A Devotion May Be Someone's Only Bible
Where your heart is, there is where your treasure lays. Our hearts guide our emotion and decisions. Unless God is the center of the heart, things are askew. Allowing the Spirit into the matters of the heart promises the faithfulness of Jesus in our lives.
“There was so much blood!”
My daughter’s words startled me. She asked for prayers as she rushed my youngest grandson to the nearest urgent care facility after a freak kitchen accident. She had made the boys a healthy protein smoothie with their small new appliance. But how quickly unexpected things can happen. A slip, a blade, a cut. Blood seemed to cover everything. It was all over the countertop—everywhere, actually—with no sign of slowing down. But our prayers were answered. Thankfully, his arm only required five stitches.
The incident reminded me that the blood of Jesus covers our sins and cleanses and purifies us. Jesus made the greatest sacrifice possible with His own blood, paying with His life to save us. Jesus paid once for us all.
No matter our sins—past, present, or future—the Bible tells us we are saved from them if we believe in Jesus. We can hand over our past and give it to Him. Jesus frees us from the power, guilt, and shame that sin has over us.
My grandchild and his two big brothers recently asked Jesus to save them. Even a child can understand we all sin, but that God loves us. God forgives us because of His great mercy and grace. I know I am freed from the bondage and burden of sin and washed clean by the blood of the Lamb.
You don’t have to carry guilt over your sin. Give it all to Jesus and receive His forgiveness.
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Suckered. That's what I was—plain, outright, suckered. If it wasn’t bad enough knowing I’d fallen for this deception, it was worse knowing that I’d done my research.
We’d lost our sweet dog a year earlier, and I finally came to the point where I was ready to open my heart to a new puppy. I’d done my due diligence, researching as best I could, but these scammers had managed to disguise their ruse very well. I made my deposit on the puppy, and then it started. The cost of a flight. Wait, this was a local breeder. The puppy was held at the airport in California waiting for a ticket. CALIFORNIA! That’s not local.
I’d been scammed. I immediately picked up the phone and called the police. Within minutes, they were running checks, but the snakes had slithered into hiding. The culprits are sly, and they’ve found loopholes to hide. They lie in wait, hoping to bring us into sin and failure. Despite my best efforts to research, I was still deceived.
God gave Adam and Eve specific instructions not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. For a time they obeyed, but then the snake slithered in and deceived Eve. Satan convinced her God was lying. “You won’t die.” And Eve fell for it. Sin entered the world through the door she opened, and Satan chalked up a win.
Deception comes in many forms. Sometimes we see it coming, and at other times it blindsides us. There are times we fall into deception and times we succumb and make a choice to give in to earthly desires. Mankind’s weakness was proven in the garden, but we do have the ability to be strong. We only have to call on the name of the Lord, who is our strong tower. God asks for our obedience, but He understands our frailty.
Despite our failure to obey, the Father stands ready and willing to bring us into Him. To love us as no other can. And to forgive us. His love and forgiveness don’t negate consequences, but God is faithful to His children. His love supersedes all.
Strengthen your bond with the Father, and follow in His footsteps. Don’t be deceived, and be on guard for the evil one's attempts to fool you. You can trust in the Father’s promises. He will never deceive you.
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Sitting at my desk with my daily Scripture portion spread before me, I clear my eyes of sleep and prepare a hot cup of tea to sip. I try to corral my thoughts, but despite my efforts, they have escaped as if on stallions galloping toward the horizon.
One horse carries the worry about my car’s costly mechanical repairs. Another steed trots off with concern about serious damage to my husband’s left eye, revealed in a recent exam—which will entail continuous treatment. An acquaintance took offense at something somebody said, and a rift erupted. We know how it goes. This is life, and we must live in it. But oh how worrisome and wearisome it is. And when it interferes with that special time with the Lord, it’s so annoying.
I feel defeated and unworthy as I struggle to order my thoughts before I read His Word. If I can’t restrain them, how can I honor the Lord? My eyes glance down and catch on the words of Jesus. The issue is not about settling and resting my mind.
When Jesus says, “above all else,” He speaks of the priority of seeking God before my tasks. Jesus didn’t deny the reality of trouble—all those things bouncing around in the saddles of my galloping horses. He addresses my tendency to ask all the what ifs that take away from embracing the now and interfere with my ability to trust in Him. He suggests staying in the moment with God, trusting Him for what comes next. He is in charge of those chargers.
Suddenly, I realized I didn’t need to get my thoughts in order to read God’s Word. I needed to read it to get my thoughts in order.
How can you seek God above all else?
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On any given day, disappointments can be overwhelming, and conquering through praise doesn’t come easily.
Enter the life of a middle school Language Arts teacher. For the first three weeks of school, the program we use for grades, homework, lesson plans, lunch, announcements, and payment was up and down because our internet was up and down.
On one particular day—as the students attempted to work through an online grammar exercise—the internet dropped us at least fifteen times within forty minutes. Frustrating. Making lesson plans was challenging due to the intermittent connection. What normally took an hour took an entire day. Student lunch orders didn’t process. One fellow teacher threatened to throw her computer out the window. I thought about it myself. Of course, all of this had nothing to do with our computers.
Since our lives as teachers are so dependent on the internet, several weeks of issues tax us and make finding anything positive difficult. And of course, we have to toss in staff meetings, parent meetings, and other student-related matters.
Yet many reasons to praise exist. We work in a smaller atmosphere where peer and student-teacher relationships are closer. Fights among students are almost non-existent. So is backbiting and jealousy among teachers and staff. We also get to bathe everything we do in a Christian worldview. I can talk about Christ and biblical principles as often as I choose. In fact, I’m instructed to.
I’ve encountered some disappointing times during my lifetime. When I’m under a heavy load of whatever, it’s challenging to discover the light—but there is one. And it is for everyone if they want it to be.
Knowing Christ as Savior gives us reason to praise Him. Realizing all our sins—past, present, and future—were forgiven at the cross is worth shouting about. God is also omnipotent. He controls everything. The reason for the disappointment is immaterial. He has authority over the situation. Looking for the positive in all situations helps too. We can see glasses of water as half full or half empty. The choice is ours.
Let God teach you how to use praise so you can conquer disappointing times.
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The Westminster Catechism has a shorter version, commonly called the Shorter Catechism, written primarily to train up a child.
Once, a US military officer was in a city in the Western world. Riots and violent gangs raged all over the city. Amid the chaos, the military officer passed a young man who appeared calm, controlled, and confident. His demeanor seemed so different from the environment around him that the officer turned and looked back at him after passing him. The officer noticed that the young man had also turned around.
The young man returned to the officer and asked, “What is the chief end of man?”
The officer said, “To know God and enjoy Him forever. I knew you were a short catechism boy.”
“And I knew you were likewise,” the young man replied.
Godly training brings about observable characteristics. Our children can shake hands and speak with respect to those much older than them. They can understand the wisdom that comes from experience, rather than considering older people old fashioned. We should teach them to use ma’am and sir when appropriate. We should teach them what the Bible says about serving so they will give an older person their seat on a bus or subway. Other essential lessons entail teaching them that the world does not revolve around them. That they can’t have everything they want when they want it without exception. That they should respect themselves as they respect others. That they should never be ashamed of their beliefs. That they are unique and should never be ashamed of what they have or don’t have.
Even with training, our children will never be perfect because parents are never perfect. Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child, but we must strive to curb that through instruction, discipline, and God’s grace. If we take seriously the admonition to train up a child, they will be less likely to stray from their faith as they age.
Think of ways you can train your children or grandchildren in the way they should go.
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(For more devotions, visit Christian Devotions.)