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Love

Daily Reading

1Corinthians 12-14

Daily Thought

I started a sermon on 1Corinthians 13 like this, “Dave is patient, Dave is kind. He does not envy, he does not boast, he is not proud. Dave is not rude, he is not self-seeking, he is not easily angered, he keeps no record of wrongs. Dave does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. Dave always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Dave never fails.” Then I laughed. Too many of the parts didn’t quite fit. The congregation laughed (a little too much, actually). My wife needed to stop laughing.

They knew what I was doing. 1Corinthians 13 is the love chapter. The Apostle Paul has been dealing with the problems in the Corinthian church for twelve chapters, and finally he stops and says, “now I will show you the most excellent way” (1Corinthians 12:31), and he writes about love.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. ~1Corinthians 13:4-8

Go ahead, put your name in there. The parts where you cringe highlight the places needing work. Put the name Jesus in there and it reads just fine. This is the way we are to love because this is the way God loves us. 

Paul sculpted this passage, choosing his words carefully, saying it just right, because love is the most important thing to get right. “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing” (1Corinthians 13:1-3). Love matters before anything else matters.

Daily Prayer

Heavenly Father, I am learning to love. Keep teaching me because You are perfect at love and there has been no greater display of love than the cross. Help me to be patient, to be kind. Keep me from envy and boasting and pride. Correct me when I am rude or self seeking or easily angered. Let me keep no record of wrongs. Change my heart so I do not delight in evil, but always rejoice with the truth. Teach me to protect and trust and hope and persevere. May I strive to be someone who never fails, but when I do, to get up and strive again, to do the next right thing, to always love. 

Amen

Daily Question

Which qualities of love make you cringe the most when you try to attach your name to them? Which qualities seem to fit nicely?

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The Night When He Was Betrayed

Daily Reading

1Corinthians 9-11

Daily Thought

The church in Corinth was a mess and the Lord’s Supper put this on display. The people gathered on Sundays, each bringing their own food, and consuming commenced on arrival. No one waited for anyone else, no shared communion. Some got drunk, the wealthy overate, and the poor went hungry. Paul’s dismay was wrapped in a single word, “What!” (1Corinthians 11:22). It was time to clean up this mess and return the Corinthians to the night when Jesus ate the Passover meal with his disciples and instituted the Lord’s Supper, “the night when he was betrayed,” (1Corinthians 11:23) is how Paul describes it. 

Jesus instituted communion as a reoccurring reminder of our daily devotion. In eating the bread and drinking the cup, we remember the cross of Christ and commit and recommit to follow, and it began “on the night when he was betrayed,” because it is a choice we must make, shall I follow Jesus or go the way of Judas, and there is no in-between. 

Daily Prayer

Father God, the abundant life You promise begins with a choice to follow You, to love You with all my heart and soul and mind and strength. That’s what I choose to do, to  follow You, and everything else in my life follows after that. 

I promise, Jesus, to keep Your cross in front of me, to live my life as a sacrifice to You just as You gave Your life as a sacrifice for me. And the amazing thing is, I lose nothing of value and gain everything that’s worth anything. The good life is the godly life.

Amen

Daily Question

What is involved in the decision as to whether or not you follow Jesus? Why follow? Why not?

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Free to Choose

Daily Reading

1Corinthians 5-8

Daily Thought

Once a Muslim, now a Christian, he was attending the men’s breakfast, and we were inviting him to enjoy the bacon. “You know, as a Christian, you are freed from all those food restrictions and you can eat bacon or ham or whatever you like?”

He understood, “Yes, I know. I know I am free to eat, but I am also free not to eat it. I go home to my family in Egypt once a year, and when I come up to my father’s door, the first question he will ask me is, ‘Have those infidels taught you to eat the filthy hog meat yet?’ If I say to him, ‘Yes, father,’ I will be banished from that home and have no further witness in it. But if I say, as I have always said, ‘No, father, no pork has ever passed my lips,’ then I have admittance to the family circle and I am free to tell them of the joy I have found in Jesus Christ. Therefore I am free to eat, and I am free not to eat. I choose no bacon”

There are some things more important than knowledge. “’Knowledge’ puffs up, but love builds up” (1Corinthians 8:1). He knows he is free to eat whatever he wants, and what he wants is for his family to know Jesus.

