Category: Devotions

Go ahead and ask !

I was driving home in my town in New Jersey after an easy-paced run. Heading eastbound on Route 202,  soon I could turn left into our street.

Uh oh! Up ahead there were many emergency vehicles with flashing lights. Looked like  a serious accident had happened ahead. Traffic ahead of me was just crawling. And ahead of me, before my corner,  was a police blockade. Everyone was forced to make a U-turn and head back to the west !   For  a moment I almost panicked, but then I realized I could  ask the police officer. I pointed to the street sign at my corner and said,   “that is where I live.“ “Fine,” he said, letting me pass the blockade and turn into my street.

That incident makes me think of how, if you are a believer, you don’t have to talk God into stuff. If it is his will, he just says go ahead and ask.

 Matthew 7:7 says  “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.”

This verse applies to much more than turning into a street! It challenges me to be bolder when asking for stuff in prayer. The answer is not always a guaranteed yes , but I won’t  be getting any yesses if I don’t bother to ask in the first  place.

The Plague of Darkness

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Stretch out your hand toward the sky so that darkness spreads over Egypt—darkness that can be felt.”  So Moses stretched out his hand toward the sky, and total darkness covered all Egypt for three days.  No one could see anyone else or move about for three days. Yet all the Israelites had light in the places where they lived. (Exodus 10:21-23)

Today’s passage from Exodus recounts one of the plagues that befell Egypt before God miraculously rescued His chosen people.

When I read this passage today, it seemed unbelievable at first. First, how could the entire land of Egypt be plunged into an unbroken darkness for three whole days? And secondly, I questioned how the complete darkness was shattered only by light only within the dwellings of the Israelites. How could such an event be possible? It defies our comprehension of the laws of physics!

Upon reflection, I realized this description of the plague of darkness speaks to the nature of faith. True faith is the understanding that something unseen can still be true. An unseen Lord governs the intricate workings of light and darkness, and he can override the very laws of physics that we hold as unchanging. It happened in Egypt over 3,000 years ago — and it well happen again in the future. In our present age, we assume that no such miracles occur. But the unseen Lord still distinguishes between His chosen people and those who rebel against Him,

It is common nowadays to hear politicians questioning whether one is on the right side of history, as if implementing their political agendas will dramatically reshape the course of humanity for the better.

However, what if, in the future, many of the events that unfolded during the Egyptian plagues reoccur? Not only will some seemingly unchangeable laws of physics be suspended, but God will distinguish between those who genuinely love Him and those who do not. A permanent separation will ensue, dividing light from darkness.

To be genuinely on the right side of history is to stand alongside God, where eternal life awaits. So, I ask you, are you on the right side of history?

Getting away with it?

In the Hebrew Bible God’s people were told not to intermarry.

Let’s see how Solomon handled that command after he disobeyed by marrying the Egyptian ruler’s daughter….

Solomon brought Pharaoh’s daughter up from the City of David to the palace he had built for her, for he said, “My wife must not live in the palace of David king of Israel, because the places the ark of the Lord has entered are holy.” (2 Chronicles 8:11)

Here’s how he justified himself:  I broke God’s command to not intermarry, but at least I’m not letting her live in the palace where the sacred Ark of the Covenant was once stored. I’ll give her her own palace instead. Perhaps that will placate God so he’ll be OK with my intermarrying!

That sounds rather twisted: Solomon gets to have his Egyptian cake and eat it too.

Oh, I would never make a clever excuse like Solomon did to try to get away with what God prohibits — would I???

God’s Love for Sinners

Here’s a devotion I shared recently at our Battleground Men’s group.

We know that our great God loved us sinners so much that he brought us to salvation in Jesus Christ. Note what Jesus said in Mark 2:16-17: And the scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his disciples, “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?” And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”

It’s easy to think of repentance as a one-time event when we first came to recognize our sin for what it is, but today let’s consider God’s continuing love for us as sinners!

What, me a sinner? I thought I was past all that!

But Paul says in 1 Timothy 1:15 The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.

Importantly, Paul does not say he WAS a sinner but that he IS a sinner.

You may have heard of Martin Luther nailing up his 95 theses. But do you know what the very first one was? It reads: “When our Lord and Master, Jesus Christ, said ‘Repent,’ He called for the entire life of believers to be one of repentance.” With no exceptions, Luther was calling Christians to repent.

Turning from sin and trusting in the good news that Jesus saves sinners isn’t merely a one-time inaugural experience but should be a daily experience for us as Christians. Our daily repentance and faith means living in constant realization of our tendency to abandon God. It is a daily re-orientation of our eyes onto Jesus the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!

Luther’s last known words scratched out on a piece of paper in February of 1546 said: “We are beggars! This is true.” That’s the heart of daily repentance and faith — living in a way that we continually recognize that our only hope is Christ. That propels change in us. And that change comes from God’s continuing love for us as sinners!

We are rebels, prone to wander, as the song says—- but God loves us too much to let us stay there when we wander. His love brings us the gift of repentance. Our rebellious condition meets with the beauty of God’s loving grace in the gospel of Jesus —a gospel deep enough to cover all the little and massive flaws of a beggar like Luther and beggars like us.

First and foremost, repentance is a gift. By his grace, God grants repentance to us, his adopted children whom He patiently disciplines. In Revelation 3:19, he says “Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent”.

In conclusion, living a life where we know that we are sinners, in ongoing need for correction from the God who loves us,  is a great launching pad for how we bring God’s love in Jesus to those sinners who haven’t  gotten  saved  yet.
Amen.