God, Touch Our Hearts

Saul also went to his home at Gibeah, and with him went men of valor whose hearts God had touched. (1 Samuel 10:26)

Just think of what is being said in this verse. God touched them. Not a wife. Not a child. Not a parent. Not a counselor. But God. God touched them.

The One with infinite power in the universe. The One with infinite authority and infinite wisdom and infinite love and infinite goodness and infinite purity and infinite justice. That One touched their heart.

How does the circumference of Jupiter touch the edge of a molecule? Let alone penetrate to its nucleus?

The touch of God is awesome not just because it is God who touches, but also because it is a touch. It is a real connection. That it involves the heart is awesome. That it involves God is awesome. And that it involves an actual touch is awesome.

The valiant men were not just spoken to. They were not just swayed by a divine influence. They were not just seen and known. God, with infinite condescension, touched their heart. God was that close. And they were not consumed.

I love that touch. I want it more and more. For myself and for all of you. I pray that God would touch me anew with his glory and for this glory. I pray that he would touch us all.

Oh, for the touch of God! If it comes with fire, so be it. If it comes with water, so be it. If it comes with wind, let it come, O God. If it comes with thunder and lightning, let us bow before it.

O Lord, come. Come that close. Burn and soak and blow and crash. Or still and small, come. Come all the way. Touch our hearts.

John Piper

Can you see what's invisible?

BIBLE MEDITATION:

“Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.” Matthew 5:8

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

Let me tell you how to experience God: Get your heart pure, and you will see God with the eyes of faith.

You see, Jesus is not talking about your physical body. You get your spiritual heart right and your spiritual eyes will see.

Hebrews 11:27 says that Moses “endured as seeing Him who is invisible.” You get your heart right and you’ll see the invisible God…

...in circumstances

...in nature

...in the face of your spouse, your child, your grandchild.

You’ll see Him in the Scriptures. God will become a bright, living reality to you.

ACTION POINT:

Put on the eyes of faith today and find God creating and sustaining life. Maybe there is a garden newly abloom with spring flowers. Do you see the hand of God?

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

Embracing Jesus

This is the love of God, that we keep his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome. For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world — our faith. (1 John 5:3–4)

Notice: Loving God is not just keeping his commandments. It is having a kind of heart for God that means that commandment-keeping is not burdensome. That’s what John says. But then he puts that truth in terms of new birth and faith, rather than love. He says, without a break, “For” — that is, here’s why God’s commandments are not burdensome: “Everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. So, the new birth is what overcomes the worldly obstacles to keeping God’s commandments without burdensomeness.

And finally he adds, “And this is the victory that has overcome the world — our faith.” So, the new birth overcomes the worldly obstacles to burden-free commandment-keeping, because the new birth gives rise to faith. So, the miracle of new birth creates faith, which embraces all that God is for us in Christ as supremely satisfying, which makes obedience to God more desirable than the temptations of the world. And that is what it means to love God.

The eighteenth-century pastor and theologian Jonathan Edwards wrestled with this text and concluded, “Saving faith implies . . . love. . . . Our love to God enables us to overcome the difficulties that attend keeping God’s commands — which shows that love is the main thing in saving faith, the life and power of it, by which it produces great effects.”

I think Edwards is right and that numerous texts in the Bible support what he says.

Another way to say it is that faith in Christ is not just assenting to what God is for us, but also embracing all that he is for us in Christ. “True faith embraces Christ in whatever ways the Scriptures hold him out to poor sinners” — that’s another quote from Edwards. This “embracing” is one kind of love to Christ — that kind that treasures him above all things.

Therefore, there is no contradiction between 1 John 5:3, on the one hand, which says that our love for God enables us to keep his commandments, and verse 4, on the other hand, which says that our faith overcomes the obstacles of the world that keep us from obeying God’s commandments. Love for God and Christ is implicit in faith.

John then defines the faith that obeys as “the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God” (1 John 5:5). This faith is “embracing” the present Jesus as the glorious divine person that he is: the Son of God. It is not simply assenting to the truth that Jesus is the Son of God, because the demons assent to that. “They cried out, ‘What have you to do with us, O Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?’” (Matthew 8:29). Believing that Jesus is the Son of God means “embracing” the significance of that truth — the value of the reality. It means being satisfied with Christ as the Son of God and all God is for us in him.

“Son of God” means that Jesus is the greatest person in the universe alongside his Father. Therefore, all he taught is true, and all he promised will stand firm, and all his soul-satisfying greatness will never change.

Believing that he is the Son of God, therefore, includes banking on all this, and being satisfied with it.

