A New Day

“Therefore, I will look unto the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me” (Micah 7:7).

 Three items of interest to a man or woman who is wanting to please the Lord: I will look, I will wait, and I will pray. Perception, patience, and prayer gives the soul rest for the new day.

 God has promised to come to the help of any who would call upon Him. The prophet intercedes on behalf of Israel, identifying himself with them. God saves from destruction and from deception and Micah knows it. When we pray for others something takes place like no other.

 Call upon the name of the Lord for others today. Micah’s name means, “Who is like the Lord?” We are no more like the Lord than when we pray for others. Try intercession and see if your life changes in that moment.

 

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  • A Baby’s Sword

    “And it came to pass the third day after that I was delivered, that this woman was delivered also, and we were together. There was no stranger with us in the house, except we two were in the house” (I Kings 3:18).

    Two women who were harlots each gave birth to a child. Each slept that night in the same room and yet one woke up the morning after to discover the child next to her was dead and he was not hers. The other woman switched the baby at death.

    The case was brought before Solomon. What would he do? He said, “Bring me a sword” (I Ki 3.24). What does this mean? The king said, “Divide the living child in two, and give half to the one, and half to the other” (I Ki 3:25). The woman whose the living child was hers said, “O my lord, give her the living child, and in no wise slay it.”

    Two lessons we can learn. In every circumstance always use and wield the Word of God. It is a two-edged sword (Hebrews 4:12). If we want to be effective cutting through this world and the words of others, let these words be upon your lips and may the Word of God be in your hand, “Bring me the sword.”

    The second lesson to draw from the true event described for us: Don’t allow division. A man or woman of God will not be identified with division in a marriage, a family, or a church body, for division leads either quickly or eventually to one thing: death. Don’t be a part of tolerating division unless it is for righteousness. May we be surrendered to God’s Word as Solomon and committed to unity as this mother was.

  • Perpetual Joy

    “And the clean person shall sprinkle upon the unclean on the third day, and on the seventh day: and on the seventh day he shall purify himself, and wash his clothes, and bathe himself in water, and shall be clean at even” (Numbers 19:19).

    We can not be part-time Christians. We are all in full-time Christian service, or we should be. A man who is faithful to his wife most of the time is not faithful at all. A man who is a Christian and something else is not a Christian in deed.

    Have you noticed that birds do not sing because they have an answer, they sing because they have a song. When sin has touched us we are deadened and saddened. Yet God has made a way for us to be cleansed from all defilement.

    God has given you the power of the third day for continual cleansing and joyful singing. Wash yourselves in the ongoing work of the cross of Christ. Out of His wounded side flows the blood and the water. Confess and turn back to your God today for the song He gives.

  • The Shepherds: Changed by God

    “And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them” (Luke 2:20).

     There was only one explanation for the lives of the shepherds: God! There should be only one explanation for our lives: God!

     The Shepherds believed God. The Angels appeared to them and told them there was a Savior, Lord, the Messiah born and given unto them and for the whole world. They left the scene and searched for the babe wrapped in swaddling cloths.

    These Shepherds were men who were not counted worthy of anything appearing to them from heaven, yet God thought so. They felt unworthy by their peers and yet God said that they were of value. The religious crowd considered them unclean, unintellectual, and unattached, but God appeared unto them and touched them by angels.

    Afterwards the men left in search for the Lord Jesus, found Him lying in the manger and told everyone of what and who they had seen. They went on with God and didn’t stop telling the good news. The appearance of the Living Word changed their lives.

    After we meet the Lord Jesus we want to be like Him. We have a sincere desire for the Word. A man without an appetite for God’s Word causes us to wonder if he is saved. We will desire as the shepherds did to be like Jesus.

    There should be only one explanation for our lives. “God” is the only explanation for what we are and what we are doing. If we can explain it on any other level, we are a failure. Most Christians’ lives can be explained on a basis other than the work of God. The shepherds represent what happens when we see the face of God.

     

  • Only Grace Can Accomplish

    “If you know these things, happy are ye if ye do them” (John 13:17).

    Remember, that the greatest danger to your child is not the evil outside them; it’s the sin inside them that is the greatest of all threats to their well-being. We have noticed that much of parenting today, especially in the church community, centers around a perimeter of human wisdom. Rigidity along with ritual brings about a conformity that does not help conform that child to the image of Christ. In the end that child runs and we wonder what happened to that training?

    The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus would not have been necessary if all we needed were a bunch of rules, ingenuity, and insight. Jesus came to solve the dilemma of sin. It is only through Him that a parent can supervise a child in the way he or she should go. We are losing children to this culture because many kids are conformed to a parent’s wishes instead of the power of God.

    Some parents don’t seem to care, while others who are in the minority do, but both sets of parenting will fall short of the glory of God when the functionality of doing is used more than receiving the mystery life-giving breath of God. The most dangerous thing in a young person’s life is his blindness to the depth of his own spiritual need. Only the Spirit of God can open the eyes of that child, and it is only the Spirit of God who will lead the dad and mom to an open field of parenting in freedom.

     

     

     

     

  • A Worthful Church

    “Ye sent unto John, and he bore witness unto the truth” (John 5:33).

    The duty and delight of every Christian is to bear witness to the truth. Our behavior and our beliefs are to be saturated by the Spirit of God. When we are living by God’s Word in the keeping, drawing power of God, then we are bearing witness to God’s Son who lives! We choose to flesh out what has been worked in by dependence upon God’s Spirit.

    John bore witness to Christ. He bore testimony to the Son of God. There can be no shining if there is no burning. John burned for Christ and was passionate about the Spirit’s work in his own life. The flesh was burned away and the Spirit of God burned within.

    A.W. Tozer said, “If the Holy Spirit was withdrawn from the church today, 95 percent of what we do would go on and no one would know the difference. If the Holy Spirit had been withdrawn from the New Testament church, 95 percent of what they did would stop, and everybody would know the difference.”

    Churches are only as powerful as their dependence upon the Holy Spirit. We can say that any man who is bored with church work and worship is not ready for Heaven. People of God are renewed daily by the inward pressure of the Spirit of God who leads. He does not drive. The external situation or climate dictates to the leader of a family, a Sunday School class, a work place, or a church, that God desires to move in! And to take over! And To change it! This is a man/woman who lives in God.

     

     

     

     

     

  • Crags or Cages?

     

    “And after he had seen the vision, immediately we endeavored to go…” (Acts 16:10).

         Charles Spurgeon once said, “I’d rather be a lean bird in the woods than a fat bird in a cage.” What a sad sight to see a caged eagle beating its wings against the bars. But what a sadder sight it is to see a Christian who has given up and resigned to low living among that which is carnal and natural.

        There were a brand of pioneers who braved dangers, crossed 3,000 miles of ocean, and blazed another 3,000 miles of wilderness and desert to make a trail for America. Rugged spirits flocked here from every land. The Fathers of liberty risked security for liberty. Today we have traded liberty for security. And the soul is more fettered than ever because of it.

        What about us and our children? If we feather the nests too well the eaglets will never fly. The baby eagles might complain because they are no longer comfortable, but eaglets do not fly that way. If we feather our nests and feather their nests, taking out as much as possible the thorns, thistles, and prickly things, then be assured that eaglet will not fly as soon as it should, or as powerful as it could.

        Find a crag! Find a mountaintop and climb. Avoid a cage and find a solitary place to meditate “far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife.” Build your home high. An eagle needs an eyrie. You and I can see the whole battle from the distance. A prophet or a parent sees the whole picture like an eagle from a mountain crag.