Do dark shadows frighten you?

BIBLE MEDITATION:

The Lord is nigh unto all them that call upon Him, to all that call upon Him in truth.

Psalm 145:18

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

Psalm 23 speaks of the “valley of the shadow of death.” For every shadow, there must be light. Jesus Christ said, “I am the light of the world” (John 8:12). A shadow may frighten you, but a shadow cannot really hurt you.

I dare say that a shadow at one time or another has spooked most of us. But thank God, death is but a shadow—if you know the Lord Jesus Christ. If you keep your face toward the light, the shadow will fall behind you. You won’t even see the shadow. God doesn’t bring us to a valley to leave us there. He always brings us through.

ACTION POINT:

God is never closer than when we’re in a dark valley. That’s when He is especially near. In the original language, we’re told Hebrews 13:5 actually has five negatives! A literal translation of it would be: “I will never, no, not ever, never leave you nor forsake you.” Memorize this short, treasured verse today.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

Jesus’s Joy in Marriage

Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that he might present the church to himself in splendor. (Ephesians 5:25–27)

The reason there is so much misery in marriage is not that husbands and wives seek their own pleasure, but that they do not seek it in the pleasure of their spouses. The biblical mandate to husbands and wives is to seek your own joy in the joy of your spouse.

There is scarcely a more hedonistic passage in the Bible than the one on marriage in Ephesians 5:25–30. Husbands are told to love their wives the way Christ loved the church.

How did he love the church? Verse 25 says he “gave himself up for her.” But why? Verse 26 says, “that he might sanctify” and cleanse her. But why did he want to do that? Verse 27 answers, “that he might present the church to himself in splendor!”

Ah! There it is! “For the joy that was set before him [he] endured the cross” (Hebrews 12:2). What joy? The joy of marriage to his bride, the church. The joy of presenting the church to himself in blood-bought splendor.

Jesus does not intend to have a dirty and unholy wife. Therefore, he was willing to die to sanctify and cleanse his betrothed so he could present to himself a wife “in splendor.” He gained the desire of his heart by giving himself up in suffering for the good of his bride.

Then Paul applies this to husbands in verses 28–30: “In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body.”

Jesus had said to husbands and wives — and everyone else — “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:39). Marriage is an extraordinary place of application. It is not merely “as” you love yourself. But you are loving yourself. When you love the person with whom God has made you one flesh, you are loving yourself. That is, your greatest joy is found in seeking the greatest joy of your spouse.

John Piper 

Do we have a jealous God?

BIBLE MEDITATION:

For thou shalt worship no other god: for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.

Exodus 34:14

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

When this verse says that God is a jealous God, that may sound like a bad attribute. But for God, it is a holy attribute. You see, I have no right to be jealous of another preacher because I am not the only preacher in the world. For a singer to be jealous of another singer would be a wrong attitude, because there are many singers. One singer doesn’t own all the singing in the world. There is room for many singers. For an athlete to be jealous of another athlete is wrong, because he doesn't own athletics. But there's only one God.

Therefore, He has every right to own the worship, adoration and praise that has come to him. He deserves it.

Put yourself in God's place for a moment. You're the one who made heaven and earth. Then imagine people worshiping a frog or a beetle or money or sports or family or their own intellect or denomination or church. Then you'd understand why the Bible says, ““I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before Me” (Exodus 20:2-3).

And when Jesus was asked what the greatest commandment was, He replied, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind” (Matthew 22:37).

ACTION POINT:

When you die to self and worship God, you will begin to experience the fullness of God in a way that transforms your life.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

The Purpose of Prosperity

Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. (Ephesians 4:28)

There are three levels of how to live with material things: (1) you can steal to get them; (2) or you can work to get them; (3) or you can work to get in order to give.

Too many professing Christians live on level two. We glorify work over against stealing and mooching, and feel we have acted virtuously if we have spurned stealing and mooching, and given ourselves to an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay. That’s not a bad thing. Work is better than stealing and mooching. But that’s not what the apostle calls us to.

