Tag Archives: consequences

All love or all wrath? June 17, 2019

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Thanks for joining me today for “A Little Walk with God.” I’m your host Richard Agee.

The text from the common lectionary yesterday came from Romans 5. Paul wrote these words: Since we have been acquitted and made right through faith, we are able to experience true and lasting peace with God through our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One, the Liberating King. Jesus leads us into a place of radical grace where we are able to celebrate the hope of experiencing God’s glory. And that’s not all. We also celebrate in seasons of suffering because we know that when we suffer we develop endurance, which shapes our characters. When our characters are refined, we learn what it means to hope and anticipate God’s goodness. And hope will never fail to satisfy our deepest need because the Holy Spirit that was given to us has flooded our hearts with God’s love.

We hear a lot about God’s love. Well, maybe in today’s culture we don’t hear as much as we used to, but when we hear people talk about God, we mostly hear about his love. That is as it should be because God is love. He showed us what love is all about when he became one of us and sacrificed himself for us that we might be freed from the guilt of our sin when we accept his sacrifice and declare him as who he is, Lord of lords, and King of kings. But sometimes in our culture, we swing too far in one direction or the other.

In the past, we went too far in the direction of God’s wrath. The revivals of the last century focused on the wrath of God and the judgment day that we all must face. Evangelists preached fire and brimstone from their pulpits and scared people out of hell and into heaven. God was to be feared above all things. In the last century, the world also faced tyrants that fought to enslave masses. Names like Hitler, Stalin, and Mousseline headlined the news through war that tore Europe apart and killed millions in its wake.

We have not had conflict on that scale since. We have not looked to the heavens and cried out to God about the global destruction we see at the hands of men since then. We went through some scary times with the cold war and nations poised with their weapons of mutual destruction aimed at each other, but the probability of human distinction has lessened through the last several decades. My children have never participated in a nuclear bomb drill or even seen a nuclear shelter. We no longer fear mass destruction like we did in the last century.

Maybe that is why we no longer think of the wrath of God. We stopped fearing the superpowers, so we stopped fearing God. We somehow started equating the two. It’s not a very smart way to look at the world or to look at God. There are still nuclear weapons in more countries than there were during the cold war. Then, neither of the superpowers would unleash the destruction because each knew it meant the end of both countries as we knew them. But now, lesser nations own the capability to destroy superpowers and can survive themselves because they do not rely on the same global economy or the same technologies so vulnerable to damage caused by those weapons. We used to talk about bombing nations into the stone age. We could not survive in the stone age any more. Many of our most dangerous adversaries could.

But we don’t want to think about that. We want to assume everyone on the planet will love each other if we just understood each other. We believe (rather wrongly) that our enemies are just misunderstood and that if we just listened better and accommodated more, the world would be a safe place and we could all get along. It’s a nice, pleasant, fanciful thought. People have not gotten along since Cain killed his brother Abel. Every ancient text is filled with stories of violence, not love and understanding. Except one.

The Bible has its moments as God directs his people to take the promised land from the Canaanites and other tribes who inhabited the land. There are many stories in both the Old and New Testaments that could be rated PG or R because of the violence depicted in them. But the God of the Bible is still a God of love. His story from the beginning is one of reconciliation between himself and his disobedient creation. We are the ones who brought sin into the cosmos and disrupted the perfection he wanted for us.

From the moment of that first act of disobedience, God’s purpose shows through the action of the stories in his word, to redeem those who would trust him and follow his commands. He is indeed a God of love, but he also requires that we understand he is God and we are not. He is in charge, not us. He is the one to be worshipped. Not us or some false god we put in place of him, whether made of wood or stone or an intangible thing like a job or the electrons today indicative of the wealth we worship. God set out to help us live with each other and with him and his rules help us do that. Is he demanding? Yes. So were my parents. They made demands to keep me safe and teach me how to live well in society. God’s rules do the same.

God doesn’t give us rules to cause us to step our toes at a cliff and see how close we can get to the edge. He doesn’t give us fences he expects us to push our heads through to see what’s on the other side. Those rules and fences are for our protection. Our problem is that we forget that the edges of cliffs sometimes crumble and cause us to slip and fall. We can get stuck when we push our head through a fence. Our problem is we forget all the land inside the fence he freely gives us for our enjoyment. We forget the beautiful meadow well away from the cliff where we can enjoy life to its fullest without any fear.

