November 9: Matthew 5 1-12
Key Verse: Matthew 5 12
Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Devotion:
The one thing everyone is after is happiness. Everyone who has lived has sought happiness, but, sadly, not everyone will find it. Our view of happiness may not agree with what everyone else's view and it will probably not agree with what others think our happiness should be! But Christ has promised us we will find happiness so long as we seek it from Him... If we are willing to live our lives for Christ, then He will be willing to bring happiness into our lives – but that happiness will not necessarily be a worldly happiness everyone else will be after. This happiness which Christ gives us is a happiness no other can give us!
If we are willing to put the world behind us and follow Christ's will, then we will certainly find a great peace and comfort which will be better than any worldly example we can seek for! If we are willing to lay aside our need and greed for worldly comforts, we will find spiritual comforts which will far outweigh worldly comforts. Christ gives eight perfect characteristics that should be in our lives in our walk with Him.
We don't have to be rich in worldly items to be happy because true happiness is spiritual. We will find greater happiness when we comfort others and love others so we miss them when they are gone. We don't have to seek popularity and notoriety because God has already promised us the earth! We need to seek out good things because it is those things we seek which will fill our souls. Showing mercy to others will allow them to show mercy to us. Being content with what God gives us will stop us from focusing on earthly things all the time. Keeping the peace instead of causing arguments will help us to be more like Him. And when we get mocked for being Christians, we need to stand proud because others have finally recognised us as being God's Children! Then we know our happiness is secure!
Points to Ponder:
What sort of person would you like to have in charge of your country?
Are you heading for a worldly slump or a Godly blessing?
November 8: Luke 9 51-56
Key Verse: Luke 9 56
Then he and his disciples went to another village.
Devotion:
It is refreshing to see the humanity of the disciples as they followed Christ. They took in the gospel as spoken by Christ and continued to make of it what they would, just as we make up our own minds when we hear God's word. Some of them were convinced Christ was within His right to destroy any place which would not accept Him. In this passage as they started to work their way back to Jerusalem, they would send out messengers ahead of them to sound out the villages and see if there was anyone who would give them board and lodging for the night. Most places rejected Christ and the disciples and would not give them space.
Our human reaction to someone who rejects us is to reject them back. We often reject them in a more defined way than they reject us, exaggerating the rejection in some manner. This passage recalls how they asked Christ if they should pray for fire to come down from heaven and consume the unbelievers just as Elijah had done in the past. But the difference between these people and those which Elijah faced are so many.
The big difference is these people may have been rejecting Christ the human this time round, but they may not have been working against God. They may not have had the chance to hear the gospel and so may have not been rejecting Christ the Son of God. Jesus knew this difference and knew some may yet come to believe as the apostles went out to preach later on. He reminds them He did not come to destroy all unbelievers, but to save those who would want to listen and repent. Destroying your own people just because they have done something wrong is not the way to create a community. God wants us to have the chance of repentance right up until it is too late, but He would rather we made a choice now and showed others than to leave it and trip others up!
Points to Ponder:
Do you lead by example or just tell everyone off all the time?
Do you work for God or against Him in your actions?
November 7: John 3 14-18
Key Verse: John 3 17
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
Devotion:
I would guess the most common reason for people not believing in God is that they know nothing about Him; but there are those who know a little and use what they think they know against Him. Maybe they realise there is a God, yet blame Him for everything that goes wrong. Maybe they think He does not care about them because they are insignificant. Maybe they just don't want to believe it can all be so easy and they want to find the most unbelievable story to explain things. Maybe they think it is all a conspiracy...
But the plain and simple truth is God created us and He loves us. He loves us so much He was willing to send His Son to die for us. How could He demonstrate His love in any better way in human eyes? Many people start to blame Christ for things or to say Christ was a blasphemer, but the truth is He is the Son of God and He came to give us all the chance to be saved from our sins.
