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November 15: Psalm 1:1-3
Key Verse: Psalm 1:3
That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither - whatever they do prospers.
Devotion:
As we have just had a week of various Remembrance services around the UK, and around the world, I thought it apt to have a reminder of choosing to follow Christ in amongst all of this terror going on in the world. The people who choose to follow Christ and try to separate themselves from the evil in this world will ultimately have a very different life to those who choose otherwise.
If we choose to follow the evil and do what evil people do, then we should fully expect our lives to be filled with evil and whatever form we are following. God has warned us enough time about evil and has warned us enough time to turn away from evil; we have been faithfully warned enough times! We cannot plead ignorance in sight of all the warnings we have received – it is our active choice!
When we follow Christ and His teachings, we will turn toward the good and righteous ways of Him instead of the evil ways of mankind. When we do turn toward Christ we will receive blessings in many ways which we may not be able to quantify without experiencing them first hand. The psalmist describes those blessings as being like the goodness and nutrients a tree receives from the earth when it is planted close to a stream – and endless supply of nutrients!
Let us continue to cling together as communities working against evil and asking God constantly for His protection as we do. God wants us to be at peace and full of joy – something we can only get from being close to Him; like being a tree planted close to a running stream. Allow God to supply you with rich blessings – stay close to Him so He can bless you!
Points to Ponder:
How close do you try to stay to God?
Are you working at staying close to Him?
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November 14: Hebrews 10:11-14
Key Verse: Hebrews 10:11
Day after day every priest stands and performs his religious duties; again and again he offers the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.
Devotion:
Have you ever had to work out a punishment you were dealt with? I’m not talking about getting shouted at or grounded or others things our parent may have done, but something like hard labour or some other hard repetitive task! At boarding school we often used to get punished by having to do something horrible like cleaning out the showers – and no matter how long you had to do it or how many times you had to do it, nothing changed!
Once again, after the punishment had been served, we were back in our own little worlds where we were tempted to do something wrong... and get caught again... and so on! This is the futile environment God was trying to open our eyes to. When we break the rules and sin against Him, we have to face the consequences. Back in the days of the Old Testament, people had to offer sacrifices to cover their sins.
These sacrifices were not easy “I’m sorry, please forgive me” but having to find a suitable animal for the sins to be covered and then making sure it was taken to the temple at the right time and offered as a sacrifice in the right way. This would have cost a fair wage back then and would not be something you would want to do every week!
But Christ offered Himself to be the perfect sacrifice for all of our sins – to be offered once and on our behalf. We did not have to try and find the ultimate sacrifice because He found us. We did not have to pay for anything. We simply have to accept the truth He is our perfect sacrifice and ask Him to forgive us once and for all!
Points to Ponder:
How often did you repeat offend after being punished?
Have you accepted that Christ has paid fully for your sins?
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November 13: Psalm 33:10-11
Key Verse: Psalm 33:11
But the plans of the Lord stand firm forever, the purposes of his heart through all generations.
Devotion:
As Christians we often talk about how the word of God endures, or how it remains the same – but how often do we link that fact with the promises God has made to us? He has given us many promises and they remain promises – still the same as they were many years ago and will remain the same! This is the immutable Word of God!
When people plot against God, there will always be someone He calls upon to make a difference so His Word can continue to be upheld and His ways remain in people’s minds. This does not mean He is going to stop all wars or remove all illness – many of these things are because of what man continues to do and how he continues to not just break rules, but try to uphold them in the face of the truth!
God wants the truth to be upheld and for people to get to know His Word so they too will recognise the promises He has made to us – those promises which we can rely on and know will come true. We often get things mixed up and say they are not true because we have twisted the truth to our own wants and desires, or we have taken what God has said and used it against Him instead of trying to find out exactly what He has said!
No matter how much planning we get into, no matter how much effort we put into things – if we leave God out of it, then we should not expect to succeed! God has a way of turning things against us when we leave Him out of it. God wants us to keep Him close at all times and also to rely on Him to help us. This means asking Him and including Him in everything!
Points to Ponder:
Do you include God in your life?
Will you bring Him closer so you know what He wants in your life?
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November 12: 2 John 1:4-6
Key Verse: 2 John 1:5
And now, dear lady, I am not writing you a new command but one we have had from the beginning. I ask that we love one another.