Just like Adam and Eve, Satan tempts us with the rules. “It’s just a little thing. It won’t hurt you. No one will know.” And suddenly we find ourselves scrambling for our lives as we fall down the side of the cliff grasping for any handhold but finding none.

God is a god of love. He desires our good. He gives us parameters to work within so we can stay safe and secure within those parameters. But we do not listen to him. We think we know better than he does. Or we think because he is a God of love that he will just forget everything we’ve ever done, and no consequences will ever come for our behavior. How naïve can we be? Consequences are a natural part of this world. Or at least we expect them to be. If I walk out in the rain, I expect to get wet. If I go out in freezing temperatures without a coat, I expect to be cold. If I speed past a policeman on the highway, I expect to get a ticket.

Why should I not expect the same consequences if I disobey the commands the creator of all the universe puts in place? Can he set them aside? Yes. And he offers to set aside the punishment we deserve when we acknowledge him as Lord, believe he came in the form of man and died for our sins, confess our guilt to him and accept his sacrifice. And repent. Repent means more than saying I’m sorry. Too often we are sorry we got caught. Repent means to do an about face. Go the other way. Stop doing what you’ve been doing and do the opposite. If you haven’t followed Christ, start following him. If you haven’t trusted him, trust him. If you haven’t obeyed God, obey him. Repent.

God doesn’t have to display his wrath. He has already put the laws of cause and effect in place. There are consequences for our actions. The consequence of not believing in him for salvation is an eternity without him. Jesus describes it as a place of eternal fire where worms never get their fill and the fires are never quenched. Eternal suffering apart from God who so desperately wants his relationship with us restored. But he is a holy God. He has already done his part. But until we repent and accept his gift, the gift remains untouched, unopened, unused.

Take advantage of his love before you become a victim of his wrath. It only takes a little faith and you can know what Paul and so many others have come to know as he shared with the believers in Rome. You can be acquitted and made right through faith, able to experience true and lasting peace with God through our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One, the Liberating King. Jesus leads us into a place of radical grace where we are able to celebrate the hope of experiencing God’s glory. No matter where you are, what you’ve done, he is ready. Are you?

You can find me at richardagee.com. I also invite you to join us at San Antonio First Church of the Nazarene on West Avenue in San Antonio to hear more Bible based teaching. You can find out more about my church at SAF.church. Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed it, tell a friend. If you didn’t, send me an email and let me know how better to reach out to those around you. Until next week, may God richly bless you as you venture into His story each day.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved. In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

How bad do you have to be?, August 12, 2018

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How bad do you have to be for your own to turn you over to the enemy?

Today we’ll look at what happens to Samson after he killed 30 Philistines to pay his debt to his bachelor party companions after they gave him the answer to his riddle. Last week we so how Samson let his emotions get out of control even though it was really his fault all these things were happening to him in the first place. We talked about his anger at everyone but himself, the real culprit in his string of failures.

Today we see the consequences of his actions in Judges 15.

Later on, Samson went to visit his wife. He took a young goat with him. He went at the time the wheat was being gathered. He said, “I’m going to my wife’s room.” But her father wouldn’t let him go in.

Her father said, “I was sure you really lated her. So I gave her to your friend. Isn’t her younger sister more beautiful? Take her instead.”

Samson said to them, “This time I have a right to get even with the Philistines. I’m going to hurt them badly.”

So he went out and caught 300 foxes. He tied them in pairs by their tails. Then he tied a torch to each pair of tails. He lit the torches. He let the foxes loose in the fields of grain that belonged to the Philistines. He burned up the grain that had been cut and stacked. He burned up the grain that was still growing. He also burned up the vineyards and olive trees.

The Philistines asked, “Who did this?” They were told, “Samson did. He’s the son-in-law of the man from Timnah. Samson did it because his wife was given to his friend.”

So the Philistines went up and burned the woman and her father to death.

Samson said to them, “Is that how you act? Then I won’t stop until I pay you back.” He struck them down with heavy blows. He killed many of them. Then he went down and stayed in a cave. It was in the rock of Etam.

