September 1: Luke 10 38-42
Key Verse: Luke 10 40
But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she approached Him and said, “Lord, do You not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Therefore tell her to help me.”
Devotion:
If you are feeling like you are not as close to God as you should be then stop! Yes, just stop. Stop doing all the things you do. Stop getting involved with everything all the time. Take time out to actually be with God and not to run around thinking you have to do it all to please Him. God wants to spend time alone with you so that you can draw closer to Him.
This story shows two sisters who were both loved Christ had a very different way of showing it when He came to visit them in their house. Martha was running round trying to be the best hostess she could to make sure that she did everything she could… but Mary sat at Christ’s feet and listened to Him. Which are you doing? Are you running round trying to organise everything and making sure that the church, youth groups and everything else are all running as they should, or do you stop and give time to Christ?
Yes there are things to be done and they need to be done in order to keep everyone on the same course; but we need to make sure that our personal relationship with Christ does not suffer from us overworking! If we are going to listen to Him then we have to spend time with Him and not running off doing things all the time. Our prayer time will suffer if we are too busy. Our time set aside to read the bible will suffer if we are too busy. Our relationship then suffers because we are just too busy!
I have set a goal to spend more time with God over the next few weeks and then to keep that going because I know that I will end up being much closer to God. I would like you to join me in doing this as well. Is it going to be easy? No! So let us start by stopping everything for just two minutes each day and wait on God. Don’t squeeze in extra prayers in that time, don’t think you can do it while walking to work, don’t do it on a train… this is quiet and private time… lock yourself in your room and just sit at Christ’s feet and listen with me.
Points to Ponder:
Do you find enough time to do everything?
Are you feeling a bit lonely?
August 31: Psalms 91 1-6
Key Verse: Psalms 91 4
He shall cover you with His feathers, and under His wings you shall take refuge; His truth shall be your shield and buckler.
Devotion:
You may think it a bit strange that God should be compared to a bird in that we should take cover under His feathers; I mean, how much protection can we get from feathers? Well, we could ask the same of our bed covers as we hide under them from night terrors. When we have something that we are hiding from, any sort of cover is going to be good enough to make us feel safe, but God’s cover is so much more than a simple description of feathers or a hedge or whatever else we hide behind!
We need to trust God with our lives, not just saying that we trust Him but really giving in to His authority and protection. He knows what dangers we are going to face and has already prepared the protection for us but we do still have to listen out to His instruction so that we can get that protection in the manner in which it is meant. If we are given a shield for protection we should have the knowledge to hide behind the shield and not to try and use it as a hat or something else.
Just the same with God’s protection, we need to know how we can use His protection and how we can depend on it. It is Satan who God is protecting us from. It is the evil one who is trying to mess up our lives so that we run from God instead of running to Him. It is our choice as to whether we follow God or run from Him. It is our feeble hearts that give in and say we are doomed rather than standing firm in God’s Word. Jesus used God’s Word to reject the devil in the desert and we need to know how to do that as well.
It is not a case of just turning round and saying that we are protected by God. It is not a case of relaxing and assuming we are safe. What we need to do is to actively use God’s Word, His instruction and His power to overcome the evil in our lives. We cannot do it by ourselves. But Christ has already paid the price for our sins so taking refuge in God’s shadow, under His wing is natural and expected; but we do need to take shelter and not just assume that God will run after us wherever we run. If we are running away from Him we are making an active choice against His protection. Be safe and rely on God for everything.
Points to Ponder:
What makes you scared?
Are you asking for God’s protection?
August 30: John 17 6-8
Key Verse: John 17 8
For I have given to them the words which You have given Me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came forth from You; and they have believed that You sent Me.
Devotion:
I still find it amazing that God loves us so very much that He put this whole scenario in place before we begun! He made sure that Jesus would be able to come to earth and to pay for our sins without us having to do anything other than get to know and love Him, believing that He is the Son of God and asking Him to forgive us for the things we do wrong against Him! Just think about it for a bit. Think about how much planning had to be put into place before everything kicked off. Then think about all the things we get wrong and mess up and how much more planning had to be done to cater for everything!
