Category: Daily Thought

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God and Grandma

Daily Reading

Exodus 22-24

Daily Thought

I hear it all the time, “All sins are the same in the eyes of God.” It is said with good intentions, I suppose. No one is worse than anyone else. God loves us all the same, like Grandma. Ask Grandma whether she loves you or your brother best. “I love you both the same,” her answer every time. God and Grandma–they don’t pick favorites. 

No one is better, therefore no one is worse, they say, and point to James 2:10, “For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.” See! No one sin is worse than any other. But is that what this verse says?

Every sin, no matter how big or little, is equally effective in separating us from God. That is the point of James 2:10. Why? Because the standard is “Be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). It does not matter if you miss  by an inch or a mile, you missed. Whether you sin badly or not-so-badly, you miss the standard, and you need saving and you need grace and you need Jesus.

On the scales of God’s judgment, however, we find disparity. Some sins weigh heavy, others not so much, and it may surprise us to see which sins are punished most severely. Exodus 22 is a lengthy list of crimes and punishments. In the first 15 verses, every one who does wrong gets fined. In the next nine verses, they die. The punishments increase because the sins worsen. All sins are not the same, the worse the sin, the greater the punishment. Look what happens when you mistreat aliens or orphans or widows. “My wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless” (Exodus 22:24). Ouch!

Tells you something about the heart of God, doesn’t it?

Daily Prayer

Almighty God, Your ways are truly so much higher than mine. I’m amazed that You are concerned about me, who I am and what I do. You care about my everyday life. It is so good to know what is right and what is wrong, how You expect us to treat each other, what is pleasing in Your eyes. Thank you, Lord, for showing us Your laws that lead to the good life–a life marked by right living. Help me God to remember how personal you are, that You are very close, and that You will lead me. I need to follow!

God, make me keenly aware of those who most need my attention. Give me a heart of compassion for the outcasts, the weak, the poor, and the helpless.  

Amen

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I AM

Daily Reading

Exodus 19-21

Daily Thought

“You shall have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3), the first, the foundation of all other commandments. Keep this one and the rest fall in line. You are to have no other gods–the many nations had many gods, all kinds of gods surrounded Israel. This was a polytheistic world and people chose their own brand to worship. But if I decide I get to choose, then who do I believe is really in charge?

The one God, the true God, told Israel his name, Yahweh. Yahweh means “I AM.” I AM, and all other gods are not, and Yahweh demonstrated this repeatedly in the Exodus from Egypt. Yahweh reminds them, “I AM Yahweh, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.” Who saved you? Me and Me alone. Who shall you worship? Me, and Me alone. 

Jesus said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I AM.” ~John 8:58

We live in a world that tells us no god is above another. That all are to be respected and none rejected. But we worship Jesus Christ and Christ alone. Why? Because rather than believing we choose god, God is the One who chooses us. Because we know that “there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). We worship Christ alone because Christ alone saved us. Who brought you out of Egypt? Who died for your sins? Through whom did you experience God’s forgiveness? Who gave you a new life? There is One and only One worthy of your worship.

Daily Prayer

Righteous God, You are holy and just, and we sin. Your grace gives us time to discover Your forgiveness before we encounter Your judgment. Thank You for Your Son, Jesus Christ, who fulfilled all righteousness and made our salvation possible.

Father, I pray that I may trust fully in You, following closely as You lead. May my life declare and display Your good news, proclaiming Jesus to this world in what I say and what I do. I pray that all would receive Your grace before the Day comes when You settle accounts, that wonderful day when You make all things right again.

Amen

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The Daily Walk

Daily Reading

Exodus 16-18

Daily Thought

Faith can be plunging forward into a future unknown, a leap of faith. But faith can be a walk, as well, one step after another, a daily discipline. God would teach Israel the latter faith as they wandered the wilderness, “Behold, I am about to rain bread from heaven for you, and the people shall go out and gather a day’s portion every day, that I may test them, whether they will walk in my law or not” (Exodus 16:4). Gather meat in the evening and manna in the morning, as much as you want, no more than you will eat. If you save some until the next day, it will not keep. Some saved some anyway, and “it bred worms and stank” (Exodus 16:20). Once a week, on Friday, gather twice as much, because Saturday is the Sabbath, the day of rest. There will not be anything to gather on that day. You can save half overnight on Friday; it won’t stink. Some did not gather twice as much. They went out on the Sabbath, “but they found none” (Exodus 16:27). They went hungry. 

Six days on, one day off. This is not daring to leap, it is learning to walk. It is a discipline of trust, gathering enough and only enough, believing God for our daily bread, a discipline of rest each seventh day. It is the discipline of living by God’s Word, being blessed in his care, that you might know the LORD is your God and you are his people.  

