Recall Notice

Recently we had to replace the transmission on our car - a 2000 Honda Accord.  We were thankful for how long we have had it and how many miles we were able to put on it. We did the repair at a hefty price. However, in the process of researching if it was worth repairing, we found out that there was a recall notice for the transmission sent out.  It went unnoticed in our home.  Also, they had extended a grace period of about 7 years - which we missed by 1 year!! All that to say, Honda did their best to give our car a new life.  We just didn't take the opportunity.  Today's RBC.org devotional captured how to apply this natural life experience to our spiritual life.

                                  Recall Notice

"Repent...that your sins may be blotted out"  Acts 3:19

In 2010, auto manufacturers recalled a staggering 20 million cars in the US for various defects. The thought of such a large number of defective cars on the road is startling enough. But what is more disturbing is the apathy of some owners. In one instance, the executive director of the Center for Auto Safety warned owners, “It’s a free repair. Get it done. It may save your life.” Yet, despite the risk to their own lives, 30 percent never responded.

Likewise, many ignore God’s “recall notice” to the entire human race. Unlike a defect found in automobiles, the moral defect of the human race is not the Maker’s fault. He made everything “very good” (Gen. 1:31), but people’s sin ruined it. God’s offer to us is “repent . . . that your sins may be blotted out” (Acts 3:19).

God offers not just a free repair of the human heart but a replacement of it (Ezek. 36:26; 2 Cor. 5:17). Though the offer costs us nothing (Eph. 2:8-9), it cost God the life of His only Son Jesus Christ. “[Jesus] bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness—by whose stripes you were healed” (1 Peter 2:24).

Don’t ignore the Lord’s call. The free and permanent remedy offered by God for your spiritual defect will save your life!

The heart of man is stained by sin,
From Adam’s fall this has been true;
Yet God in Christ can make a change—
Through faith in Him we are made new. —Fitzhugh

 

 

                  For a new start, ask God for a new heart.

...

He went about doing good.

My husband very recently left a career of 30 years as a Commodities Trader.  We have been married for 24 of those years!  He is a loyal friend to many and being in that industry fostered some interesting relationships.  When he became a believer and follower of Jesus (out of a Buddhist background!!) he chose to really learn about the Lord and follow in His footsteps.  For the last 10 years he and some other believers would hold bible study in the offices that surround the "Pit" of the trading floors.  Many men would come to hear about the faithfulness of the God of Israel who sent the Messiah who loves the sinner, tax collector, and prostitute. Good news for all.

Though he still goes down to the "Pit" as a consultant from time to time and for a weekly bible study, more often he goes about counseling, encouraging, and teaching the Word of God to those in his path. I have witnessed a beautiful exchange of spirit in this man. The apostle Paul said*, "We proclaim Him, admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone perfect in Christ. To this end I labor, struggling with all his energy, which so powerfully works in me."  It is a privilege to go forward in our new season of life together...walking by faith and not by sight.

 *Colossians 1:28-29

"He went about doing good.”  Acts 10:38

"Few words, but yet an exquisite miniature of the Lord Jesus Christ. There are not many touches, but they are the strokes of a master’s pencil. Of the Savior and only of the Savior is it true in the fullest, broadest, and most unqualified sense. “He went about doing good.” From this description it is evident that he did good personally. The evangelists constantly tell us that He touched the leper with his own finger, that He anointed the eyes of the blind, and that in cases where He was asked to speak the word only at a distance, He did not usually comply, but went himself to the sick bed, and there personally wrought the cure.

 A lesson to us, if we would do good, to do it ourselves. Give alms with your own hand; a kind look, or word, will enhance the value of the gift. Speak to a friend about his soul; your loving appeal will have more influence than a whole library of tracts. Our Lord’s mode of doing good sets forth his incessant activity! He did not only the good which came close to hand, but he “went about” on his errands of mercy. Throughout the whole land of Judea there was scarcely a village or a hamlet which was not gladdened by the sight of him. How this reproves the creeping, loitering manner, in which many professors serve the Lord. 

