March 4: 1 Timothy 6 6-10
Key Verse: 1 Timothy 6 8
But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.
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. All those things which Christ has allowed us to have, we need to be good stewards of them – in other words, look after them well and not fleece our neighbours just so we can profit from God!
Nothing physical 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 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 He will continue to allow you to have it?
The more 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 you have more than the person you are boasting to? 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 which will ruin His gift. He will not give us those gifts until we are ready to receive them! It is not the money which is the evil part, it is the lust we have that we exercise when we have it which is the evil part. As long as we are willing to allow God to be in control, we will not go down the lustful paths 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?
March 3: Proverbs 30 7-9
Key Verse: Proverbs 30 9
Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’ Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonour the name of my God.
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 we will find some sort of comfort from the balance 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 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 who should be able to give us exactly what we require to make sure 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 who 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 we think should matter, we get into trouble with our wants and desires. The more we think we are in control, the more we get side-tracked and go after our own desires. The more we do that, the more we fill our lives with our desires and which leads to us leaving God out of it! What does desire do? The less we have of something in our lives, the more we will crave for that thing. 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?
March 2: Matthew 6 19-24
Key Verse: Matthew 6 21
For where your treasure is, there your heart will 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 they looked harmless enough, or maybe we thought 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 which 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 lose 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?
March 1: Luke 8 22-25
Key Verse: Luke 8 25
“Where is your faith?” he asked his disciples. In fear and amazement they asked one another, “Who is this? He commands even the winds and the 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 He is our Creator, Guide, Father… but He alone is the one who is actually in control! We prove many times to ourselves no matter how much we feel like we are in control, something will always come along which will break our rules and cause havoc in our lives. It may be a small earthquake, a strong wind or a violent storm passing 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 around and say we believe in God and 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 which is being tossed about by wind? Where does it go when we are trying to climb up or down a mountain side we think is too steep or slippery? Our own internal fear blocks us from trusting in Him. I am not saying 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 Him not seeing us or hearing us – we just need to have faith that He will answer our prayers!
Why is it then 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… That is the time when the evil one will focus on to distract us and to prevent us growing closer and safer with God!
Points to Ponder:
Who do you turn to when you need help?
Who do you turn to every other time?
February 28: Isaiah 40 18-26
Key Verse: Isaiah 40 21
Do you not know? Have you not heard? Has it not been told you from the beginning? Have you not understood since the earth was founded?
Devotion:
We may well think it is strange for anyone to sit down and carve a little image of a god and then worship it, but what do we do in our lives? We may not spend the time to go and buy metal and cast it into a statue, nor spend money to get someone else to do that for us… but how much time do we spend doing our own things? How much time do we devote to doing things we are not proud of? How much time do we spend doing things that we ought not to?
Each time we lift up something in our lives to make it our number one favourite thing to do, we are making that the most important thing in our lives. Each time we do that, we are knocking Christ off of the number one position. Each time, we are manufacturing an idol, albeit not made up of stone/iron/gold/silver/whatever. You see, God has given us everything for us to realise He is our Creator, our one true God, yet we always try to see what scandals or conspiracies we can come up with just so we can be the inventor of things. We all inwardly aspire to being God until we come to the realisation that we are not!
Even the poorest of people will aspire to be something they cannot be or do, just so they can lift up their spirits – or at least that is what they try to do. But when each of us hits a stumbling block, we try to level the blame on someone else so we do not look bad. The best times of our lives are probably when we have done things with other people, not done things by ourselves. God has created us to be with people, befriend them, love them and care for them. He has created us because of His love for us. There is no other conclusion we can come to other than that God created us when we look hard enough.
Points to Ponder:
What are some of your number one things in your life?
Are you willing to try and find out that God is our Creator?