Following Jesus is not so much a leap of faith as an every day walk. 

Daily Prayer

O LORD my God, You and You alone are God, worthy of my devotion, my worship, my love, and my life. With all my heart, soul, mind, and strength, I love and adore You. You bring each day afresh and put a thankful expectation of Your grace and glory in my heart. As I live this day for You, may I see Your handiwork in this world. May I reflect Your grace to others. May I love the people You created with the same tender love that led Your Son to endure the cross.  

Fill my thoughts with the wonder of Your Kingdom and guide my steps toward righteousness. May I be so heavenly-minded that the world cannot help but see Your goodness shine. Teach me to walk in faith, to listen and obey all that You have commanded, because that’s the best way to live. I love You. 

Amen

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Not an Issue

Daily Reading

Exodus 13-15

Daily Thought

God remembered his covenant with the Hebrew people (Exodus 2:24), and delivering ten monumental blows, leveled the Egyptians and freed Israel. In turn, he commanded they “remember this day in which you came out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, for by a strong hand the LORD brought you out from this place” (Exodus 13:3).  

Not long after, the Israelites were trapped between the sea and a terrifying army of Egyptians.  “What have you done to us in bringing us out of Egypt?” they complained. “It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.”

They had already forgotten.  

Moses responded, “Fear not, stand firm, and see the salvation of the LORD!” The story of God in Scripture is a continual reminder that God is on our side. He provides all we need to stand firm. “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.”

Love is not an issue. “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8).

Power is not an issue. “Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world” (1John 4:4).

Confidence is not an issue. “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (Romans 8:31).

Significance is not an issue. “Through the church the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 3:10).

Freedom is not an issue. “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).

Life is not an issue. “The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1Corinthians 15:56-57).

Eternity is not an issue. “For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 8:38-39).

I have nothing to add. I have all I need. I can stand firm. I can be still and know that He is God.

Moses answered, “The LORD will fight for you, and you have only to be silent” (Exodus 14:14). And remember.

Daily Prayer

God, You are my refuge and strength, always with me in times of trouble. I will not fear, though the earth shakes and the mountains quake. Whatever comes before me, You, the Lord Almighty, are with me. Greater is He who is in me than He who is in the world.

I will be still, and rest in the knowledge that You are God. You will be exalted among the nations, You will be exalted on the earth. The Lord Almighty is with me; You are my fortress. On this I take my stand and still my heart.

Amen

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The Lamb of God

Daily Reading

Exodus 10-12

Daily Thought

The tenth plague, the death of the firstborn, introduces Passover, so named because the angel of death passed over homes protected by the blood of a lamb. If God knew which homes belonged to Egyptians and which were Israelites, why didn’t he simply skip the Israelite homes? Why did God require blood on the doorframe of a house to protect it from death? 

Go back to the beginning. When Adam and Eve chose their own desire rather than God’s, they chose death. Judgment was immediate and they were instantly severed from God. They were, therefore, dead, because God is life. Death through sin has been passed on to each and every one of us. We are all dead, separated from God because of sin. But Grace began immediately, as well. The world makes light of sin and misses God’s grace. God allowed Adam and Eve, though dead, to keep breathing, and he launched his plan of salvation. Every breath is a gift of God. We are amazed by grace only so far as we are appalled by sin.

Fast forward to Exodus 12. The judgment that would be passing through the land was just. Every family deserving of death would be visited by the destroyer, which means, because all sin, every family would be visited, including the Israelites. That Passover night, the destroyer would not discriminate between Egypt and Israel, all would be judged unless death had already been to that household. A substitute sacrifice, a lamb approved by God would pay the price. Blood on the doorframe was a sign that the sins of this household had been covered by the death of a lamb.  

Fast forward to A.D. 30. “The next day John the Baptist saw Jesus coming toward him, and said, ‘Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!’” (John 1:29)

Daily Prayer

Almighty God, Your goodness runs deep, but I choose to wallow in the shallows of my desires. Still, despite my rebellion, Your grace seeks me through the loving sacrifice of Your Son. May your righteousness consume my passions and may my desires become Yours. In response to Your overflowing never-ending love, I live thankfully and joyfully in a life made new again. 

What a wonderful Savior. What amazing grace.