Let us gird up the loins of our mind, and be not weary in well doing. Does not the text imply that Jesus Christ went out of his way to do good? “He went about doing good.” He was never deterred by danger or difficulty. He sought out the objects of his gracious intentions. So must we. If old plans will not answer, we must try new ones, for fresh experiments sometimes achieve more than regular methods. Christ’s perseverance, and the unity of his purpose, are also hinted at, and the practical application of the subject may be summed up in the words, “leaving us an example that we should follow in His steps.”  Charles Spurgeon 'July 28th'

But God raised him from the dead

 “Brothers, children of Abraham, and you God-fearing Gentiles, it is to us that this message of salvation has been sent. The people of Jerusalem and their rulers did not recognize Jesus, yet in condemning him they fulfilled the words of the prophets that are read every Sabbath.  Though they found no proper ground for a death sentence, they asked Pilate to have him executed.  When they had carried out all that was written about him, they took him down from the tree and laid him in a tomb.  But God raised him from the dead,  and for many days he was seen by those who had traveled with him from Galilee to Jerusalem. They are now his witnesses to our people.
 
     We tell you the good news: What God promised our fathers  he has fulfilled for us, their children, by raising up Jesus. 

As it is written in the second Psalm:

         ‘You are my Son;  today I have become your Father.' (Psalm 2:7)

     The fact that God raised him from the dead, never to decay, is stated in these words: 

         ‘I will give you the holy and sure blessings promised to David.' (Isaiah 55:3)

 So it is stated elsewhere:

       ‘You will not let your Holy One see decay.' (Psalm 16:10)

 For when David had served God’s purpose in his own generation, he fell asleep; he was buried with his fathers and his body decayed.  But the one whom God raised from the dead did not see decay. Therefore, my brothers, I want you to know that through Jesus the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. Through him everyone who believes is justified from everything you could not be justified from by the law of Moses. 

Take care that what the prophets have said does not happen to you:

 “‘Look, you scoffers,
    wonder and perish,
for I am going to do something in your days
    that you would never believe,
    even if someone told you.” ( Habakkuk 1:5)

Acts 13:26 - 41 New International Version 1984

Because of Him - I am reminding you

In order to deflect conversations of faith,  one might say they 'do' the 10 Commandments. Before seeking after God, and as a religious person, I would say the same thing. But truthfully, I never fully took in the teachings of the 10 Commandments.  Choosing not to be distracted by the language of thou shalts and thou shalt nots and reading them, I was convicted to the core and my heart hurt.

1. Have no other Gods before me.

2. Do not make or bow down to any idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters.  You shall not bow down to them or worship them.

3.  Do not misuse the name of the Lord.

4.  Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy.  Do no work - you or your children.

5.  Honor your father and mother.

6.  Do not murder.

7.  Do not commit adultery.

8.  Do not steal.

9.  Do not give false testimony against your neighbor.

10. Do not covet.

 (read Exodus 20: 1-17)

There is another teaching that hurt my heart when I read it ... the Beatitudes.  The teachings of Jesus to his disciples as he sat with them on the mountainside.  He made 8 points that showed where his followers needed to adjust their attitudes.  (The parenthesis are a personal interpretation of each point.)

1. Poor in Spirit (recognizing one's spiritual bankruptcy and need for God)

2. Mournful (of one's own sin and recognizing the pain it causes others as well as myself)

3. Meekness (Humility. I don't always have to win! No room for pride or arrogance.)

4. Spiritual Hunger for Righteousness (A heart that truly longs to seek God in all circumstances)

5. Mercifulness

6. Pure Heart (and Mind)

7. Peacemaker (Is my response to conflict anger and bitterness, or willingness to bridge the gap?)

8. Persecution (How I stand for what is right without reacting defensively or with self-pity)

(Read Matthew 5:1-10)

Before every point Jesus makes he says, "blessed are" and goes on to explain what characteristics are to be found in every child of God. And at the end of his teaching he says, "Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you and falsely say all kinds of evil against you BECAUSE OF ME.  Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you." (v 11)

Those prophets of the Old Testament made sure to remind the people of all God's Commands.