The Philistines went up and camped in Judah. They spread out near Lehi. The men of Judah asked, “Why have you come to fight against us?”

“We’ve come to take Samson as our prisoner,” they answered. “We want to do to him what he did to us.”

Then 3,000 men from Judah went to get Samson. They went down to the cave that was in the rock of Etam. They said to Samson, “Don’t you realize the Philistines are ruling over us? What have you done to us?”

Samson answered, “I only did to them what they did to me.”

The men of Judah said to him, “We’ve come to tie you up. We’re going to hand you over to the Philistines.”

There it is. Once again Samson goes where he isn’t supposed to go. He does what he isn’t supposed to do. Then wonders why the Philistines want to take him prisoner. Of course the reason is Samson is a criminal. Sure the Philistines did bad stuff, too, but Samson was one of God’s chosen people and a Nazarite to boot. He was to live better a more noble life. He was to keep higher moral standards that the pagans God displaced when he told Joshua to possess the land. He didn’t. Little that Samson did portrayed the kind of behavior God wanted his people to share with the rest of the world.

Samson strayed so far from the moral compass God set for his people, though, that 3,000 men from Judah came to turn him over to the Philistines. Can you imagine that number arriving at your doorstep to tell you that you’re no longer welcome in your own country. You’ve done so much to alienate yourself from your family and friends that 3,000 of your neighbors come to tie you up and make you disappear.

Samson moved further and further from God and didn’t even know it. How could he think it was right to destroy the Philistine crops? How could he think it was right to kill those 30 innocent men to take their clothes from them? How could he think it right to abandon his wife and then go back to reclaim her and expect her father to have done nothing about it in that culture? How could Samson live the way he lived and not expect consequences?

How about you and me? Do we do the same? Do we live apart from God’s will and expect his blessings? Do we live however we choose and expect no retaliation from those we leave in our wake of destruction? Do we think we can act with no consequences?

I’m afraid too often that’s exactly what we do. We buy into the mantra that God is love without also understanding that God is just. He set in place these rules that govern the universe. We understand them in physics and chemistry and math. For instance, we believe that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. We believe that 2 + 2 will always equal 4. But we have a hard time believing that our actions have consequences, whether good or bad, there are consequences.

Learn from Samson’s mistakes. Understand that life is full of cause and effect rules. When you do something, good or bad, something else will happen that affects you and others around you. Don’t be like Samson.

Talk about awkward (Acts 9:4-6), May 6, 2017

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Thanks for joining me today for “A Little Walk with God.” I’m your host Richard Agee.
Have you ever been in a conversation where people were gossipping about someone and all of a sudden that person showed up? Awkward!
Scripture
1. Acts 9:4-6
2. The Lord: Saul, Saul, why are you attacking Me?

Saul: Lord, who are You?

Then he hears these words:

The Lord: I am Jesus. I am the One you are attacking. Get up. Enter the city. You will learn there what you are to do.

Devotional
1. It happens more often that people want to admit.
  1. Sometimes it happens real time – person walks up behind and hears the conversation
  2. Sometimes the person walks into the middle of the conversation and everyone gets quiet, they still know something is up
  3. Sometimes the word just gets back and they know who said what
  4. Relationships are destroyed as much as reputations are destroyed often by untruths
2. That’s what was happening in Paul’s life
  1. Persecuting Christians
  2. Telling the Jews things about them that were not true
  3. Telling stories about Jesus that were not true
  4. Spreading lies and rumors that despoiled Jesus’ reputation
  5. Jesus stepped behind him one day to interrupt his conversation
3. Saul, why are you attacking Me?
  1. What are you saying about Me?
  2. What are you doing to My followers?
  3. What have you been doing behind My back
  4. Why don’t you say these things to My face
4. And you know when we get ourselves caught in those embarrassing situations where we know we’re gossiping and shouldn’t, there are always consequences
  1. Paul got caught and was embarrassed by his wrong actions
  2. Fortunately did something about it
  3. Repented for his wrongdoing
  4. Learned of the tasks Jesus had for him to do
  5. Carried them out enthusiastically
  6. Stopped persecuting and became the persecuted
  7. Gained life and lost his
  8. Became the most prolific writer in the new testament
If you want to learn more about my church, you can find us at SAF.church. If you like the devotional, share it with someone. If you don’t, tell me. I hope you’ll join me again tomorrow for “A Little Walk with God.”

