Tag Archives: Matthew

Floods and foundations (Matthew 7:24-27) February 5, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Isaiah 29-33

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 7:24-27
Jesus: Those people who are listening to Me, those people who hear what I say and live according to My teachings—you are like a wise man who built his house on a rock, on a firm foundation. When storms hit, rain pounded down and waters rose, levies broke and winds beat all the walls of that house. But the house did not fall because it was built upon rock. Those of you who are listening and do not hear—you are like a fool who builds a house on sand. When a storm comes to his house, what will happen? The rain will fall, the waters will rise, the wind will blow, and his house will collapse with a great crash.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

A few weeks ago floods tore through the midwest again. The Mississippi River overflowed its banks and the same little town that routinely finds itself ravaged by those floodwaters found itself ravaged again. I sometimes wonder about the intelligence of the people that live in that little town. Year after year, the Mississippi floods when the rains hit the countrysides upstream. Rains don’t necessarily hit that town, but all through the midwest, melting snow and spring rains fill the tributaries that feed the Mississippi and invariably that little town hits the national news.

So why do the people stay there? When I hear the name of the town on the news every year, I think about Jesus’ words to the crowd on the mountainside. When a storm comes, the rain falls, the waters rise, the wind blows, and his house will collapse with a great clash. That’s what I think about as I see the houses float down the Mississippi after the floods rip them from their foundation in the spring and autumn rains. You would think people would look at the maps and quit building in the floodplain, wouldn’t you? But next year, guess what we’ll see on the news. Yep. Rescuers will be pulling someone from a rooftop or out of a tree because they built back in the same place and the Mississippi will overflow its banks and they’ll feel the power of the floodwaters as their house disappears in the torrent.

Jesus describes two kinds of people using the metaphor. The foolish are like those I just describe. We don’t understand why they keep building in the same spot just to be washed away year after year. Yet look at how many people return to their sin day after day realizing the penalty for sin is death. A payday is coming. We have the published wages clear for all to see. Evidence of the ruin sin brings to life is everywhere. Families destroyed. Relationships ruined. Self set above all else. When self reigns, the collapse is great.

Jesus tells us the opposite is true of those who listen to and live by His teachings. Their foundations are firm. They are like those who build their houses on foundations that stand up to the storm. They make good decisions on where to build in the first place. They don’t continue to build in the floodplain and when they build, they build on a solid foundation that will withstand the storms of life that come our way. Storms will come. Life happens. We all face trials that test our faith and make us wonder why God would allow things to happen the way they do.

But God isn’t to blame for the bad that happens to us. Sin entered the world and set in motion the consequences of man’s fall. Death. These events are not God’s plan, but the consequences of mankind’s doing. And so, natural consequences fall on the just and unjust. Rain falls on all of us. Storms hit all of us. Natural events happen to all of us. Evil strikes all of us. But when we follow the principles and precepts God lays out for us and honor Him as God, we build our lives on a solid foundation of trust and respect for Him and for others. We put priorities in the right place. We lean on God for the solutions to our problems and His word gives us the concepts we need to find those solutions.

We won’t be exempt form the storms of life, but we will weather them. We won’t go through life without trouble, in fact, Jesus promised we would have trouble in this world. But when we follow His teachings, we will overcome, just as He overcame. Becaue we will let Him reign in our lives. That’s His teaching. He wants to be Lord of our lives. Not just another teacher, another voice, but Lord. Director. Guide. Everything.

When our lives are built on Christ as the foundation. We can handle anything that comes along. Will it always be easy? No. Life isn’t easy. Nor is it always fair. But we can handle it because He is on our side. He doesn’t leave us to walk the journey alone. He will go with us and help us through every storm. We can anchor ourself to Him and make it through the toughest situations. Turn your life over to Him. Build on Him as the foundation of your life. You’ll be glad you did.

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.

Saying versus doing (Matthew 7:21-23) February 4, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Job 9-10

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 7:21-23
Jesus: Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven. Simply calling Me “Lord” will not be enough. Only those who do the will of My Father who is in heaven will join Me in heaven. At the end of time, on that day of judgment, many will say to Me, “Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name? Did we not drive demons out of the possessed in Your name? Did we not perform miracles in Your name?” But I will say to them, “I never knew you. And now, you must get away from Me, you evildoers!”

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

These words of Jesus must have been tough for those who heard it that day. They are probably tough for us if we really stop to think about them a little. Jesus is saying all our good deeds don’t mean anything to God if they haven’t come from an obedient heart. Look at the list of things He mentions as the works of those who He turns away at the day of judgment. Prophesy, driving out demons, performing miracles. Aren’t these the very works He did? Aren’t these the things Jesus said we would do for Him when He departed?

How can He tell us that those who do these very things will not be allowed to live with Him? These people are doing great things in Jesus’ name! They show every evidence on the outside that they are His followers, so how can He now reject them from heaven?

