Daily Devotional Inspirations

[Sons to Glory!]

I read and meditate with a few different devotionals daily. These include "Daily Open Windows" by T. Austin Sparks; "God is Enough" by Hannah W. Smith; "The Supplied Life" by Bill Freeman; and "Daily Light" by Ann Graham Lotz (et. al.). Christians I know often send me things from other daily devotionals, such as "None but the Hungry Heart" by Miles Stanford and "Jesus Calling" by sarah Young. The Lord has spoken to me through these, and other devotional sources.

So I thought to start a thread whereby we could post things read in devotionals that touch and inspire us. And, if we choose, we can say a few words about what we were impressed or comforted from it and how it helped us pursue Christ.

Below is something I read from The Supplied Life for today.

A personal testimony - December 1st
"Thy words were found, and I did eat them; and thy word was
unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart." JEREMIAH 15:16 (KJV)

Many years ago I began to learn the secret revealed in this verse.
After being a Christian for about nine years, I came to a point
where I felt dry, discouraged, and defeated. I tried to overcome my
failing self in many areas, but found I lacked the necessary strength.
This went on for several weeks, and then somehow it occurred to me
that I should begin reading my Bible three times a day in a regular
way. So I began reading the Old Testament in the morning, Psalms
and Proverbs at noon, and the New Testament in the evening. It was
amazing to see what happened to me within one week. I discovered
that the Word of God was food! At that time the Lord impressed me
with Jeremiah 15:16.

Formerly, my time with the Lord in the Word was mainly an
exercise of my eyes and my mind. But when I discovered that the
nature of God's Word was food, I began to read the Word with a
praying spirit. The Bible became a new book in my hands. It became
a book of enjoyment, a book from which I could feed upon the living
God. I found myself reading and praying simultaneously and then
taking up a verse or a phrase and beginning to fellowship with the
Lord with the very words of Scripture. I found I did not have to strive
to find what to pray. The Word of God itself became the content of
my prayer. While doing this I found a mysterious yet real supply
spontaneously infusing my inner man. No longer was I merely
looking at black and white letters on a page or trying to mentally
understand things, which had often left me spiritually deadened. For
the first time in my Christian life, I began to enjoy God Himself in
tile pages of the Bible.

Eating three square meals a day by feeding upon the Word taught
me experientially that my inner man requires food just as my
physical body does. The reason for my defeated Christian life, I
discovered, was simply lack of nourishment. In studying the Bible
for seven years, it had become to me a book of theology, sermons
and outlines, rather than a book of enjoyment and suppl y. I realized
that the mere knowledge of the Bible could not change me. It was
only when the Bible was translated into food by my praying with and
over the verses that it turned into enjoyment rather than mere
thought. I realized then, as I do today, that one of the secrets of
spending time with the Lord is to feed upon the Word.

This is an encouragement to me to be diligent to feed on His word!

[Sons to Glory!]

I appreciated the message in this devotional a couple days ago, from "God is Enough" by Hannah W. Smith.

DECEMBER 3
WRECKING BUT LOVING

A seasoned saint was asked by a despairing Christian, "Doesn't
the world look to you like a wreck?" "Yes," was the cheerful and
confident reply, "like the wreck of a bursting seed." Any of us who
have watched the first sproutings of an oak tree from the heart of a
decaying acorn will understand what this means. Before tile acorn
can bring forth the oak it must become a wreck, No plant ever came
from any but a wrecked seed.

Our Lord uses this fact to teach us the meaning of His processes
with us, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat rail into
the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, il brinqeth forth
much fruit" (John 12:24).

The explanation of the apparent wreckage of the world at large
or of our own personal lives in particular is here set forth. Looked at
in this light, we can understand how it is that the Lord can be good
yet permit the existence of sorrow and wrong in the world He has
created and in the lives of the human beings He loves,

It is God's very goodness that compels Him to permit sorrow
and wrong. He knows that only through such apparent wreckage can
His glorious purposes for us be brought to pass. And we whose hearts
also long for that fruition, will, if we understand His ways, be able to
praise Him for all His goodness even when things seem their hardest
and most mysterious.

