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Saturday, July 2, 2022
Surviving and Thriving / ODB
Wisdom from the Psalms / July 2
The haters of the Lord should have submitted themselves unto him; but their time should have endured for ever.
The Cry from a Cave / Chuck Swindoll
The Cry from a Cave
It was a wicked refugee camp . . . a dark vault on the side of a cliff that reached deeply into a hill. Huddled in this clammy cavern were 400 losers—a mob of miserable humanity. They came from all over and wound up all together. Listen to the account:
Everyone who was in distress, and everyone who was in debt, and everyone who was discontented gathered . . . . There were about four hundred men.
(1 Samuel 22:2)
The original Mafia. They all had one thing in common—a bad record. The place smelled like the Rams' locker room and sounded like an Army barracks. You can bet not one of those guys ever heard Gothard's principles on handling irritations. They were so tough they'd make Al Capone sleep with a night-light. They were gross. Anybody who got near that gang stayed as quiet as a roomful of nuns. They had a quaint name for those who crossed their paths . . . victims.
Except for David. That's right. David. It became his responsibility to turn that mob into an organized, well-disciplined fighting force . . . mighty men of valor. Talk about a challenge! These weren't the filthy five, nor the nasty nine, nor the dirty dozen. Remember—there were 400 of these hard-luck hooligans. Shortly thereafter, their numbers swelled to 600. And David was the den mother for these desperados. He was general, master sergeant, and chaplain all rolled into one. David, "the sweet psalmist of Israel," became David the drill instructor. Needless to say, his battalion of 600 is not to be confused with the 600 who "rode into the valley of death" in Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade. The only place these guys had ridden was out of town, chased by their creditors . . . which turned David's men into predators.
Did he pull it off? Could a shepherd from Bethlehem assume command of such a nefarious band of ne'er-do-wells? Did he meet the challenge?
Indeed! In a brief period of time, he had the troops in shape—combat ready. Incredible as it seems, he was doing battle against the enemy forces using strategic maneuvers before the year was up. These were the very men who fought loyally by his side and gave him strong support when he became the king of Israel. They were called "the mighty men," and many of their names are listed in the Bible for heroism and dedication.
All of us face a challenge. For some of you, it's a business that has all the earmarks of disaster. For others, it's the challenge of schooling without adequate money, or a houseful of young lives to shape, or a wounded relationship, or a prolonged illness that lingers and hurts. Still others of you find yourself in leadership over a group of people who need constant direction and encouragement . . . and you're tired of the demands. Some of you endure employment in a company that lacks a lot.
Be encouraged! If David could handle that cave full of malcontents, you can tighten your belt and take on the challenge in your cave. Do you need strength? Peace? Wisdom? Direction? Discipline? Ask for it! God will hear you. He gives special attention to cries when they come out of caves.
Prayer Is a Conversation / Billy Graham
Prayer Is a Conversation
Prayer is a two-way conversation; it is our talking to God, and His talking to us. As a Christian, you have a heavenly Father who hears and answers prayer. Jesus said, “All things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.” Every man or woman whose life has counted for the church and the Kingdom of God has been a person of prayer. You cannot afford to be too busy to pray. A prayerless Christian is a powerless Christian. Jesus Christ spent many hours in prayer. Sometimes He spent the night on a mountaintop in solitary communion with God the Father. If He felt that He had to pray, how much more do we need to pray!
Daily Prayer
There is inexpressible joy as I come to You in prayer, my heavenly Father.
“And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith.””
Matthew 21:22 ESV
Jesus Prays: For the Church / David Jeremiah
Jesus Prays: For the Church
Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are.
John 17:11
Recommended Reading: John 17:9-19
Bible scholars view John 17 with awe. This is the prayer Jesus prayed near the Kidron Valley after He left the Upper Room but before He entered Gethsemane on the final night of His natural life. It’s the longest prayer we have from Jesus. In verse 11, He prayed for His disciples, for His Church, and for us. He told the Father He was leaving His children in the world as He returned to heaven, and He asked the Father to watch over them, protect them, and make them one.
Alexander Maclaren had an interesting application. Jesus was leaving people behind, but He knew how to commit the ongoing work to the Father. “Happy [are] we if we can leave our unfinished tasks to be taken up by God, and trust those whom we leave undefended to be shielded by Him!” wrote Maclaren.
Let’s learn from the Lord to do all we can and to entrust the future prayerfully to the Father.
Christ’s prayer for us should be our aim and deepest desire for ourselves.