The answer is simple. They haven’t been obedient to Him. Remember Moses? Do you remember why God didn’t let him cross over the Jordan River into the land promised to the Israelites? The event was such a simple thing. God told Moses to speak to the rock and tell water to come out of it to give the Israelites water to quench their thirst. Instead, Moses struck the rock with his rod. Years earlier in the journey God had told Moses to get water by striking the rock and water came out of the rock. So why would God ban Moses from the promised land for such a simple thing, striking the rock instead of speaking to the rock? Disobedience.

But the answer is deeper than that. Look through the rest of the story of Numbers and Deuteronomy. You’ll never see Moses take responsibility for his disobedience. In every cases where the event is told, Moses blames his failure to go into the promised land on his brothers and sisters. He blames their hard-heartedness, not his own. He never confesses that God told him to speak to the rock to get water and in his arrogance and anger at the Israelites, he disobeyed God’s command. Moses never repented of his sin before the people.

Is it this failure to confess that prohibited Moses’ entrance into the promised land? The older I get and the more I read of God’s grace and mercy, the more I think it was Moses’ stubborn failure to take responsibility for his disobedience, more than his act of disobedience that led to his rejection at the Jordan River. The same will be true for these characters Jesus speaks of in His discourse. God demands obedience, not show. He demands true repentance, not sacrifices and offerings and things for others to see.

God wants us to come humbly to Him and listen to His voice and love Him enough to do what He asks us to do, fully, without fanfare. He wants us to just go about our lives with the simple thought of saying yes to whatever He tells us to do. Maybe He’ll tell us to prophesy for Him. But He might just ask us to give kind words to those around us that are hurting. Maybe He’ll ask us to drive demons out of the possessed. But He might just want us to hold the hand of a grieving mother for a lost child. Maybe He’ll want us to perform miracles in His name. But He might just want us to go about our daily business with a smile on our face and joy in our heart so others know He lives in us.

The question He has for me and you today is whether He is Lord of your life. When He is Lord, He can ask you to do anything and you will say yes. Anything means the most important, earth-shaking responsibility in the world that will put your name in the limelight and everyone will see and know you. And it means the lowliest, nastiest task you can think of that no one in the world wants to do and everyone would look down on you because of you did it. It also means doing things that will cause people to completely ignore you and never know you’ve done anything at all, but God knows. It means obedience. That’s what Jesus being Lord means. Saying yes to His command every time, in every circumstance, at every opportunity.

If He truly is Lord, you don’t need to worry about what He will say to you at the day of judgment. His words to you will be, “Enter into the joys of heaven, you good and faithful servant.” Is He your Lord today? He can be. Just ask Him to be, then say yes to Him, 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.

Beware false prophets (Matthew 7:15-20) February 3, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Psalms 12-18

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 7:15-20
Jesus: Along the way, watch out for false prophets. They will come to you in sheep’s clothing, but underneath that quaint and innocent wool, they are hungry wolves. But you will recognize them by their fruits. You don’t find sweet, delicious grapes growing on thorny bushes, do you? You don’t find delectable figs growing in the midst of prickly thistles. People and their lives are like trees. Good trees bear beautiful, tasty fruit, but bad trees bear ugly, bitter fruit. A good tree cannot bear ugly, bitter fruit; nor can a bad tree bear fruit that is beautiful and tasty. And what happens to the rotten trees? They are cut down. They are used for firewood. When a prophet comes to you and preaches this or that, look for his fruits: sweet or sour? rotten or ripe?

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

There are a lot of false prophets out there now days. They were around in Jesus’ time, thrived during the days of the early church, and keep on truckin’ today. In fact, if I read my Bible right, they will be around until Jesus comes again. And guess where they do their best work. If you guessed in the church, you’d be right. It’s sad, but true.

They come in with all the right words. They look religious. They quote long passages of scripture to prove their point. But when you look at their lives, they are empty shells with nothing inside. No real life. Nothing to show on the inside that would point anyone to Christ and His truth. Yet many will fall for their flattering words and mystic sounding phrases and follow them anywhere. Just look at the number of people that followed Jimmie Jones and David Koresh. Those two made national headlines because of the scores of people who died because of their false teaching, but there are dozens like them that don’t get the mass attention but are just as dangerous.

The false teachers typically pick a verse or two and blow it out of proportion to the rest of scriptures. They hang their hat on those few scriptures and build a religion around them. Then work to convince the ignorant that everyone else is wrong. I did say ignorant and it has nothing to do with IQ. It has to do with whether or not you study God’s word. Not the flavor of the month the false teachers give, but God’s word. Dare the false prophets to use any other translation than their own and see what happens. See, the beautiful thing about God’s Spirit working in the lives of His servants is that all the legitimate translations I’ve every read, and I’ve read about 30 of them through from cover to cover at this point, all say the same thing about God, Jesus, His Son, salvation by faith, good works as a demonstration of faith, a final judgment for all people who ever lived, an accountability for our actions, eternal destinations for those who believe in Jesus as the way of salvation and those who do not.

