Daily Devotional 8-16-2021
Gal 5:16 I say then, walk by the Spirit and you will certainly not carry out the desire of the flesh. As a believer walks through life he should depend on the indwelling Holy Spirit for guidance and power. But the Spirit does not operate automatically in a believer’s heart. He waits to be depended on. When a Christian does yield to the Spirit’s control, the promise is that he will not in anywise gratify the desires of the sinful nature. Thus, while no believer will ever be entirely free in this life from the evil desires that stem from his fallen human nature, he need not capitulate to them, but may experience victory by the Spirit’s help.
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.
Daily Devotional 8-12-2021
Pro 16:17 The highway of the upright avoids evil; the one who guards his way protects his life. The upright person seeks to avoid evil. Guarding his way (i.e., maintaining upright conduct) is a means of guarding one’s soul (inner life with its drives, appetites, and desires) from sin.
Daily Devotional 8-7-2021
2Co 10:3-5 For although we live in the flesh, we do not wage war according to the flesh, (4) since the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but are powerful through God for the demolition of strongholds. We demolish arguments (5) and every proud thing that is raised up against the knowledge of God, and we take every thought captive to obey Christ. The weapons Paul used were the proclaimed Word of God and prayer, weapons with divine power. In dependence on God these weapons, frail by worldly standards, are able to demolish the arguments and every pretension of the gospel’s foes. Neither the god of this Age nor his henchmen could oppose the knowledge of God on which Paul relied. The object of Paul’s warfare was to make people obedient. Paul was not interested in making them subject to himself or any other man after the…
Daily Devotional 7-23-2021
Psa 86:16 Turn to me and have mercy on me; show your strength in behalf of your servant; save me, because I serve you just as my mother did. Because the proud had risen against David, he asked God for strength. His enemies were ruthless men with no regard for the Lord. But by contrast the Lord is compassionate, gracious… slow to anger, loving, and faithful. David’s prayer for “strength” in the face of his peril was based on the greatness of God. He also asked for a sign of God’s goodness, that is, deliverance so that others would see and know it was God at work.
Daily Devotional 7-19-2021
Act 20:24 However, I consider my life worth nothing to me; my only aim is to finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me–the task of testifying to the good news of God’s grace. As the apostle weighed this outlook in his mind, Paul did not think that his own life was the great consideration. His ambition was to obey God and to please Him. If in doing this, he would be called upon to offer up his life, he was willing to do so. No sacrifice we could make would be too great for the One who died for us. All that mattered was that we finish our race and complete the ministry which we received from the Lord Jesus, to testify to the gospel of the grace of God. No title could better express the good news which Paul preached—the gospel of the…
Daily Devotional 7-18-2021
1Ti 1:13-14 Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief. (14) The grace of our Lord was poured out on me abundantly, along with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. That Paul had broken the Ten Commandments before his conversion is abundantly evident from this verse. He speaks of himself as formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and an insolent man.. The first sin is a matter of words only. The second describes suffering inflicted on others for their religious beliefs. The third includes the idea of cruelty and abuse. But Paul obtained mercy. He did not receive the punishment he deserved because he did these things ignorantly in unbelief. In persecuting Christians, he thought he was doing God’s service. Since his parents’ religion taught the worship of the true God,…
Daily Devotional 7-15-2021
Jas 1:22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. It is not enough to receive the implanted word; we must obey it. There is no virtue in possessing the Bible or even in reading it as literature. There must be a deep desire to hear God speaking to us and an unquestioning willingness to do whatever He says. We must translate the Bible into action. The word must become flesh in our lives. There should never be a time when we go to the Scriptures without allowing them to change our lives for the better. To profess great love for God’s word or even to pose as a Bible student is a form of self-deception unless our increasing knowledge of the word is producing increasing likeness to the Lord Jesus. To go on gaining an intellectual knowledge of the Bible without obeying…
Daily Devotion 7-13-2021
Mat 6:24 “No one can serve two masters, since either he will hate one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money. The impossibility of living for God and for money is stated here in terms of masters and slaves. No one can serve two masters. One will inevitably take precedence in his loyalty and obedience. So it is with God and mammon. They present rival claims and a choice must be made. Either we must put God first and reject the rule of materialism or we must live for temporal things and refuse God’s claim on our lives.
Daily Devotional 7-11-2021
Tit 1:1 Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ to further the faith of God’s elect and their knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness– As servant and apostle, Paul concerns the faith of God’s elect and he knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness. God was using Paul to call out a people for Himself and to teach them the truth which is conducive to godly living. It highlights the salvation of a believer is a process. It begins with justification (which is an one-off event when the believer first believed), followed by sanctification (which is a continuous process) and then finally glorification (which is the consummation of the process). The Knowledge of God taught by the Spirit leads us to a devotion to God (which is a fruit of worship and communion) as well as an attitude of obedience being displayed in…