The hated Master (Luke 19:12-27) December 24, 2016

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Acts 25-26

see the whole year’s plan [here](http://www.bible-reading.com/bible-plan.pdf)

Today’s Devotional

Luke 19:12-27
Jesus: A ruler once planned a journey to a distant country to take the throne of that country and then return home. Before his departure, he called 10 of his servants and gave them each about three months of wages. “Use this money to buy and sell until I return.” After he departed, the people under his rule despised him and sent messengers with a clear message: “We do not want this man to rule over us.”
He successfully assumed kingship of the distant country and returned home. He called his 10 servants together and told them to give an account of their success in doing business with the money he had entrusted to them.
The first came before him and said, “Lord, I have made 10 times the amount you entrusted to me.” The ruler replied, “Well done! You’re a good servant indeed! Since you have been faithful in handling a small amount of money, I’ll entrust you with authority over 10 cities in my new kingdom.”
The second came and said, “Lord, I’ve made five times the original amount.” The ruler replied, “I’ll entrust you with authority over five cities.”
A third came and said, “Lord, I have successfully preserved the money you gave me. I wrapped it up in a napkin and hid it away because I was afraid of you. After all, you’re a tough man. You have a way of taking a profit without making an investment and harvesting when you didn’t plant any seed.”
The ruler replied, “I will condemn you using your very own words, you worthless servant! So I’m a severe man, am I? So I take a profit without making an investment and harvest without planting seed? Then why didn’t you invest my money in the bank so I could have at least gained some interest on it?” The ruler told the onlookers, “Take the money I gave him, and give it to the one who multiplied my investment by 10.”
Then the onlookers replied, “Lord, he already has 10 times the original amount!”
The ruler responded, “Listen, whoever has some will be given more, and whoever doesn’t have anything will lose what he thinks he has. And these enemies of mine who didn’t want me to rule over them—bring them here and execute them in my presence.”

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

Here’s another one of those stories I’ve read a lot, but overlooked a part until today. But that one sentence stuck out for me like a sore thumb and I couldn’t get past it. So let’s look at it today. The sentence I’ve ignored? “After he departed, the people under his rule despised him and sent messengers with a clear message: ‘We do not want this man to rule over us.’”

So why would that sentence pop out at me today? I’m not real sure, except I think our whole society fits that description pretty well. Jesus left physically a couple thousand years ago when ascended into heaven and told us He would return. We don’t know exactly what He’s been doing since then. We know He’s preparing a place for us to spend eternity, but it’s a big universe out there. Maybe He’s visiting some of those other planets He created. Maybe UFOs are real and there are some other sentient beings He is offering His salvation? We just don’t have a clue what God is doing other than intervening for us with the Father and preparing a place for us. But He’s God and that doesn’t take much time when you’re God and can do anything and everything without being concerned about time, a meaningless concept for Him.

Since He left, however, we have not gotten better in our sensibilities toward solving the social problems of the planet. We still build thick walls between us. Whether nationally, racially, economically, just pick any trait and if there is a difference between any group of people, we’ll use it to build a wall so we don’t have to associate with “those” people. That’s not what God planned for us when He created us. That has been our doing.

And in the process, as God has tried to teach us with His word and His example, our selfish desires have so gotten in the way, that the world has learned to despise Him. Even those who follow His example are despised. Just take a look at the increase in martyrdom since He left. More and more Christians are killed because of following Him every year. It wasn’t just ISIS when they came on the scene. Christians have died at the hand of evil men since Jesus departed 2000 years ago for claiming Him as Lord.