Every single translation I’ve read says the same things about those essential elements of the Christian faith. Without exception. So when someone tries to introduce something that contradicts the greater voice of all those translations that survived through centuries of scholarly criticism, I question the single voice. Those false prophets will try to twist scripture the same way Satan tried to twist scripture in his temptation of Jesus in the wilderness. The issue is, how do we discover the false teacher from the real thing?

The answer is simple. First, know the scriptures. Read God’s word and test what your teachers tell you. Go look it up for yourself. Put those thoughts and instructions back into the context of the whole Bible and the whole story or passage from which it came. Don’t let your teacher take a phrase or verse or two out of context and twist it around. Jeremiah 29:11 is one of my favorites for pointing out how we can twist scripture. It’s a great verse. Jeremiah gives the exiles a great promise from God: For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Eternal, “plans for peace, not evil, to give you a future and hope—never forget that.

What we seldom remember, is that God’s plans included continued exile for another 70 years, then only a small remnant of those who departed would return. Jeremiah wrote these words in around 570 BC. Israel didn’t have sovereign reign of their land again until the peace accords after World War II. That’s 2500 years before their future and hope of a sovereign nation came to fruition. So be careful what those prophets tell you. Go look it up! See what’s right! Listen to God more than you listen to man!

Second, look at the fruit of the teacher. Does he or she produce good fruit? Do you see the fruit of the spirit evident in his or her life? Do he have to fake it? Do his children tell you he’s the same person at home that he is at church? How does she treat those who work for her? Do you see good fruit there? How about at the grocery store and other places in public? Is he short with waitresses or does he treat them with the same gentle spirit you would expect from Jesus? What fruit do you see? It doesn’t take long for tree to show the kind of fruit it bears. Just look around and you’ll see it. Follow the good fruit bearer. You’ll be glad you did. 

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.

Which road? (Matthew 7:13-14) February 2, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Joshua 21-25

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 7:13-14
Jesus: There are two paths before you; you may take only one path. One doorway is narrow. And one door is wide. Go through the narrow door. For the wide door leads to a wide path, and the wide path is broad; the wide, broad path is easy, and the wide, broad, easy path has many, many people on it; but the wide, broad, easy, crowded path leads to death. Now then that narrow door leads to a narrow road that in turn leads to life. It is hard to find that road. Not many people manage it.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

It’s easy to go along with the crowd. Just ask the herd of cattle on the farm. They move from the barn in the morning to the pasture and just graze around following the lead cow. In the afternoon, the lead cow knows it’s about time to go back to the barn so they follow the same worn path back to the barn until the next morning. The same routine goes on day after day, with the cows going out into the field and coming back in again until one day the lead cow leads the herd through a series of gates that ends up with the cows looking through the sideboards of a transport headed to the slaughter house.

We’re not much different. We have a tendency to just follow the leader, not thinking much about who we’re following. We get into the middle of the crowd and let it push us along mindlessly going back and forth day after day until finally we find out one day we’re looking through the sideboards of life on our way to the slaughter house and it seems there’s no way out.

My wife and I enjoy seeing Broadway plays off Broadway as they tour our community. When we first started going to the theater in our town we discovered a quick way out of the theater through an exit by the stage. Only a few people knew about that exit and it only took swimming upstream a few rows for us to break through the mass of people trying to go out the way they came in to get to that exit and beat the crowd to the parking lots.

Getting through those first few obstacles is hard. People are thinking you’re crazy. You’re going the wrong way. Everyone else is moving to the back of the room and we’re moving to the front. People jostle us. We squeeze through the cracks in the crowd. We take some verbal abuse at times. But our mind is set. We’re going for that smaller door that few people know about. Freedom from the crowd. Freedom from the meandering push. Freedom to break out and get loose.

The other interesting thing that has happened is that over the several years we have attended those plays, some of those who routinely sit around us started to notice our escape route. They started following us through that sea of people and discovered they, too, got to their cars faster and escaped the downtown traffic faster. We brought along some people through that narrow path to freedom.

I think about Jesus’ metaphor sometimes as I still bump into the newbies that don’t know about the door by the stage. They don’t know they can escape the mass of people they are following and break free to the fresh air outside if they’ll just break away from the crowd and follow the narrow path to the side door. Maybe they’ll stick around long enough to learn. Maybe I should tell them.

But more important than that secret door at the theater, I want to make sure I find and follow that narrow path that Jesus talks about. The world will take me and you down a path that’s easy to follow. Just sit and watch television and the world will tell you what you need, money, sex, fame. The world will make you believe that what you want is more important than anything else. But the world lies. What’s most important is what God wants. His will is most important and it will be accomplished. His plans will be carried out, the question is whether or not you and I will let ourselves be part of them.

