Friday Reading: James 4 11-17
Key Verse: James 4 15
15 For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that.
Devotion:
There are many times when you can shout about what you have done, such times as being the fastest person to run a race or to throw something the furthest or jump the highest; those are times when we can celebrate what we have been able to achieve. But if we close off everything else in our lives just so that we can attain that goal, we are closing off too much for too little gain. Yes it is amazing what we can achieve when we put our minds to it but let us never forget that it is God who has created us and He that has designed us the way we are. Without the gifts that He has given us we would not be in a position to have gained what we have been able to gain.
How quickly we lose focus on God when things do go our own way. How quickly we forget about exactly what He has done for us when we don’t seem to have to depend on Him. But then how much we seek Him when things go wrong or when everything is piling up against us. If we, however, were to be more consistent in our approach toward loving God and keeping Him close to our hearts we would find just how much He could do for us.
Drawing the line between living for ourselves and living for God is something that many of us will find hard to do because we cannot seem to separate the two. When we do not focus on God we forget about how much He can do and how much He wants to do in our lives. But when we do live for God and keep Him close to our hearts we begin to understand what He wants in our lives and also just how much He is willing to allow us to achieve with Him.
Our goal should be to work with God and not to work against Him. I’m not one to say that if you do everything right God will bless you and give you all your desires or visa versa. God kicked man out of the garden of Eden for disobeying Him in the beginning and told us that we would have to work hard for our living. That has not stopped because we still live in this harsh world in which we have to make ends meet. If we are consistent and keep God close to us we will be able to understand better the direction He wants us to take – the right direction that will be best for us; after all, He does want what is best for us in our lives…
Points to Ponder:
Are you keeping up with your goals?
Are you keeping God’s goals in mind?
Thursday Reading: Luke 12 16-21
Key Verse: Luke 12 20
20 But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided?
Devotion:
I count myself lucky because I have been in the position of having no money and wondering where the next meal was going to come from as well as being in the position of being able to share the wealth that I have with others. So when people try to use verses like this to put down the wealthy I take issue with that. It is not for us to judge others as quite clearly pointed out through these verses. God is the one who allows us to gain the riches that we are able to and He wants us to be wise with all that He gives us.
Then there may be some doubters who would say that God should not allow people to gain such riches if He already knows that they are going to waste them or to hoard them; but how can He give everyone a second chance unless He is going to give that chance to the poor as well as the rich? As I keep trying to remind people, Jesus came into this world to seek and to save, not to hunt down and shoot! (Luke 19 10)
Our lot in this world is not to lift ourselves as high as we can, nor to lift up any other person as much as we can; our lot is to lift up our heavenly Father and His only Son. If we are going to spend all our time thinking of ways in which we can build up our own wealth and our own power then we should not be surprised if we get to a time in our lives when we either lose it all or find that we have a bank full and can’t take it with us when we die. God continues to give us chances to clear our heads and re-focus on Him. But when the time comes and enough is enough, we are the ones that should have made sure that we were ready – it is not up to God to keep making sure that we are ready. Just as our parents take a step back and allow us to take on our lives, God expects us to step up to the block and take on our lot as given to us by Him.
Let us, therefore, not forget that we live within this entity called time. Time will continue marching on and will not stop and wait for us to make up a decision that will suit everything and everybody. We have to make our decisions and live by them and we have to do that before we have to face our Judge.
Points to Ponder:
What do you seek out of life?
Are you running with God?
Wednesday Reading: John 11 47-53
Key Verse: John 11 48
48 If we let him thus alone, all men will believe on him: and the Romans shall come and take away both our place and nation.
Devotion:
Whenever I spend time in God’s Word I always seem to find something that will make me think, something that will make me stop in my thoughts and wonder why these words have been included where they are… then I come back to my senses and remember that God is the one who is in control and He knows our needs at all times!
No matter how much the world will try to take Christ out of our lives and out of society, they will never succeed! When God promised that His Word would always remain throughout time, He did not mean “only when other people allowed it to happen” but that it would continue no matter what man did. Here we see the Pharisees communing to try to get rid of Jesus in some way hoping that their precious country would survive by their own hands instead!
Yes we can look back and see how they were mistaken in not believing that Jesus was and is the Messiah, but to them they were facing a real dilemma. They were faced with a man who was seemingly subverting their country and taking their own power and authority away from them. They even thought that the Roman authorities could take everything away because of this ‘man’ who was claiming to be their rightful leader; if the people had backed Jesus instead of the government they feared that the Romans would do so as well.
