Friday Reading: Psalm 136:23-26
 
Key Verse: Psalms 136 26
26  O give thanks unto the God of heaven: for his mercy endures forever.

 

Devotion:
If you have doubts about whether God has done anything for you, then all you have to do is to think back over your life and see all the things that He has done. They will start from before you were actually born because He has made it possible for you to be born in the first place. He has given instruction to so many from the beginning of time and continued to encourage and show mercy throughout time.

 

He is the one that looks out for us when we are at our lowest ebb. He is the one waiting, patiently waiting, for us to call on Him because He is merciful. Each time we go back and see when we were at a low ebb in our lives, we will see that something happened to get us back on track; ever thought who made it happen? Each time we have been faced with people conspiring against us, He is the one waiting for us to call out for help so that He can. We try to do our own battles for as long as we can instead of calling on His name before we get into a sticky mess!

 

He is the one that has created our wonderful planet that we live on giving us all manner of food to live with and making sure that there is a cycle of life that runs from the very biggest mammal to the very smallest insect and even the bacteria. We all live together sustaining each other. He is the one that created all of this. The more we inject into the world, the more we seem to break things down – but God patiently waits for us to ask Him for help and guidance.

 

With all that knowledge of everything He has done, we need to get up and thank Him for everything – because He is the merciful God that continues to be by our sides. He is the only one that deserves our worship and praise!

 

Points to Ponder:
How many tight spots have you been through?
 
How often do you listen to God?

Thursday Reading: Genesis 1 26-31
 
Key Verse: Genesis 1 27
27  So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
 
Devotion:
Have you ever wondered why we look the way that we do? Well, it's nothing to do with growing up from a monkey, who grew up from some other animal that grew up from some primordial soup which came from nothing to start with... God created us in His image – He wanted us to be in His image – not to be gods, but to be like Him. So what went wrong? Did the mould break? Did the recipe get spoiled?

 

No, we just chose to be the way that we are now. We chose to be the people that we are. We chose to act the way we do. We chose to be the reckless individuals we are! Even though we started out as being perfect and not having bad thoughts or evil minds... we just had to come along and spoil things for ourselves! And we continue to do that day after day, choosing to spoil things in ways that only we can do!

 

God created us to be like Him. He did not create us to be evil little wretches. He created us in a world that He had just created for us. He made a perfect civilisation based in a perfect world and because of us thinking the way that we do, we decided that we wanted more! No longer were we pleased with everything that God had given us... we wanted more!

 

That is exactly what drives us today – we want more of everything! We want to be able to make things look better. We want to look better ourselves. We want to be better than the person next to us. We want more than them! Why can't we just be pleased with all that God has given us. An amazing planet with beauty beyond comparison suspended in a universe of nothingness that allows stars to shine is a silky black sky at night and warm glowing blue during the daytime. Yet we want to spoil that all by painting it up with anything we can lay our hands on – and yet we are still not satisfied with it... Because we have lost sight of the real beauty that God created!

 

Points to Ponder:
Who do you aspire to be like?

 

What could ever be better than being more like God?

Wednesday Reading: Romans 5 1-5
 
Key Verse: Romans 5 1
1  Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ:
 
Devotion:
When people ask you “why are you a Christian”, how do you respond. Do you tell them of the wonderful peace that you get through knowing that God is real (that does get a few strange looks) or do you tell them that you have always sought the truth and finding it was easy. Or do you tell them that you simply do not want to go to hell. Whatever you do say, try to think about the difference in you life from before you admitted that there actually was a God and afterwards.

 

If you can remember the life that you had before knowing Christ, you will remember so many things which did not go right and so many things which used to get you down. Looking in you life now, you may well find that many of those things are still around – but they do not affect you in the same way as they used to. The peace of God is something that does fill our lives and allows us to get on with things in our lives. Just knowing that you have someone there, caring, watching out for you, allows you to go forward and do things.

 

A child will probably not take their first steps until they know that there is someone close by that can catch them if they fall. It is the same with our life in Christ. Once we acknowledge Him as our God, we can take those steps and learn to walk again. Yes, it does take faith. We cannot see God and we do not physically hear Him. But we know He is there. And with that knowledge we can do things in our life that we used to put off because we were not secure enough to do them. We know that we will still face problems, but with God behind us, we no longer look at them as such awesome issues that we can not face them!

 

Points to Ponder:
Who do you look to for help in your family?
 
How often do you realise that God is with you too?

Tuesday Reading: Psalm 71:14-17
 
Key Verse: Psalms 71 14
14  But I will hope continually, and will yet praise thee more and more.
 
Devotion:
No matter how we think about it, we will always come to the conclusion that God has been there teaching us right from the beginning. We cannot escape from the truth that He has been faithful to us right from the start. We can only realise that He is the one that has been protecting us when all else failed. How else can we explain how things have happened the way they have? So what are we going to do about that? Are we going to praise Him one day of the week and leave Him to do the work the rest of the week; or are we going to praise Him more and more for all the things He continues to do for us?

 

We need to speak about the good things that He does, so that we will realise just how much He does do and others will then be encouraged. We need to continue doing that right up until we go to meet Him. We have no idea how long we are going to live, so we need to make sure that we do recognise Him here and now. Saying that we will do it tomorrow is not going to help if we will not be here tomorrow!

 

We need to make sure that we do realise that it is Him alone that is behind our success in life. We need to make sure that we thank Him for that and that He knows it. Allowing others to hear of the success that He has wrought in our lives will encourage us and them to know that He is our God and that we can trust Him with everything. Placing that trust in Him and depending on it is what He wants. We are not spooning off Him but rather following His will.

 

We need to know just how much He has done for us all and we need to show others how much He continues to do for us. Being happy and content with our lot and sharing our lives with those that we can allows us to share Him in truth and in faith. Let us go forward and declare His wondrous works!

 

Points to Ponder:
How much can your parents look after you when you are not with them?
 
Have you realised how much God does for you every day?