We can run through life like the herd headed to the slaughter house or the crowd pushing to the back of the theater, or we can listen to Christ and follow Him. We can take the narrow road and bring some along with us. We can help others figure out the broad path leads to their own destruction, pull them aside and point out the narrow path that Jesus shows us. We can help them experience real freedom.

So which path are you on? Are you part of the herd or do you think for yourself? Are you following Jesus on the narrow path that leads to life or on the broad road that leads to destruction? You get to choose the path you take. One is easy and one is hard. Don’t take the easy road. It doesn’t turn out so well in the end. Swim uphill against the crowd. You’ll be glad you did.

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.

Good gifts (Matthew 7:9-11) January 31, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Romans 9-10

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 7:9-11
Jesus: Think of it this way: if your son asked you for bread, would you give him a stone? Of course not—you would give him a loaf of bread. If your son asked for a fish, would you give him a snake? No, to be sure, you would give him a fish—the best fish you could find. So if you, who are sinful, know how to give your children good gifts, how much more so does your Father in heaven, who is perfect, know how to give great gifts to His children!

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

So, can we couple today’s thoughts with what Jesus said yesterday and make a case for cosmic Santa? Yesterday, we highlighted “ask and it will be given to you.” Now Jesus talks about the good gifts God gives. Is this a case for the name it and claim me gospel? Can we stand on this and just ask for a new car or a better job? Can we get that bigger house from God or a new wardrobe?

The answer is no. God is not sitting in heaven waiting to grant our every selfish desire. Let’s go back to the premise of Jesus’ comments on prayer here. We are seeking after God. We are seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. We are asking for His will to be done on earth as it is being done in heaven. We are requesting the Father’s power to manifest itself through us in our activities in the same way He manifests His will through the angels that do His bidding around the throne room of heaven.

So when we ask for these things. When we ask for our daily bread, will God give us calamity? Will God give us illness? Will God give us tornados and floods and hurricanes? No. Jesus is bashing the idea prevelant among many of the day that God poured out terrible things on people. Many saw God the same way the Romans and Greeks saw their gods. Heavenly beings just playing with the lives of humanity. The God of creation is not like the false gods of the heathens surrounding the faithful Hebrews.

Jesus makes the case that God answers prayer and He answers with good gifts. When God’s children ask for things, God responds with the right gift that will benefit His children. He will give the right answer at the right time that will bring glory to Him and move His children along the path toward eternity with Him. Jesus puts the teaching in terms those around Him will clearly understand, though.

Remember, He is talking about a new covenant with God’s people. He is turning the teachings of the scribes and Pharisees upside-down. Jesus’ teachings rebel against the status quo telling these religious leaders they are not good enough to enter heaven. All their pious prayers, they magnanomous offerings, their boisterous religious pageantry means nothing to God. It’s all so much whitewash for other people to see, but it means nothing to God because He sees their heart.

What God wants is our recognition that He is God. He wants our honor, respect, and obedience. He wants us to say yes to His will. He wants us to accept the gifts He has for us and to use those gifts to carry out His will on earth, not ours. He wants to us forget about our desires are focus on His. God wants us to abandon our selfish ambitions and seek His kingdom and His righteousness. You see, we can never be good enough, but we can accept His goodness as our own through faith. That’s what Abraham did without the written law. That’s what Moses did before the law was given to Him on tablets of stone. That’s what Joel talked about when He said God would write His law on the hearts of men and women.

Jesus told the crowd that day, every good thing comes from God. Don’t blame Him for the bad that comes into your life. The bad things that happen are sometimes a consequence of your own sinful behavior. If you take drugs, they will destroy your body. It’s a natural consequence of your own actions. If you have affairs, it will destroy your family. That’s a natural consequence of your decision. Don’t blame God when you can’t fix your marriage. It’s a natural consequence of the destruction of trust between you and your spouse. Your relationship is gone and building that trust back will forever be an uphill battle for you.

If you’re the victim of a flood or tornado, it’s not God’s fault. Things just happen. Life isn’t fair. Rain falls on the just and the unjust. The physics of weather patterns were set in motions when God created the earth. You decide to live in a flood plain and the river overflows. Can you blame that on God? I don’t think so. Things just happen. Every good gift comes from God. Sometimes He will protect us from our own stupid decisions. Sometimes He doesn’t. He lets us suffer the natural consequences that come from those decisions.

But one thing is certain. When we ask our Father for something in prayer, we can be sure He answers. And when He answers, His answer is good. It might not be what we want, but it will be good. Because the Father gives good gifts to His children. 

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.