Daily Thought

My God, You saved me. Not because I was good. Not because I was worth saving. You saved me because You loved me. What an amazing love, too, because I did not love You. I was not good, nor was I godly, and yet You went to death for my life. Now, because of Your goodness, I am becoming like You. 

May I love others, as well, sacrificing my wants for their needs. Make my deepest desire be to do what is good for others. May the choices I make help others choose Jesus.

Amen

Daily Question

What are some things you are free to do, but you choose not to, for the sake of your witness to others?

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Follow Me

Daily Reading

1Corinthians 1-4

Daily Thought

“I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment.” ~1Corinthians 1:10

The Apostle Paul grieves at division in the church at Corinth. They were choosing sides, , “for when one says, ‘I follow Paul,’ and another, ‘I follow Apollos,’ are you not being merely human?” (1Corinthians 2:4). It began at the beginning, when Adam and Eve, rather than follow God, preferred to make their own choices and ate the fruit, and now we follow them. Do a search of churches and you find lots of choices, Presbyterian or Methodist or Baptist or Lutheran or Catholic or Anglican or Episcopal or Pentecostal, the list goes on. That is our way, we major on the minors and champion the lesser. We choose style or songs or sermons, and brush aside the prayer of our Savior, “that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me” (John 17:21).

Paul insists that he and Apollos are but gardeners, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth” (1Corinthians 3:6). Jesus said, “Follow me” (Matthew 4:19, and a whole bunch of other verses), so Paul, “decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified” (1Corinthians 2:2). He championed Jesus, and it is in that alone that we are Christian, we are united, we are one.

Daily Prayer

You, O God, are One. Father, Son, Holy Spirit. The Lord our God. The Lord is one. 

You told us we must be one, that we must love one another, that we must be united, that our joy in You is connected to our unity in Your Spirit. God, bring us together. Your church is strongest when our shared love for Jesus matters more than our differences. Teach me humility and servanthood and love.

Amen

Daily Question

Why are there so many different denominations in the Christian Church? Is this a good thing or bad thing? 

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Names

Daily Reading

Romans 14-16

Daily Thought

The last chapter of Romans is like the credits at the end of a movie. I don’t sit through the credits. I usually make it to about verse 4, then I start skimming, but Paul names over thirty people by the end of this chapter. 

My son-in-law, Staphon, works at Pixar. There is a theater at Pixar and he got me in to see a movie before it was released. As the movie wound to what I thought was the end, I started to get up, but Staphon grabbed my arm and sat me down. The important part was just beginning–the credits. The theater was packed with Pixar people and the names of their friends and co-workers were beginning to roll. We sat to the very end.

Lest we think Paul is merely writing Romans as a treatise on theology, building this great religion called Christianity, this last chapter grounds us in reality and reminds us what is vitally important. This is about real people who live in real community with each other and follow a very real Savior, Jesus Christ. 

I go to church and I know the names of all sixty-six books of the Bible. God would be happier if I knew the name of the person sitting next to me. 

Paul knows who these people are and what they have done. He knows their role in the church and their service to God. Paul does not see the church as an organized religion, but as a community of people saved by Jesus Christ and in love with one another. Paul knows their names, and so does God. Every last one of them.

Daily Prayer

Father, I love You and worship You. And You love me. You love people. God, help me love better what You love most. 

Change my heart, God, and teach me to love well, to serve all, to follow the example of Your Son and live a life of compassion, to sacrifice my life for the sake of others.

Amen

Daily Question

Jesus said the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself. Is one more important than the other? Why or why not?

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I’ve Got Wings!