Devotion:
The writer addresses an elder in the church, a lady whom they knew well and knew they stood for the truth and followed Christ and His gospel. But, in amongst all this, they choose to include the commandment Jesus gave the disciples, the one which was said to be above all others, to love one another. This is not one of the commandments they would have learned from the old scriptures, but one which Jesus Himself had told the disciples.
Why did they expound on this commandment? Was it because there was something in her life where love should have been abounding? Was it because one of her children was not following the command to love others? We don’t know, but it should be a passage which makes us stop and think!
Jesus would always make sure people stopped and thought about what He was saying. He would encourage people to meditate on what they were hearing – not to just believe everything, but to study things and see if they agreed with what was the truth. Jesus made a point of highlighting this as a commandment, but in truth, it was nothing new.
If we stop and spend the time to go over the Old Testament, we will see how much of it points to us loving one another. Often, we see the Old Testament as full of wars killing many people and laws which were too hard to follow. But when we spend the time to study what it is about, we find it is God trying to teach us how to love each other without condition. If we really want to obey God, then we need to learn how to love each other without question.
Points to Ponder:
How many grudges do you hold?
Will you take them to God and try to love instead?
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November 11: Luke 17:20-25
Key Verse: Luke 17:21
nor will people say, ‘Here it is,’ or ‘There it is,’ because the kingdom of God is in your midst.”
Devotion:
We all like to think we can see things coming and how prepared we are for the unseen things which may happen in life. But, in reality, many of those things happen in a split second and we don’t see them. Take an accident, for example. We think we can avoid accidents and keep out of trouble – but by its very name, it is an accident!
We don’t always see everything happen in slow motion or watch things unfold; sometimes a volcano will simply explode. Sometimes a crash happens before we even have time to react. Jesus was warning the people His coming would not happen in slow motion. It would not be announced in the papers. There would not be a ‘breaking news’ event on TV!
We don’t have to go searching for God. We don’t have to go to university to learn of the love of God. All these things are with us now and Christianity lives all around us. What we do need is to accept it as it is and accept it when it is, here and now. If we miss out on the acceptance, then we will have missed out completely when it comes like a bolt of lightning! The sound will only come after the event!
There are going to be people who will announce His coming and those who will say they know the secret time and place. Don’t be fooled by them because Jesus has already told us, He did not even know the time and place when He was here with us. Jesus has warned us to be ready all the time; just as a thief comes unannounced and probably while you are away doing something else or asleep in bed...
Points to Ponder:
Do you know when the next person is going to knock on your door?
Are you ready for Jesus’ return?
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November 10: Luke 17:11-19
Key Verse: Luke 17:17
Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine?”
Devotion:
At first glance when you read through this passage, you may be think about the lack of thankfulness of the nine lepers who did not come to Jesus’ feet and praise Him for what He had done. But the laws in those days were quite strict and the people upholding the laws very strict!
We could imagine the other nine to be strict Jews because they were not explicitly listed as foreigners like this Samaritan. If they were, then the laws strictly forbade them to approach anyone until they had been given the go-ahead by the chief priest or whomever was presiding over the lepers at that time.
If they were Jews, then they may well have tried to avoid Jesus because the priests were saying Jesus was not the Messiah. How could they go and tell the chief priest they were healed by the man pretending to be the Messiah. How could they admit to Jesus being all powerful?
This is the type of quandary we are caught up in our lives. We get so tied up in laws and rules we lose sight of what is real. We focus too much on the rules we have made up because we think they make sense. After all, why should we admit to being weak and in need of a Saviour! Jesus just wants us to be honest and open with Him. This may well mean coming to bow at His feet and acknowledging Him as Saviour in front of other people!
Points to Ponder:
Do you hide your relationship with Christ?
Will you be more open about your love for Christ?
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November 9: Isaiah 5:22-25
Key Verse: Isaiah 5:22
Woe to those who are heroes at drinking wine and champions at mixing drinks,
Devotion:
These are a few of the warnings which go out to people who are depending on their own strengths and powers and using them against others in one way or another. I’m sure we can all relate to this through mankind's recent history where we can see how the smoking of cigarettes is now frowned upon as opposed to being the latest fad during the sixties and seventies.
The people in charge of those commodities knew the risks but chose to ignore them because so many people were buying into their products. We are now facing the dangers of over-drinking once again; long gone the days of prohibition! People choose to ignore the dangers because of the profit they were gaining even though it was at the expense of other people's lives.