The Father’s will (Matthew 7:7-8) January 30, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Matthew 11-13

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 7:7-8
Jesus: Just ask and it will be given to you; seek after it and you will find. Continue to knock and the door will be opened for you. All who ask receive. Those who seek, find what they seek. And he who knocks, will have the door opened.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

Jesus moves back to the topic of prayer. He tells us to just ask, but does He mean we can get anything we want? Does He portray the Father as a cosmic Santa that will give us whatever we want? “Just ask and it will be given to you…” It might sound like it if you lift that verse out of His sermon like a lot of name it and claim preachers try to do. But go back and look at the model prayer He gives us earlier in His sermon and remember that He never contradicts Himself.

Ask and it will be given to you. Ask for what? Remember Jesus’ model prayer? Father in heaven, I ask that your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Ask and it will be given to you. Seek after it and you will find it. Find what? Find the Father’s will. You see, I think we get the wrong idea about what to ask for in the first place. We get ourselves mixed up into the equation and let that selfish desire poke its head up and try to grab all the attention instead of listening to what Jesus says to us in the rest of His discourse.

Remember what He told us just a few verses before this? “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness.” Don’t worry about all that other stuff. God knows what you need and He’ll see that all that other stuff is taken care of. Just seek Him first. Don’t let your greedy self get in the way of looking for Him. Be like David and “let your soul pant for God like a deer pants for water,” he writes.

We get too anxious to snap up this one verse and let it manipulate our selfish desires instead of putting it back into the sermon where it belongs and understanding that God must be first. Seek first God. Seek first His will. That means don’t even worry about what His will is for your life. Just find His will and then go get on board with it. You’ll find your place in the world, just by going and doing His will, not yours. Did you ever think about doing things on those terms? Jesus did.

Jesus went about not asking what God’s will was for Him, but asking what is the Father’s will and doing it. Period. Maybe it’s time we start asking that question. What is the Father’s will? Stop the question right there. Don’t add any other identifiers to it. Don’t ask what is His will for my church or my life or my organization or my family or my anything. See, when we put “my” in there, we begin to let self get into the equation and open the door for something other than God’s will.

Just ask, “God what is your will?” Then go jump on board. Do whatever you can do to further His will. Now what does Jesus’ command mean. Let’s think about it a little deeper.

Just ask for God’s will and it will be given to you, He’ll show it to you. Seek the Father’s will and you will find it. You won’t have to look hard, but you’ll need to look because Satan and the world’s clamor will try to drown it out. But look for it and you’ll find His will in His word. Continue to knock and the Father will open doors of opportunity for you to walk through so you can be a part of furthering His will on earth when you ask Him earnestly and sincerely.

All who ask Him what His will for humankind really is will know what His will is. He doesn’t hide from you. He wants you to know Him, just ask and He’ll tell you. And everyone who wants to work for Him in furthering His purposes and His plans will find doors of opportunity opened for them. All you have to do is be obedient to His voice and walk through them. But understand they are His plans, not yours. Those doors progress His purposes, not yours. The opportunities provide for His glory, not yours. The will you seek and the doors of opportunity all belong to the Father, not you.

Until you begin to operate with that frame of mind, don’t expect to find the Father acting as a cosmic Santa. He’s not. He cares about you, but He is God. We are not. It’s His will we should long for, seek out, grab hold of, spend as much energy and effort as we can muster following His will.

In that frame of mind, Christ shared His sermon. Totally sold out to the Father, Jesus made His statement. Committed wholely to His heavenly Father, Jesus tells us a truth we can stand on, “Just ask and it will be given to you; seek after it and you will find. Continue to knock and the door will be opened for you. All who ask receive. Those who seek, find what they seek. And he who knocks, will have the door opened.” Find the Father’s will, not yours.

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.

Protect your treasures (Matthew 7:6) January 29, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Isaiah 23-28

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 7:6
Jesus: Don’t give precious things to dogs. Don’t cast your pearls before swine. If you do, the pigs will trample the pearls with their little pigs’ feet, and then they will turn back and attack you.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

We have a tendency to break up Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount by the convenient chapters and verses given to us in our current Bibles, but few today realize those chapters and verses didn’t exist until the publication of the Geneva Bible in 1560. Until then, each book ran from beginning to end as a single narrative or collection of poems, stories, etc. Just like an editor today uses page numbers and line numbers to help his staff find specific passages for his writing team, the translators of the Geneva Bible inserted chapters and verses to assist their translators, then left them there as an aid to all readers.

The problem with the chapters and verses is that sometimes they break thoughts and concepts in the wrong places. So it is with the Sermon on the Mount. Start in Chapter 5 and read through Chapter 7 to get the full effect of Jesus’ message. Here we are at Matthew 7:6, but it really references all those things Jesus has said up to this point. He has given his audience so important information about what’s really important in life and now he adds this tiny proverb into the middle of his sermon.

