The Ticking Clock

Read 2 Peter 3:1-18

9The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent. 10But the day of the Lord will come as unexpectedly as a thief. Then the heavens will pass away with a terrible noise, and the very elements themselves will disappear in fire, and the earth and everything on it will be found to deserve judgment. 11Since everything around us is going to be destroyed like this, what holy and godly lives you should live, 12looking forward to the day of God and hurrying it along. On that day, he will set the heavens on fire, and the elements will melt away in the flames. 13But we are looking forward to the new heavens and new earth he has promised, a world filled with God’s righteousness. 2 Peter 3:9-13

When visiting another country or culture, we may discover that the sense of time is quite different from our own. What does it mean to be on time? How long should something take? Another country, another timetable. It behooves us to adjust if we want to get along.

God’s sense of time is the focus of this reading. Here Peter explains that God’s timing is different from that of humans. Despite the differences, however, Peter encourages readers to have patience. God is in control and has not forgotten his people. As you read, consider how you can be both watchful and relaxed.

Note that hope is held up in abundance in this reading, as is the example of Jesus.

Some of the Christians to whom Peter wrote faced harassment and suffering for their faith. They knew that God planned an eventual judgment of the earth, when all would be put right. But they wondered, Why was he waiting? and Why not do it now? Peter told them: God has a different timetable than we do (2 Peter 3:8-9; see Psalm 90:4).

While we anxiously await God’s gavel of justice to fall, God patiently waits for more people to repent. He moves with perfect timing, not slowness.

Keep waiting with Jesus for more people to repent and turn to Him. Each day he delays is another opportunity for us to have compassion as he does and to give a few more people an opportunity to accept Him. Use the time God’s given you to spread the Good News.

This is an excerpt from:

The One Year Through the Bible

What Good Is Worry?

When I am afraid, I will put my trust in you. Psalm 56:3

I don’t think it’s possible to eliminate every shred of worry from our lives. Maybe someone on planet Earth has found a way to stop worrying forever, but I have yet to meet the person. Having said this, I think it is both advisable and possible to reduce the amount of worry we feel.

Let’s look at why worry is problematic. 

First, worry transports you away from reality and into your imagination. Though your anxiety may have sprouted from something concrete, it quickly leads to a make-believe world in which the dragons and demons you face will seem far bigger, fiercer, and more numerous than they are.

Second, God deals in reality. Worrying catapults you into a future that may never happen, but it is in the present that you need God’s grace.

Third, though worry can instigate a search for solutions, chronic worrying rarely, if ever, results in anything helpful. (Ask yourself whether you have ever felt glad that you worried and fretted about something.)

Fourth, as Chuck Swindoll points out, “We worry when we subtract God’s presence from our crises.” It’s hard to feel peaceful if you think God is absent just when you need him most.

You can probably come up with your own list of reasons why worry is problematic. Perhaps our goal should not be to eliminate every atom of worry from our lives but to use it for a good purpose. In that case, worry could function like an alarm clock, warning us that we need to pray about something or do something in order to address a problem. Just as we wouldn’t let an alarm clock keep ringing once it’s done the job of prying us out of bed, we shouldn’t let the worry alarm keep sounding once it’s woken us to the need to take our concerns to the Lord. Instead of letting worry become a way of life, let’s think of anxious feelings as a call to prayer and action, based on the wisdom God gives.

Lord, help me to notice anxious thoughts the minute I start thinking them. As I do, help me to turn to you for help and perspective, trusting you will give it in your good time.

Good Samaritans

“Now which of these three would you say was a neighbor to the man who was attacked by bandits?” Jesus asked. The man replied, “The one who showed him mercy.” Then Jesus said, “Yes, now go and do the same.”Luke 10:36-37

Generally speaking, the typical man in the street dislikes those who come across as “holier-than-thou.” He has little time for “do-gooders,” but he usually has a warm place in his heart for a “good Samaritan.” He likes the idea of Boy Scout-style behavior that helps old ladies across the road and runs errands for shut-ins. But is this really what Jesus had in mind when he told what is arguably his most famous story, the parable of the Good Samaritan? Hardly!

The context of the story is critical. “An expert in religious law stood up to test Jesus by asking him this question: ‘Teacher, what must I do to receive eternal life?’” (Luke 10:25.) The Good Samaritan story was prompted by a question about eternal destiny and life in the hereafter, about eternal communion with or separation from God. Jesus responded by asking the expert for his understanding of Moses’ instructions to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind” and “Love your neighbor as yourself” (10:27; Deut. 6:5; Lev. 19:18). The clear implication was that the way to eternal life is through absolutely meticulous and perfect fulfillment of the law. The legal expert retorted, because he wanted “to justify his actions, . . . ‘And who is my neighbor?’” (10:29). In response, Jesus told his story about the Good Samaritan. Jesus made it clear that the Samaritan was the model of neighborliness.

The “expert” in the law had, no doubt, tuned in to rabbinical teaching that conveniently limited the definition of “neighbor” and “neighborliness” to a select group of associates. Jesus widened the definition to show that anyone can be a neighbor, and that neighborliness should be shown to everyone. Bleeding victims in the ditch are neighbors, and so are despised and ostracized Samaritans.

More significantly, Jesus pointed out that human efforts—at neighborliness or anything else prescribed by the law—fall far short of meriting eternal life. Understanding this, a man is driven to grace—his only hope of life eternal. Jesus insisted, in his run-ins with the legalists, that he had not “come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:31).