After rereading the 10 Commandments and the Beatitudes, I am even more firmly convinced of my need for a Savior. How about you? How about your children?

 

Be Strong, Do not Fear

We need to be reminded of better things to come.  There will be a place where 'gladness and joy will overtake us and sorrow and sighing will flee away' and we can rest. We are called to remind those who are fearful of the hope we have in a loving God. This passage is from Isaiah 35.

"The desert and the parched land will be glad; the wilderness will rejoice and blossom. Like the crocus, it will burst into bloom, it will rejoice greatly and shout for joy.

The glory of Lebanon will be given to it, the splendor of Carmel and Sharon; they will see the glory of the Lord,  the splendor of our God.
 

Strengthen the feeble hands, steady the knees that give way; say to those with fearful hearts, “Be strong, do not fear;  your God will come,  he will come with vengeance; with divine retribution he will come to save you."

Then will the eyes of the blind be opened

and the ears of the deaf unstopped.  

Then will the lame leap like a deer,  

 and the mute tongue shout for joy. 
 

Water will gush forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert. The burning sand will become a pool, the thirsty ground bubbling springs.

In the haunts where jackals once lay, grass and reeds and papyrus will grow.

 And a highway will be there;
    it will be called The Way of Holiness;
    it will be for those who walk on that Way.

The unclean will not journey on it; wicked fools will not go about on it. No lion will be there, nor any ravenous beast; they will not be found there.

But only the redeemed will walk there, and those the Lord has rescued will return.

They will enter Zion with singing;
    everlasting joy will crown their heads.
Gladness and joy will overtake them,
    and sorrow and sighing will flee away."

Isaiah 35 

Self pity

. . .  God's fellow worker in spreading the gospel of Christ, to strengthen and encourage you in your faith, so that no one would be unsettled by these trials. —1 Thessalonians 3:2-3

After sanctification, it is difficult to state what your purpose in life is, because God has moved you into His purpose through the Holy Spirit. He is using you now for His purposes throughout the world as He used His Son for the purpose of our salvation. If you seek great things for yourself, thinking, “God has called me for this and for that,” you barricade God from using you. As long as you maintain your own personal interests and ambitions, you cannot be completely aligned or identified with God’s interests.

This can only be accomplished by giving up all of your personal plans once and for all, and by allowing God to take you directly into His purpose for the world. Your understanding of your ways must also be surrendered, because they are now the ways of the Lord.

I must learn that the purpose of my life belongs to God, not me. God is using me from His great personal perspective, and all He asks of me is that I trust Him. I should never say, “Lord, this causes me such heartache.” To talk that way makes me a stumbling block. When I stop telling God what I want, He can freely work His will in me without any hindrance. He can crush me, exalt me, or do anything else He chooses. He simply asks me to have absolute faith in Him and His goodness.

Self-pity is of the devil, and if I wallow in it I cannot be used by God for His purpose in the world. Doing this creates for me my own cozy “world within the world,” and God will not be allowed to move me from it because of my fear of being “frost-bitten.”

Utmost for His Highest - Nov 10 - Oswald Chambers

Testing the heart

This is such a good reminder by David McCasland who writes for Our Daily Bread of RBC Ministries.

Two Lessons Learned

The Lord your God led you all the way these forty years . . . to humble you and test you. —Deuteronomy 8:2

A few weeks after writing an Our Daily Bread article about the importance of obeying the law, I set out on an 850-mile trip—determined to stay within the posted speed limit. While driving out of a small town in New Mexico, I became more occupied with unwrapping a sandwich than with watching the road signs, and I got a speeding ticket. My first lesson that day was that not paying attention costs the same as deliberate disregard for the law. And I still had 700 miles to go!

My second lesson was that our resolve will always be tested. I thought of Moses’ words to God’s people as they prepared to enter the Promised Land: “You shall remember that the Lord your God led you all the way these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you and test you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not” (Deut. 8:2).

Pastor and author Eugene Peterson called the process of following Christ “a long obedience in the same direction.” Every resolution to begin to obey must be followed by many decisions to continue.

