Sunday 28 Jun 2009


Sunday Reading: Psalm 25:1-7
 
Key Verse: Psalms 25 7
7  Do not remember the sins of my youth, or my rebellings; according to Your mercy remember me for Your goodness' sake, O Jehovah.

Devotion:
It is often said that if you do not put everything into something you will not get out of it what you expect; and in so many thing in life that is very true in that we have to be willing to go that extra mile in order to reap the benefits we want. How we go about that is often bent far beyond what is true and righteous because many a business person will teach ruthlessness rather than compassion – that is not putting your soul into something but rather your greed.

When we come before God we need to put our souls into our worshipping Him; not so that we forget all others nor put aside our lives but that we conform our lives to His will and not to our own. We could all try our best to follow all the physical commandments laid down by Moses but unless we are willing to listen to the spiritual side that God wishes us to understand and follow, then we are simply following rules and not putting our souls into anything. There is no reason to be ashamed of the truth because the truth will always come out. There is no reason to think that our enemies will ever triumph over us because God has promised us that He will overcome all. If we want to be true to God then we need to be true to Him and follow that truth with our whole hearts and not just because the rules say so!

God is merciful. God is Just. God is true. God is unchanging. We do not have to build our faith on a set of rules nor do we have to build our faith on what other people tell us because we can build our faith on the solid truth. We have Jesus Christ who willingly paid our debt so that we may be forgiven of all our sins even those we did right from our beginnings. We can and must put our whole heart into our relationship with God because He has already shown us what He is willing to do for us. Be sincere. Believe.

Points to Ponder:
How much do you put into any relationship?
 
Are you putting your whole heart into your relationship with God?

Saturday 27 Jun 2009

Saturday Reading: Psalm 55:1-8
 
Key Verse: Psalms 55 1
1  Give ear to my prayer, O God; and hide not Yourself from my cry.

Devotion:
Have you ever found yourself in a position where you would just love to be able to fly away from it all? I’m sure we have all reached that sort of stage some time in our lives and we feel trapped by the world around us maybe even feeling that everyone is against you. Or maybe it is something of your own making and you are just feeling incredibly guilty about all the things that you have done in the past... As king David found out, taking everything to God in prayer will help to ease even the worst burden you can imagine.

God may not take all of your troubles away but He will give you the strength and wisdom to be able to keep going in the face of the adversity that you face. When we are faced with many problems the fact that we have problems to worry about normally takes up so much worrying time that you do not have time to be calm and think about how to solve the problems around you. That may well be the time that you then start to think back on all the things that you have done wrong and they then become the problem because they take up too much time and energy – yes it does sap your energy when you worry about things.

God wants to be able to share our burdens and He wants to be able to help with all our problems; we are the ones that have to bring forward those burdens to Him so that we can recognise how much we need Him in our lives. The more problems king David had to face, the more he realised how much he needed God in his life. The more that we realise that, the more encouraged we should be to seek God and His protection too. Nothing is too big for God and nothing will take Him by surprise – but He does want us to admit to our problems and ask for His help.

Points to Ponder:
Do you like asking for help?
 
How much more must God do to show us He cares?

Friday 26 Jun 2009

Friday Reading: Psalm 42:1-5

Key Verse: Psalms 42 5
5  Why are you cast down, O my soul, and moan within me? Hope in God; for I shall praise Him for the salvation of His face.

Devotion:
It is said that many animals can smell water a long way off; well I don’t think it’s the water they smell but the interaction between water and soil or plants that they can probably smell. They have much better noses that we do! When a deer is thirsty they will seek out water just as we would but with their more simpler minds they focus on the water more than we would. When the psalmist talks about the deer panting after the water he is talking about that more fervent need for water where it focuses on the water. That is the way that we should be focusing on God so that we get distracted less and less by the things around us.

Our bibles tell us that we will all face God one day and we can either be looking forward to it knowing that Christ will present us blameless before Him, or we can look forward to that day with fear knowing that we will be judged. That choice is ours to make before we die. That choice will give us great comfort if we know that Christ will intercede on our behalf and so we can look forward to it with joy as a deer would smelling the water they so desire. But there will also be times when we feel down and dejected and will question our own beliefs...

That is the time that we need to pour out our souls to God in prayer or worship. Nothing will lift our souls more than knowing that we can commune with God before we face Him. We can build up our own relationship with Him by talking with Him and knowing that He is listening and answering too. Being ready for out meeting with Him must be our aim because we do need to be ready for that day. Knowing that we are keeping our souls fit for that day will give us all the more confidence to face Him with earnest love rather than fear.

Points to Ponder:
Do you prepare for meetings?
 
Are you ready to meet God?

Thursday 25 Jun 2009

Thursday Reading: Psalm 11:1-7
 
Key Verse: Psalms 11 7
7  For the righteous The Lord loves righteousness; His face looks on the upright.

Devotion:
When we go through our bibles we find a few people who have been through more than we would expect Christians to go through; but we have to remember that God allowed them to go through this so that we would not have to! King David went through all manner of things in his life from the highest and most esteemed position of king through to being hunted down as well as being faced by a multitude of temptations. We have this all recorded so that we can see how we too can depend on God. David was a man who always turned to God; granted it seemed like it was not always as early as it should be but we are much like that in our lives.

If we can continue to remember just how wonderful our God is and also bear in mind just how much He hates sin, then we will be well on the way to focusing our lives towards God instead of towards the earthly things that surround us. At the time of David writing this Psalms he was being hunted down by Saul and treated like a common thief would be treated. David was not about to give in to being run down by anyone because he still had faith that God would deliver him from Saul. We can look back on all that David did and we can see places where he could have done things differently in our minds – but that is what we are all like... we all make mistakes...

The difference here is that David wanted to depend on God. He wanted to allow God to protect him. It was not always as easy as that because he had to go through a lot of persecution and prayers to get himself right before God. We cannot hope that God will wave His hand and make all our troubles disappear, but we can be sure that He does want to help us. Being a friend to God is a good first step to making things right before we go demanding things from Him!

Points to Ponder:
Do you help your friends?

Are you a friend of God’s?

Wednesday 24 Jun 2009

Wednesday Reading: Colossians 3 1-4
 
Key Verse: Colossians 3 2
2  Be mindful of things above, not on things on the earth.

Devotion:
When we do start thinking about things, just what do we start thinking of? Are we stuck on thoughts about what we are doing, missing out on, wanting to do, or are we thinking about what could happen? Most of the time our thoughts are not centred around what we should be thinking of in order to work more efficiently but rather things that we day-dream about. If we could add up all of the thoughts that come through our minds we would surprise even ourselves. But what use are those thoughts if they are just day-dreams?

Well, many of our thoughts are about satisfying ourselves in some way, mentally or emotionally. Without that satisfaction we would find ourselves trapped by our emotions. When we start to think about what we do get up to in our minds, that may well scare us too – but we still have our Advocate, Christ, who is willing to forgive us of our impure lives when we do turn to Him. We do need to be aware that He does know our thoughts and that He knows how sincere we are and that is why we need to focus our thoughts on the right things.

If we actively seek Him and His ways, we will be heading in the right direction and will be mindful of the things that He wants us to be aware of. Once we are aware of His ways we can then see when our ways are not in line with His ways. He is the one who has willingly paid our debt already and He is the one trying to get us to focus on things that matter. When we focus on His ways we will find that He allows us to see things on earth in a different light and we can become more effective in allowing others to know His ways too. We do have Christ through the Holy Spirit with us all the way, continually guiding us; we just have to have faith that His ways are so much better when we know them!

Points to Ponder:
How much does your mind wander?
 
Are you trusting in His ways?