February 27: Leviticus 19:9-10
Key Verse: Leviticus 19:9
When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest.
Devotion:
When God laid down the rules about sacrificing, He was making sure there was equality for all – unlike many governments nowadays! The people were expected to follow Gods rules and hence ensure the community as a whole would survive and thrive. When He gave commands about sacrifices and reaping He made sure provision was put in place for people who could not afford to live because they had no money!
God still wants us to be fair and to uphold justice; and justice is not all about making sure the laws are followed to the exacting words or ideals of the person in charge. God put the laws in place so everyone would be able to survive, with the rich who had plentiful allowing the poor who had nothing to glean and gather that which was not profitable to gather.
Farmers will try to harvest as much as is practical whilst ensuring their machines and people are kept safe from dangers. If the edge of the field has become to wet and muddy, driving a machine through that part would cause damage to the machine and to the field. By leaving these parts of the field untouched by the harvesting, they are preventing accidental damage and expense but also giving the poor and needy a place where they can manually gather the meagre amounts they may need to survive.
What God may prefer is for us to be able to gather the harvest and share it with the people in need, not just banking everything and making as much money as possible! God was saying these things because He would ensure they had enough to gather and harvest the first time round and also that enough was left for the people in need. But each person had to do their thing!
Points to Ponder:
Do you expect God to supply everything?
Will you work with God instead?
February 26: Matthew 4:1-11
Key Verse: Matthew 4:11
Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him.
Devotion:
When was the last time you gave up on something because it got a bit too hard to carry on? If we are honest we can all admit to giving up before we should, and then carrying on with something else far longer than we should do! Our judgment on things of this world is not always as good as it should be because we are swayed by earthly things as well as emotions and peer pressure!
Jesus probably knew He was going to have to face the evil one at some stage in His human existence, and after fasting for 40 days He was probably at His weakest point of all. I find it hard to fast for a single day, never mind multiple days! But Jesus had put His mind to it and knew God was going to look out for Him – not to see if God would look after Him!
The evil one approached Jesus and tried to get Him to tempt God or to perform a miracle for Himself so He could eat. Jesus was not going to give in to the temptations which the devil would throw at Him! Just when you think things are at their worst, the evil one may well approach you in some manner and try to dig a little more out of you; not because he wants to see you suffer, because he wants to see if he can tempt God into doing things!
Jesus did not call out to God during this visit and certainly was not going to give in to the temptations or peer pressure being exerted on Him by the devil! Instead Jesus stuck up for God by upholding the scriptures and reminding the evil one of the truth. When the devil could stand it no more he demanded Jesus should worship him instead! Seeing right through that Jesus reminded him of the commandments to serve God alone, the very one he had broken to be cast out of heaven!
Points to Ponder:
Do you give in too easily?
Will you trust God a bit more like Jesus did?
February 25: Mark 9:2-13
Key Verse: Mark 9:13
But I tell you, Elijah has come, and they have done to him everything they wished, just as it is written about him.’
Devotion:
How many times have you been totally confused by what your teacher is trying to teach you? I can remember a few times when I just could not get what the teacher(s) were trying to say; but through persistence and time I have learned many things and have overcome most of those confusions!
When Jesus was telling the disciples about all the things which had to happen, they probably grew weary because they did not understand what He was talking about. But, once they had lived through all of these things, they had no problem believing and even writing about the issues – this is why we have our bibles, because they took the time to try and explain things to us after living through the events.
When Jesus was telling them about these things He had lived through many of the things which had been talked about already. He knew what lay ahead and knew what had to be done in order to live our what is written in the Torah, or the Old Testament books as we know them. Jesus wanted them to trust the written words and to believe them knowing God was working toward making sure they all came to pass!
We have a God who has stuck to His word and continue to tell us the truth in all ways. We are the ones who have grown weary and have not been able to listen or understand because we were too caught up in the things of this world. God is not limited by anything from this world and so will make sure everything will come to pass – we just have to trust Him and believe in Him!
Points to Ponder:
How often do you get confused because you are thinking about the wrong answer?
Will you set time aside for God to explain things to you?
February 24: Genesis 11:1-9
Key Verse: Genesis 11:6
The Lord said, ‘If as one people speaking the same language they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them.
Devotion:
One of the things which worried God was the capacity for mankind to do wrong. It was not the capacity of mankind to do good, because God knew we could do anything if we set our minds to it – why else would He have created us in this manner if He did not want us to do good! But it is our failing which worried Him most of all and He did not want us to compound those failings…
When I look back on the bible I see civilisations which were able to accomplish great things and all throughout the world of archaeology we see the remnants of the great things mankind has done – but we also see the remnants of the great destruction we have wrought on the world too!
God wanted to stop the people from building the tower and making things great because they were doing it all for the wrong reasons. We I look around at the amazing inventions and science and technology we have in the world, I see the result of the intelligence God created us with… But when certain people get going, they don’t stop when they go overboard and end up hurting a whole lot more people than they do with the good they have done.
We need to take account of what God has done for us, why He has given us the intelligence and where-with-all we have; and we need to use what he has given us for the good of all mankind, not just a select few who want to get richer while the rest of the world gets poorer!
Points to Ponder:
How many things do you do which are for the good of many?
How many things have you done which are for the good of your own self?