Isn't that just the case in our lives and the world around us!? That is, things look a mess and impossible, and then He can come in and it will therefore be much easier to see that He deserves all the credit and glory!

[Sons to Glory!]

Here's a good one someone sent me yesterday.

from None But The Hungry Heart

12-6. Sustained

“Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee” (Ps. 55:22).
Our Father’s living waters flow both in summer and winter (Zech. 14:8). He provides the barrenness of winter in order to cut us off from every other supply, and teach us to draw from His ever-flowing water of life.

“The Father passes us through all the seasons here; and the winter, the most trying one, is the most helpful, if we are really cast on Him in it. Then the real measure of our dependence on Him is ascertained, and also the extent of our resources in Him; and we make acquisitions in Him which we never make at any other time. All our growth and fruit depend on our winters, or rather on how we pass through them.

“The more we can rest in Him the more we are independent of everything outside of Him at such a time, the more vigor we really possess; and the better we get over the winter, be it ever so severe. If I am independent of the winter, it is evident that I have mastered it, and not it me; and if I have done so, through the strength of the Lord Jesus, I am relieved though in no human way. Peter is delivered from prison in a superhuman way; but first he, though enduring a very trying winter, could lay him down and sleep-take his rest, because the Lord sustained him.” - J.B.S.

“It is a wonderful thing to be so satisfied with the Lord Jesus’ company, that we can be tranquil about everything. I remember when I used to think that I should be happy beyond conception if I were able to say, ‘I will fear no evil; my heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord.’ In order to reach this, you must find Him enough, without anything else. You can never prove the worth of anyone, until you are absolutely dependent upon him.” -J.B.S.

“I laid down and slept; I awaked; for the Lord sustained me” (Ps. 3:5).

In this Christian life journey we are on, He is persuading us that He loves us and that He's got this! This takes various things, the ups & downs and the sideways stuff, so we really see, experience and know that God is enough.

[Sons to Glory!]

This post is not from a devotional, but rather from Merlin Carothers famous book, "Prison to Praise."

Wherever I went I now shared what I had dis-
covered about the power of praise. I was begin-
ning to learn that praise was not just a form of
worship or prayer, but also a way of waging spir-
tual warfare. Often when someone began to
praise God for the problems that faced him, he
found that Satan increased his attacks and the
situation appeared to become worse instead of
better. Many who tried the way of praise became
discouraged and were unable to hold on to their
belief that God was in charge.

Others simply didn't understand and refused
to try praising God for unpleasant things. It Just
doesn't make sense," they'd say. "I'm not going to
praise God for something I just don't believe He
has anything to do with. How can God have any-
thing to do with my broken arm or my wrecked
car or my husband's horrible temper? I'd be
foolish to thank Him for something like that."
Of course it doesn't make sense. The question
is, does it work? It didn't make much sense when
Jesus said, "Leap for joy when you are hungry or
poor or persecuted." Yet He very definitely told
us to do just that. In Nehemiah 8:10 I read: "The
joy of the Lord is your strength."

The enemy's arrows just can't penetrate the
joy of someone who is praising the Lord. In II
Chronicles 20 we read how a whole army was de-
feated when the Israelites simply praised the
Lord and believed Him when He said that the
battle wasn't theirs, but His.
The message is just as clear today. The battle
isn't ours; it is God's. While we praise Him, He
sends our enemies scurrying.

This is very meaningful for me, because the Lord has personally been impressing on me, and many I fellowship with, regarding this passage in 2 Chronicles 20:15 & 17, "This is what the LORD says to you: ‘Do not fear or be dismayed because of this great multitude, for the battle is not yours but God’s . . . You need not fight in this battle; take your position, stand and watch the salvation of the Lord in your behalf"

Christ finished it! Now all we need to do is to praise Him and have boldness to make that connection with Him and all His amazing power toward us (and in us) is already made available! (a brother this morning said it was like we have been given the battery fully charged, but sometimes the connections get a little dirty and simply need a quick cleaning. To me, this is the same as what the Lord spoke to His disciples in John 13:10, that only their feet need a little washing because of the dust of the earth, not their whole body . . . i.e., just a dirty connection, easily taken care of)

[Sons to Glory!]

