Friday Reading: 1 Kings 12 26-33

Key Verse: 1 Kings 12 28
28  Whereupon the king took counsel, and made two calves of gold, and said unto them, It is too much for you to go up to Jerusalem: behold thy gods, O Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.

Devotion:
Jeroboam was a king who had his own interests and fame at heart and certainly not the things of God. He knew how much the people would look to a great leader and he also knew that they would be swayed by any god that would seem to deliver a bit of prosperity or normality to the kingdom. So he took it upon himself to give the people what they wanted – just as Aaron had done so when the Israelites were in the desert being led by Moses away from Egypt. How soon his people forgot about the things that happened when last they followed after idols instead of God.

But Jeroboam was not going to leave things to chance; rather he made two idols, placed them at different places and then set about telling the people how difficult it would be to go all the way to Jerusalem instead of the shorter distances to his idols. He also elected priests to look after the things of his gods that he had created and sold them the same story as the Children of Israel first thought up with Aaron – that these strange golden statues somehow got them out of slavery in Egypt!

Now it is one thing to run after something else in God’s stead, but to make up your own religion based on a lie that abounded previously in history sounds a bit too farfetched for us to believe… We like to think that we have a much better grip on reality that these people seem to have; but when we look at the things that we allow to take control in our lives just as they were allowing golden calves to take over their lives we should not be so proud. We allow pop stars who throw their lives out the window to lead us. We allow leaders that we know are telling lies to lead our countries. We leave behind righteousness, holiness and honesty to follow on in these people’s footsteps. Are we any different to them?

God does not want us to continue to give in to the temptations of sin that surround us in this world. He knows just how much we do allow into our lives and knows just how much we will give in when faced by those same temptations. It is little wonder then that He wants us to leave behind those ways and to follow on in His ways. Why should we throw our lives away just because it sounds a bit greener on the other side of the fence? Be happy with what God can and does give to us…

Points to Ponder:
What tempts you away from God?

What must God do to make you listen?

Thursday Reading: Exodus 32 1-8

Key Verse: Exodus 32 8
8  They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them: they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt.

Devotion:
No matter how hard we try to keep things going on the straight and narrow, when we get squeezed or pushed in the wrong direction too much we are liable to give in and go along with the crowd. Aaron did exactly that in this passage. The Children of Israel had been waiting for Moses to come down from communing with God on the mountain and they were now restless and impatient. They had probably figured that they should wait for a while before Moses was due to come back and their time was up in their minds.

So instead of waiting a bit longer for Joshua to come down (because he had gone part of the way up the mountain so that he could watch out for Moses in case anything happened) they took things into their own hands. They turned to Aaron and demanded that he make them a figure to worship because they were beginning to think that Moses and God had abandoned them. Whilst it is very easy for us to look back on things and say that they had nothing to worry about, the people did not see that at the time. They were still in turmoil over what had happened and all that God had seen them through. Their memories of the enslavement times in Egypt were still fresh in their minds; and now they could not see past the current day.

We often get into the same sort of rut when we are faced with multiple things going wrong in our lives; we cannot see past the current day and so we look for the quick fixes to try and pacify our thirst for being in control of everything. If we are not careful we too will grab hold of the nearest fix which will probably be the wrong one! We then run with it because it makes us feel good at the time not thinking of future consequences.

God wants us to listen to Him and to be patient! He has not abandoned us and will never abandon us. If we focus on Him and His ways we will get to experience what God wants us to receive and not any quick fix we can find instead. God is with us!

Points to Ponder:
How long before you give up?

How long are you willing to wait for God?

Wednesday Reading: Psalms 94 1-7

Key Verse: Psalms 94 1
1  O LORD God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth, shew thyself.

Devotion:
If there is one thing that will get to many Christians it is the fact that the non-Christians seem to prosper in so many things in life. But we do not have to look very far into their lives to see the reality of what is going on. These words here in this Psalms will help us to remember a few of those facts; the first being that it is those people who disregard God that are working against us. No matter how much they say that they are not working against us the very fact that they are working against God, lifting themselves up and praising the things of this world rather than our Creator means that they are working against us while we try to stand up for God.

When man loses focus on God then he tends to get himself all caught up in the things of this world and when that happens he also loses focus on humanity and righteousness. Who else is going to look after the children of God who cannot look after themselves? This society seems bent on pushing aside the people that cannot care for themselves and lifting up the people who can pay for their own care instead. People are losing focus on Godly love and promoting the love of money and of fame instead.

All this time they are just fooling themselves into believing that our Omniscient and Omnipresent God is not going to see them! How I feel for them knowing just how horrible it is to be found out as being guilty of something. When I was young there was nothing worse than having some teacher or other adult catching you out and bringing your world crashing down around you. How they are going to feel when they find out that they are truly guilty will be beyond our comprehension.

God is Holy and Just. How many times do we have to continue telling ourselves and others that fact before we will remember it? It does not matter how many times you tell yourself that something is right or how many times you do something to make it look right, if it is wrong, it is wrong! But just because they are fooling themselves and heading for a very dark end, does not mean that we can judge them or take revenge on them for what we think they are doing. That is Christ’s domain and not ours. He is the one who has paid for those sins and not us – so we need to leave it to Him to do the judging and we should instead focus on telling people just who God is…

Points to Ponder:
Do you feel angry with people?

Do you think God is ignoring them?

Tuesday Reading: Exodus 4 10-14

Key Verse: Exodus 4 10
10  And Moses said unto the LORD, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue.

Devotion:
Doubting God seems to be a very human thing to do and there is evidence of it in just about every generation in our bibles; man just does not seem to get it! When God told Moses that he must go forward to be the leader that would bring the people out of Egypt his first thoughts were about his own inadequacies and how he would not be able to cope with what God was asking him to do. Time and time again we see the evidence that when God asks us to do something it is because He actually does know that we can do it! Why then the doubt?

God is our Creator God, the one who brought everything into being through His own power and that does include us as well. He knows what we are capable of and He knows what we are too scared to go out and do; but that does not mean that He is going to not get us involved just because we have our own doubts.

When we think that we are falling short of what God is asking or if we think that we do not have the wherewithal to do what God asks then just maybe we do not trust Him fully. When God said that we should fully rely on Him it was not a challenge but a command that we must rely on Him and on Him alone. He will give us what we do need to accomplish what He is asking; whether that is getting someone else to stand by our side or getting us to understand we can do things is what will differ for each of us. For Moses it was giving him someone that could stand up and talk so that he would not have to stammer. For Gideon it was allowing things to happen so that he would understand how powerful God actually is.

God is not going to be averse to allowing us to go through things so that we are built up and more ready than before either. In other words we may well go through trials to build up our strength and resolve so that we are ready to face what is ahead for us. For those people around us who do not know God and do not understand His ways, this may well look like us trusting in a God who allows bad things to happen to us. What we should always be doing is understanding that God is constantly working in our lives and we need to be ready for whatever He has got planned for us next…

Points to Ponder:
What do people have to do for you to trust them?

What will it take for you to trust God?