Almost all the forces of our culture urge us to live on level two: work to get. But the Bible pushes us relentlessly to level three: work to get to give. “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8).

Why does God bless us with abundance? So we can have enough to live on, and then use the rest for all manner of good works that alleviate spiritual and physical misery — temporal and eternal suffering. Enough for us; abundance for others.

The issue is not how much a person makes. Big industry and big salaries are a fact of our times, and they are not necessarily evil. The evil is in being deceived into thinking that a large salary must be accompanied by a lavish lifestyle.

God has made us to be conduits of his grace. The danger is in thinking the conduit should be lined with gold. It shouldn’t. Copper will do. Copper can carry unbelievable riches to others. And in the very process of that giving we enjoy the greatest blessing (Acts 20:35).

John Piper 

Are God’s laws a burden to you?

BIBLE MEDITATION:

Let Thy tender mercies come unto me, that I may live: for Thy law is my delight.

Psalm 119:77

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

How does God unite a law book with a song book? I’ll tell you how. With liberty and harmony. God never intended His laws to be burdensome. He meant for them to be a blessing.

A piano operates according to laws. When a person masters those laws, the drudgery of learning turns to delight. Piano practice enables a person to sit at the piano in perfect liberty and let the melody dance off the ivory keys

Isn't it marvelous how God turns statutes into songs and how law books can become songbooks? When you learn authority and submit to authority, at that same moment you learn perfect freedom. As Ethel Waters used to sing, “I sing because I’m happy. I sing because I’m free….” There’s liberty in God’s law.

ACTION POINT:

Every law has a song written on the back of it. And you will discover this when you obey God’s laws. Have you yielded yourself to the Lordship of Christ? “Duty” will turn to delight.

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers 

Fear and Hope in God’s Jealousy

“The Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.” (Exodus 34:14)

God is infinitely jealous for the honor of his name, and responds with terrible wrath against those whose hearts should belong to him but go after other things, like a spouse running after another lover.

For example, in Ezekiel 16:38–40 he says to faithless Israel,

“I will judge you as women who commit adultery and shed blood are judged, and bring upon you the blood of wrath and jealousy. And I will give you into their hands, and they shall throw down your vaulted chamber. . . . They shall strip you of your clothes and take your beautiful jewels and leave you naked and bare. They shall bring up a crowd against you, and they shall stone you and cut you to pieces with their swords.”

I urge you to listen to this warning. The jealousy of God for your undivided love and devotion will always have the last say. Whatever lures your affections away from God with deceptive attraction will come back to strip you bare and cut you in pieces.

It is a horrifying thing to use your God-given life to commit adultery against the Almighty.

But for those of you who have been truly united to Christ and who keep your vows to forsake all others and cleave only to him and live for his honor — for you the jealousy of God is a great comfort and a great hope.

Since God is infinitely jealous for the honor of his name, anything and anybody who threatens the good of his faithful wife will be opposed with divine omnipotence. That’s good news for the faithful wife — the faithful people of God.

God’s jealousy is a great threat to those who play the harlot and sell their heart to the world and make a cuckold out of God (James 4:3–4). But his jealousy is a great comfort to those who keep their covenant vows and become strangers and exiles in the world.

John Piper 

Can you ever exhaust God’s compassion?

BIBLE MEDITATION:

It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.

Lamentations 3:22-23

DEVOTIONAL THOUGHT:

Do you know what Lamentations 3:22-23 means? It means that God never runs out of compassion.

Have you ever gone to Niagara Falls and watched the water cascading with torrential force? I’ve thought, “Surely the water is one day going to dry up.” But it hasn’t. Friend, greater than Niagara is the compassion of the Lord. His compassions fail not.

In 1923, Thomas O. Chisholm wrote one of the greatest hymns of all time and this stanza is the refrain of this truth, “Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father; There is no shadow of turning with Thee; Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not; As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.”

ACTION POINT:

God is faithful. What are you facing today? Dear friend, lean upon Him and His faithfulness. He will never, no never, leave you, nor forsake you (Hebrews 13:5).

LWF Dr. Adrian Rogers