Society despised Jesus so much, they even try to blot out His name. We can’t even celebrate Christmas in public anymore. Now it’s the holiday season instead of Christmas. Strange how we lose the name of the very person for whom the holiday came to be in the first place, isn’t it? How does it happen? Because we want our way. We don’t want anyone, even God, telling us how to live. We can choose to follow Him or not, though. We don’t get to choose the consequences of that decision, but we can choose to follow Him or not. Be forewarned, if you follow God, the rest of the world will despise you, just like the Master that left on a long journey 2,000 years ago. He’s coming back, though, and will ask for a reckoning of what He has entrusted to us. Choose well.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

What will you do? (Matthew 10:32-33) March 4, 2016

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Isaiah 51-55

see the whole year’s plan [here](http://www.bible-reading.com/bible-plan.pdf)

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 10:32-33
Jesus: Whoever knows Me here on earth, I will know him in heaven. And whoever proclaims faith in Me here on earth, I will proclaim faith in him before My Father in heaven. But whoever disowns Me here, I will disown before My Father in heaven.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

These were incredibly important words to Jesus’ disciples as they began the first missionary task He gave them. When He sent out the twelve with the message, “The kingdom of heaven is at hand.” He gave them a short sermon to encourage them, but also to warn them of the opposition they would face, the potential imprisonment and suffering that would come their way because of the message they shared. But now Jesus gives His disciples the warning in the words we consider today.

“Whoever knows Me here on earth, I will know him in heaven. And whoever proclaims faith in Me here on earth, I will proclaim faith in him before My Father in heaven. But whoever disowns Me here, I will disown before My Father in heaven.”

We sometimes let Satan add a word in our thought process that confuses the warning Jesus gives us. We often think, “Whoever knows ‘about’ Me…,” but that’s not what Jesus said. So what does it mean to know Jesus? It is certainly more than understanding the intellectual facts about His life and death during the reign of Herod and Pilate. It’s more than believing Mary was His mother and Joseph, her husband, helped raise Him at least into His teen years. To know Jesus means more than regurgitating facts about Him.

When we look at the use of the word in the Old Testament we begin to get a better idea about what it means to ‘know’ Jesus. In Genesis 4, the King Jame version and many of the older translations use the term Adam ‘knew’ Eve and she conceived and bore Cain. Abraham ‘knew’ Sarah and she bore Isaac. ‘Knew’ and ‘begat’ go hand-in-hand throughout the Old Testament. The term denotes the intimate relationship between husband and wife. It’s even more than a sexual relationship. It’s the relationship that desires and accomplishes procreation.

Jesus wants us to know Him. To create more spiritual children for His kingdom. He is sending our His disciples to share His message to increase the population of the kingdom of heaven. The intimate relationship that draws us close to our spouse, so close we want to create progeny to carry on our human legacy, is the kind of close relationship Jesus wants with us. He wants us to know Him intimately.

After 38 years of marriage to my best friend, we often finish each others sentences. We know each others likes and dislikes. I know my wife’s favorite movies, songs, books, foods, colors, vacation likes and dislikes. I know her. I know her so intimately that I can tell when others cannot exactly what she thinks about something without her saying a word. I know when she feels bad, but puts on a smiling face to fool the public. She can do the same for Me. We know each other.

There’s only one way to have that kind of intimacy. You have to talk. We do that through prayer. When you keep your prayer life active and let Him talk to you through His word and His alive, active Spirit that permeates His word and His world, you get to know Him…intimately. Inside and out. He wants us to be able to complete His sentences, finish His thoughts, understand His will for humanity and for you. And when we know Him here on earth, He will continue that relationship with us in heaven at the end of this age.

He also gives His disciples a warning about sharing His message. If you proclaim faith in Him on earth, He will proclaim faith in you before the Father in heaven. But if you disown Him here, He will disown you there. Sounds pretty drastic, doesn’t it? But it also sounds pretty fair, don’t you think? It’s kind of like His message on forgiveness. If we forgive others, He will forgive us. We are forgiven in the same measure we forgive others.

Jesus told the disciples to share His message, to let others know the Messiah arrived, the kingdom of heaven is at hand. He told them to proclaim Him to those they met. When they did, He would proclaim them to His Father, the Creator. But if they failed to share Him, if they decided it was too hard or too embarrassing or too risky to proclaim allegiance to Him and share His message. If they disowned Him, He would disown them.

The sermon Matthew recorded, delivered to the twelve before they went out to the villages around them is still true today. We are disciples if we accept Him as Lord and we accept His forgiveness, that’s part of the bargain. He accepts Lordship or nothing. All or none. So as His disciples we, like the twelve have a responsibility to share His message. When we proclaim Him before others, He proclaims us before the Father in heaven. When we disown Him before others, He disowns us before the Father. Still our choice. We can choose what we do, but we don’t choose the consequences. We know what the consequences are. He has told us.