Amen

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Hammer It Home

Daily Reading

Exodus 7-9

Daily Thought

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Go in to Pharaoh and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord, “Let my people go, that they may serve me. ~Exodus 8:1

Twice, God says to Moses, “I will harden Pharaoh’s heart” (Exodus 4:21; 7:3), and a hard-hearted Pharaoh refuses to let God’s people go, but what choice does a he have? Is he to blame? If God “hardens whomever he wills,” the apostle Paul asked and (sort of) answered this question, “why does God still find fault? For who can resist God’s will? But who are you, O man, to answer back to God? Will what is molded say to its molder, ‘Why have you made me like this?’ Has the potter no right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for honorable use and another for dishonorable use?” (Romans 9:18-21). In other words, God is God and you are not, and he does what he wants for his purposes. Not a terribly satisfying answer, but then, God does not have to satisfy me. 

God is sovereign, but that does not mean we are puppets. God does not pull our strings, but God’s sovereignty and our freewill walk together, side by side. Of the ten plagues, the Bible says God hardened Pharaoh’s heart in four of them; in six, Pharaoh hardened his own heart. God is in charge and Pharaoh cooperates. He is no innocent; he cannot point to God and claim, “You made me do it.”

But why ten times? Why so many plagues? The answer is in the stubbornness of Pharaoh, but also in the First Commandment, “You shall have no other gods before me.” Israel worshipped God; every other nation worshipped gods. So, the one and only true God used the plagues to demonstrate that he is God like no other. The first couple plagues, the Egyptian magicians were able to mimic the work of God, as if God wasn’t unique. But they couldn’t keep up. By the third plague, they admitted, “This is the finger of God,” and God continued seven more plagues to hammer it home. The Egyptians would never forget the Hebrew God, the God of gods, the only true God, and the Israelites would always remember their God who delivered them from bondage.

God is God. That seems obvious, but it’s good to remember. 

Daily Prayer

My God, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last, the One and Only Creator of the heavens and the earth, You alone I worship and adore. Your ways are good and there is none like You. Why would I ever seek good from another source?

May Your Name be known always in my house. May You always be God of my family–we seek no other. May my children and my children’s children (someday!) follow You and worship You. You are my Lord and Savior. I will always remember.

Amen

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The Next Right Thing

Daily Reading

Exodus 4-6

Daily Thought

Moses, after hiding in Midian, obeys God and returns to Egypt to speak against the Pharaoh on behalf of the nation of Israel. Along the way, something strange occurs: “At a lodging place on the way the Lord met him and sought to put him to death. Then Zipporah took a flint and cut off her son’s foreskin and touched Moses’ feet with it and said, ‘Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me!’ So he let him alone” (Exodus 4:24-26). Why does God threaten Moses with death shortly after he had commissioned him to go to Egypt?

God promised to Abraham he would be a great nation and established a sign of circumcision securing that covenant (see Genesis 17:9-14). Delivering the Israelites from slavery to Egypt was part of God keeping his promise, but Moses, God’s chosen leader, had broken covenant. It seems Zipporah, his wife, was repulsed by the very idea of circumcision and Moses had accommodated his wife rather than do what was right. Moses messed up, he did the wrong thing. He could not do the wrong thing and, at the same time, lead Israel to God’s promised land. But there is grace. Zipporah did wrong, but then she did right. She circumcised her son, and Moses survived God’s wrath.

Following God, you will mess up sometimes, like Moses. You will not always do the right thing, but after you do the wrong thing, God’s grace gives you the opportunity to do the next right thing. Following God is not always doing the right thing, but doing the next right thing.

Daily Prayer

Mighty God, thank You for salvation and grace and Your goodness. You saved me from bondage of my own making, my sin. Thank You, as well, for Your righteousness and holiness. Saved by grace, may I live for You. May I hunger and thirst for Your righteousness. May I live rightly. 

I should not cheapen Your grace by taking advantage of it. Instead, I shall each day wake up and see the day before me as a gift from You, and delight in it. I shall remember that I am Your workmanship, made to do good works, that others will praise You. I shall love You fully, and live out Your love to this world. Help me do that, God!

Amen

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Simon Says

Daily Reading

Exodus 1-3

Daily Thought

Children play a wonderful game called, “Simon says.” One kid is up front, and he thinks he is in charge. He commanded us to stand on one foot, but no one did. He told us to jump up and down. No one jumped. Finally, he said, “Simon says,” and we all did it. Apparently, it was really Simon who was in charge. We didn’t do anything unless Simon said it.

The people of Israel flourished in Egypt and grew in number, a number that brought fear to the king of Egypt. “Behold, the people of Israel are too many and too mighty for us. Come, let us deal shrewdly with them” (Exodus 1:9-10), so the king instructed the Hebrew midwives, “When you serve as midwife to the Hebrew women and see them on the birthstool, if it is a son, you shall kill him” (Exodus 1:15-16). The king of Egypt thought he was in charge. “But the midwives feared God and did not do as the king of Egypt commanded them” (Exodus 1:17). And the children of Israel continued to multiply, just as God had promised Abraham, “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you can. So shall your offspring be” (Genesis 15:5).