Don’t give precious things to dogs. Don’t cast your pearls before swine. They don’t understand the value of those things and they’ll just trample them into the ground. What does He mean putting this parable into His sermon at this point? I’ve taken it out to talk about it as a single verse today and we can use it as a stand-alone proverb. But taken together with everything He has said about attitudes, the law, offerings, thoughts and actions, real love and relationship with God and man, prayer, fasting, forgiveness, heavenly treasures, I think we can begin to see a much richer, deeper thought as Jesus shares this proverb with those on the mountain that day.

He shared a lot of illustrations with them to help them understand what’s really important to God in His relationship with us. He wants us to enjoy our life, but enjoyment doesn’t come with the collection of stuff. Enjoyment comes in the company of friends and family. Jesus talks about the family of God and the relationship we have with Him. The actions and the heart change, the attitude change that means real joy for the individual and the community as a whole when as a society we honor God as God instead of trying to put ourselves in His rightful place.

You say, “I would never take God’s place.” You’re right, you can’t. Ever. But we try. We try to put everything else in His place. Sometimes good legitimate things. But they are not God. And when we put any created thing above Him we practice idolatry. Idolatry doesn’t have to entail bowing to a gold or silver statue. It is any failure to honor and respect God as God and remember we are not. That’s the crux of the message Jesus has here. We so often put insignificant things in front of God and lose sight of what’s important.

We in essence throw the important to dogs. We throw pearls before swine. And after they trample our “precious treasures”, they turn around and attack us. They destroy and devour us without any thought whatsoever.

On the other hand, we can take the precious treasures God gives us, the relationships nurtured and grown with our brothers and sisters in Christ, and throw them away with the kinds of attitudes, unjust judgments, blind criticisms, and wrongs Jesus shared with His listeners. We can forget all the things He has said and just live the way we want with self on the throne of our heart and do what we want. When we do, we will lose the relationships we worked so hard to build. It takes little to destroy relationships, but years to develop them. Just like it takes little to toss your treasures at the feet of dogs and swine. How hard is to recover them from those beasts once done, though? Not so easy is it?

Recognize the treasure you hold in your hand as a child of God. Share it, but don’t throw it away. Listen to Jesus’ words and meditate on them today. What are you doing with your treasure? 

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.

Which measuring stick do you choose? (Matthew 7:1-5) January 28, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Job 7-8

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 7:1-5
Jesus: If you judge other people, then you will find that you, too, are being judged. Indeed, you will be judged by the very standards to which you hold other people. Why is it that you see the dust in your brother’s or sister’s eye, but you can’t see what is in your own eye? Don’t ignore the wooden plank in your eye, while you criticize the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eyelashes. That type of criticism and judgment is a sham! Remove the plank from your own eye, and then perhaps you will be able to see clearly how to help your brother flush out his sawdust.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

If I’m honest with myself, it’s easy to criticize others. It’s easy to find faults in others work, their language, their dress, the way they do anything and everything. And it’s easiest in those areas where I think I’m pretty good at something. I’ve been at this church stuff for a long time, so it’s easy to criticize others in how they do church. What kind of music they sing. How they pray. How they preach. What lessons they choose to share. If you’re honest with yourself, you can do the same thing in your areas of expertise.

Adam gave us a great system of selfish comparison when he passed down those genes to us through his progeny. We’re great at magnifying the faults of others to minimize ours. We want to make ourselves seem better than others so we don’t feel as bad about our own faults. The problem is that the things we see in others are often the very things we do ourselves but just overlook in our own behavior.

Paul talks about it in Romans when he addresses the plight of humanity. We know the law implicitly. God places it in our hearts. We fail to obey it, but criticize others for doing the same. Our hypocrisy is obvious to everyone but ourselves and Jesus points it out clearly in his admonition to those who will hear His words.

Does Jesus tell us not to provide constructive criticism to those around us? No. We should be mentors to those who come behind us. We should help our juniors on life’s journey, in whatever areas of life, through sound constructive criticism and instruction. But Jesus warns we must remove the obstacles from our own life first. Be wary of the hypocrisy He saw in the Pharisees and teachers of the law who prided themselves on their knowledge of the law, but failed to live by its precepts.

Some will tell you not to judge. Quite frankly, I’m not sure it’s possible. We will judge. But Jesus reminds us with this stern warning that we will be judged in return by the same standards. If we become critical, demeaning, out to gain glory for yourself, that same measure of judgement will be leveled against you. It will not be a pretty sight in the end. Your charade will come to an end and your fall will be great, just like that of the Pharisees as the people saw their veil ripped apart with Jesus’ words.

So what is our response to His words today? Do we sit by and let behavior go unchecked because of a misinterpreted pronouncement of “don’t judge or you’ll be judged”? No. Do we let anything go because of a fear that we cannot adequately know what is right and wrong in a world that continues to slide down a steep path of degradation and evil? No. The words Jesus shares here doesn’t mean we don’t have a responsibility to stop bad behavior, but to first police our own behavior before we level judgements against others.