Jesus’ declaration to His disciples, past and present, seems pretty straight forward. So, what will you do?

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

Consequences (2 Samuel 15:1-14), May 8, 2015

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Today’s Scriptures

Today’s Bible reading plans include:

Ready – 2 Samuel 15:1-14
Set – 2 Samuel 15; Matthew 25
Go! – 2 Samuel 15-16; Psalms 32; Matthew 25

2 Samuel 15:1-14
¹ After this, Absalom acquired a chariot and horses, and he hired 50 men to run ahead of him. ² Now Absalom made it a practice to rise early and stand beside the road leading into one of Jerusalem’s gates. When someone came along who wanted to petition the king, he would ask, “What is your city?” The person would answer, “Your servant is from a certain tribe of Israel.”

Absalom: ³ I’m sure your claims are truthful and have merit, but the king has not appointed anyone to hear your case. ⁴ If only I were appointed the authority in the land! Then anyone with a petition could come before me, and I would give him justice!

⁵ When people came to Absalom to show their respects, he would embrace them and kiss them. ⁶ Absalom did this to everyone who sought justice from the king; and in this way, he made himself the favorite of the people of Israel.

⁷ When four years had passed, Absalom went to his father the king.

Absalom: My king, please let me go to Hebron and satisfy the vow I made to the Eternal One. ⁸ I made a promise when I lived at Geshur in Aram: “If ever the Eternal will bring me back to Jerusalem, then I will go and serve Him [in Hebron.]”

David: ⁹ Go in peace.

So he got up and traveled to Hebron. But this was all part of Absalom’s plan to come to power. ¹⁰ He had secretly planted messengers in all the tribes of Israel with these instructions: “As soon as you hear the trumpet play, then shout that Absalom has been crowned king in Hebron.”

¹¹ Two hundred men from Jerusalem who were ignorant of Absalom’s plan were his invited guests on the journey. ¹² While Absalom was offering sacrifices to God, he sent for David’s counselor Ahithophel of Giloh. The rebellion grew in power and number, ¹³ and at last a messenger came to David.

Messenger: Absalom has captured the loyalty of the people of Israel.

¹⁴ David could see now that he had been outmaneuvered, so he called for his advisors in Jerusalem and instructed them.

David: Gather your things, and let’s flee from the city right now, or we won’t escape Absalom’s revolt. Hurry, or he will catch us and kill us and anyone left in the city.

Today’s Devotional

From today’s background scripture God might say:

The consequences of David’s sins have matured. I forgave him, but he still suffered the consequences of his actions. David should have been out with the people, but his guilt shut him inside his palace. He feared the people saw his sins the way I did and so he hid in his palace. He should have know what his sons were doing. He should have punished Amnon for raping Tamar and Absalom for killing Amnon, but his own past haunted him and he instead he did nothing.

Word spread around the kingdom, and so, David could no longer face his subjects. He hid in the shadows of the courts. He still worshipped Me. He knew his sins were forgiven and he wrote songs about it. He led his army on occasion and met with his advisors, but grew further away from the people I called him to serve.

In fact, Absalom plotted for four years gathering the hearts of the people before launching his revolt. And David didn’t notice a thing. David lost his children. He lost the loyalty of his people. He almost lost his throne. All because of single night of indiscretion he tried to cover with more evil. The consequences of sin spread much wider than you think.

The rules haven’t changed. I gave you David’s story to teach you just how bad things can get. Look around, though, and you’ll find his example isn’t so extraordinary. The web sin weaves is always extensive. Today, the webs are just as complex and far reaching for each sin and each person as they were for David in his day. No sin goes unnoticed and no sin is executed without consequences. I forgive, but consequences can still follow. It pays to obey Me from the start and learn to walk in My ways always.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

You reap what you sow (Galatians 6), Mar 15, 2015

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Today’s Scriptures

Today’s Bible reading plans include:

Ready – Galatians 6
Set – Deuteronomy 28; Galatians 6
Go! – Deuteronomy 28-29; Galatians 6

Galatians 6
¹My spiritual brothers and sisters, if one of our faithful has fallen into a trap and is snared by sin, don’t stand idle and watch his demise. Gently restore him, being careful not to step into your own snare. ² Shoulder each other’s burdens, and then you will live as the law of the Anointed teaches us. ³ Don’t take this opportunity to think you are better than those who slip because you aren’t; then you become the fool and deceive even yourself. ⁴ Examine your own works so that if you are proud, it will be because of your own accomplishments and not someone else’s. ⁵ Each person has his or her own burden to bear and story to write.

