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September 9: Luke 6:39-41
Key Verse: Luke 6:41
Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?
Devotion:
As our country mourns the loss of our Queen, we reflect on a life, not of a untouchable monarch, but of a monarch who gave herself selflessly as a servant to her country and empire. It is not until you genuinely look into her life that you see just how reachable she wanted to be. During her last decade of service we saw more and more of her life with God. She certainly was not blind in her faith but deeply committed to living as a Christian and serving those she promised to serve all her life. We need to take a page out of her book and live our lives faithfully for God so others can be encouraged to seek Him too.
Our Queen was a very learned individual, not just in ways of the Royal Family, but in a very personal and caring way with all she met and learned about. Her life was spent learning about others so she could be the leader she promised to be, a head of state she had committed to be and a Christian above all. Her command of the English language and the knowledge and compassion she learned along the way allowed her to be approachable in most people’s eyes – something which may have been lacking in the history of Royal Families of the past.
Our Queen did not look for the speck of sawdust in other’s eyes but rather tried to help us see we are all vulnerable and all need Christ in our lives to live life to the full.
In the words of The Archbishop of Canterbury “As we grieve together, we know that, in losing our beloved Queen, we have lost the person whose steadfast loyalty, service and humility has helped us make sense of who we are through decades of extraordinary change in our world, nation and society.”
Points to Ponder:
May Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II rest in peace and rise in glory.
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September 8: Luke 6:32-36
Key Verse: Luke 6:33
And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that.
Devotion:
One of the hardest lessons I learned out on the mission field was to show love to others even though they may being hostile to you. There is no way others are going to trust you if you do one thing and say another thing – so starting by showing love and support to others before you expect anything back has got to be the first step!
Jesus did not wait for mankind to be nice to Him before He came to give His life. He came to give His life for us knowing we are doing things wrong and knowing we did not show Him the correct love and respect. Through that action by Jesus we know He loves us and we know He does not expect anything before showing that love.
This is the example we need to follow – we need to show love, compassion and respect to others so they know we are being genuine with what we say because we follow that us with actions and not just words. Jesus wants us to go out to be disciples – this means going out into the sinful world and showing people there is love and hope through Christ and His actions.
If you are able to show love to you enemies they may think differently of you because of your actions. How far do we go? How can we love our enemies? We need to do what Jesus did and show them respect and support even though they are labelled as our enemies...
Points to Ponder:
How do you treat others?
Will you try to love everyone instead of choosing who to love?
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September 7: Luke 6:20-26
Key Verse: Luke 6:23
Rejoice in that day and leap for joy, because great is your reward in heaven. For that is how their ancestors treated the prophets.
Devotion:
Jesus’ words here where both an encouragement and a warning; and encouragement reminding the disciples what was in store for them in Heaven, and a warning to all who would turn their backs on God because they would not be in a good place! God wants us all to be able to receive blessings and not have to face His wrath!
It is our choice as to whether we face the blessings or the woe. If we choose to include Christ in our lives and to keep Him close, then we should expect to see and receive the blessings Jesus is talking about here. We can see this throughout history as the people of Israel received blessings when they walked with God, but we also see the opposite side of the story when they walked away from God because the world over ran them and their lives were filled with woe.
Any suffering we endure here on earth is going to be nothing in comparison to the joy we will have in Heaven. We have Jesus’ words to remind us of the things which can go wrong – the parables which foretell of disasters or hard times. We also have parables which tell of the blessings and joy of the people when they continued to walk with God.
If we aim for personal wealth or favour during our life on earth, are we not asking for earthly recognition instead of Heavenly recognition? When we strive for earthly comforts, that will be our reward – earthly comforts. But if we strive to serve God we can expect worldly opposition to what we do and hence earthly discomforts; but our Heavenly rewards will be so much more than we can imagine!
Points to Ponder:
Do you seek earthly recognition?
Will you humble yourself before God and serve Him?
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September 6: Luke 6:12-19
Key Verse: Luke 6:19
and the people all tried to touch him, because power was coming from him and healing them all.
Devotion:
What an amazing experience it must have been to be close to Jesus when all this was happening. To see the people being cured of all sorts of things, spiritually and physically. Though Jesus had just picked out the 12 apostles, He did not limit His time to them but allowed everyone who was close to enjoy the healing time!
This is just one demonstration of the power of Jesus. He may have been fully man, but He was also the Son of God and He depended on God for everything He was able to do with the people around Him. We know Jesus spent time alone with God before these events – something we need to be mindful of and what we need to practice in our lives.