He says we must look at our own actions first. Make sure we are prayed up, in right relationship with God and man, before going to our brother to judge his actions. Know that we are doing some self-assessments and cleaning up our own act before we try to clean up the actions of those around us. It’s easy to see the bad behavior around us and announcing bad behavior for what it is doesn’t violate God’s commands or the precepts in His word. Jesus just says to also take inventory of our own lives as well.

For instance, it wasn’t okay to commit murder to stop the preaching of those opposed to the teaching of the Torah. Nor is it okay to burn down abortion clinics or shoot those who work there because of the right or wrong aspects of abortion. Violating God’s laws is still violating His laws. He doesn’t contradict Himself in His principles and precepts. So when you go about doing very unChristian things to prove your Christian point of view, what are you really doing? Aren’t you as guilty as those who violate those laws in the first place?

That’s the point Jesus makes here. Be careful that you don’t miss error in your own thinking and actions while looking for some misdeed in your brother. You’ll be measured with the same yardstick, so what kind of measure do you want to use? One of grace and mercy or one of wrath and anger? It’s still up to you. Choose wisely.

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.

Don’t wait to start the hunt (Matthew 6:31-34) January 27, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Psalms 9-11

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 6:31-34
Jesus: So do not consume yourselves with questions: What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we wear? Outsiders make themselves frantic over such questions; they don’t realize that your heavenly Father knows exactly what you need. Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and then all these things will be given to you too. So do not worry about tomorrow. Let tomorrow worry about itself. Living faithfully is a large enough task for today.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

What are you chasing? Is your career at the top of your list? Are you wanting a better car or a bigger house? Are you trying to prepare for retirement? Are you looking for a spouse? How about love from your kids? Are you chasing a relationship that seems to elude you? What are you spending your energy on? If someone looked at your calendar or better yet your checkbook, what would they think you are chasing?

Jesus told us not to consume ourselves with trivial questions that seem to consume the world today. All those questions that have to do with material things. He mentions questions of what will you eat or drink or wear, but it goes much further than that. These are basic necessities of life God knows every person must have for survival, yet He says don’t every worry about these. So why should we spend so much energy on things that are so much less meaningful than food, water, clothing, and shelter? Why should we listen to the world and chase the baubles society proclaims important when all of them are fleeting?

Jesus tells us to seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and all the other things will come into place. Living faithfully is a large enough task. Just do that and you’ll do well. It takes a moment to begin the chase for God’s kingdom. A decision to live for Him. Yet it also takes a lifetime to chase after God’s kingdom. He changes us continually. He never leaves us in the state we are in. He always makes us better, more like Him as we delve into His word and learn more of Him with each conversation we have with Him.

So the question for us is, “What does it mean to seek the kingdom of God and His righteousness?”

God doesn’t play hide-n-seek with us. He wants to be found. He wants a relationship with us. I think that’s the first thing we need to remember about God. But He also expects us to put some effort into our relationship with Him. He doesn’t want our relationship to be one-sided and until we accept His forgiving grace and let Him become Lord of our lives (which means continual obedience to His will), our relationship is one-sided. He puts out all the effort.

We all have a God-sized hole in us that needs filling. We try to fill it with all those things Jesus doesn’t talk about but implies in His sermon. Money. Houses. Careers. Things. Sometimes even good things like family and friends. But when they take the place of God. When they become more important than seeking after God and knowing Him, we’ve lost the battle. We don’t have to lose the war if we will come back to Him and let Him take the throne of our life, but we’ve lost those battles.

God wants first place. In fact, God wants more than first place. He wants to be the only place with nothing else coming in at even distant second. When we do that with Him, He says He will take care of all those other things. They come along with the journey if we seek God first.

How do we find Him? A good place to start is in the scriptures. It’s His word to us. It’s the written record of how He wants us to live and act and think. Pick your favorite translation. As long as the translation is true to the original manuscripts, it really doesn’t matter much which translation you choose. That’s one of the beauties about what God has done for us. As I’ve read and explored and used various translations over the last forty years of my diligent search for God (before that I wasn’t diligently searching for Him, I was just stumbling along with what others would tell me), I’ve found that every one of those translations talk the same way about what’s important to get me to heaven. Every one of them have the same formula for pleasing God. Every single one tell me that Jesus is the Son of God, born of a virgin, died on a cross for my sins and the sins of the world, rose from the tomb on the third day, sits at the right hand of the Father interceding on my behalf for all those who believe in Him for salvation. Every one of those translations tell me that Jesus will return again and all humankind will face a final judgment based first on whether Jesus is Lord of our life. Every one of them tells me that salvation comes through faith in Jesus alone. But also that faith with the subsequent demonstration of that faith by doing good works for others is not really faith, but just words.

