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August 8: Matthew 15:10-14
Key Verse: Matthew 15:11
What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.
Devotion:
There are times when I read about what is happening in some churches and I see people leaving churches, splitting churches or even closing churches, and these things make me sad. No, I do not have a perfect church to go to and there are problems we have to face each day; if only we were able to curb our outbursts!
If there are things which you face in your local church which you do not agree with, then you should be going to them and talking to them to find out why things are being done the way they are. As a congregation which is part of the Church of England we have to abide by some rather archaic rules and regulations which make many people sad and even confused, but how we react to them could make waves in our congregations.
When Jesus talked about loving our neighbours it really did mean loving people around us. When someone does something wrong or says something wrong, we should approach them and give them time to see what they have done or said wrong; we could be the ones who have made the error in judgement! But if we broadcast the error to everyone we are alienating that person from everyone who hears the broadcast. We are driving a wedge into our congregation!
What we say and do can be used to build up a congregation or break it apart. We need to think about what we are saying to others so we can, hopefully, build up our congregations instead of breaking them down. God has called us to spread the gospel and not spread gossip. God has called us together not apart. He chose us and will look after us just as a loving Father does; but He may well chastise us if we are the cause of arguments between others!
Points to Ponder:
How often do you replicate gossip?
How often do you replicate the gospel?
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August 7: Matthew 14:22-33
Key Verse: Matthew 14:31
Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. ‘You of little faith,’ he said, ‘why did you doubt?’
Devotion:
One of our biggest problems seems to be keeping faith when the world around us is raging. We have many accounts of this happening all throughout the bible, and it will continue to be displayed time and time again. Most of this comes from broken promises; we get so used to broken promises from other people we no longer have faith they will keep their promises – even when it is a friend making a promise to us.
Jesus always makes sure all of what He says will come to pass – He always keeps His promises. We can see this, also, throughout the bible and so we should be able to know what he has said will happen. Yet we continue to doubt because of the broken promises around us. The way to change this is to try to make sure all the promises we make are kept because that will go a long way to making sure people see promises can be kept.
The more people keep their promises and tell the truth, the more others will have faith in those promises and trust the truth. This will go a long way to encourage people to trust in the promises of God and believe the truth in our bibles. The only real way to convince people to trust in something is to give them reason to trust in what you say!
Jesus wanted the disciples to see He could be trusted, even in the wildest storms and the seemingly impossible feats. He now wants us to go out into the world and give people reason to trust in the truth and believe the promises God has made. This is the task of a disciple: to go out into the world and share the faith we have in the truth so others can have faith and go out to share their faith...
Points to Ponder:
Who are the people you always believe?
Will you try to keep your word more?
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August 6: Luke 9:28-36
Key Verse: Luke 9:35
A voice came from the cloud, saying, ‘This is my Son, whom I have chosen; listen to him.’
Devotion:
When we look through our bibles we find differing descriptions of God and of Christ and you may ask yourself how they can be different or not consistent. I would put it to you that each of us will describe something differently because of the way we handle thoughts and sights and so it was to all who were able to see something of Christ or God; their descriptions are what they felt and saw whilst trying to make sense of something they had never dreamed they would see!
This description from Luke gives an added insight about the apostles who accompanied Jesus whilst He went to pray. They must have been tired because the writer describes them as being very sleepy, probably dozing off during the prayer time. But when they saw other people there they struggled to become fully awake with Peter asking Jesus whether they should be building shelters for the others. Peter knew they were important in some manner and even called them by name assuming them to be who he called them!
I can imagine them being shocked awake when a cloud appeared and covered them with a voice telling them “this is my Son, whom I have chosen!” Obviously not in English, but the words are similarly described by others. This was God Himself telling these people present Jesus was His Son. What other words could have meant more to the disciples!
When we bring all the stories of encounters with God together, we see a common thread where God tells people He sent His Son to come to us. These words come from ancient scriptures and more recent scripture from the disciples; I say recent being a couple of thousand years instead of thousands of years before then as the people of Israel trekked through the desert.
Points to Ponder:
How many times do you have to hear a story before you trust it?
Will you trust the scriptures and trust in Christ?
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August 5: Leviticus 25:14-17
Key Verse: Leviticus 25:17
Do not take advantage of each other, but fear your God. I am the Lord your God.
Devotion:
When I came out of university there was a bit of a financial slump going on and finding work, even as a graduate, was difficult. Needless to say I did try various jobs to get money in which is where I found out about the greed some people and companies have; something I could not live with.