God wants us to draw close to Him by spending time with Him in prayer where we can pour out our hearts to Him. But we must also remember to stop and wait for answers from God. What use is a one sided conversation when we can benefit more from a two way discussion? Jesus always spent time waiting for answers from God and not just chatting away to Him.
People had come from all over the countryside to be with Jesus because they had heard of the miracles He was doing. They had enough faith to believe Jesus would be able to do something for them and so made time to be with Jesus. We need to stop in our busy lives and make time for God too!
Points to Ponder:
When do you make time for God in your life?
How much of that time do you wait for Him to answer you?
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September 5: 1 Corinthians 5:6-8
Key Verse: 1 Corinthians 5:6
Your boasting is not good. Don’t you know that a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough?
Devotion:
How many times have you boasted about what someone has done in your community – even though you have known in your heart it was wrong? We tend to get carried away when extraordinary things happen; sometimes justifying what is happening by saying it cannot be done by man or by boasting about how powerful that person must be to achieve something like that.
When someone does something wrong in a tight-knit community there will be some who support that person just because they have managed to do something nobody else has, whilst there will be a few who try to stand up and say something is wrong. The majority may well ignore that person who stand up because the ‘problem’ goes away when nobody taken notice of it.
God wants us to stand up for righteousness, to stand up for what is right and just… He does not want us to ignore the issue just so it will go away. When we stand up for what is right, we should be asking Christ for the strength to stand up against the crowd. He will give us the strength if we ask. When we ignore things we become part of the problem and we are complicit in what has been done wrong.
Rather than allowing one wrong thing to affect the whole community in this manner, if we stand up and declare the truth, the community will be able to see what is wrong and work against that. By ignoring it we are allowing the whole community to become corrupted by that evil… that makes it harder to work with Christ in amongst those people because they will all be afraid of what will happen to them!
Points to Ponder:
Do you try to ignore problems?
Will you ask Christ to allow you to stand firm with the truth?
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September 4: Jeremiah 18:3-11
Key Verse: Jeremiah 18:8
and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned.
Devotion:
This passage tells us of God’s great mercy and also His holiness! No matter what we have done wrong, whether it be as a nation, community or by ourselves, God is always willing to forgive us when we admit to what we have done wrong and ask for forgiveness. When Jeremiah received these words it was to show him Judah could be forgiven if they were to come back to Him and ask forgiveness; but equally, if they were to turn away from Him, then He would turn His back on them!
God may have chosen the Israelites as His chosen race, but when they turned their backs on Him and did all manner of sins against Him, He had to show them He is Holy and cannot abide the sin. But when they turned their backs on the sin and turned back to Him, He would show them mercy beyond their understanding!
Time and time again the people of Israel turned away from God and had to face all manner of things going wrong because they were walking away from God at the time. But as soon as they turned back to Him, they prospered and were able to live with His great blessings once again.
It is not God who is changing, but us. We are the ones falling in and out of grace because of the lives we choose to live. Once we turn back to Christ, our lives change once again and we begin to live the blessed life He wants us to have.
Points to Ponder:
Do you keep changing your love for God?
Will you try to be more consistent with your love for Him?
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September 3: Acts 8:18-24
Key Verse: Acts 8:20
Peter answered: ‘May your money perish with you, because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money!’
Devotion:
There are many people around the world who make money out of religion! Some of those people are very well known and continue to say things which many believe and after which many follow them. But when we compare those lives with what Christ teaches us, we find gaps and even polar opposites!
This Simon was a man who practices sorcery in the city and was well known for the things he did. When people said ‘this man is rightly called the Great Power of God,’ he did not disagree with them nor tell them they were wrong. Instead he continued to be content with the notoriety he was receiving and continued to practice his sorcery!
When Philip came and told them all the gospel, people started to believe him because they saw it was the truth. Even Simon believed and ended up being baptised, following Philip and being astonished by the great signs and miracles he saw – this was the true power of God working in the people. When the disciples heard about this they sent Peter and John to come and bring Christ and the Holy Spirit into their lives.
Simon offered them money to receive the Holy Spirit! None of us can do this! Christ does not give out the Holy Spirit to the highest bidder. The Holy Spirit is shared with people who truly believe Christ in their hearts. When people do believe in their hearts, God allows them to receive the Holy Spirit as their continued guide and strengthener. Simon, on realising his mistake, asked for forgiveness right away knowing this was the real truth!
