Verses for the Day / April 5

Redeemed 

'‘He is so rich in kindness and grace that He purchased our freedom with the blood of His Son and forgave our sins.” 

Ephesians 1:7

New Creation 


“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come: The old has gone, the new is here!” 

2 Corinthians 5:17

Holy


“And by that will, we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.” 

Hebrews 10:10

Temple of the Holy Spirit 


“Don’t you know that you yourselves are God’s temple and that God’s Spirit dwells in your midst?  If anyone destroys God’s temple, God will destroy that person; for God’s temple is sacred, and you together are that temple.”

1 Corinthians 3:16-17 

"Put on your new nature, created to be like God."

Ephesians 4:24

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Verses for the Day / April 5

Quiet Time...

”Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised, in the city of our God, His holy mountain. We have thought on Your lovingkindness, O God, in the midst of Your temple. As is Your name, O God, so is Your praise to the ends of the earth; Your right hand is full of righteousness. For such is God, Our God forever and ever; 

He will guide us until death.“

Psalms 48:1, 9-10, 14 

"For when we were still without strength,

 in due time Christ died for the ungodly.”

Romans 5:6 

"See what great love the Father has lavished on us, 

that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! 

The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know Him.” 

1 John 3:1

"For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, 

neither the present nor the future, nor any powers,  neither height nor depth, 

nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us 

from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” - 

Romans 8:38-39 

Today's Verses April 3

”He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.“

Colossians 1:17 NASB

“So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.”

Romans 10:17

“Praise the Lord, all nations! Extol Him, all peoples! For great is His steadfast love toward us, and the faithfulness of the Lord endures forever. Praise the Lord!"

Psalm 117:1-2

"Let everything that has breath praise the Lord! Praise the Lord!"

Psalm 150:6

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In His great mercy He has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.”

1 Peter 1:3

“LORD, You are my God; I will exalt You and praise Your name, for in perfect faithfulness You have done wonderful things, things planned long ago.”

Isaiah 25:1

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While I am Away...

Please continue to read the devotionals while I am away... you can search by author, even by date to get readings for each day. These devotionals are timeless and there are many years worth of readings. I will try to start blogging again at a later date. God Bless!

Verse of the Day / February 19

 

Quiet Time...

"The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, 

Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." 

John 1:29 KJV 

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Bible in One Year: February 19

  Bible in One Year: Leviticus 25; Mark 1:23-45

Verse of the Day / February 18

Quiet Time...

"For Christ also hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened by the Spirit:" 

1 Peter 3:18 KJV

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Bible in a Year: February 18

 Bible in a Year: Leviticus 25; Mark 1:23-45

In God’s Loving Hands / ODB

 

In God’s Loving Hands Before the mountains were born . . . from everlasting to everlasting you are God. Psalm 90:2 READ Psalm 90:1–6 After another health setback, I feared the unknown and uncontrollable. One day, while reading a Forbes magazine article, I learned that scientists studied the rising of the “Earth’s rotation velocity” and declared that the Earth “wobbled” and is “spinning faster.” They said we “could require the first-ever ‘drop second’—the official removal of a second from global time.” Though a second doesn’t seem like much of a loss, knowing that the Earth’s rotation could change seemed like a big deal to me. Even slight instability can make my faith feel wobbly. However, knowing God is in control helps me to trust Him no matter how scary our unknowns or how shaky our circumstances may seem. In Psalm 90, Moses said, “Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God” (v. 2). Acknowledging God’s unlimited power, control, and authority over all creation, Moses declared that time cannot constrain God (vv. 3–6). As we seek to know more about God and the wonderful world He made, we’ll discover how He continues perfectly managing time and all He created. God can be trusted with every unknown and newly discovered thing in our lives too. All creation remains secure in God’s loving hands. By Xochitl Dixon How does knowing God is in control of time and all creation help you trust Him when facing the unknown? How can you honor God with the time He’s entrusted to you today? Unchanging Creator, thank You for securing every second of my life in Your trustworthy hands.

SCRIPTURE INSIGHT The book of Psalms is the hymnbook and prayer book of Jews and believers in Jesus. The Hebrew title is Tehillim, which means “praise songs.” The 150 songs were composed and compiled by numerous authors over a period of nearly one thousand years. Authors include Moses, David, Asaph, the sons of Korah, Heman, Solomon, and Ethan. But 48 psalms are by unnamed authors. The superscription of Psalm 90 says it’s “A prayer of Moses the man of God.” This esteemed title is also used of Moses in Deuteronomy 33:1 and Joshua 14:6. Psalm 90 is the only psalm attributed to Moses, which makes it the oldest of the 150 psalms. Scholars believe that Moses had the forty years of wilderness wandering as the backdrop for this psalm. Contrasting the eternality of God (vv. 1-2) with the transience of human life (vv. 3-12), Moses reminds us of the mercy and compassion of God for sinful human beings (vv. 13-17). K. T. Sim

Confess Your Sins to God / Spurgeon

 