So start with His word. Read it. Meditate on it. Let it soak into your brain. You’ll find God there if you desire to find Him. Then confess that He is God and you are not. Confess that you need His forgiveness for the wrongs you have committed against Him as laid out in His instruction book to us. Then let Him become the Director of your life. You’ll find Him. He will impart His righteousness on you. He will begin to transform you by the renewing of your mind. He will make you over again until those around you before you gave yourself to Him will barely recognize you because of your changed behavior, attitudes, demeanor, love for God and others.

Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. It’s a challenge that will take you the rest of your life to complete no matter how old or how young you are today. But begin today if you haven’t started on that treasure hunt. It is so worth the effort, you won’t understand why you waited so long to start!

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 will you fill the empty spot? (Matthew 6:25-30) January 26, 2016

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Today’s Podcast

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Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Joshua 16-20

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

Today’s Devotional

Matthew 6:25-30
Jesus: Here is the bottom line: do not worry about your life. Don’t worry about what you will eat or what you will drink. Don’t worry about how you clothe your body. Living is about more than merely eating, and the body is about more than dressing up. Look at the birds in the sky. They do not store food for winter. They don’t plant gardens. They do not sow or reap—and yet, they are always fed because your heavenly Father feeds them. And you are even more precious to Him than a beautiful bird. If He looks after them, of course He will look after you. Worrying does not do any good; who here can claim to add even an hour to his life by worrying?
Nor should you worry about clothes. Consider the lilies of the field and how they grow. They do not work or weave or sew, and yet their garments are stunning. Even King Solomon, dressed in his most regal garb, was not as lovely as these lilies. And think about grassy fields—the grasses are here now, but they will be dead by winter. And yet God adorns them so radiantly. How much more will He clothe you, you of little faith, you who have no trust?

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

Here are some eight-year old statistics for you, the latest comprehensive statistics I could find quickly:
* In 2007, about 27 million adults, or 11.8 percent of adults ages 18 and older reported receiving treatment for anxiety and mood disorders.
* Medical spending to treat anxiety and mood disorders totaled $36.8 billion in 2007.
* Half of these expenditures ($18.4 billion) were in the form of prescription medications used to treat anxiety and mood disorders in adults.
* Annual expenditures on anxiety and mood disorders for those with an expense related to these disorders averaged $1,374 per adult.

Some reports I’ve seen since then show as many as 67% of Americans will seek treatment for mood disorders in their lifetime. 27% of Americans are in current active treatment for mood disorders of some kind. What does that tell you about how much we worry about tomorrow? About what we eat? Or what we wear? How much do we let things get to us today instead of trusting God to get us through life with Him? How much do we worry about things that just don’t really matter in the long run?

I mentioned my 95% Rule on the 21st of January if you want to go back and listen to the end of that podcast. In essence, it says 95% of everything that happens to us everyday just doesn’t matter. No one will remember tomorrow or the next day. Think about it. Can you recall the events of December 14th without looking back at a journal or diary? No one cares about what happened except as it pertained to your relationship with God and other people.

Can you understand what Jesus is trying to tell us? Don’t worry about the things the world tells you are so important because they’re not. Just like He tells us to lay up treasures that don’t rust and corrode, treasures that theives can’t break in and steal, He tells us to focus on the things that really matter, heavenly things, things of God. Throughout His sermon, Jesus bends our attention away from the material things of life and tells us to look inward. Look at our attitudes. How do we feel about others? How do we use the material things we have to help those in need? Do we hold those things as if they belong to us? Or do we realize they are God’s to use as He directs?

Will we hold the things of this life loosely so God can use us the way He wants? That the real message Jesus has for us. Don’t worry about the things you put on. Fashion changes to fast to keep up, anyway. And have you seen the stuff models wear? Who wants to go out in public with what comes down the fashion runway? Sometimes I think the designers have contests to see who can come up with the most comic, outrageous outfits. I’ve never seen any of those things on the streets of any city anywhere. Some of it looks like Sci-fi, fifty-first century trash.

And what should we eat? We get so caught up in the latest fad diets, butter is bad, not it’s good for you, no the report says maybe. Greens stop cancer, but wait, they might cause cancer, but only if there grown in Peoria under a blue moon. We get so tied up in what’s right and what’s wrong. The truth is, if we stick to a moderate diet of what God created, real vegetables, real meat, real fish and foul. We’d stay pretty healthy. It’s just hard to find stuff that is real now days. Everything is processed and fortified for our “health.”

Maybe God got it right in the first place. After all, He tells us not to worry about what to eat, doesn’t He? I think He probably knows what’s best if we would eat what He creates instead of what we recreate. Just a thought. What God really wants us to spend our time thinking about, meditating on is not what we will put in our mouths, or put on our bodies, but how will we fill that empty place in our soul? How will we satisfy that God sized empty spot in your soul? Will we try to satisfy it with the things of this world or with Him? That’s the question. Only you know your answer. What will it be? 

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.