January 24: Joel 2 12-14
Key Verse: Joel 2 13
So rend your heart, and not your garments; Return to the Lord your God, For He is gracious and merciful, Slow to anger, and of great kindness; And He relents from doing harm.
Devotion:
How many times have you done something physical just so you could get a reaction? Have you ever made a hardship look worse than it is to get people to see how you are not coping with the hardship? Have you ever stretched the truth so it looks like you are in more trouble than you actually are? God wants us to be honest with Him! He can see exactly what sort of a pickle we may be in and He would like us to be honest and ask for help in those times – not to ask for more than we need but to lay it down exactly as it is a give it to God for His support.
This passage tells us we need to be sorrowful in our hearts and not just on our faces or through our outward appearance. God can see the reality, so be honest with Him and ask Him for help. God does not expect us to be able to do everything and to put up with everything that comes our way; He expects to have to help us once in a while! Even when we mess up and we have to say sorry and plead for help… God still listen and will answer us.
We cannot pretend to know how God thinks or when or even if He will do what we ask; but you can be sure that God does not ignore us and will not ignore our pleas! We don’t know whether what is coming our way will be a blessing to us or to someone else – it may look like hard work and even horrible to us, but God may be using that moment to give something to another person. It is not all about us all the time because God cares for all of us, not just the ones who call out to Him or do things for Him!
If we try to pretend things are not as they are we are going to get what we deserve and not what we ask for! Does that sound harsh? Try to imagine what God must be going through each time we lie to His face and try to get more out of Him than we deserve. Be honest and be brave. God does want to hear from us; He wants to hear the truth!
Points to Ponder:
Do you exaggerate?
DO you think God cannot see through you?
January 23: Genesis 2 21-25
Key Verse: Genesis 2 25
And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.
Devotion:
How many times have you skipped over the verses where it talks about Eve being created from Adam’s rib? I have just stopped and thought about it a while and I would like you to do the same; not because of the miracle of Eve being created from the rib but because of the love that this describes. God wanted Adam and Eve to be together as one and the best way of ensuring that was to make them from the same source as it were. God wants us to be able to love, not just to love the person you are marrying but to love people with truth and honesty.
God is blessing Adam and Eve with a very deep love for each other so they can live together in love and to learn to share this deep love with God. When we grow up and leave our families it is to be with the people that we love most of all in our lives we need to embrace this new-found love God gives us for our partners and new families. We still need to continue on in the love for our existing families but to grow in love for our partners is very important.
God is also showing us that any true love between people is going to be pure and without all the hangups and lust that we associate with relationships nowadays. Our relationships are to be honest and open and long lasting; it is not until we allow the rotten things into our lives which break them apart that they collapse. God wants our relationship with Him to be as open as Adam and Eve’s relationship was.
Love truly is a miraculous thing which we don’t tend to allow into our lives too much in fear of us being hurt, being left alone, being out of control and other ill feelings. But if we are willing to allow this true love to fill our lives we will not have room for those ill feelings. The same can be said for our relationship with God – the more we fill our lives with His love, the less room we have for the doubt and temptations.
Points to Ponder:
Do you allow God’s love to fill you?
Are you still leaving room just in case?
January 22: Psalms 31 1-8
Key Verse: Psalms 31 1
In You, O Lord, I put my trust; Let me never be ashamed; Deliver me in Your righteousness.
Devotion:
Putting your trust in The Lord means a whole lot more than just saying that you do. It means a whole lot more than getting up in front of a bunch of people and saying that you do. Putting your trust in God means you are willing to allow God to tell you where you should be going and then following Him when you have been told; following Him not because you think it is a good idea or because you like what you have been told, but because it is God who has told you.
We may think we know the right way and we may be very convincing toward others or they may be convincing toward us, but it is God’s righteousness that needs to guide us and not our heads, hearts or anything else of us. Always being willing to acknowledge God as being right and showing other people you do believe He is right is one way of acknowledging Him as God in our lives. When we are willing to show our faith in such a manner and through listening to and obeying God, others will get to see we have something special with God. He is willing to acknowledge us before others too.
