Daily Devotional 12-8-2021
Rom 10:14-15 CSB How, then, can they call on him they have not believed in? And how can they believe without hearing about him? And how can they hear without a preacher? (15) And how can they preach unless they are sent? As it is written: How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news. After proclaiming God’s gracious offer in Christ, Paul confronted the natural questions that arise, each additional question building on the key verb from the preceding question. God’s promise of salvation to “everyone who calls” on Him begins the process. How, then, can they call on the One they have not believed in? Previously, to call on the Lord was equated with trusting Him or believing in Him, but here it follows the believing. When one believes in Christ, he “calls” on Him. Believing, in turn, is based on hearing, and hearing is based…
Daily Devotional 11-28-2021
Heb 3:15 As it is said: Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. Now the writer concludes the personal application of Israel’s sad experience by repeating the words of Psa_95:7-8 : “Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.” This poignant appeal, once directed to Israel, is now directed to any who might be tempted to forsake the good news and return to the law.
Daily Devotional 11-22-2021
Col 2:13-14 And when you were dead in trespasses and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made you alive with him and forgave us all our trespasses. (14) He erased the certificate of debt, with its obligations, that was against us and opposed to us, and has taken it away by nailing it to the cross. Before a person is liberated to this new life in Christ, he is dead in his sins and in his sinful nature. Death means separation, not annihilation. Even the unsaved still bear the image of God, but they are separated from God. Cut off from spiritual life, they still have human life. But now God made you alive with Christ. The same “power” that raised Christ from the dead resurrects believing sinners to spiritual life. This new life came when God forgave us all our sins for He canceled the written code. Before…
Daily Devotional 11-08-2021
Heb 2:3 how will we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? This salvation had its beginning when it was spoken of by the Lord, and it was confirmed to us by those who heard him. But now the argument moves from the lesser to the greater. If those who broke the law were punished, what will be the fate of those who neglect the gospel? The law tells men what they must do; the gospel tells men what God has done. By the law is the knowledge of sin; by the gospel is the knowledge of salvation. To neglect so great a salvation is more serious than to transgress the law. The law was given by God through angels, to Moses and then to the people. But the gospel was spoken directly by the Lord Jesus Himself. Not only so, it was confirmed to the early Christians by…
Daily Devotional 10-21-2021
1Co 1:23-24 but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles. (24) Yet to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God, But Paul did not cater to their desires. He says, “We preach Christ crucified.” As someone has said, “He was not a sign-loving Jew, nor a wisdom-loving Greek, but a Savior-loving Christian.” To the Jews, Christ crucified was a stumbling block. They looked for a mighty military leader to deliver them from the oppression of Rome. Instead of that, the gospel offered them a Savior nailed to a cross of shame. To the Greeks, Christ crucified was foolishness. They could not understand how One who died in such seeming weakness and failure could ever solve their problems. But strangely enough, the very things that the Jews and the Gentiles sought…
Daily Devotional 10-18-2021
1Co 1:30 It is from him that you are in Christ Jesus, who became wisdom from God for us—our righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, This verse emphasizes even further that all we are and have comes from Him—not from philosophy, and that there is therefore no room for human glory. First of all, Christ became for us wisdom. He is the wisdom of God, the One whom God’s wisdom chose as the way of salvation. When we have Him we have a positional wisdom that guarantees our full salvation. Secondly, He is our righteousness. Through faith in Him we are reckoned righteous by a holy God. Thirdly, He is our sanctification. In ourselves we have nothing in the way of personal holiness, but in Him we are positionally sanctified, and by His power we are transformed from one degree of sanctification to another. Finally, He is our redemption, and this doubtless…
Daily Devotional 8-20-2021
1Pe 3:18 For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit, One of the shortest and simplest, and yet one of the richest summaries given in the New Testament of the meaning of the Cross of Jesus. Christ died for sins. However, once for all is clearly a contrast with the Old Testament yearly sacrifice on the Day of Atonement and declares the complete sufficiency of Christ’s death. The substitutionary nature of Christ’s death is indicated by the phrase the righteous for the unrighteous. Christ, the “righteous One, uniquely qualified to die as the substitute for the “unrighteous ones”. The divine purpose for Christ’s sacrificial death was man’s reconciliation, to bring people to God. Peter concluded his summary of Christ’s redemptive work by referring…
Daily Devotional 8-19-2021
1Sa 12:21-22 Don’t turn away to follow worthless things that can’t profit or rescue you; they are worthless. (22) The LORD will not abandon his people, because of his great name and because he has determined to make you his own people. In a marvelous manifestation of the grace of God, Samuel related to the people that God would bless them in spite of their wrong choice if they would only be steadfast in their obedience from this point on. The past could not be undone but their future was untainted and could be devoted to the Lord.
Daily Devotional 8-18-2021
2Ti 2:8 Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead and descended from David, according to my gospel, Jesus is an example of suffering followed by glory. Remember that Jesus Christ, of the seed of David, was raised from the dead according to Paul’s gospel. The thought is not that Timothy is to remember certain things about the Lord Jesus, but rather that he is to remember the Person Himself, alive from the dead. In one sense, this verse is a brief summary of the gospel which Paul preached. The crucial point in that gospel is the resurrection of the Savior. Hiebert writes: “Not the vision of a crucified Jesus but the vision of a risen Lord is held up before Timothy.” The expression of the seed of David is a simple statement that Jesus is the Christ, the descendant of David, in whom the Messianic promises of God are fulfilled.…
Daily Devotional 8-13-2021
1Jn 1:5 This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light, and there is absolutely no darkness in him. Here he began with something he had heard from the Lord Jesus Christ whose Incarnation he had just referred to verses 1-2. The content of this “message,” as John expressed it, is that God is Light; in Him there is no darkness at all. In describing God as Light, John was no doubt thinking of God as the Revealer of His holiness. As Light, God both exposes man’s sin and condemns it. If anyone walks in darkness, he is hiding from the truth which the Light reveals. The transition from darkness into Light is what brings about salvation.