Wednesday Reading: Romans 3 5-8
 
Key Verse: Romans 3 7
7  For if in my lie the truth has more abounded to His glory why am I still judged as a sinner?

Devotion:
Is it right to tell a lie so that good will come out of it? By human standard we do that all the time, we are taught to do it and we certainly live under a government that practices that. That is not what God teaches us. God does not say that He is going to fib in one place so that we can all get to heaven but rather that a lie, no matter how small, is still a lie. How could we expect God to be able to judge us if He were to be unrighteous in any way, mean or form? God cannot lie, is righteous and will always judge by those standards, absolute standards.

I guess that makes us all hypocrites! We go round saying one thing and doing another. We tell ourselves and others that it is for the greater good and that is how we try to justify the things that we like to do wrong. But if truth be told we are doing those things because of our pleasure and no other reason. We do not like to have to admit to anything being wrong. We do not like to admit that we are sinners and we certainly like to hide the sins that we do! God cannot and will not do that. He cannot accept sin. Which gives us a problem – how do we get to be with Him if He cannot accept sin?

That is where we have an advocate, Jesus Christ, who has not only already paid for the sins that we commit, but has also promised to present us sinless before God. That means we will leave all of our sins behind because of what Christ has done for us. We get to have a perfectly clean slate again in a place where we will no longer want to sin or have any reason to sin. God has prepared for us a place where we will no longer have any temptations, no longer face any bad choices and no longer want to sin like we do now! How awesome is our God!

Points to Ponder:
What are your weaknesses?
 
Have you given them to Christ yet?

Tuesday Reading: Genesis 27 38-41
 
Key Verse: Genesis 27 41
41  And Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing with which his father had blessed him. And Esau said in his heart, The days of mourning for my father are at hand. Then I will kill my brother Jacob.

Devotion:
How many times do we read our bibles to see of tales of deception and hatred? We don’t have to look too far through the books of the Old Testament to see that they are remarkably similar to the hatred, deception and general misconduct shown to us through our history books. It is not a case of Christians live lives being withdrawn from the pitfalls of life, being withdrawn from the bad judgement, being set apart from bad things or even living a sinless life. Christians continue to live lives as people do along with all the bad things that we do. What is different is our relationship with God!

When you read through this chapter you get to know the greed and deception that was going on in a single family; not just the one son but both Esau and Jacob as well as their mother Rebekah! When we first get to hear stories from the bible we get to hear about the good things that happen and the wonders that God has done for us but by far the most wonderful thing that has happened is that God has chosen to forgive us of all the foulest things that we get up to! You don’t have to read too far to see that God is willing to forgive even murderers if they will bring their deeds to Him and truly ask for forgiveness!

It is no good asking God to forgive us of our sins is we are simply going to continue on in the same manner the second we stop praying! It is no good saying that we will try to stop doing what we do if we are not willing to give it a try! Yes, God is willing to forgive the vilest of deeds but He does require us to mean it from our hearts and not just through the vain words that come from our mouths! God will use all manner of people to make sure that His Word gets to be told to all, but He would like us to be servants willing to bring forward His Word!

Points to Ponder:
Do you think you have things that cannot be forgiven?

Have you seen the people God has already forgiven?

Monday Reading: Isaiah 40 28-31
 
Key Verse: Isaiah 40 28
28  Have you not known? Have you not heard, that the everlasting God, Jehovah, the Creator of the ends of the earth, does not grow weak nor weary? There is no searching of His understanding.
 
Devotion:
Isn’t it amazing that no matter how many times someone tells you something you don’t really believe them until you see something for yourself! People can describe things until they are blue in the face and you don’t quite believe what they are describing until you can see it with your own eyes! That is exactly what we have facing us when people first tell us about God or when we first tell others about God; how can something so simple and so good be true – after all we live in a world where nothing is simple anymore and nothing seems to be able to be trusted either.

Often the best way for you to get to believe something is to get to know the person who has made whatever it is you are looking for. By getting to know the maker, you get to know that what is being described is actually the truth and is real. Getting to know our Maker of us all will allow us to get to know that what He has created is not only real (after all we are real) but also everything else that He tells us is also the truth. Getting to know that you can trust someone explicitly is what we all search for in finding a friend because when we find someone like that we learn very quickly that we can trust them in everything.

So when we are reminded that God can give power to the weary and strength to the weak, then we can stand forward and know that we have a truly awesome God on our side. There is nothing our God cannot do. There is nothing our God cannot see. There is nothing our God withholds from those who ask with an expecting yet humble heart. His love for us is beyond question so we need to simply step forward and trust His love to get us through.

Points to Ponder:
What do you find is hard to believe?

Do you know how much you can trust God?

Sunday Reading: Job 11 7
 
Key Verse: Job 11 7
7  Can you by searching find out God? Can you perfectly find out the Almighty?

Devotion:
When Job was facing all the Satan hurled at him, he continued to hold fast to God knowing that God was more powerful than anything that was affecting him and that God would bless him for continuing to be faithful. What Zophar came out with was good knowledge but he himself fell into the trap that each of us fall into when we try to find out about God. We try to find out about Him in terms of human understanding – and that is just not possible! Even though he was telling Job that he should not try to understand God, he continued on to say that Job needed to get rid of all iniquity from his own heart so that God could accept him back.

God never rejects us... we are the ones who reject Him. He continues to wait with open arms for each one of us to come to Him; and it’s not a case of He is hiding behind some bushes so we have to search for Him for He is waiting right in front of us and continues to wait in front of us. There is nothing secret about God but we do not have the understanding and wisdom to learn all there is about Him. That should not put us off finding out more about Him because each thing that we find out will encourage us to go to Him.

We don’t have to find out how we can get rid of all of our sins and iniquity because Christ has done what has to be done already. He has paid the price for our sins so that we can simply come to God through Him. If we tried to get rid of all of our sins we would be doing a whole lot of hard labour for a lot longer than we can live! Why then should we try to bring God down to earthly measures so that we can gain His mercy? We already have His mercy; we need to give all of our troubles and strife to Christ who has already paid the price for it all. We need to accept that we are human and that God is God. Trust God as your God and allow His will in your life.

Points to Ponder:
Can you understand others?
 
Are you trying to understand God?