God gave me a humbling reminder of how vital it is to keep my heart set on obeying Him—and to pay attention along the way. —David McCasland

                                         To love God is to obey God.

One day there will be no night...

Working with some young adults yesterday, I met a sweet girl who is fighting the battle against the darkness in her life.  It's trying to take her down.  But, by the Grace of God, she has made every effort to get back into the fold of fellowship that she walked away from 10 years ago.  The battle rages on, but she has recommitted her life to the Lord and walking in a way that would please Him.  If you believe in the God who can transform us from the inside out, please pray with me that she have wisdom to do the right things, protection from the temptations that want to destroy her, and courage to take each step - one at a time.  May we remember that even in darkness light dawns for the upright.

     “And the evening and the morning were the first day.” Genesis 1:5

"The evening was “darkness” and the morning was “light,” and yet the two together are called by the name that is given to the light alone! This is somewhat remarkable, but it has an exact analogy in spiritual experience. In every believer there is darkness and light, and yet he is not to be named a sinner because there is sin in him, but he is to be named a saint because he possesses some degree of holiness. This will be a most comforting thought to those who are mourning their infirmities, and who ask, “Can I be a child of God while there is so much darkness in me?”

Yes; for you, like the day, take not your name from the evening, but from the morning; and you are spoken of in the word of God as if you were even now perfectly holy as you will be soon. You are called the child of light, though there is darkness in you still. You are named after what is the predominating quality in the sight of God, which will one day be the only principle remaining.

Observe that the evening comes first. Naturally we are darkness first in order of time, and the gloom is often first in our mournful apprehension, driving us to cry out in deep humiliation, “God be merciful to me, a sinner.” 

The place of the morning is second, it dawns when grace overcomes nature. It is a blessed aphorism of John Bunyan, “That which is last, lasts forever.” That which is first, yields in due season to the last; but nothing comes after the last. So that though you are naturally darkness, when once you become light in the Lord, there is no evening to follow; “thy sun shall no more go down.”

The first day in this life is an evening and a morning; but the second day, when we shall be with God, forever, shall be a day with no evening, but one, sacred, high, eternal noon." - Charles H. Spurgeon

"The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp...On no day will its gates ever be shut, for there will be no night there." 

Revelation 21:23, 25 

Remember the Truth

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights. —James 1:17

"At a cultural show in Bandung, Indonesia, we enjoyed a wonderful orchestra performance. Before the finale, the 200 people in the audience were each handed an angklung, a musical instrument made of bamboo. We were taught how to shake it in rhythm with the conductor’s timing. Soon we thought we were performing like an orchestra; we felt so proud of how well we were doing! Then it dawned on me that we were not the ones who were good; it was the conductor who deserved the credit.

Similarly, when everything is going well in our lives, it’s easy to feel proud. We’re tempted to think that we are good and that it is by our abilities that we’ve achieved success. During such moments, we tend to forget that behind it all is our good God who prompts, prevents, provides, and protects.

David remembered that truth: “Then King David went in and sat before the Lord; and he said: ‘Who am I, O Lord God? And what is my house, that You have brought me this far?’” (1 Chronicles 17:16). David’s heart swelled up in appreciation of God’s goodness.

The next time we are tempted to take credit for the blessings we enjoy, let’s pause and remember that it is the Lord who brings blessing. The hand of the Father is behind all good things." - Albert Lee - from Our Daily Bread www.odb.org

No strength of our own, nor goodness we claim;
Our trust is all thrown on Jesus’ name:
In this our strong tower for safety we hide;
The Lord is our power, “The Lord will provide.” —Newton

 

Singing a new song

Recently I answered the prompt to join the choir.  Praising God is something that should come as naturally as breathing for one who believes He exists.  But to be honest with you, I had to learn how to do it and with a bit more abandon.  Not easy for a buttoned up conservative former-Catholic girl.  This new journey has been a humbling joy.

Today's devotional was a sweet confirmation to those 'promptings' from the Lord.  Thought you might enjoy it as well...especially if you are considering joining the choir!

A Mountain Choir
"Sing, O heavens; and be joyful, O earth; and break forth into singing, O mountains: for the LORD hath comforted His people, and will have mercy upon His afflicted"   (Isaiah 49:13).