Alexander Maclaren
You Don’t Have to Do it on Your Own By Brent Rinehart
You Don’t Have to Do it on Your Own
By Brent Rinehart
“Moses's father-in-law said to him, ‘What you are doing is not good. You and the people with you will certainly wear yourselves out, for the thing is too heavy for you. You are not able to do it alone’” (Exodus 18: 17-18).
Country music star Reba McEntire was once asked to what she attributed her successful career. Without hesitation, she shined the light on the myriad of people on her team. “Some of my crew has been with me since the 80s,” she said. “They are family.”
While it sometimes can feel like “me against the world,” none of us were designed to face life’s challenges alone. Just like Reba, we all need support from others to find success.
We get a clear picture of this by examining the experience of Moses. After leading the Israelites out of Egypt and into the desert, Moses had a lot to deal with as the man in charge. When the people were hungry and thirsty, all the grumbling and complaining came to Moses. When they were fighting amongst themselves, all the disputes came to Moses to be settled. All the pressure and responsibility was on Moses’ shoulders.
“When Moses's father-in-law saw all that he was doing for the people, he said, ‘What is this that you are doing for the people? Why do you sit alone, and all the people stand around you from morning till evening?’” (Exodus 18:14).
“What you are doing is not good. You and the people with you will certainly wear yourselves out, for the thing is too heavy for you. You are not able to do it alone” (Exodus 18: 17-18).
Jethro advised his son-in-law, Moses, to set up a better system of governance, where Moses could handle the bigger issues, while other capable leaders handle smaller matters and bear the burden with him. “If you do this, [Jethro said], God will direct you, you will be able to endure, and all this people also will go to their place in peace” (Exodus 18:23). By sharing the load, it would be much easier for Moses and the people.
Jethro’s advice came on the heels of Moses’s own first-hand experience of needing help. Israel was battling Amalek. While Moses stood on the nearby hillside, he raised his arms. As he did, Israel began to prevail against Amalek. When his arms lowered, Amalek would prevail. As Moses became tired, he was hard for him to keep his arms raised. Aaron and Hur came beside him and each held up one of his arms so Israel would win the battle.
Moses understood that he couldn’t do this alone. He needed God, of course, but he also needed support from those around him. From the beginning, it was God’s design for us to help each other. We weren’t created to do everything on our own. We see this all the way back in the Garden of Eden.
“The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it…Then the Lord God said, ‘It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him’” (Genesis 2:15, 18).
Sometimes, life can be overwhelming with deadlines at the office, demands at home and a long list of unfinished tasks. We all have a lot of pressure on our shoulders, even if we aren’t in charge of thousands of people wandering in the desert.
But, just like with Moses, God designed helpers to come along side us to offer support. And, He created us to help others around us carry their heavy loads. Often, it’s our own pride that keeps us from accepting help, or our own self-involvement that keeps us from offering it.
Jesus Himself said to “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11: 28). Are you tired? Overwhelmed? Today, find time to share your heavy burdens with God and with others. Know that you can rest in the fact that you weren’t created to do it all on your own.
Intersecting Faith and Life:
- What does sharing the load look like, practically, in your life?
- Do you need to prioritize your day differently to avoid feeling overwhelmed?
- Are you holding on to tasks that you should delegate?
- Whose arms can you hold up today?
- Who is on your team? Spend a few moments thanking God for the helpers in your life.
Further Reading:
Legacies of Faith / Alistair Begg
Legacies of Faith
What does faith look like? In chapter 11 of his letter, the author of Hebrews tackles this question by presenting us with a portrait gallery, as it were, of the saints of old—men and women who were commended on account of their faith. This biblical record of commendation is not meant to elevate these individuals to some superhuman status. Instead, we are to view Noah, Moses, and the rest as ordinary people from whom we can derive strength and encouragement as we reflect on how God helped them and honored their faith.
If we want to follow their example of a living, lived-out faith, we need first to see what the faith of these individuals was not. It was not a warm, fuzzy feeling deriving from emotion or circumstances, nor was it a vague notion that everything would just work out in the end. No, for these men and women, faith in practice meant believing what God had said, taking Him at His word, and then regulating their lives accordingly. In other words, as these verses tell us, their faith was an assured conviction that what God had promised would indeed come to fruition.
Furthermore, these saints of old regarded their future reality as if it were present and that which was invisible as if it were actually visible. Even if they didn’t see God’s promises fulfilled in their lifetime, they trusted His faithfulness to His word in light of eternity. Their faith was a deep-seated trust not in their circumstances in the present but in the one who had made promises about their future.
