Proverbs 18:10 ” The name of the Lord is a strong tower; the righteous run to it and are safe.” Especially this year and what’s happening with COVID 19 we can’t take the protection of God lightly. But instead of me rattling on, I feel it’s more important to read what the Word of God says. Psalm 20:1 “May the Lord answer you when you are in distress; may the name of the God of Jacob protect you.” Job 11:18 “You will be secure, because there is hope; you will look about you and take your rest in safety.” Psalm 69:29 “I am in pain and distress; may Your salvation, O God, protect me.” There is protection in the powerful name of the Lord, and He assures us that He will keep us safe from calamity, and enemies…including COVID 19.
Category: daily devotional
God says you are: Full of Joy
John 15: 9 &11, ” As the Father has loved Me, so I have loved you. Now remain in My love. I have told you this so that My joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.” Let’s admit it…there hasn’t been a lot to be joyful about the last nine months. But it shouldn’t stop us from finding our source of happiness, well-being, and delight in the Lord. Jesus tells us that His joy is in us…fulfilled at the cross. And we should take this blessedness and share it with others…or as Mother Teresa once said, “Joy is a net by which you can catch souls.”
Luke 20:1-2 ” One day as He was teaching the people in the Temple courts and preaching the Gospel, the chief priests and teachers of the law, together with the elders, came up to Him. ‘Tell us by what authority You are doing these things,’ they said. ‘Who gave You this authority?’ “
The chief priests and teachers of the law didn’t like what they saw and heard. This Jesus fellow was teaching with a command of the law they’d never seen before, and He was proclaiming the Good News of the Kingdom of God with such power and conviction that the crowds were being won over by Him…and this wasn’t good. So when they approached Jesus that day in the Temple courts they wanted answers. “Just who gives You the right to do this?” For they were afraid…fearing that their power and control over the crowd was slipping. But neither would they accept or believe where Jesus’ authority came from. “Jesus said, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Me.” (Matthew 28:18)
II Thessalonians 1:6-7 ” God is just: He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled…”
Our broken human nature likes to get even and retaliate when we think we’ve been wronged…even if it’s just in our minds. But God is very clear, “Don’t take revenge my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: ‘It is Mine to avenge; I will repay, says the Lord.” (Romans 12:19) But we want vengeance and when we don’t see it quickly from the Lord, we whine. But as Jesus tells us in Luke 18:7-8, “Will not God bring about justice for His chosen ones who cry out to Him day and night?” There is but one just and righteous Judge Who will avenge all the wrongdoing in the world…while also, as it says above, giving the Believer rest from their affliction and tribulation.
Psalm 105:4 ” Look to the Lord and His strength; seek His face always.”
Is going to the Lord with something the first thing you do…or is it only after you’ve exhausted all other options? Do you seek His presence at the beginning of a situation, or at the end when all your hope is gone? It’s all a matter of timing, priorities, and pride. If I think I can “fix it” why should I bother God with it, right?! But it says that we should seek His face always…continually and at all times. And when we look to God first, not as a last resort, He gives us His perspective, and purpose for the situation, along with His peace.
John 3:20-21 ” Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God.”
Nothing good happens after midnight, or so the saying goes. And Ephesians 5:11 warns us, “Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness.” Darkness and wickedness go hand and hand…and they like it that way. For evil is more comfortable in the dark…because it naively thinks no one can see. That’s why men love darkness instead of light…it shines forth brightly with truth and all their deception, lies, and falsehoods are laid bare for all to see. The penetrating beacon of God’s truth is absolute, transcendent, and divinely revealed to those who willingly come into the light.
Daniel 1:6-7 ” Among these were some from Judah: Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah. The chief offical gave them new names: to Daniel, the name Belteshazzar; to Hananiah, Shadrach: to Mishael, Meshach; and to Azariah, Abednego.”
The meaning of the Hebrew names for these four men all affirmed God’s sovereignty, mercy, and grace for His people. But the new names they were given by the Babylonian chief official sought to undermine and degrade this. For their new names were deliberately drawn from the Babylonian false religions, gods and idols, and erased any trace of God from them. Even today we have the challenge of believing what God calls us vs what the world calls us. The world will call us fat, dumb, ugly, stupid and old….while the Lord will call us loved, free, healed, whole, and His. The world is all about demeaning and humiliating…while God is all about lifting us up. So just remember this…no matter what the world calls you…the Lord named you first, and that name is all that matters.
Jude 1:1 ” To those who have been called, who are loved by God the Father and kept by Jesus Christ.”
Within this verse is a perfectly simple but totally effective description of the Trinity. The Trinity being three persons in one Godhead… Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. First, we are called or summoned to salvation through the the Gospel Message by the Holy Spirit as we are wooed or drawn in. For the Holy Spirit shows us very plainly our shortcomings and convicts us… so that we may be saved. Next, we need to grasp just how greatly valued, esteemed, and loved we are by God the Father. For who else would give His only Son to die on a cross for all that we might have eternal life? (John 3:16) Finally, know you belong to Jesus who watches over you to keep you safe. (John 17:12) So just think of it…we are His and He is ours, and no one can ever snatch us out of His hand. (John 10:28)
Job 8:13-15 ” Such is the destiny of all who forget God; so perishes the hope of the godless. What he trusts in is fragile; what he relies on is a spider’s web. He leans on the web, but it gives way; he clings to it, but it does not hold.”
The false hope and promise of the world is much like a spider web. It appears strongly constructed, secure, and can be relied on…but in reality, it’s fragile, weak, and undependable. The world’s false hope is like thinking a spider web will break our fall…only to find it disintegrating in our hands. What the world promises us can’t be trusted…what it tells us to rely on is very deceptive…and how it influences us on a daily basis is usually wrong. That’s because, our true hope can only be found in placing our trust and confidence in the Name of Jesus Christ, our Rock and our Deliverer.
Isaiah 61:11 ” For as the soil makes the sprout come up and a garden causes seeds to grow, so the Sovereign Lord will make righteousness and praise spring up before all nations.”
The Lord is evident to all mankind…everyday, in every way. It says here that He causes His righteousness and praise to spring up as seeds sprout up from the warm soil in the Springtime. For elsewhere in Isaiah it says, “You heavens above, rain down righteousness; let the clouds shower it down. Let the earth open wide, let salvation spring up, let righteousness grow with it; I, the Lord have created it.” (Isaiah 45:8) God’s righteousness and praise comes down like the Spring rains, watering the land and causing the seeds to sprout and grow… covering the earth with beauty for all to see.
Safetypinlove 