Points to Ponder:
Have you tried to gain Salvation or Godly support through earthly means?
Will you simply trust in Christ and receive His full attention?
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September 2: Luke 5:36-39
Key Verse: Luke 5:37
And no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the new wine will burst the skins; the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined.
Devotion:
This is one of those answers Jesus gave which causes more questions than answers to many people – it is only after trying to get to the bottom of what He is saying we begin to understand… but what does this relate to in our lives, after all we live in a throw-away society where old clothes are thrown away and new ones bought, and wine comes in screw-top bottles!
I believe Jesus was saying these things to make the people stop and think about why they were doing what they were doing! Much of the time we do things out of habit or because of tradition; after all isn’t it the way it has always been done! Jesus wanted the people to stop blindly following tradition and think about the real reason they did what they did!
Often we don’t think through the whole story and end up doing what others do or what is traditional to do. This is not what Jesus wants because that is doing things because of our worldly ways. Jesus wants us to think about the personal reasons for doing what we do. If we want to do something for God, then we should be making our work give glory to God and not just doing it because we think it’s what He wants!
When we do things because of tradition, we often end up messing up what we try to do and then we blame something or someone else because it “should have worked” like it always used to! Equally, when we often will not try something new in fear of it all going wrong. I think Jesus wants us to try new things to keep our lives with Him more interesting and to allow younger people to feel like they can get involved especially when they don’t like traditions!
Points to Ponder:
Are you traditional or contemporary?
Will you simply make room for God instead of worrying about traditions?
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September 1: 1 Corinthians 3:18-23
Key Verse: 1 Corinthians 3:20
and again, ‘The Lord knows that the thoughts of the wise are futile.’
Devotion:
I used to think of myself as being very intelligent and quite practical; I even compared myself to others to see how well I was doing. It was only when I started walking close to God I realised how futile my endeavours were to be the clever one! When I was in junior school I used to slack off work because it seemed too simple for me to do – when it came to tests at the end of the year I failed in parts because I had not learned what I should have done!
In high school I only wanted to focus on the subjects I enjoyed, and to that end I got prizes for Engineering Drawing and mathematics; but failed in many other subjects because they just did not interest me! When I started work I taught other people how program before I was sent on the programming course – it just seemed natural to me at the time. Looking back I now think of so much of that time as foolish because I was trying to conform to a rigid world which had no lea way for people who were above average!
Coming to know Christ better set my playing field level once again as I started to see the many facets of life which I had missed out on because of the privileges I had as a youngster. When I went to work in the mission field in London my world was brought down to meet with the people who were nothing like me and needed help and direction in so many ways – things I had taken for granted as a youngster!
God wants us to focus on the people around us and not on the world around us. If we focus on the world we will compare everyone to the world and find so much wanting we may well get scared and run off to a place we feel more comfortable at. Christ wants us to reach out to the people around us and allow them to draw closer to Him where He will be able to do the protecting we cannot hope to do!
Points to Ponder:
Do you really want to help others?
Will you introduce them to your God?
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August 31: Luke 4:38-44
Key Verse: Luke 4:39
So he bent over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her. She got up at once and began to wait on them.
Devotion:
After spending time in the synagogue, Jesus went to Simon’s house where he found Simon’s mother-in-law suffering from a high fever. Now the writer could have just said He healed the woman, but instead says He rebuked the fever! This, to me, shows the amazing power of Christ over everything in life! When we say there is nothing impossible for Christ, we don’t often think about things like Him talking to fevers!
Jesus had more of an understanding on everything in life than our scientists will ever have. Our scientists may be able to work out many amazing things and be able to do amazing things, but Jesus was able to understand what the underlying issue was and do something directly with that.
Quite often when we go to see our doctors we go through a barrage of questions so they can narrow the scope down a bit before trying things out. If they could see inside of us they may well be able to get to the root cause much quicker and be able to try and start treating the issue, but they cannot do that and have to go on experience and knowledge to give a best diagnosis – most often than not getting it right and helping us out!
Jesus got word directly from God to know what the issue was and work with that to start with; but not in the same way as our doctors and nurses do nowadays – He dealt with the issue in ways we cannot understand. This is the awesome God we have in our lives and this is how we can have greater peace and comfort than with any practitioner of any kind… even if we do need the practitioners to help us to fix the problems we have!
Points to Ponder:
Do you see Christ as your everything?
Will you ask Christ to guide you more today?