Tag: Savior

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A New Heart

Daily Reading

Jeremiah 14-17

Daily Thought

If you do a thing often enough, you become that thing. Pick up a basketball, practice and play, and, in time, you will become a basketball player. So, also, a pianist, a writer, a welder, and, yes, a sinner. It is argued that there are no bad people, rather people do bad things; however do a bad thing often enough, it will become part of who you are. “The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron; with a point of diamond it is engraved on the tablet of their heart, and on the horns of their altars” (Jeremiah 17:1). The heart in Jewish thought is the essence of you. Doing is becoming. Sin leaves a deep mark. Jeremiah etched with a diamond-tipped pen the sins of Judah on the stone horns of the altar, as sin itself has left its indelible mark on the hearts of the people.

Habits can be broken, but the heart requires more; “the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” (Jeremiah 17:9). Jeremiah cries for a surgeon, a Savior, because more than changing habits, he is healing hearts, “Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved” (Jeremiah 17:14). A Savior will come, one who can and will, if you let him, erase what has been written and write something new, “I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people” (Jeremiah 31:33). Let him create a new you with new habits, repetitions of righteousness that change your heart.

Daily Prayer

Holy God, lead me in Your ways; change my heart. May I desire good, may I love deeply, as You do, so that my heart will be holy and righteous. I cannot do this, I need Someone who knows me better than I know myself. I am deceived by my own heart; You designed me for better than this. Take over, God.

Teach me new things, build in me new habits, create in me a new heart, O God.

Amen

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Troubles and Trials

Daily Reading

Psalm 106-107

Daily Thought

“Some wandered in desert wastes, finding no way to a city to dwell in” (Psalm 107:4). Literally it says they just want a place to sit. They are “hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted within them” (v 5). Job to job, relationship to relationship, community to community, they wander, looking for something to hold onto, a place to call home.

“Some sat in darkness and in the shadow of death, prisoners in affliction and in irons, for they had rebelled against the words of God, and spurned the counsel of the Most High” (vv 10-11). Trouble of their own doing, they would not listen. They had the Word, they heard the counsel, and they did their own thing, and now are bonded to their rebellion.

“Some were fools through their sinful ways, and because of their iniquities suffered affliction; they loathed any kind of food, and they drew near to the gates of death” (vv 17-18). They blew it and they know it, but now they cannot get over it. Their despair is deep, they have no value, they fight the voice inside that tells them there is no hope, no future.

“Some went down to the sea in ships, doing business on the great waters; they saw the deeds of the Lord, his wondrous works in the deep. For he commanded and raised the stormy wind, which lifted up the waves of the sea. They mounted up to heaven; they went down to the depths; their courage melted away in their evil plight; they reeled and staggered like drunken men and were at their wits’ end” (vv 23-27). Life came crashing in, and not of their own doing. Going about their business, tragedy strikes, and they are overwhelmed.

And each turns to God. “Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he delivered them from their distress” (Psalm 107:6, 13, 19, 28). The troubles and trials did them a favor. It brought them to their knees, their knees led them to their Savior, and their Savior loved them and lifted them up.

Daily Prayer

My Lord and Savior, I was lost and now am found, simple as that. Like the blind man, now I see. Now I see Your face, Your grace, Your love, Your holiness, and I want it. I am ready to give up what keeps me from it, and do whatever makes it grow in me.

Teach me to walk, then to run, then to soar, that I may delight in You and in life and in love. Turn my heart outward toward others, to love them in Your name, to serve them with Your grace, to show them Your face, so they may see You and cry out to You and be lifted up.

Amen

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Great Sinners

Daily Reading

Psalm 40-45

Daily Thought

David begins the 40th Psalm, “I waited patiently for the Lord” (Psalm 40:1). That seems proper, but by the end of the psalm, David’s mood had changed, “O Lord, make haste to help me!” (Psalm 40:13). What happened to patience?

Verse 12! “For evils have encompassed me beyond number; my iniquities have overtaken me, and I cannot see; they are more than the hairs of my head; my heart fails me.” David counted his sins.

David warns against the proud, “those who go astray after a lie” (Psalm 40:4). The lie is, “I am not so bad,” and therefore their god is not so big. Great sinners, on the other hand, need a great Savior, and David’s sins were countless. He was that bad, he needed God, and he needed him now.

As for me, I am poor and needy,
but the Lord takes thought for me.
You are my help and my deliverer;
do not delay, O my God! ~Psalm 40:17

Daily Prayer

My God, keep me from comfort in sin. May I love Your righteousness so much that I never delay to confess and turn away from the wrong I do. Thank You that Your mercy is endless because my sins are countless, and I need your never-ending forgiveness.