The same can be said about the things which take us away from God. Too many things are much greater temptations to us and many are ignoring the dangers of these temptations simply because they can gain from the supply chain in one way or another. I like the way the prophet likens this to the flames of a bush fire.
If you have seen a bush fire roaring away in real life, then you will know how easily everything surrounding it gets consumed by the flames in seconds. This is like the temptations which take us away from the gospel and separate us from God. They do spread quickly and uncontrollably because they are temptations! God sees every step of this happening and it upsets Him to know people are being carried away by things outside of their control.
Points to Ponder:
Do you stoke the fires against God?
Will you try to reverse the course of the temptations surrounding you?
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November 8: Titus 1:5-9
Key Verse: Titus 1:5
The reason I left you in Crete was that you might put in order what was left unfinished and appoint elders in every town, as I directed you.
Devotion:
Have you ever wondered why God has not done as you asked? Just maybe He is trying to get you to do something which you have either been rejecting or putting off just because it does not fit in with your timeline! When we get our minds set on something, it is hard to let go of the goal we have set. What we should be doing is making sure the goals we set are the goals asked of us by God and not those we think He should have!
If we continue to read through the rest of this passage, we see a list of attributes we should have. But, I hear you say, these are for leaders... Well, they may have been written down as being for leaders at this time, but if we think about it, God selects each one of us to be a leader in some form or another. We should be willing to do what God requires – which is often leading other people towards Him.
We can’t run off and do as we want because we think God should be doing something new in our lives or the lives of those around us – sometimes we just need to stop and listen to what God is saying. In Isaiah 45 we read of how He is doing a new thing. This is not us doing something new in our community, but God doing something new in our community.
If we listen closely to Him, we may end up doing something new to serve Him; but always remember it is God who is doing something new – something we may not expect and something we may think is going to take far too long! God is the one who knows our futures and knows what the best approach is for us to take to make the biggest impact.
Points to Ponder:
Do you work for God?
Are you really ready to submit to Him?
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November 7: Jonah 3:1-10
Key Verse: Jonah 3:10
When God saw what they did and how they turned from their evil ways, he relented and did not bring on them the destruction he had threatened.
Devotion:
To me, the Old Testament contains so many stories about how people were so quick to forget about God, this chapter is almost a summary of what we are like! When things are good and we are enjoying our lives, we can get carried away with our lives and the content therein rather than where it all came from and who we have to thank for our lives.
We sometimes think of the Old Testament as being irrelevant because of the time which has passed between this period in history and now. We think we have changed too much and it does not reflect how we live today. But when we look at this we should be able to relate to it as the way we live in our modern world.
If we wanted to walk from one end of a modern-day city to the other, we would take a long time to do so. Our cities themselves may officially be big, but if we take into account the suburbs and surrounding towns and villages which have been encompassed by the cities, we can imagine the size of Nineveh. We can also know what goes on in our cities – some being places which have forgotten about God because they are too focused on being cities instead of being communities.
Jonah had the thankless task of going from one end of the city to the other telling them they had forgotten about God and because of this, the city would be destroyed before long. Thankfully, the people remembered where they had come from and how much God had done for them to get to where they were then. They turned back to God who was more than willing to forgive them!
Points to Ponder:
Do you have a good life?
Do you thank God continually for what you have?
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November 6: Romans 16:25-27
Key Verse: Romans 16:26
but now revealed and made known through the prophetic writings by the command of the eternal God, so that all the Gentiles might come to the obedience that comes from faith
Devotion:
Paul closes this letter to the Romans off by listing many people who have faithfully told others about Jesus, not because they had to under the law, but because they wanted to share their knowledge of Jesus Christ so others could get to know Him too.
This is what Christ has encouraged each one of us to do too – He has asked us to tell people of our own experience with Him so they can be encouraged by the love, joy and peace we find in our relationship with Christ. It is not an onerous task to tell someone of the great things Christ has done for you, and should never be looked upon as being that.
I continue to be surprised by how much God does for me and how much I can share with others. It could just be a little word here and there, or it could be standing up in front of others and sharing what you have learned from your bible... or it could be showing them through what you do rather than what you say.
Quite often our actions do speak louder than our words, not because we don’t know what to say, but because people do react to actions more than they react to words. Quite often we can be thinking of something else, be distracted or just stop listening to others – but when we see them doing something, or not doing something, we remember that more than the words.
Points to Ponder:
How do you tell others about Jesus?
Will you show someone Jesus by the way you act today?