Confess Your Sins to God

Father, I have sinned. Luke 15:18

It is quite certain that those whom Christ has washed in His precious blood need not make a confession of sin as culprits or criminals before God the Judge, because Christ has forever taken away all their sins in a legal sense, so that they no longer stand where they can be condemned, but are once and for all accepted in the Beloved. But having become children, and offending as children, should they not every day go before their heavenly Father and confess their sin and acknowledge their iniquity in that character? Nature teaches that it is the duty of erring children to make a confession to their earthly father, and the grace of God in the heart teaches us that we, as Christians, owe the same duty to our heavenly Father. We daily offend and ought not to rest without daily pardon. Suppose that my trespasses against my Father are not at once taken to Him to be washed away by the cleansing power of the Lord Jesus—what will be the consequence? If I have not sought forgiveness and been washed from these offenses against my Father, I shall feel at a distance from Him; I shall doubt His love for me; I shall tremble before Him; I shall be afraid to pray to Him: I shall grow like the prodigal who, although still a child, was yet far away from his father. But if with a child’s sorrow at offending so gracious and loving a Parent, I go to Him and tell Him everything, and do not rest until I realize that I am forgiven, then I shall feel a holy love to my Father and shall go through my Christian career not only as saved, but as one enjoying present peace in God through Jesus Christ my Lord. There is a wide distinction between confessing sin as a culprit and confessing sin as a child. The Father’s bosom is the place for penitent confessions. We have been cleansed once for all, but our feet still need to be washed from the defilement of our daily walk as children of God.

Purchased for God / Alistair Begg

 

Purchased for God

By your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation, and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God, and they shall reign on the earth.

Revelation 5:9–10

I was at Bible college with a Welsh missionary candidate named Mary Fisher. She was studying the Shona language so that she might teach young boys and girls in Zimbabwe. Within a relatively short time after her arrival there, there was a terrorist raid on the school at which she Was teaching. Along with many other teachers and children, Mary did not survive; her life was snuffed out in that attack.[1] Yet while her death was tragic, her life had testified to the all-surpassing joy of serving God, not only here but also in eternity. In the song of the elders gathered around the Lamb in Revelation, we are reminded that the purpose of Christ’s death was so we might be ransomed by God. We have been set free from the sin that held us in its grip in order that, having been purchased by His blood, we will live for Him. Our praise is for God. Our service, like that of Mary Fisher, is for God. As believers in the first century looked around and saw some of their friends taken into captivity for their faith, they tried to make sense of Christ’s triumph over death, the victory of His ascension, and the reality of His return. In light of the tribulation they faced, these Christians were able to find encouragement in the reminder that even as Jesus made atonement for our sins, His focus was always on the Father. He purchased us for God. How else do we make sense of the tragedies told in missionary biographies or explain the apparent rampant chaos represented in the death of martyrs? The last recording of Mary Fisher offers clarity. As a singer and guitar player, she was teaching the children in her class lyrics of a song based on Paul’s words to the Philippian church: “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain” (Philippians 1:21).[2] Walking His path and holding His hand, the song states, is the way of peace and joy. That song is nothing but empty rhetoric unless Revelation 5 is absolutely true when it tells us that Jesus went to the cross in order to purchase us for God. And Revelation 5 is absolutely true; and so, even if all of our breath were to be squeezed out in His service, even if all of our life were to be trampled over for His name’s sake, still it would be time and energy and life well spent. You have been ransomed by God so that you might praise Him today and enjoy Him for all eternity. Whatever your day holds, be sure to walk through it with that as your greatest passion and highest purpose.

https://www.nytimes.com/1978/06/25/archives/12-white-teachers-and-children-killed-by-guerrillas-in-rhodesia.html. Accessed February 19, 2021. J. White, “For Me to Live Is Christ” (1969).

Verse of the Day / February 17

 

Quiet Time...

"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 KJV

*****

Bible in a Year: February 17

 Bible in a Year: Leviticus 21-22; Matthew 28

Do You Love or Lecture? / Adrian Rogers

Do You Love or Lecture?
Romans 5:8
Sermon: 1499 Your Child: Wise or Otherwise, Part 2

Pray Over This

“But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
Romans 5:8

Ponder This

Many of you would say, “Pastor, my heart is breaking because my son, my daughter, may not be a fool, but my son, my daughter, is a smart aleck. What do you do with a child like that?” Well, first of all, remember that scolding and lecturing a scorner does very little good. If you think you can sit down your know-it-all child and preach to him, you’ve got another thought coming. You’re not going to be able to drill it into his head. Scolding is going to do little good. As a matter of fact, it’ll probably increase his ability to sin. You need to talk less and pray more. And love that scorner more, then wait for the open door. Not the rebuke, but the open door.

When you’ve got a rebellious teenager, you surround that child with your love. Let her know where you stand on these issues, but don’t constantly be against her. Do not constantly be rebuking her, but be loving, praying, and waiting. Asking, “Oh, God, help me to speak a word in due season.” And as you pray, God will work according to His will and ways.

• When have you been tempted to lecture instead of love?
• When has an act of love by another impacted you?

Practice This

Pray for someone you know to grow in love for the Lord.