Develop in me a habit of goodness, that I would desire to do what is right all the time. When I fail, pick me up and set me on the right path again, and I will do the next right thing. I want my life to reflect Your glory, so others will desire the same salvation You have given me. I love Your salvation!

Amen

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What Kind of Savior

Daily Reading

2Chronicles 6-8

Daily Thought

Listen to the pleas of Solomon, “Of your people Israel, when they pray toward this place, listen from heaven your dwelling place, and when you hear, forgive” (2Chronicles 6:21). “If your people Israel are defeated before the enemy because they have sinned against you, and they turn again and acknowledge your name and pray and plead with you in this house, then hear from heaven and forgive the sin of your people Israel” (vv 24-25). “Hear in heaven and forgive the sin of your servants, your people Israel” (v 27). “Hear from heaven your dwelling place and forgive” (v 30).

Solomon anticipates great sin, so he asks for great forgiveness. “If they sin against you–for there is no one who does not sin–if they turn their heart repent and plead with you, saying, ‘We have sinned and have acted perversely and wickedly,’ if they repent with all their mind and with all their heart then hear from heaven your dwelling place their prayer and their pleas, and maintain their cause and forgive your people who have sinned against you” (vv 36-38).

God’s answer came quickly, “As soon as Solomon finished his prayer, fire came down from heaven and consumed the burnt offering and the sacrifices, and the glory of the Lord filled the temple. They bowed down with their faces to the ground on the pavement and worshiped and gave thanks to the Lord, saying, ‘For he is good, for his steadfast love endures forever’” (2Chronicles 7:1, 3). Our God forgives.

She had an excuse for not coming to church, “Oh, but you don’t know what I’ve done,” she explained. “I’m not the kind of person God could ever forgive.”

They cried out again, “Crucify him” (Mark 15:13). Then they spit in his face and struck him. And some slapped him, saying, “Prophesy to us, you Christ! Who is it that struck you?” (Matthew 26:67-68). Pilate said to them, “Shall I crucify your King?” The chief priests answered, “We have no king but Caesar” (John 19:15). They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and twisting together a crown of thorns, they put it on his head and put a reed in his right hand. And kneeling before him, they mocked him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” And they spit on him and took the reed and struck him on the head (Matthew 27:28-30). They kept shouting, “Crucify, crucify him!” (Luke 23:21). So they took Jesus, and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called The Place of a Skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha. There they crucified him (John 19:16-18).

Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34).

“You’re right, I don’t know what you’ve done, what kind of person you are,” I said. “But here’s what I do know. I know what Jesus has done and what kind of Savior he is and what kind of person God forgives and how great is his grace.”

Daily Prayer

Loving Father, Your love endures. I’ve put it to the test! So have others. All of us. And yet Your love lasts forever and forgiveness is always in front of me. So, God, thank You for forgiving me by the blood of Your Son.

God, may I live life with confidence, not in my own strength, but in the absolute certainty that Your Son did everything needed to restore my relationship with You forever. Your love endures forever.

Amen

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No Sin Unpunished

Daily Reading

Numbers 35-36

Daily Thought

No sin unpunished, but each and all shall be atoned for in proportion to the sin. This is the substance of the Law of God, and in Numbers 35, this means the blood of the murderer is required for the blood of murdered. To leave a sin unaccounted stains the land. “You shall not defile the land in which you live, in the midst of which I dwell, for I the Lord dwell in the midst of the people of Israel” (Numbers 35:34). “You shall be holy, for I am holy,” says God (1Peter 1:16).

Our sin is not only personal, but eternal. It is always an affront to the One who created us to be holy. An atonement for an eternal sin, and all sin is eternal, must itself be eternal–eternal separation from what is holy, from God. It requires eternal death. Paul cries, “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:24). Or it requires the death of one who is eternal. “Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” (Romans 7:25).  

“The blood of Jesus, God’s Son cleanses us from all sin. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1John 1:7, 9). No sin unpunished, but each and all shall be atoned for in proportion to the sin, and they were in Christ Jesus, so that “we have been made holy through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all” (Hebrews 10:10). 

“You shall be holy, for I am holy” (1Peter 1:16).

Daily Prayer

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. We worship You, adore You, praise You. But how, then, do we approach You? For we are not holy. Far from it.

By the blood of Jesus Christ, who bore our sins, we are made righteous with his righteousness. We may approach You, O God, with confidence, through a holiness not of our own, but through our Savior, our Lord, our God, Jesus Christ.

Amen