Saturday 14 Sep 2013

Saturday Reading: Luke 11:38-41

Key Verse: Luke 11:39
39  And the Lord said unto him, Now do ye Pharisees make clean the outside of the cup and the platter; but your inward part is full of ravening and wickedness.

Devotion:
How often do you do things just because the people or family before you did them? How often do you do things because that is just the way it was always done? I fear that far too often we get caught up in doing things just because we don’t like change or because we have got into the habit of doing things like that. God does not change, but we do and the world around us is constantly changing. He does not want us to change our love with Him but rather allow it to grow deeper every day. If we get caught up in doing things out of habit we are not doing them out of real love for God!

There is much comfort in being able to do things as they have always been done, but we must make sure that we are doing things for God and not for our own comforts because that is as good as taking an idol instead of God. The Pharisees were sticklers for keeping to the law and making sure that things were done in the same traditional ways as were written down by someone a long time ago. They had actually lost sight of God’s real law and were carrying out what they felt most comfortable with then!

Christ came to help wash away all of those ways and to make sure that we keep a good and honest relationship with Christ so that we can serve Him best of all and not get caught up in serving man or even serving ourselves. If we get caught up in serving man then we are serving the sin that is within us and not serving our God who hates sin!

We need to take a long look at what we have on the inside and make sure that we do not let that come out instead of our worship for Christ. We need to make sure that we do not lift up our ways, which are steeped in sin, instead of God’s ways. God can see straight through us even when we cannot see the wood for the trees so we need to trust in Him more and follow His direction; not follow what man has written down but actually follow God’s wishes in our lives.

Points to Ponder:
Who do you listen to?

Is your own law taking control?