Tuesday Reading: 1 Timothy 6 6-10
 
Key Verse: 1 Timothy 6 8
8  And having food and raiment let us be therewith content.

 

Devotion:
It is sad to see some people making a trade of Christianity. They go all out to make money from being a Christian or make money from starting a church or something similar. Each one of us has been directed to take good care of all that is God’s. In other words, we have to take good care of everything. Not only that, but those things that Christ has allowed us to have, we should be good stewards of them – in other words, look after them well!

 

Nothing physical that we gain here in our lives will be able to be taken with us when we die. No belongings, no money, no wealth, no comforts, nothing. Christ is the author of this world and He certainly does know what is best for us. If we are willing to allow Him to guide us in our lives, then we will be getting the best possible advice for our lives. He is not going to give us a whole bunch of money unless He is sure that we need it to do His work. But if He does allow us to gain that money and we do not use it for His works, then do you really expect that He will continue to allow you to have it?

 

The more that we gain, the more we abuse our gains to either gain more, or worse, to subdue others… How many times have you boasted about getting something just to show that you have more than them? How many times have you actually used what has been given to you for their betterment rather than your own gain? God is very careful in giving us things because of our built-up temptation that will ruin His gift. He will not give us those gifts until we are ready to receive them! It is not the money that is the evil part, it is the lust we have that we exercise when we have it that is the evil part. As long as we are willing to allow God to be in control, we will not go down that lustful path with the gifts He gives us…

 

Points to Ponder:
How often do you receive gifts?

 

How often do you use those gifts for others rather than yourself?

Monday Reading: Proverbs 30 7-9
 
Key Verse: Proverbs 30 9
9  Lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, Who is the LORD? or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain.
 
Devotion:
How often have you heard people wishing for one thing and not another? Maybe that is exactly what you have done too. We often crave for more of one thing in our lives and less of another, hoping that we will find some sort of comfort from the balance that we hope to achieve. More often than not we get into more of a pickle as we get more upset by the things we cannot have. Agur, on the other hand, wanted something a bit different. He did not want to limit things according to his own wishes, but for God to limit things according to what He knows best.

 

We often think that we do know what is best for us and get into all manner of trouble when we find out that it is not true. But our Creator, God, does know exactly what we need. He alone is the one that should be able to give us exactly what we require to make sure that we have the best possible mix of things in our lives. We don’t need the riches of the earth to try and make our lives better. We don’t need the poverty of the world to try and make us realise what we actually need in our lives. God is the one that knows what we need in our lives. Anything else is what we desire – that may then lead us into all manner of temptation!

 

When we try to fill our lives with the things that we think should matter, we get into trouble with our wants and desires. The more that we think we are in control, the more we get side-tracked and go after our own desires. The more that we do that, the more we fill our lives with our desires and that leads to us leaving God out of it! The less that we have in our lives, the more we will crave for things. The more we crave, the more likely we are to do something stupid to fulfil our cravings. We really do need to allow our Master to have control in how we run our lives!

 

Points to Ponder:
How often do you do things to please yourself?

 

How often do you do things to please God?

Sunday Reading: Matthew 6 19-24
 
Key Verse: Matthew 6 21
21  For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

 

Devotion:
What does it take for us to be persuaded to go off and do something – probably just a glance at what it is… So often we are tempted by things just because we had a look. Maybe we thought that they looked harmless enough, or maybe we thought that it would not affect us in the same way, but the most probably cause was because it looked like something fun to do! We will most often go off and do something because we saw it done by others. So what are we supposed to do about it – we cannot walk round with our eyes closed all the time!

 

What we have to do is to focus on something else. How many times have you been asked whether you saw something and you did not even though you were seemingly looking right at it? How many times has your partner or friend asked you why you did not notice something they had on or did? If we have our minds focused on something else, then the temptations that are paraded in front of us will not seem as big and exciting as they are meant to look! We will be focusing on that other thing and not noticing what is right in front of us.

 

We need to focus on God, focus on God’s Word and make Him the centre of our lives. Only then will we be able to ensure that we are not as tempted by all the things that Satan throws our way. If we are making sure that we are centring our world on God, then He will continue to provide us with more than enough to do and more than enough protection from all that we desire. As long as our eyes are focused on the Light, we will not be tempted by what lies in the darkness because we will not see what lies in the darkness. If we loose focus on the light and peer off into that darkness for long enough, we will then see what we want to see – because we have made the choice to ignore the Light and go off into the darkness, leaving the Light behind!

 

Points to Ponder:
How often do you not notice things?
 
How often do you ignore God to see other things?

Saturday Reading: Luke 8 22-25
 
Key Verse: Luke 8 25
25  And He said to them, Where is your faith? And being afraid, they marvelled, saying to one another, Who then is this One? For He commands even the winds and water, and they obey Him!

 

Devotion:
One thing we often forget is just who God is! Yes, we may well admit that He is God and that He is our Creator, Guide, Father… but He alone is the one that is actually in control! We prove many times to ourselves that no matter how much we feel like we are in control, something will always come along that will break our rules and cause havoc in our lives. It may be a small earthquake, a strong wind or a violent storm that passes by and we suddenly realise just how out of control we are. We cannot tell these things to stop. We cannot stop the earth from shaking, the wind from blowing and the rain from falling – but He can!

 

We may well turn round and say that we believe in God and that we trust Christ to help us in our lives – but where does that trust and faith go when we get into a spot of danger? Where does it go when we are in an aeroplane that is being tossed about by wind? Where does it go when we are trying to climb up or down a mountain side that we think is too steep? Our own internal fear blocks us from trusting in Him. I am not saying that we should all go out and try and scale Mount Everest tomorrow! Our fear should be able to guide us away from doing something foolish! But when we are going about our normal lives and we are confronted by something like an earthquake, we have to depend on Him for our safety. If we feel like we are in mortal danger, then we should be praying and asking Him to sort things out. We don’t have to worry about Him being asleep or not being seen by us – we just need to have faith that He will answer our prayers!

 

Why is it then that we only turn to Him when things go wrong? Why do we not have Him by our side always? Why do we not continue in prayer so that we will never be alone? The answer is simple, we forget about our faith when we feel safe…

 

Points to Ponder:
Who do you turn to when you need help?
 
Who do you turn to every other time?