May 14: Jeremiah 6 16-20
Key Verse: Jeremiah 6 16
Thus says the Lord: “Stand in the ways and see, And ask for the old paths, where the good way is, And walk in it; Then you will find rest for your souls. But they said, ‘We will not walk in it.’
Devotion:
Jeremiah had the unfortunate task of delivering bad news to the people of Israel, but he knew that nothing should stop him from giving people what God wanted them to hear. As a church leader, in whatever form you may be a leader, you need to make sure you are doing what God wants you to do and not what you think is comfortable to do. God is not going to ask you to do anything you cannot do; but He may well ask you to do something you don’t really want to do!
Jeremiah’s message points back to the ‘old ways.’ This was not to say God was requiring a return to the regular sacrifices or to the keeping of the correct feasts or to doing any other religious ways. This was God telling the people they should return to being in a right and proper relationship with Him once again. It is not the work, religion or any other things that matter to God but an honesty between the people and God that counts most of all.
As with any relationship, deception is not going to get us very far especially when we are found out. The problem is we cannot and will never deceive God! The only person we are deceiving when we try to deceive God is ourselves. God tries to set the right people in place in our lives so we will listen to His ways and live effectively with Him but we are the ones who ignore these people and God’s ways to choose our own direction and desires instead.
God wants us to be effective Christians which means doing what is righteous and His will in our lives. That implies listening to Him through His Word and through the Holy Spirit to ensure we walk a closer walk with Him. When we stop listening, stop loving or stop communicating with Him, we find ourselves drifting away from Him and drifting toward the places He is trying to get us to avoid. Being with God means so much more than just pitching up in church once a week!
Points to Ponder:
What sort of life do you live?
Is Christ at the centre of your life?
May 13: Hebrews 6 9-12
Key Verse: Hebrews 6 12
that you do not become sluggish, but imitate those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.
Devotion:
In this letter the apostle is talking about people who don’t quite get the word, people who think that they have to renew their salvation every time they do something wrong against God. He says this is like crucifying Christ over and over again as the people bring their repentance before God. We are forgive once and for all when we ask Christ to forgive us of our sins. Yes, bringing your sins before God is good because it will persuade you not to go back there and do it over and over again… but that means bringing them to God and leaving them once and for all at His feet.
Far too often we bring our sins before God but we do not really let them go. Now we may think that it is the big sins, the things like murder, adultery and other things listed in the ‘top ten’ that are the ones we need to place firmly at the feet of Christ. In reality it is every single one of those things we have to drop. The little lies we told to get out of trouble. The delayed payments because we wanted something else for ourselves. The envious looks at those temptations. Each one is another little mouse trap which will hurt when we do not treat them properly.
God does not want us to hold on to the sins of our past but to release them fully into His charge. Christ died on the cross so we could be forgiven for everything we do; so long as we do trust Christ to forgive us and leave our sins with Him, He is faithful and just to forgive us, totally.
This is the gospel we need to take out to the people around us. This is the gospel we need to pass on to others. This is the gospel we need to build up disciples with so they too can pass the same gospel on to more people. This is our great commission and one which is worth everything because Christ gave everything for it.
Points to Ponder:
Do you know your gospel?
Do you live the gospel?
May 12: Ephesians 4 1-6
Key Verse: Ephesians 4 5
one Lord, one faith, one baptism
Devotion:
The apostle writes here to the church in Ephesus to get them to realise just how important their own walk with Christ is. It is not good enough to sit around and let everyone else in the church do all the work whilst you go along and say all the right stuff once a week. God wants each of us to walk with Him every day and to commune with Him every day. There are many different church buildings and many different ways in which people worship God and many will argue as much as possible as to whether they are right or others are wrong – so let us not go there!
The words here are those which Jesus taught the disciples. There is only one true God and He allowed His Son Jesus Christ to come to take on our sin debt. He left behind the Holy Spirit for all believers so we would not be left alone after Christ ascended back to heaven. There is only one true faith – the belief in Jesus Christ as being the Son of God. There is only one true baptism and that is under the blood shed by Christ for our sins. Any other baptism we do is a symbolic demonstration to others of our belief in Christ and what He has done for us.