There is a pervasive idea in Western culture that a “good life” in the here and now merits eternal life in the hereafter. But the parable about the Good Samaritan contradicts this dangerous misunderstanding. A clear word from the apostle Paul puts the matter beyond doubt: “The wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom. 6:23, emphasis added, emphasis added). Eternal life is about a free gift, not about a good life. But those who receive the gift will have a deep desire to live a good life. Just like the Samaritan!

This is an excerpt from:

Devotions for Men

The Submission of the Believer

You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am.  JOHN 13:13

Our Lord never insists on having authority over us. He never says, “You will submit to me.” No, He leaves us perfectly free to choose— so free, in fact, that we can spit in His face or we can put Him to death, as others have done; and yet He will never say a word. But once His life has been created in me through His redemption, I instantly recognize His right to absolute authority over me. It is a complete and effective domination, in which I acknowledge that “You are worthy, O Lord…” (Revelation 4:11). It is simply the unworthiness within me that refuses to bow down or to submit to one who is worthy. When I meet someone who is more holy than myself, and I don’t recognize his worthiness, nor obey his instructions for me, it is a sign of my own unworthiness being revealed. God teaches us by using these people who are a little better than we are; not better intellectually, but more holy. And He continues to do so until we willingly submit. Then the whole attitude of our life is one of obedience to Him.

If our Lord insisted on our obedience, He would simply become a taskmaster and cease to have any real authority. He never insists on obedience, but when we truly see Him we will instantly obey Him. Then He is easily Lord of our life, and we live in adoration of Him from morning till night. The level of my growth in grace is revealed by the way I look at obedience. We should have a much higher view of the word obedience, rescuing it from the mire of the world. Obedience is only possible between people who are equals in their relationship to each other; like the relationship between father and son, not that between master and servant. Jesus showed this relationship by saying, “I and My Father are one” (John 10:30). “…though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered” (Hebrews 5:8). The Son was obedient as our Redeemer, because He was the Son, not in order to become God’s Son. From My Utmost for His Highest Updated Edition

The Mystery of Believing

By Oswald Chambers

He said, "Who are You, Lord?" —Acts 9:5

Through the miracle of redemption, Saul of Tarsus was instantly changed from a strong-willed and forceful Pharisee into a humble and devoted bondservant of the Lord Jesus.

There is nothing miraculous or mysterious about the things we can explain. We control what we are able to explain, consequently it is only natural to seek an explanation for everything. It is not natural to obey, yet it is not necessarily sinful to disobey. There can be no real disobedience, nor any moral virtue in obedience, unless a person recognizes the higher authority of the one giving the orders. If this recognition does not exist, even the one giving the orders may view the other person’s disobedience as freedom. If one rules another by saying, “You must do this,” and, “You will do that,” he breaks the human spirit, making it unfit for God. A person is simply a slave for obeying, unless behind his obedience is the recognition of a holy God.

Many people begin coming to God once they stop being religious, because there is only one master of the human heart— Jesus Christ, not religion. But “Woe is me” if after seeing Him I still will not obey (Isaiah 6:5 , also see Isaiah 6:1). Jesus will never insist that I obey, but if I don’t,I have already begun to sign the death certificate of the Son of God in my soul. When I stand face to face with Jesus Christ and say, “I will not obey,” He will never insist. But when I do this, I am backing away from the recreating power of His redemption. It makes no difference to God’s grace what an abomination I am, if I will only come to the light. But “Woe is me” if I refuse the light (see John 3:19-21).

It’s All Right

Read 2 Samuel 21:1–24:25

26To the faithful you show yourself faithful; to those with integrity you show integrity. 27To the pure you show yourself pure, but to the wicked you show yourself hostile. 28You rescue the humble, but your eyes watch the proud and humiliate them. 29O Lord, you are my lamp. The Lord lights up my darkness. 30In your strength I can crush an army; with my God I can scale any wall. 31God’s way is perfect. All the Lord’s promises prove true. He is a shield for all who look to him for protection. 32For who is God except the Lord? Who but our God is a solid rock? 33God is my strong fortress, and he makes my way perfect. 34He makes me as surefooted as a deer, enabling me to stand on mountain heights. 2 Samuel 22:26-34

“It’s all right,” Billy said forgivingly, and you couldn’t help but smile. You had accused him of conspiring to keep you out of the clubhouse, but that wasn’t what was truly going on. In fact, Billy had been decorating the clubhouse for your surprise birthday party. Now the truth was out, and so was your sheepish apology.

These are the later years of David’s rule, a song of praise that David wrote, and some of David’s last words. In this song, David brings up the subject of his own guilt. It’s a telling speech. As you read, you will see that, to paraphrase, “forgiveness is cool.”

You’ll find other lessons, too, about bringing justice to others and placing our security in God instead of money.

“I am blameless before God; I have kept myself from sin” (2 Samuel 22:24). With these words, David was not denying that he had ever sinned. Psalm 51 shows his tremendous anguish over his sins against Uriah and Bathsheba. But David understood God’s faithfulness and was writing this hymn from God’s perspective. He knew that God had made him pure again—“whiter than snow,” with a “clean heart” (Psalm 51:7, 10).

God will forgive our sins if we bring them to him in sorrow and repentance. Through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we can be cleansed and made perfect in God’s eyes. God replaces our sin with his purity—he sees us as forgiven and clean.

Stop right now and confess your sins to your loving heavenly Father. Accept his total forgiveness through Christ.

This is an excerpt from:

The One Year Through the Bible