God has tried to educate people time and time again about living together as community, sharing what we have and supporting each other. This has prompted some to give up on things and live some pretty radical ways of life. But God also taught about buying and selling, supporting ourselves, having businesses and much more. This points to a very varied society where people look out for each other a live by fair rules and fair trade.
What we have in modern society is very far from that in many cases. We have a few people making big businesses out of supplying what people want and extorting what they can from the supply chain in order to turn a profit, not caring for the individual but rather the corporate profit margin instead. This sees the workers who make products or farmers who grow produce getting offered lessor wages whilst the people buying the goods being forced to pay more.
God wants us to love our neighbours. This means putting aside greed and profit margins to make sure our neighbours get what they need and not what you want them to have. Each of us does have to make a living, but we do not need to extort others in order to get what we desire.
Points to Ponder:
Do you try to earn as much as you can?
Do you help others as much as you can?
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August 4: Matthew 13:54-58
Key Verse: Matthew 13:57
And they took offence at him. But Jesus said to them, ‘A prophet is not without honour except in his own town and in his own home.’
Devotion:
One of the things about going away to learn something and returning home is the people you know before you went away expect you to come back being the same as when you left! They know you have gone away to learn things, but they expect you to still be the same – that’s just the way we are. As they get used to you with your new-found knowledge, they will change their views of you. But if you come back a very changed person and have greater knowledge or wisdom than they do, they may take offence!
When Jesus returned to His home town, He faced a lot of people who expected Him to be “the carpenter’s son” still and did not expect a level of wisdom and knowledge which would outshine their own. When Jesus stood u and started teaching the people in the synagogue, they were probably a bit upset someone could come in an have such wisdom when the people who had gone through much learning and studying were the ones they expected to have the wisdom.
So we have two sets of people being upset with Jesus. The teachers who had spent their lives studying so they could teach; they being the ones who got upset because this “uneducated” person came in with so much wisdom. The other set being the people who had known the family as carpenters and expected them just to be carpenters and nothing more.
Each of us will face someone in our lives who expects us to be the underdog and will get upset with us when we prove them wrong. Because we are brought up in societies where we are encouraged to be the best, being anything else hurts our pride. If we are not willing to put aside our pride and accept others can be better than us, we will always struggle in life. Christ reminded us we are all different and we will all excel in different ways!
Points to Ponder:
Do you always measure yourself against others?
Will you accept God made you unique?
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August 3: Psalm 84:5
Key Verse: Psalm 84:5
Blessed are those whose strength is in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrimage.
Devotion:
Depending on which interpretation of the bible you read, you may get very different ideas from this psalm, so I have purposely just taken a single verse. Why? In the hopes you will choose to read through the full psalm in your own time.
I think this psalm was written by someone who was content to meditate in the house of the Lord, watching what was happening and thinking about what God could have been thinking. That to me is a place we should all try to put ourselves in each day – spending time taking our minds out of the busy world and allowing it to commune with God in a special place.
We have looked at relationships in the past and surmised they need to be worked on by both parties where we work toward consolidating and building up the relationship together. When we think about our relationship with God it is different to our earthly relationships because we are always looking forward to the time when we can finally be with God. Everything we do before then is done in preparation for that time; a time when we will enjoy eternity with Him.
This means we need to focus on what is ahead and not just the quickest way of getting there. When we focus on what we think God wants of us, we will probably change our earthly lives to look after His people and live as a disciple reaching out to make more disciples. We think we cannot do anything like that in the beginning but as soon as we accept Christ into our lives we are bringing in a new strength to live a different life for Him. A life which will look forward to the journey with Him for eternity!
Points to Ponder:
How often do you stop and commune with God?
Can you take a few minutes today to stop your busy life and just think?
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August 2: Matthew 13:44-46
Key Verse: Matthew 13:44
‘The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.
Devotion:
Who doesn’t want more of a good thing when they get introduced to it! We only have to look at our modern world to see how things like this can go terribly wrong when the human perception of a ‘good thing’ is taken into account. Too many things in life are touted as being good when they work against everything we need in life. One of the biggest things I always look back on is the wide spread introduction of smoking as being in some way good!
We can look throughout history and see many things like this where we jumped on board some new thing or habit only to find out years down the line it was doing us more harm than anything. This can be seen as a weakness in life or it can be viewed as something which binds us humans together. Some will use this to scam others whilst others will band together as make it something to bind us together.
Whatever way we look at it, the truth always makes it to the surface after time passes. Those things we find out are bad get recognised as such and laws come in to protect others from them. Those things which prove to be good stay and gain recognition. Then there are the early adopters who risk everything to choose whether it will be good or bad and have to live with their choices.