Each of us is called to follow Christ and to allow our lives to be a reflection of the life of Christ. We should not boast about our own accomplishments in or out of the church but rather seek to glorify God in everything as we try to reflect Christ through our lives. The words the apostle offers here encourage us to live righteously so we can live closer with Him in our lives. Having the Holy Spirit in the centre of our lives should mean us not living for the world anymore but for Christ instead.
Let us lift up the name of Jesus Christ to be held above all others as we live with Him in our lives. Many may try to discredit Christ, the Holy Spirit or even God by blaming the world on God. In reality we all blame just about anything or anyone else just so we can go on living our lives the way we want to. It was Christ who paid the price for us – lift Him up in glory!
Points to Ponder:
Do you think of Christ throughout the day?
Are you bring Him glory or blame?
May 11: James 2 18-26
Key Verse: James 2 24
You see then that a man is justified by works, and not by faith only.
Devotion:
Here in the UK we have just been through the general elections where the country had to step forward and vote for the people they wanted to run the government. Don’t worry I am not going into politics here but I would like to raise two observations. The first being that people had to come forward and actually vote otherwise the result would have been hollow and empty. The second being that the elected government now has a job to do – to do what they promised would be done.
I do like the way we are able to have a democratic system through which the people do have some sort of say as to how things happen in the country; there are still far too many countries in the world where the leader has ultimate power and can do whatever they want to. God has ultimate power throughout the world, but He still allows us to have freedom of choice – whether we choose to be bad or to be good is something we must think about.
The key here is that we can say and we can read whatever we like, but until we step forward and start to make a difference we are about as useful as a chocolate tea-pot (yes that is very English!) We need to do what we say we are going to do and not just talk about it. We can believe everything that is righteous and fully understand what God is all about, but until we start to show others we believe, until we start to show others we care… we are nothing.
God has given us many tools and scriptures through which we can know He is God and know what we should be doing. We are the ones to step forward and do what is required. We are the fools is we believe that others will pick up the work and do it for us! If we left it to others to do our voting we would not know the outcome and we could not influence the outcome at all! So step forward and pick up the banner for Christ. Start to make a difference instead of looking for the difference!
Points to Ponder:
Are you looking for a difference?
Are you working with Christ to make a difference?
May 10: Galatians 2 1-10
Key Verse: Galatians 2 2
And I went up by revelation, and communicated to them that gospel which I preach among the Gentiles, but privately to those who were of reputation, lest by any means I might run, or had run, in vain.
Devotion:
Paul was doing his best to take the true Gospel message out to both the Jews and the gentiles, not favouring one or the other but allowing all to be open to the truth. He trusted the Holy Spirit to guide him and tell him where he should be preaching – because God knows best the people who most need the Gospel message. Where the Holy Spirit send us and where we want to go may not be the same place; in fact we may not like the place He sends us at all!
Submitting to God’s will in our lives can be daunting and can be harrowing. Imagine being told to go to the one place that you absolutely don’t want to go near! Jonah was asked to go to Nineveh and preach to the people he disliked, so there is nothing new in God asking us to go where we are needed! Paul did test the waters in that he would not plunge in and see what happened but rather tested out talking to some in private in case he had not heard God correctly. There is nothing wrong in making sure we are hearing God correctly, but we do need to trust Him!
Paul was not trying to get everyone to be the same by getting them all to become Jews and do everything according to Jewish laws and traditions. What he was trying to do was to give them all the same Gospel message, the same truth, the same Word of God and allow them to draw their own conclusions about their own lives. God did not create us all to be the same but that we could all be different and still worship the same God.
God does not show personal favouritism to anyone. He does not judge according to colour, race or position in society. What God does do is to treat all according to God’s law. We are created different and we should work to the best of our own abilities and capabilities. In this case the apostles decided it would be best for them to teach the Jews and for Paul to teach the Gentiles. This is God giving direction so they could be used to their fullest advantage. Trust God, test what you think you hear against what God tells us in the bible. Trust your final judgement to God.
Points to Ponder:
Do you listen to people?
Does God agree?