Despite our best intentions, our lives very quickly get overtaken by our sinful deeds and minds and we jump straight into the fire. We don't see it coming and by the time we jump, it is too late. It is nobody else's fault other than our own – we are the ones who took the first leap! That is why we have to come to the realisation of exactly what Christ has done for us. He is the one who has made it possible to be rescued. He is the one who has given us the choice. He is the one who came to earth so we could be saved from ourselves. He did not come down to set blame on anyone, nor to condemn us all because of the sinful lives we live. He came so we could be saved from eternal death and it is only through Him we can be saved. The only thing He requires is that we believe it to be so. It’s impossible to not make a choice because we have already chosen sin. We still have a choice to come back to Him. If we don't believe, then we go down like the rest because we are the ones who jumped. It is our choice.
Points to Ponder:
Do you like putting off choices?
Does God know your choice?
November 6: Daniel 3 13-20
Key Verse: Daniel 3 19
Then Nebuchadnezzar was furious with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, and his attitude toward them changed. He ordered the furnace heated seven times hotter than usual
Devotion:
When any of us get angry, we lose sight of all that is sensible... We may like to think we are in control, but we are typically not. We do stupid things, we don't think logically or rationally but simply follow our wrath and anger. Yet no matter how many times we read about it, or get told about it, or learn from other mistakes, we seem to go back there over and over again – this is one mistake in our lives we find hard to learn from because our anger consumes our spirits.
Just like a huge bush fire which gets to a forest of fir trees, there is nothing to stop it. Everyone around us takes a step back and has to ride it out whilst we lose it all and destroy things which we probably love... That has got to be the worst part, the fact we can lose control so much that we do things which we know are stupid and we know are wrong – yet we cannot stop ourselves, even with loved ones. We tear apart friendships, we break down trusts, we build up barriers, destroy hard work; and all in a few seconds... Things which may have taken us years to build up are torn asunder as we go on the rampage.
Nebuchadnezzar, I'm sure, knew all about furnaces and how dangerous fire was; yet when his fury got hold of him, he heated the furnace far beyond that which was safe. In doing so he endangered the lives of those around him just to try and placate his feelings. When the men pushed Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego into the fire, they lost their own lives.
We need to be able to control our anger before we blow up. Wrath normally comes after pride is put down, greed is challenged, or jealousy is provoked. It follows on from bad situations and not from good. Following Christ's examples instead of our lustful eyes will help us to avoid those situations in the beginning rather than having to face the consequences of our outbursts!
Points to Ponder:
What makes you really mad?
How can we hope to follow God's Will if we let anger rules our lives?
November 5: Proverbs 27 3-4
Key Verse: Proverbs 27 4
Anger is cruel and fury overwhelming, but who can stand before jealousy?
Devotion:
Which is easier to carry, a rock weighing 5 kilograms or 5 kilograms of sand? Well, unless you have the sand in a nice bag, it will be almost impossible to pick it up in one go! Each has its drawbacks, and each has its strengths and until we have tried both, we will not be able to say with all honesty which is easier than the other. Neither are going to be pleasant to have to carry because they are both heavy, but with a little thought we can get to carry them. What we do find much harder to carry is what people can lump upon us. People can give us burdens to carry without thinking about it, they can overload us without realising it; and those burdens will be the ones which weigh us down more than anything. When people get angry with us, they throw all sorts of things at us and we have to do something with them!
For those who do not believe in Christ, they have a weight on their shoulders they don't know the half of! They have a weight which far out-weighs anything we could ever give them. Yet most people go through life trying to figure out what their excess baggage is, never looking at the obvious truth because it just looks too simple. We always want to find a complex answer to everything to make us feel like it has been worth the struggle! We are being out-weighed by our own thoughts. Wrath and anger are weights we carry around and don't think about. They pull us down, building up inside, until they come out screaming – and we find ourselves screaming! Wrath does not know bounds, it rips through everything and anything in its path. It is not kind and thoughtful but cruel and thoughtless overwhelming anything and everything.
Envy will pull us down further below the surface than anything else we know; and we won't know it until it is far too late! Without asking Christ to lift you above wrath, anger and envy, we may as well be on the Titanic! We need His strength and guidance to lift us above those thoughts and feelings and allow His love to shine through us!
Points to Ponder:
How much anger does it really take to upset you?
How much do you rely on God to lift you above your feelings?