By living out their faith in such a visible way, these saints made a radical impact on their day—and so can we in ours. Whenever an individual, a couple, a family, or a church is prepared to take God at His word and do what He says, lives will be transformed. If we do so, we will better understand who God is and what He has done, and we will be better placed to make a difference in this world and for eternity.
Of all that was true of the saints presented in Hebrews 11, the one unifying characteristic which brought them to this portrait gallery was their faith in the living God—an assurance that God’s promises were able to bear the weight of their hopes and a steady conviction that what God had said was as real as what they could see. Is that your faith? Meditate on all the promises that are yours from God in Christ. Reflect on all the promises God has already kept through history and supremely in the death and resurrection of His Son. Then you will be able, with joy and determination, to set your priorities and make your decisions based on His promises, not on your circumstances.
Hebrews 11
An Adventure Awaits / Greg Laurie
An Adventure Awaits
“Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full—pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back” (Luke 6:38 NLT).
We know that as Christians, we are supposed to share faith. In fact, we find the Great Commission in two Gospels, Matthew and Mark.
In Matthew’s version, Jesus says, “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you” (28:19–20 NKJV).
And in Mark, He says, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature” (16:15 NKJV).
Frankly, most of us don’t follow this command. Research shows that 95 percent of Christians have never led another person to Christ. Only 2 percent of churchgoers have invited an unchurched person to church in the past year, and 59 percent of Christians say they seldom or never share their faith with others.
If some of us were brutally honest, we would admit that we don’t really care that much about nonbelievers. But the gospel, by design, is meant to be shared, not hidden. And sometimes we end up hoarding the truth instead of sharing hope.
We can become so inward in our focus that we miss this great truth. But as we give to and serve others, it will replenish and refresh us.
Jesus put it this way: “Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full—pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back” (Luke 6:38 NLT).
God is looking for someone like you who actually will say, “Use me, Lord. I’ll go where You want me to go. I will say what You want me to say.” Will you be that person? If so, a wonderful adventure awaits you.
Copyright © 2022 by Harvest Ministries. All rights reserved.
Cry to the Lord / Spurgeon
Cry to the Lord
To you, O Lord, I call; my rock, be not deaf to me,
lest, if you be silent to me, I become like those
who go down to the pit.
A cry is the natural expression of sorrow, and a suitable utterance when all other modes of appeal fail us; but the cry must be alone directed to the Lord, for to cry to man is to waste our entreaties upon the air. When we consider the readiness of the Lord to hear and His ability to aid, we shall see good reason for directing all our appeals at once to the God of our salvation. It will be in vain to call to the rocks in the day of judgment, but our Rock attends to our cries.
“Be not deaf to me.” Mere formalists may be content without answers to their prayers, but genuine suppliants cannot; they are not satisfied with the results of prayer itself in calming the mind and subduing the will—they must go further and obtain actual replies from heaven or they cannot rest; and those replies they long to receive at once—they dread even a little of God’s silence.
God’s voice is often so terrible that it shakes the wilderness; but His silence is equally full of awe to an eager suppliant. When God seems to close His ear, we must not therefore close our mouths but rather cry with more earnestness; for when our note grows shrill with eagerness and grief, He will not long deny us a hearing. What a dreadful case we would be in if the Lord should become forever deaf to our prayers. “Lest, if you be silent to me, I become like those who go down to the pit.” Deprived of the God who answers prayer, we would be in a more pitiable plight than the dead in the grave and would soon sink to the same level as the lost in hell. We must have answers to prayer: Ours is an urgent case of dire necessity; surely the Lord will speak peace to our agitated minds, for He never can find it in His heart to permit His own elect to perish.
Daily Blessings / July 2
Daily Blessings
Step Out Boldly / Streams
Step Out Boldly
Choose Your Mentors / Max Lucado
Choose Your Mentors
Click below to listen to today's devotional
The world has seen wiser kings, wealthier kings, and more powerful kings. But history has never seen a more courageous king than young King Josiah. He inherited a fragile throne and a tarnished crown. The temple was in disarray, the law was lost, and the people worshiped idols. But by the end of Josiah’s thirty-one-year reign, the temple had been rebuilt, the idols destroyed, and the law of God was once again elevated to a place of prominence and power.
Josiah was eight years old when he ascended the throne, and he flipped through his family scrapbook until he found an ancestor worthy of emulation. “He lived as his ancestor David had lived, and he did not stop doing what was right” (2 Kings 22:2 NCV).
The principle? We can’t choose our parents, but we can choose our mentors.
Friday, July 1, 2022
The Inevitable Penalty / Oswald Chambers
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