So sweet are the comforts of the LORD, that not only the saints themselves may sing of them, but even the heavens and the earth may take up the song. It takes something to make a mountain sing; and yet the prophet summons quite a choir of them. Lebanon, and Sirion, and the high hills of Bashan and Moab, He would set them all singing because of Jehovah's grace to His own Zion. May we not also make mountains of difficulty, and trial, and mystery, and labor become occasions for praise unto our God? "Break forth into singing, O mountains!"

This word of promise, that our God will have mercy upon His afflicted, has a whole peal of bells connected with it. Hear their music -- "Sing!" "Be joyful!" "Break forth into singing." The LORD would have His people happy because of His unfailing love. He would not have us sad and doubtful; He claims from us the worship of believing hearts. He cannot fail us: why should we sigh or sulk as if He would do so? Oh, for a well-tuned harp! Oh, for voices like those of the cherubim before the throne!

Taken from Check Book of Faith for July 7

JOHN 3:16

This is one Bible verse that many people quote.  Before ever reading the Bible, I would look at the verse and wonder why so many people bandy it about. Today's devotional from C.H. Spurgeon gives great interpretation.  May you take it to heart and believe.

                                    His Love; His Gift; His Son

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His Only Begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have Everlasting Life"   (John 3:16).


"Of all the stars in the sky, the polestar is the most useful to the mariner. This text is a polestar, for it has guided more souls to salvation than any other Scripture. It is among promises what the Great Bear is among constellations.

Several words in it shine with peculiar brilliance. Here we have God's love with a "so" to it, which marks its measureless greatness. Then we have God's gift in all its freeness and greatness. This also is God's Son, that unique and priceless gift of a love which could never fully show itself till heaven's Only-begotten had been sent to live and die for men. These three points are full of light.

Then there is the simple requirement of believing, which graciously points to a way of salvation suitable for guilty men. This is backed by a wide description -- "whosoever believeth in him." Many have found room in "whosoever" who would have felt themselves shut out by a narrower word. Then comes the great promise, that believers in Jesus shall not perish but have everlasting life. This is cheering to every man who feels that he is ready to perish and that he cannot save himself. We believe in the LORD Jesus, and we have eternal life."

The Word of Life

"I meditate on your precepts and consider your ways.  I delight in your decrees; I will not neglect your word." Psalm 119:15-16

IN WORD   Is the Bible an obligation, something that we know we should read whether we have enthusiasm for it or not-like finishing our vegetables before we head on to dessert?  If so, we have perhaps not accurately understood the weight of this Word that God has given us.  It is more than literature, more than history, more than theology.  It is life.

Many a reader has gotten bogged down in the 'begats' and 'thou shalts' of the Bible, missing the relevance of those sections in establishing our faith as historical and human.  But think about our condition; We are lost in this world, not knowing which way is up.  Every midlife crisis or pang of existential angst will force us to admit it, whether we want to or not.  Meanwhile, the Bible smolders on the shelf, burning to answer our ultimate questions on meanings and mysteries. It is the revelation of the divine.  It has all the wisdom we need.

IN DEED  Your culture and whichever elements of it you dwell in-whether it's your work environment, your entertainment choices, your conversations with friends, etc.-will constantly try to pull you into its value system and its own sense of morality.  God's Word, if we let it, will pry us back out of it.  Only the Word can resist the currents of this world and shape us according to God's design.

Does this mean we should avoid our culture?  No, we cannot escape.  In fact, we should involve ourselves in our world in order to influence it for God's kingdom.  But we cannot be swayed by it.  Let the Word be a stronger influence in your life than any other philosophy or value system.  Not only should we give it proper attention; we should delight in it, crave it, and savor it.  When we do, it will accomplish in us all that God means for it to accomplish.  It will make us everything we are meant to be.

"Some read the Bible to learn, and some read the Bible to hear from Heaven."  Andrew Murray

 

 Devotional above is the July 1st excerpt of One Year Devotional "Walk with God" by Chris Tiegreen