Daily Reading

Romans 11-13

Daily Thought

“Present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed.” ~Romans 12:1-2

That last word, “transformed,” comes from the Greek word “metamorphoe,” from which we get our English word “metamorphosis.” 

“God causes an amazing thing to happen,” the science professor’s eyes flashed delight as he shared with his students the wonder of metamorphosis. “Inside a cocoon, the digestive juices go to work. The caterpillar eats itself from the inside out, transforming its body into something new.”

“Where do the wings come from?” asked Mary.

He smiled, “This part is really cool. When the caterpillar digests itself, it produces waste. That waste is the building material that becomes the wings of the butterfly.”

“So, can God take the waste in my life,” Matt’s head wrinkled as he put this together, “and make something beautiful out of it?”

“…that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.” ~Romans 12:2

He sure can. Imagine the caterpillar, when he wakes up and discovers wings!

Daily Prayer

Lord God, You created me once, and I messed it up. Then You created me again, transformed me into something new. The old has gone, the new has come, and life is different now. To wake up and discover I have wings to fly! Thank You for Your patience and Your love. Thank You for second chances.

May I do now what I should have done the first time, be the person you created me to be and live the life You created me to live. I am Yours, God. Every bit of me. 

Amen

Daily Question

Where have you seen God make the biggest changes in your life?

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Abba Father

Daily Reading

Romans 8-10

Daily Thought

I love when one of my children calls me “Daddy.” My boys started calling me “Dave.” They thought it was cute. All my kids call me “Dave” when I do something ridiculous, “Way to go, Dave.” I guess I deserve that. But “Daddy,” when I hear that word, I turn and smile and the one who said it has my undivided attention. 

“You have received the Spirit of adoption as children, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’” (Romans 8:15). “Abba” is like calling God “Daddy.” My grandkids call me “Bapa.” Same thing. It is a special relationship, intimate, close.

The night before Jesus would go to the cross, he is in a garden in Jerusalem called Gethsemane, praying to his heavenly Father. We get to listen. “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will” (Mark 14:36). You can hear the intimacy. This isn’t “our Father who art in heaven,” this is “Daddy” and a deep sigh, and Jesus is ready to do whatever his Father says.

We can pray to God like that, too. We share the same intimacy as Jesus–“we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ” (Romans 8:16-17)–like children with their daddy, that special, personal, unique relationship. That kind of relationship where you can run up to God and lift your arms up and get wrapped up in his. You are never interrupting, because nothing else is as important to your daddy. 

I never start prayer with, “Hey God, you got a minute.” Children don’t ask that. My children never considered my time because they know I always have time for them. 

That’s God. We talk to our Father with confidence because we know when we pray, he swipes all the paperwork to the side, turns his chair toward us, lifts us up on his lap, and he listens. And I am ready to do whatever he says.

Daily Prayer

Abba Father, You left Your throne and looked for me and found me and saved me and brought me into your family. I am Your child. I wasn’t even looking for You. You came to seek and to save the lost and that was me. Your love is amazing. 

I love this intimacy, that I can climb on Your lap and You are mine and I am Yours. You love me and I love You back and trust You and I am ready to do whatever You say.

Amen

Daily Question

What do you call your father and what does that indicate about your relationship with him?

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Bad News, Good News

Daily Reading

Romans 4-7

Daily Thought

You could attempt to not sin. Benjamin Franklin tried, and recorded the effort in his autobiography, “I conceiv’d the bold and arduous project of arriving at moral perfection. As I knew, or thought I knew, what was right and wrong, I did not see why I might not always do the one and avoid the other.” He made a chart of virtues: Temperence, Silence, Order, Resolution, Frugality, Industry, Sincerity, Justice, Moderation, Cleanliness, Tranquility, Chastity, Humility. He recorded his success (and failure): Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and “was supris’d to find myself so much fuller of faults than I had imagined.”

A good way to become aware of our sins is to try not to. 