He did this because He loves us and He wants us to be able to join Him in heaven just as Jesus was received back into heaven after completing His task on earth. We too will be able to join Him in heaven after our task on earth is done. He is the one who has got a complete plan for each of us just as He had a complete plan for each of the disciples. In the garden of Gethsemane Jesus knelt down and prayed to God in heaven asking that the seeds that He had planted would continue to flourish in each of these men because God had ordained it in the beginning.
Each time one of us gives our lives back to the Lord the prayers start flowing to make sure that those seeds planted continue to grow and flourish just as they did in the disciples. God continues to keep His promises making sure that we get to know Him better each day and to trust and rely on Him totally for our lives. When we do place our trust in Him He is able to help us with greater ease than when we are fighting Him with worldly ways.
Jesus came to earth to make sure that we understood just how much God had given us in the beginning and how much had already been written down for our good. Jesus came to fulfil the scriptures and to show us that every word that had been written down in prophesy was coming to pass just as He had promised in the beginning. Trust in God. Believe in His word and ask for His help because that is what He planned all along!
Points to Ponder:
Are you trusting the world or God?
Do you ask Him for your daily help?
August 29: John 10 22-30
Key Verse: John 10 28
And I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand.
Devotion:
When the Jews confronted Jesus and asked Him plainly if He was the Christ that they were expecting, He told them the truth and they did not expect that! Jesus is not here to deceive people or to try get them to join any cult or anything like that; He is here to give people the truth and to allow them to make a choice as to whether they want to believe in Him or not. What He told the Jews that were asking the question was that they did not understand the answer and they could not figure it out because they did not want to believe it.
If we have doubts and fears that are going to take us away from believing Christ, then those doubts and fears are going to play on our minds and stop us from believing the truth. If we allow them to build up they will block our thoughts and stop us from allowing Christ into our lives or from allowing the Holy Spirit to continue opening the truth. Don’t allow the world to take over your life!
Christ also reminded them that anything that He did was always in His Father’s name so that nobody could claim glory apart from God! We need to make sure that we do everything to God’s glory and lift Him up into His rightful place. Believing in everything that He has done for us is a solid step forward. That means believing in Jesus Christ, believing that He is the Son of God and that He came down to earth in Human form to die on the cross to take on our sins.
When we do put our faith and trust in Jesus Christ then we open the doors for Him to come into our lives, open the door for God to save us and open the doors for the Holy Spirit to work in our lives. It is a wonderful journey when you start, but you do have to make the first step and start! Put your faith firmly in God’s hands and allow Him to make the most of your life.
Points to Ponder:
How much do you trust others?
How much do you trust Christ?
August 28: 1 John 2 15-17
Key Verse: 1 John 2 16
For all that is in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—is not of the Father but is of the world.
Devotion:
It is good to enjoy life and all that God gives us in our lives. Celebrating what God has supplied to and for us is not a sin. God would not have given the earth back to us after the flood if He did not want us to enjoy it and tend to it! But what happens when we start to fixate on the things of the earth? What happens when we start to get consumed by what we see rather than what God would have us to look for? We get lost!
If we focus on the lust of our flesh then that is what we will start living for; our lives will become centred on that lust and those wanton feelings. How can we expect to be able to concentrate on anything else when we are focused on something like lusting after another? If we go down that road we will not see the love that comes from deep within other people and we will not be able to have a meaningful relationship with anyone, all we will see is that lust and nothing else. To fulfil that lust we will start to do wicked things and try more and more to get some sort of satisfaction. It is like a drug and should not be abused!
If we focus on the things that look good we will find fools gold! I can remember searching as a young child in the bush behind our houses for those rocks that glistened in the sun; this was fools gold and had very little to do with actual gold! When we focus on things like that we will be the ones rushing out to find the next glistening stone and will lose focus on the real gold in our lives; the love of God!
When we focus on what we have built up, the treasures that we have gained, then those treasures will be our focus in life. We will go out of our way to build up those treasures and lose track on the important things in life. Our eyes are the things which will affect us the most in our lives because they are like cameras taking pictures constantly and storing those images in our heads. God gave us our Bibles so that we would be able to read them and get to know Him better. Use what God has given you to do more with and for Him and you will see the greatest treasure in life!
Points to Ponder:
What do you focus on?
What do you like looking at?