I appreciated this from "The Supplied Life."

The Liberty of the Saints December 14th

"For the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but
righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit." ROMANS 14:17

By observing Paul's interaction with the saints in the New
Testament letters, we can see that he was always careful to
speak in a way that preserved the liberty of the saints (Philem. 12:
14; Rom. 1:11-12; 2 Cor. 8:7-8). Study the fine points in Paul's
dealing with the churches, and you will see a relationship between
an apostle and the saints in which freedom was maintained.

Brothers and sisters, for freedom Christ set us free! We are all
here willingly. There is no forcing or compelling. There are no
unspoken or hidden agendas. There is not an expected way to meet
or practice the church. Whether we meet this way or that way, as
long as Christ is.not nullified, we are all happy. This is to be in tile
reality of the kingdom of God, which is righteousness, peace, and joy
in the Holy Spirit. We are not here with formed ideas and concepts,
or even the scriptural way to practice the church. Of course, nothing
is wrong with the scriptural way of gathering believers. But what is
more important is the way these kinds of things are handled, because
it determines whether the atmosphere of freedom is preserved or
lost. If freedom is lost, then Christ is nullified, and the Spirit cannot
operate. Spiritually speaking, everything comes to a halt, even though
outwardly the meetings and activity of the church life continue.

This is why it is so serious for the law to come into the church
in any form. It kills the ability of the Spirit to be released and the
ability of the divine love to flow. This happened among the
Galatians. When the saints were put under a yoke of slavery, they
discovered that they not only lost the love between themselves, but
they were also biting and devouring one another. They were
consuming one another because the freedom was lost (Gal. 5: 14-15).
When freedom returns, Christ returns, and love toward all the saints
returns.

This is so key!!! It is only in this kind of freedom - free from religious legalism - that Christ can best grow in us! I praise the Lord that in the fellowship He brought me to (after the LC) is one in which this kind of outward pressure is essentially nonexistent. So much so that I often take it for granted, but lately, I've been much more appreciative to the Lord for this! Praise Him! Praise Him! Praise Him!

[Sons to Glory!]

This brings up an interesting question . . . Since we say God is revealed and expressed in Christ; can we also say Christ is revealed and expressed in the church?
I believe so, but is this thinking overly influenced by LC teaching, or is it a mainstream Christianity thought?

From The Supplied Life; December 17th

"That their hearts may be comforted, they being knit together in
love, and unto all riches of the full assurance of understanding, that
they may know the mystery of God, Christ." COLOSSIANS 2:2 (ASV)

Of the mysteries mentioned in the Bible, two are basic. The first
is the mystery of God. The phrase "the mystery of God, Christ"
is an appositional statement. That is, the mystery of God is Christ.
Christ is the unveiling of God! If we want to know God, if we want
to see God, if we want to touch God, if we want to understand the
mystery of God in this universe, then we must see that this mystery
is embodied in Christ. To look at Christ is to look at God! To know
Christ is to know God!

The second basic mystery in the Bible is the mystery of Christ.
After Paul speaks concerning some of the details of this mystery in
Ephesians 3:3-5, he then unveils what the mystery is in verse 6:
"That the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, of the same body, and
partakers of His promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel." Thus,
the mystery is the one Body of Christ, made up of both Jews and
Gentiles. Paul continues to refer to the mystery of Christ in
Ephesians 3:9 by saying, "And to bring to light what is the admin-
istration of the mystery ... " (NASV). Then he specifies in verse 10
that the administration, or the economy, of the mystery is being
worked out through the church. Thus, the mystery of Christ is the
church! If we want to know Christ, touch Christ, heat Christ, and see
Christ, we must realize that Christ is. revealed in the church. The
mystery of Christ is His Body, the church, the fullness of the One
who fills all in all (Eph. 1:22-23). The church is the expression of Christ.
It is Christ Himself lived out in a corporate way through His
members. The revelation that the mystery of Christ is the corporate
Christ was the unique revelation of Paul's ministry. It was given In
him in order that all believers might enter into his understanding. In
other words, there is not going to be another revelation of the church
for us to enter into. No! All believers are required to enter into Paul's
revelation and understanding.