Tuesday Reading: Proverbs 10 2-3

Key Verse: Proverbs 10 3
The Lord will not allow the righteous soul to famish, but He casts away the desire of the wicked.

Devotion:
One thing we can be very sure of is that God is actually in control of things. No matter how out of control we think things are in this world, if we stop and look carefully we will see how God is working with the chaos and allowing His people to succeed where others continue to fail! If we just look at Joseph and Mary for a second; they were probably being accused of all sorts of immoral things at this time, but they were taken away from the crowds and placed in a stable for this night so that Jesus could be born without blame and worshipped by the shepherds in a place they would feel comfortable in! That is just awesome when you think of it!

You may think you are in control sometimes too, but stop and think for a while and see how God is allowing things to come together so that you can do what is best for Him. If you allow Him to work effectively in your life, just as Joseph and Mary, then you will see some pretty amazing things happen in your life. If you go fighting against Him all the way you may well find that you are uncomfortable with many things along the way as Christ tries to get you to do His will instead of your own.

Then sometimes as people go along their own way, ignoring God entirely, they seem to be happy, prosperous, busy enjoying life… Maybe God is allowing them to get some enjoyment out of life because He knows they will not ever turn to Him until it is too late. Just maybe this is all the enjoyment that they will ever see. But even with them doing their own things you will find those special moments in their lives where God tries to knock on the door – He never gives up because He loves us so!

Wicked ways may lead to desires being filled for an instant, but they will never fill the soul with that love, joy and peace that God fills us with when we trust in Him. As we remember just how much Joseph and Mary had to trust God with in these days many years ago, let us put our faith and trust in Him as well. Let us look for people who are knocking on the door, trying to find solace. Let us look for people searching for shelter from life. Let us look for people lost in their own world. Let us declare the gospel as loud as we can! Praise God!

Points to Ponder:
What do you aim for in life?

What has God given you to work with?

Monday Reading: Isaiah 26 1-6

Key Verse: Isaiah 26 4
Trust in the Lord forever, For in YAH, the Lord, is everlasting strength.

Devotion:
We do have a certain future if we have placed our faith and trust in Christ! It was a promise from the beginning and will continue to be our hope until it has come to pass! God is the one who has been here since before the world was created and He alone has the power over everything to keep us after this world has gone. It is all because of Christ that we have this promise of salvation and it is our salvation that is the important part here. God allowed Christ to come to earth so that we could be saved from our sins and to live a life in absolute safety from the evil one.

We need to open up to other people, especially in times like this when we start to celebrate the coming of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. If we are not willing to share Christ with others at times like this then we are keeping God’s gift to ourselves and not sharing it with the whole world like He commanded us to! God gave us His Son so that we could be saved, but He also expects us to invite everyone in to share in this wonderful gift.

There is nothing that will bring down God, nothing that can ever destroy Him and nothing that will stop Christ from returning to us again one day. These are all certainties and we need to trust them as such. God is all powerful and He alone knows the time when this will all come to a head, so we need to be ready for that time and not delay our lives with Him.

We talk about God as being our Rock, our Rock of ages; we need to make sure that we remember that and treat Him more like that Rock, depending on Him always and not just when we think we need Him. It is very easy to grab onto something when we are feeling down or rejected, but sometimes it is hard to hold on when all we feel like doing is running off in the other direction. Always trust in God. Always make sure you have a firm footing on your Rock of ages!

Points to Ponder:
Are you ready for Christmas?

Are you ready with Christ?

Sunday Reading: Psalms 131 1-3

Key Verse: Psalms 131 3
O Israel, hope in the Lord From this time forth and forever.

Devotion:
One thing that God has reminded mankind throughout the years is that we must wait in hope, having faith that Christ will come again to take us home. Just as the psalmist wrote so many years ago, we may be doing everything right and lifting up God, but we must still wait.

When Jesus walked on the earth He did not give us a date and time when He would return but kept that from us to prevent us from being lazy. If we know when something is going to happen then we may well get a bit lazy and fill in the time before then with things we ought not to. I know that when I was at university I would fill in my time before exams with games instead of preparing like I should have. I know that I still do get carried away with games or computers when I should be getting stuck into work.

God wants us to remain faithful by always being ready for His return. That means trying to live our lives as if He is going to return this very day! We do not know the time or date so we should be ready at all times. Living in the hope that Christ is going to return is not a lost cause because it is a promise from God Himself. Being prepared for that day is what will set us aside from the rest of the crowd and allow us to live a life that glorifies God instead of being full of sin.

As we march onward towards Christmas once again it is a fitting reminder that Jesus was born and that all of what God promised did come to pass. This must give us a better hope that the promises made for His return are exactly that, promises. Let us come together and worship God because He is the reason why we are all here and this is the time when we remember what He came to do for us all. What love!

Points to Ponder:
Are you ready for Christmas?

Are you ready for Christ’s return?

Saturday Reading: Acts 4 1-4

Key Verse: Acts 4 4
But many who heard the message believed; so the number of men who believed grew to about five thousand.

Devotion:
When God wants people to stop and take notice He is going to make sure that people do exactly that; stop and take notice! The religious leaders at the time were struggling with the fact that Christ was being taught in the temples; their very jobs were being undermined by people just telling the truth! And when people tell the truth, others will hear that truth and know that it is true.

It was amazing that so many people got to hear the gospel in these few days and that many of them realised that this was the truth being told. They believed the words and came to believe that Jesus is the Son of God. This meant a bit of a population explosion happening in the church as thousands of people believed in Jesus and the real church instead of continuing to follow the religious leaders who were promoting themselves and their religious ways.

God wants us to hear the take in the truth because it will release us from the lives we are trapped within. Christ had taught these fishermen to be fishers of men; they took the bait out (which was the gospel truth) and cast it into the sea of people. Just as Jesus had told them that the harvest was ready, they found out that people wanted to hear the truth and needed to hear it quickly.

We may look at this number of people coming to know Christ as extraordinary, but when we see what Christ was doing in the few years that He taught the masses, we can look at these numbers and realise that they were not extraordinary in God’s eyes. Jesus was the one who fed 5000 men with someone’s lunch! These sorts of numbers are of no measure according to God other than they are being saved from their sinful lives. Each one of us that is saved is as important to Him as the heavens sing as each soul is saved. We have a God that cares about each individual and yet cares for so many people!

Points to Ponder:
Are you limiting God’s effectiveness?

Do you trust God to deliver?