The truth about God and His love for us has stood the test of time and continues to prove it is good and righteous; though many still doubt it because they may have been burned by bad choices in the past. But once you recognise everything which is good about God, you don’t want to let it go; instead, making choices to make Him a bigger part of your life!
Points to Ponder:
How important is God in your life?
Are you choosing earthly things over God?
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August 1: Exodus 34:5-9
Key Verse: Exodus 34:7
maintaining love to thousands, and forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished; he punishes the children and their children for the sin of the parents to the third and fourth generation.
Devotion:
I have been asked a few times about these words with people being worried about what their children get up to or what their parents had done in the past with the main complaint being ‘how do I control what my children/parents do/did?’ The short answer is you can’t! The long answer is actually quite simple as well… Each one of us is personally accountable for the actions we take; the most important action being us choosing to believe in God!
We cannot and should not try to say what Christ did on the cross falls short for paying for the debt we owe due to our sins. When Christ said He will forgive all who come to Him it was a promise, not a suggestion. If we impose a restriction on how much He can and does forgive, we are imposing earthly limits of our Heavenly Almighty God!
So the phrase I like to use is ‘the buck stops here!’ When we believe and trust in Christ to forgive us of our sins, we are forgiven in totality, which means nothing anyone else has done wrong is going to affect our level of forgiveness from Christ. The provisor being ‘what are we going to do about the great commission?’
Christ will forgive us. The buck stops there. What we then do as a new disciple of Christ will affect how our grandchildren, children or parents live their lives. If we are not willing to show them there is hope for a total forgiveness, then we are falling short of the mark in our relationship with Christ. A big part of living with Christ is taking on the task of spreading the gospel through the way we live.
Points to Ponder:
Do you believe God’s love is all encompassing?
How does your love stack up?
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July 31: Matthew 13:31-35
Key Verse: Matthew 13:34
Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them without using a parable.
Devotion:
Sometimes the best way to reach someone is to tell them a story which they can relate to identifying the content you wish them to hear. Jesus knew if He stood there and recounted the scriptures the people would soon stop listening because they had probably had that done to them over and over again. Instead He told them stories which would make them think about God’s Word in new ways.
I don’t know if you have ever been able to watch how bread is made in a factory or bakery; they do not work in terms of cups and teaspoons but in bucket loads and sacks of flour. But the principle remains the same, the yeast is activated in some manner and then has to be mixed all throughout the flour mixture in order for the dough to raise in a uniform manner.
We can think of God’s Word in this same manner. The flour is useless by itself because it will not rise and become a fluffy loaf of bread without the yeast and other ingredients. I have made the mistake of putting all the ingredients into the bread machine and forgetting the yeast… what comes out is more akin to a brick than a loaf of bread!
Jesus tries new ways of talking to people so they would listen and think about what was being said. If we want to reach other people with the Gospel then introducing them to it in new ways which will make them think about the words is always going to help!
Points to Ponder:
Do you get bored in church sometimes?
How would you make things more interesting for others?
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July 30: 1 Kings 3:5-12
Key Verse: 1 Kings 3:9
Give your servant therefore an understanding mind to govern your people, able to discern between good and evil; for who can govern this your great people?
Devotion:
This always seems to remind me of stories we hear as children about a genie being released from a bottle and giving the person 3 wishes; the number of different ways the people choose their wishes seems to be never ending! But this is no genie and this is no ordinary person! Solomon had grown to learn many things but in his humble way he recognises he is nothing in comparison to the great prophets who had come before him.
So his answer the God when God asks what he wants is enlightening for all of us, not whimsical as in the fairy stories we get to hear as children! Solomon simply wanted to be able to do more for the people in a way which would not just please God, but a way which would be honouring and praiseworthy for and to God. He wanted wisdom to be able to carry this all off!
If we look at our lives we could boast about our earthly wares and ways, or we could look at the world as a whole and recognise we are just one tiny part of what we call human existence! God alone knows all the details and we should always be looking for guidance from Him to cater for the things around us and especially the people around us.
There is no way we can know what is in people’s hearts and minds – but God can and does. We don’t know what makes people do what they do – but God can and does. We don’t know what is going to happen tomorrow and the next day – but God does. Our knowledge and wisdom is like a tiny mustard seed in comparison to God’s knowledge and wisdom. Choose to be more like Solomon and ask God for your daily guidance!
Points to Ponder:
Have you been successful in school?
Have you been successful in your relationship with God?