⁶ Remember to share what you have with your mentor in the Word.

⁷ Make no mistake: God can’t be mocked. What you give is what you get. What you sow, you harvest. ⁸ Those who sow seeds into their flesh will only harvest destruction from their sinful nature. But those who sow seeds into the Spirit shall harvest everlasting life from the Spirit. ⁹ May we never tire of doing what is good and right before our Lord because in His season we shall bring in a great harvest if we can just persist. ¹⁰ So seize any opportunity the Lord gives you to do good things and be a blessing to everyone, especially those within our faithful family.

¹¹ Look at how giant these letters are now that I am writing with my own hand!

¹² The troublemakers who are putting pressure on you to be circumcised are trying to impress the flesh. They want to avoid the persecution that comes from preaching the cross of the Anointed One, the Liberating King. ¹³ But even those who receive circumcision can’t keep the law—although they think they can—and they hope to influence which way you go with your own skin so they can have bragging rights over your flesh.

¹⁴ May I never put anything above the cross of our Lord Jesus the Anointed. Through Him, the world has been crucified to me and I to this world. ¹⁵ Let me be clear: circumcision won’t save you—uncircumcision won’t either for that matter—for both amount to nothing. God’s new creation is what counts, and it counts for everything. ¹⁶ May peace and mercy come to all of you who live by this rule and to the Israel of God.

¹⁷ In the future, don’t let anyone cause trouble for me because I bear in my body the marks that wounded Jesus.

¹⁸ May the grace of our Lord Jesus, the Anointed One, infuse your spirit with His, brothers and sisters. Amen.

Today’s Devotional

From today’s background scripture God might say:

I wish young people today learned more about agriculture in school or at home. It seems many of them don’t understand one of the very basic natural laws I set in place when I created the universe. It’s a simple rule. It says, “Whatever you sow, you reap.” If you sow corn in a field, you don’t get wheat, you get corn. If you sow beans, you don’t get watermelons, you bet beans. Simple.

The same rule applies to all of nature. If you sow deceit, you reap deceit. If you sow hatred, you reap hatred. If you sow love, you reap love. If you sow kindness, you reap kindness. Whatever you sow, you reap. I wish I could make people understand that fundamental law early in life. It would reduce so much pain and suffering in this generation.

You see, that first act of adultery has consequences you cannot stop. The first toke has consequences you cannot stop. The first drink or the first pill has consequences you cannot stop. Whatever you sow, you reap. Whether it’s the physical, emotional and psychological, or the spiritual effects of your actions, there are always consequences as a natural offshoot because whatever you sow, you reap. It’s a law you cannot change.

Every once in a while, I might use My power to bail you out of the consequences of your action, but most of the time, I don’t. I forgive you and cover you with My blood so your sins are never held against you again in My sight. But the physical, emotional, and relationship scars created remain. Often I still let you reap what you sow. I don’t take away the consequences of your actions. So broken relationships remain broken. Diseases don’t go away. Scars remind you never to walk that path again.

I’m not sure why people today think they can do things without reaping the consequences that come with those actions. I’ve said it enough in My word. The phrase is well known in the general populace. Common sense should tell you actions create consequences from the first time you stick your finger in a flame. But time and again I see people thinking they will get away with their bad behavior. They think nothing will happen. They think what they do will have no affect on their life or the lives of others. It’s as if someone sucked out their brain just before they decide to participate in behavior they know is wrong.

Perhaps one day people will listen better. Perhaps they will understand the natural laws of the universe I put in place. Perhaps they’ll stop before “sowing wild oats” because those wild oats grow where they are planted and reap consequences that live on. Perhaps parents will begin to share their stories with their children and teach them to live responsibly early in life because they will reap what they sow even at those early ages. That law hasn’t changed since creation. Don’t expect Me to change it any time soon.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
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