God is in charge and that is better than any alternative, whether king or culture or even (especially) me. So, what God says, obey. Everything else take under advisement.

Daily Prayer

My God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God of the Hebrews, the God of this world, the one and only God. May I know You, love You, and listen to You. May I know Your voice, and when I hear it, follow it.

God, You are good. Everything that is good comes from You. When I pursue righteousness, when I love my neighbor, when I serve the least of these, I live according to Your kingdom. I display Your kingdom on earth. Your will be done, on earth, as it is in heaven.

Amen

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January 17

Daily Reading

Genesis 48-50

Daily Thought

Moses was called by God, and so was Pharaoh. “The Scripture says to Pharaoh, ‘For this very purpose I have raised you up, that I might show my power in you, and that my name might be proclaimed in all the earth’” (Romans 9:17). God put him on the throne of Egypt. Likewise, the wicked nations attacking God’s people in Israel were doing God’s bidding, “for behold, I am raising up the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation” (Habakkuk 1:6). They were God’s servants, whether or not they intended to be.

Jews never imagined partnering with the Romans, and yet they did, because salvation required a cross and only the Romans could crucify. “This Jesus, delivered up according to the definite plan and foreknowledge of God, you [Jews] crucified and killed by the hands of lawless men [Romans]” (Acts 2:23). 

Jesus chose twelve disciples, including one named Judas Iscariot; “Did I not choose you, the Twelve? And yet one of you is a devil” (John 6:70). He knew it ahead of time.

And ten brothers were intent on murder, but God was intent on salvation, so Joseph was sold as a slave to be just the right person in just the right place at just the right time. “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20).

When your world seems out of control, remember who is in charge. God’s plans and God’s promises are a sure thing. “And Joseph said to his brothers, ‘I am about to die, but God will visit you and bring you up out of this land to the land that he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob’” (Genesis 50:24).

Daily Prayer 

Sovereign God, the mountains and the oceans, the sun and moon and stars display Your majesty. I hear Your story in the history of my world. I see Your love and Your lordship in, and often in spite of, the events around me. Throughout history, we people try to live without You and against You. How foolish! How foolish we are if we do not call You King of kings and Lord of lords. You are sovereign over the good and the bad. Over all.

Lord, may I live in such a way that people see good works and praise You. God, may I always walk in Your Holy Spirit and do those works You have set before me, good works that reflect Your love to this world.

Amen

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Settle

Daily Reading

Genesis 46-47

Daily Thought

Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Your father and your brothers have come to you. The land of Egypt is before you. Settle your father and your brothers in the best of the land. Let them settle in the land of Goshen” (Genesis 47:5-6). Pharaoh means for Jacob and his family to make a home here in the land of Goshen, but hidden inside that word ‘settle’ is often a whisper of compromise, of settling for less. It can even mean “to sink gradually or slowly to the bottom.” 

By no means was Goshen the bottom. It was the one-time domain of the great Pharaoh Rameses, the best of the land of Egypt, but it wasn’t the land God promised to Jacob, “the land that I gave to Abraham and Isaac I will give to you, and I will give the land to your offspring after you” (Genesis 35:12). To take Pharaoh’s offer would be to settle for something other than what God had designed for Jacob. 

May I brag about my dad for a moment? My dad taught math to junior high students for 35 years. The pre-teen years are an age of terror for most people, but my dad delighted in them, in shaping these young students not just for math, but for life. It was more than his job, it was his passion. He was made for the classroom, made to teach. Early on, he had been offered advancement into school administration. It was attractive and lucrative, but it wasn’t what God had designed him to do and he stayed in the classroom. I’ve always admired that he didn’t settle, in this case, for more.

“Thus Israel settled in the land of Egypt, in the land of Goshen. And they gained possessions in it, and were fruitful and multiplied greatly” (Genesis 47:27). Sounds good, doesn’t it? But there is more to the story. The people of Israel would become the slaves of Egypt. For 400 years, they would sink slowly and gradually to the bottom, until God called a man named Moses to lead them out of Egypt and back to his land of promise. But that’s another story. 

This story is about my dad. My dad did not settle. He taught me the best life is to discover what God has made you for, grab on and give it all you got.  

Daily Prayer

My God, your design in all of creation is amazing and wonderful. I see that everywhere I look, so remind me of that when I look in the mirror. I am fearfully and wonderfully made, made on purpose for a purpose. May I give my whole heart to you and live the life you have set before me. God, help me to never settle for less, or even what might appear to be more, than what you want for me, because I know your desires are my greatest delight. 

Amen