Monday Reading: Acts 26:12-18
Key Verse: Acts 26:18
18 in order to open their eyes so that they may turn from darkness to light, and from the authority of Satan to God, so that they may receive remission of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me.
Devotion:
One thing we can all be certain of is that God wants each of us to be a Christian, a follower of Christ. He is not going to announce Himself to each of us like He did for Saul/Paul, but He does come to us with the same vigour – whether we realise it or not! God knows what is in each of our hearts and He knows what makes us tick. If it is going to take something drastic in order to gain our attention, then just maybe He will allow something drastic to happen in our lives; but why should we tempt Him into doing something drastic when we can so simply and lovingly turn to Him with open arms.
If you are willing to make this year the year that you make a difference then you have to start with a change in yourself and your own ways. If you are not willing to make that first change, then how is anything else going to change around you? Paul was a man with a mission against God and he was not willing to make any changes, so God had to do something to get his attention. I don’t think Paul really knew just how important that moment was until after things had begun to change. Many times in our lives we don’t realise just how important God actually in and we tend to leave Him out of those moments when we should be drawing closest to Him.
God wants us to be able to stay close to Him at all times so that we do have the best possible chance at getting to know Him, getting to hear Him and getting to do His will in our lives. If we are going to be running off in the opposite direction like Paul or Jonah, then should we really expect to be able to hear God’s will? Our walk has got to change within us so that we focus on Christ. Once that focus has changed from being a focus on the world to a focus on Christ, then we will be able to see more of His will in our lives. But notice that that change starts with you doing something. When we look back in our lives we will then see that God was the one who made the first move and that He gave us the opportunity to change – we just took that opportunity and made that change. You see, God has already set things in motion so that we can achieve all that is good. God has already made things possible for us through all that He has already done for us. We need to grab His opportunities with both hands and show Him that we are ready for change and ready for Him to work in our lives. Once we do that we will see the changes that He brings into our lives and we will experience a whole new life with Him. Let that be your aim this year!
Points to Ponder:
Are you ready for change?
Are you willing to do God’s will?