We often think of many things in our lives that we think that we need above all else. Money, unfortunately, is one of those things for most people and robs Christ of His rightful place in our lives. When God told us that He was to be first and foremost in our lives it was not just because He wanted to be the first but rather because He wanted us to understand His absolute love for us and to return that love through faith. God wants us to understand that His Word stands because His love remains. He wants us to understand that governments and principalities remain because of His love for us. He wants us to understand that this world stand because of His love for us. That love will not break down so we must know that nobody will be able to take away what God wants us to have!
Points to Ponder:
Do you continually ask God for help?
Are you trusting that God will answer?
Tuesday Reading: John 11 19-22
Key Verse: John 11 22
22 But I know, that even now, whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it thee.
Devotion:
Somehow I often gain comfort in working through things backward instead of following the logical course of events. Hence going back in time as we find out more about Martha and Mary and their relationship with Jesus. We can ignore the conspiracy theorists who will claim all manner of things because we are following the truth that is God’s Word and not following man’s thoughts and feelings!
Martha and Mary each expressed their love for Jesus is different ways as we saw yesterday, but we also see that they expressed their faith in different ways as well. Martha was quite ready and willing to take her faith to Jesus and express it openly, whereas Mary, for some reason, would stay at home and be content with waiting for Jesus to come to her; probably knowing that Martha would bring Him in due time!
Martha was quite forward in her actions which would normally suggest that she was the elder sister. Both sisters had a fervent love for their Lord and Saviour and wanted to express that love in the proper manner. Martha took her faith with her to meet Jesus as He came toward Bethany. At first glance it may seem like she was going to meet Jesus and blame Him for allowing her brother to die. But when we read the whole chapter we find out that both Martha and Mary loved Christ and would not have apportioned blame where it was not due. Yes she said that her brother would still be alive if Jesus had arrived earlier, but she also added that God could do anything if Jesus were to ask for it.
This is where we are rewarded by the love that Jesus has for us. He knew that these events would unfold in this order so He set things up so that we would have absolutely no doubts that faith is rewarded and that love is at the core of that faith. Because of the love Christ has shown us, we can love Him and trust Him totally; we can have absolute faith in Him as our Lord, Saviour, Friend and God! We can know that our prayers that we lift up to God and ask in His name will be answered just as Martha’s request to God through Jesus was answered. Note, though, that many people would have given up when Martha continued on in faith. Our faith needs to stand firm even when our world is seemingly crumbling around us!
Points to Ponder:
What makes your faith weak?
Are you building up your faith through God’s Word?
Monday Reading: John 12 1-3
Key Verse: John 12 3
3 Then took Mary a pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly, and anointed the feet of Jesus, and wiped his feet with her hair: and the house was filled with the odour of the ointment.
Devotion:
We all like to show our love for and toward others in different ways. I guess we all like to buy gifts for others to show part of that love; or even to make gifts for others; but would you be willing to give all that you have in order to show your love for someone? Our first answer would be “yes” when we thought of that someone special in our lives but actually carrying out what we say could be entirely different. When push comes to shove we may well crumble instead.
Mary and Martha displayed their love for Christ in very different ways; when we study the difference between their displays of love we tend to pick sides. What side we pick depends on how we view God’s Word and how we view man’s feelings. If we are going to lift man’s feeling above God’s Word, then we would probably take sides with Martha and say that Mary was the one being lazy or even wasteful. On the other hand if we side with God’s Word we would probably side with Mary’s ways because she showed her love for Christ as Lord of Lords instead of a man.
When we are faced with circumstances in our own lives we do not always take time out to study things through but rather jump to conclusions based on our feelings at the time. It was Judas who first came forward to complain about Mary doing what he thought was wasteful at the time. Martha did not complain like that because she knew that what she was doing was in some way displaying her love for her Lord. Judas on the other hand was thinking about the monetary waste; his mind was focused on the love of money rather than the love of Christ. It is little wonder then that we are told that the love for money is the root of evil.
Showing your love for others is a very complex subject and the closer we get to the time for Christ to return, the more complex it will probably become. You see, the evil one will continue to make things more difficult so that he can disrupt the love that Christ wants us to share with others; his goal would be to try to break down all that Christ is trying to build up in us. Don’t let the evil one win just because someone says you should act in their way instead of following God’s way.
Points to Ponder:
How do you display your love?
Are you reserving your love for Christ?