John Piper 

What brings you to tears?

BIBLE MEDITATION:

“Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.” Matthew 5:4

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

The world would never say this: “Blessed are they that mourn.” The world would say just the opposite: “Blessed are those who never have to cry.” We’ve done all we can do to keep ourselves from feeling any pain. We have psychologists who numb our neurosis. Counselors who absolve us of guilt. Doctors to sedate our pain. Insurance agents to take away our worries. And even at death we have the mortuary to try to beautify death for us.

But Jesus was a man of sorrows. He saw the sin around Him and it broke His heart. Jesus here is not talking about the moaners, but the mourners, those who primarily mourn over sin. In Matthew 23:34-39, we read how Jesus’ heart ached for Jerusalem and the destruction sin had wrought in the hearts of men.

ACTION POINT:

Do the things that break the heart of Jesus, break yours? Do you have a dry eye in a hell-bent world? It’s time to be like Jesus.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

What does it mean to be meek? Not what you think.

BIBLE MEDITATION:

“Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth." Matthew 5:5

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

What does it mean to be meek? First, let me tell you what it is not before I tell you what it is.

Meekness is not weakness. Jesus said in Matthew 11, “I am meek and lowly at heart.” If you think meekness is weakness, go a week trying to be meek. The Bible says Moses was the meekest man on earth (Numbers 12:3), yet he performed miracles, defied Pharaoh, and led a nation for 40 years.

“Meek” means yielded. It is strength under control. When an animal, especially a horse, is domesticated, it is trained so a rider can sit on its back or it can pull a plow. The proper term for bringing the animal under discipline is ”meeked.” Its will has been broken. Now it yields to the rider or the yoke. It still has the same fire, the same drive, the same instincts, but now there's a bit, a bridle and a saddle. God does not hobble the horse; He energizes it. Now it exhibits strength under control. I still have ambition, but now my ambition is to serve the Lord Jesus Christ. That’s what meekness is.

ACTION POINT:

Read Matthew 11:29 and 21:5. What does Jesus say about Himself and how can you emulate Him?

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers

Mercy for Today

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. (Lamentations 3:22–23)

God’s mercies are new every morning because each day only has enough mercy in it for that day. God appoints every day’s troubles. And God appoints every day’s mercies. In the life of his children, they are perfectly appointed. Jesus said, “Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble” (Matthew 6:34). Every day has its own trouble. Every day has its own mercies. Each is new every morning.

But we often tend to despair when we think that we may have to bear tomorrow’s load on today’s resources. God wants us to know: We won’t. Today’s mercies are for today’s troubles. Tomorrow’s mercies are for tomorrow’s troubles.

Sometimes we wonder if we will have the mercy to stand in terrible testing. Yes, we will. Peter says, “If you are insulted for the name of Christ, you are blessed, because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you” (1 Peter 4:14). When the reviling comes, the Spirit of glory comes. It happened for Stephen as he was being stoned. It will happen for you. When the Spirit and the glory are needed, they will come.

The manna in the wilderness was given one day at a time. There was no storing up. That is the way we must depend on God’s mercy. You do not receive today the strength to bear tomorrow’s burdens. You are given mercies today for today’s troubles.

Tomorrow the mercies will be new. “God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord” (1 Corinthians 1:9).

John Piper

Don’t Be Like the Mule

Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you. (Psalm 32:9)

Picture God’s people as a farmyard of all sorts of animals. God cares for his animals, he shows them where they need to go, and supplies a barn for their protection.

But there is one beast on this animal farm that gives God an awful time, namely, the mule. He’s stupid and he’s stubborn and you can’t tell which comes first — stubbornness or stupidity.

Now the way God likes to get his animals into the barn for their food and shelter is by teaching them that they all have a personal name and then calling them by name. “I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go” (Psalm 32:8).

But the mule will not respond to that sort of direction. He is without understanding. So God gets in his pick-up truck and goes out in the field, puts the bit and bridle in the mule’s mouth, hitches it to the truck, and drags him stiff-legged and snorting all the way into the barn.

That is not the way God wants his animals to come to him for blessing and protection.

One of these days it is going to be too late for that mule. He’s going to get clobbered with hail and struck by lightning and when he comes running, the barn door is going to be shut.

Therefore, don’t be like the mule. “Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding, which must be curbed with bit and bridle.”

Instead, let everyone who is godly come to God in prayer at a time when he may be found (Psalm 32:6).

The way not to be a mule is to humble ourselves, to come to God in prayer, to confess our sins, and to accept, as needy little farmyard chicks, the direction of God into the barn of his protection and provision.

John Piper