Many people who do not want to believe in Christ may well try to derail us by placing all manner of things in our path to try and trip us up or trap us into sin. We need to hold fast to God and His ways to show them we have faith in our God as deliverer and saviour before all else. We are placing our lives into God’s hands as we grow in faith and begin to see just how much of a strength He is to us.
We need to turn our backs on the temptations others may drop into our path, but to make sure we hold them up to God. They may be trapped in their own horrible world where they cannot break free, have no hope and feel as they have no escape; but we have a place where we can uphold God as our deliverer. We have a place where we know God is with us. We have a place where we know He will always be there to put His hand out and lift us up as we sink in our own worries.
Points to Ponder:
Do you feel like you are sinking?
Are you trusting God as your strength?
January 21: John 8 2-11
Key Verse: John 8 11
She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said to her, “Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.”
Devotion:
Have you ever had someone forgive you in such a manner; I don’t mean in the act of adultery but rather after witnessing you do something wrong they were willing to forgive you for what you had done! It is an amazing thing that people are willing to forgive others some of the time. But it is of no real surprise to find out how many people just do not want to forgive others because they think they have gone too far!
Can you imagine what sort of a problem we would find ourselves is Christ turned round and said that He was not going to forgive us even after we said we were sorry? Can you imagine how that would feel, knowing you are truly sorry and that you don’t want to go back and do anything like that again, but you will not be forgiven for doing that thing wrong? It is bad enough when we have arguments with friends or even enemies and find we just don’t want to forgive them or they don’t want to forgive us…
Jesus was willing to show that forgiveness should cover everything and not just the ones we think it should. Forgiveness must also be real and not just a word we use to hide behind to avoid arguments. Yes, forgiving someone can be very difficult but when we ask God to help extend the grace and mercy He shows us to other people, we can then get to forgive them for anything they have done. God had given clear commandments to stone people caught in adultery, and yet Christ was willing to show that in the event where people are actually truly sorry, we should forgive them and give them another chance.
Whether this woman did not ever go back and commit adultery or not is not shown here, but Christ gave her the chance to put it behind her so she could move forward sharing His love and living in the grace He showed her. Imagine how special she would have felt knowing that Christ had forgiven her when all the leaders had all but stoned her already! Forgive and allow people to live!
Points to Ponder:
Do you always forgive?
Will you continue to hold grudges?
January 20: 1 John 3 4-9
Key Verse: 1 John 3 9
Whoever has been born of God does not sin, for His seed remains in him; and he cannot sin, because he has been born of God.
Devotion:
Have you ever been told that you cannot be a Christian because you continue to sin? Have you ever had doubts about your own faith because of the fact that you sin? Well this verse is going to make you feel bad to begin with but hopefully you will get to feel a little better after we have gone through our study today.
We sin. We all sin. That does not make us evil. Yes evil people sin but we also sin. Why would God have to allow His Son to pay the price for our sin if we could get through life without sinning? If there was just one person who would be able to get through life without sin, besides Jesus, then we would not have need of a Saviour. You are not alone. You are not the first and you certainly will not be the last!
This does not mean that we should go about life enjoying everything that we call sin. This does not mean we have a free hand to go off and do what we like just because we know Christ has forgiven us! Think about what He went through for us, because of the stuff we did wrong, think of the consequences of our actions. Just maybe that will encourage us to come forward and try not to do the same again and again. Just maybe we will be persuaded to take a different line and work out a way we do not have to give in to the sin. Just maybe we can aim to please God instead of upsetting Him daily.
Jesus Christ came to die in our place to forgive us of our sin. He did not come to make us into perfect people who would no longer go out and sin. He makes us perfect because He separates us from our sin totally; but then a few seconds later we go off and invite a little bit of that sin back into our lives. We are not perfect any more, but we still have a Saviour who is perfect and who is willing to forgive us from those sins once again. Live for Christ. Live with Him and be encouraged to try and live a better life; but be encouraged that He is faithful to forgive us, always!
Points to Ponder:
Do you feel caught in the sin pit?
Will you allow Christ to lift you up?