There are two movements that John sees in this event, and he gathers them up in the preface to this account. John sees first in this remarkable scene the evidence and the demonstration of the unchanging love of Jesus for His disciples. Jesus remains considerate, compassionate, and thoughtful about His disciples, and that impresses John. He is amazed by the fact that Jesus is not thinking of Himself, even though He knows that this is the dramatic hour toward which He has been living. Rather, His thoughts are still upon His disciples. He teaches them and manifests love and compassion and concern for them to the end.
The second movement concerns Judas. John sees in the act of foot washing a demonstration of the truth that is in Jesus, of the remarkable passion that strips away all pretense and hypocrisy and reveals things exactly the way they are, In this dramatic act in which Jesus stoops to wash the feet of Judas as well as those of the other disciples, John sees a manifestation of that honesty of God, that reality of God that exposes all hypocrisy, and by means of such revelation seeks to lay hold of the traitor's heart and show him what is happening to him. Jesus is moved to do this, John says, by an awareness of His own authority. The Father gave all things into His hands; He knew that. He knew who He was, knew He had come from God, and knew He was going to God. And, moved by this sense of His own identity and authority, Jesus begins to speak direct words to Judas, exposing what he was doing and where he was headed. John sees all this as intertwined in this remarkable scene: the commitment of love that taught to the end and the passion of truth that fought to the end for the deliverance of Judas.
Lord, thank You for the love that stoops to serve me. Thank You for the honesty that seeks to deliver me from my own hypocrisy. Help me to surrender once again to the way You are working in my life.
Life Application
Actions speak louder than words. How do we demonstrate the highest form of love - even to those who may not deserve it?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jul 3, 2023 8:07:48 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JULY 2ND
The Drama Of Redemption
After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples' feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.
John 13:5
There can be little doubt that in this passage Jesus is deliberately working out a parable for the instruction of His disciples. He is dramatizing for them the truth of His own ministry, of His own redemptive mercy. He is showing them by this means what He had come into the world to do. You can trace the parallel in the events that John records: First, Jesus rose from supper, just as He had previously risen from His throne of glory. Then He laid aside His garments. Paul tells us that He laid aside His glory when He came into the world in the incarnate state. He laid aside the exercise of His own deity. He did not come to act as God; He came to act as man indwelt by God (see Philippians 2:5-11).
And Jesus wrapped Himself with a towel, just as Paul also records that He [took] the very nature of a servant and humbled himself and became obedient to death (Philippians 2:7-8). So here He humbles Himself, taking the role of a slave, girding Himself with a towel. Then he poured water into a basin, just as in a few hours He was to pour out His own blood in death, the blood that would be for the cleansing of human defilement, of human guilt of every kind and source, So He pours water into the basin as a picture of that.
Then He began to wash his disciples' feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him, picturing the very act of applying the cleansing of His own blood to human lives. And if you skip to verse 12, you have the end of the parable. When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place, just as the writer of Hebrews records for us that after he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven (Hebrews 1:3). Thus, you have this remarkable, beautiful parable worked out for us, teaching us the meaning of Jesus' whole ministry.
Lord, I stand amazed at Your love for me. Thank You for rising from Your throne of glory, laying aside the exercise of Your own deity, taking the form of a servant, pouring out Your blood, and resuming Your place at the Father's right hand.
Life Application
What does it mean to serve humbly with a servant's heart? How are we working out Jesus' amazing discipleship parable in our lives?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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Post by Obadiah on Jul 3, 2023 8:08:59 GMT -8
A DAILY DEVOTION FOR JULY 3RD
Prideful Humility
No, said Peter, you shall never wash my feet. Jesus answered, Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.
John 13:8
Peter's refusing to be washed by Jesus serves as a remarkable picture of the human need for the cleansing Jesus offers and the sinful pride of those who reject Jesus' cleansing ministry. Peter's actions ostensibly were prompted by humility. You can see the incredulity on his face when Jesus approaches him and he protests, Lord, You'll never do this to me! It sounds as though this is a humble statement, and that Peter is appalled that Jesus should ever take such a low position as to wash his feet.
At first glance it does appear as though Peter's expostulation arises out of his own sense of unworthiness before Jesus. But when you look a bit closer, you can see that it is really the expression of intense personal pride. Peter is offended by Jesus' actions because he knows that if he were a teacher, he would never consider stooping to wash someone's feet because it would be beneath him. This is a rebuke to his self-sufficiency. He doesn't want Jesus to wash his feet. He would be content to wash Jesus' feet, but it is an affront to his sense of independence that Jesus should do anything for him. Peter shows this same pride later on when he offers to lay down his life for Jesus; he doesn't want Jesus to lay down His life for him.
This is a revelation of the sinful pride of our own hearts, which often cloaks itself with a guise of humility, when we are really insisting on our self-sufficiency. We do not want to admit to anybody that we need anything. That is what Peter is doing here. He doesn't want to acknowledge his need to be washed, and, especially, of letting Jesus do this menial act for him. It humiliates him. And so he stands as an example of the pride in our own hearts that resists Jesus' ministry to us.
One of the remarkable things about the gospel is that it is always bringing us down to the lowest point. We must stand in utter humiliation in order for God to minister to us. All human pride must be brought low before Him before we can receive what God wants to give us from His hand. And that is where we struggle. We don't like to be delivered to a place where we have nothing to offer. We want to add something. Peter is a clear picture of this. Then when Jesus explains to him, Unless I wash you, you have no part with me, Peter immediately capitulates to the other extreme: Lord, if that's the case, then by all means--not my feet only but also my hands and my head! In other words, he asked for a bath.
Lord, forgive me for the pride that is often disguised as humility. Teach me that I desperately need You to minister to me and that I, myself, have nothing to offer.
Life Application
What is behind our strong sense of independence? Where do we find sufficiency for our needs?
Daily Devotion © 2006, 2023 by Ray Stedman Ministries.
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