The Apostle Paul became aware and cried out in despair, “I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing” (Romans 7:18-19). Our sin is not merely personal, but ultimate, against God our Creator, who made us in his image to be holy, and thus, “the wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23), eternal separation from God. In trying to be good, Paul discovered he cannot be good enough for heaven, but he is certainly bad enough for hell. “Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death?” (Romans 7:24). When we become aware of our sin, we become aware of our need, not for a system, but a Savior. Then we begin asking the right question, not can I be good enough, but who is good enough?

“Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!” ~Romans 7:25

It is an oft-asked question, do you want the good news first or the bad? We need the bad news first, “for the wages of sin is death,” for the good to sink in, “but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Romans 6:23). The bad news of sin prepared Paul for the good news of a Savior.

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. I may approach You, O God, with confidence, through a holiness not of my own, but through my Savior, my Lord, my God, my friend, Jesus Christ.

Amen

Daily Question

Are you good enough for heaven? Are you bad enough for hell? Why or why not?

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Sunsets

Daily Reading

Romans 1-3

Daily Thought

Paul has longed to share the Gospel with the Romans, “for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek” (Romans 1:16). By Greek, Paul means Gentiles, the non-Jews. Speaking to the Romans of a Jewish Savior, Paul begins with something they have in common, with the world they can see, in order to explain the unseen, “for what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made” (Romans 1:19-20).

I looked up the science of a sunset: the Raleigh equation along with Mie theory employing discrete dipole approximation will mathematically account for the enhancement of the colors of the sky. 

Okay.

Then I looked at the sunset. The firmament unfolding in front of me, colors stroking the heavens. I called my wife and holding her hand, we gazed. Whatever she was doing would wait because the world had stopped and we surveyed the skies, taking time to taste the wonder of the Almighty. “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours out speech, and night to night reveals knowledge” (Psalm 19:1-2).

Science can explain how a beautiful sunset comes to be, but not why we stop and stand and stare in wonder. This is worship.

Daily Prayer

Wonderful God, what an incredible creation. The splendor, the spectacular array of colors, shapes, aromas. They speak of Your majesty, Your artistry, Your creativity, Your wisdom, Your power. All of creation glorifies You.

You have called me Your “poema,” Your workmanship, Your poem. God, when I look at each person You created, I see a work of art. Your work. My Creator, I pray I will always treat Your workmanship with love and respect, appreciating the wonder of Your handiwork in each and every one of us. I stand and gaze and marvel at Your creation. I worship You. Oh my God, my Creator, my Savior, Heavenly Father, Lord. What a life! You are wonderful.

Amen

Daily Question

What in creation speaks most to you of God? What does it say to you about God?

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A Captive Audience

Daily Reading

Acts 27-28

Daily Thought

At long last, Paul arrived in Rome and lived there “two whole years at his own expense, and welcomed all who came to him” (Acts 28:30). Paul, under house arrest, was chained to a Roman guard, but the way Paul looked at it, the guards were chained to him. You could look at prison as an obstruction to evangelism, but for Paul, obstacles are better seen as opportunities–“Therefore let it be known to you that this salvation of God has been sent to the Gentiles; they will listen” (Luke 28:28). They had to! Think of all they heard, a captive audience to Paul’s stories of Jesus.

The Book of Acts does not end, it stops. The disciples continue taking the Gospel to the world, but Luke is done writing. He puts his pen down as Paul is “proclaiming the kingdom of God and teaching about the Lord Jesus Christ with all boldness and without hindrance” (Luke 28:31). Paul is in chains, the Gospel is not, and Luke has written of its progress from the streets of Jerusalem to the seat of Caesar in Rome, but it’s not over. It is just getting started. The book of Acts closes as the door to the world opens wide to the advance of the Gospel. Two thousand years later, it continues and we have become part of and participants in this grand and ongoing story of God’s Kingdom come.

Daily Prayer

Father God, may we set our eyes on Christ, Your Son. Jesus, the Name above all names, the One who saves us. May I let go of my ways, submitting to You. It is by Your grace that I am saved, Your gospel, Your goodness, Your glory.

May I speak of You at all times, seeing opportunities when no one would think they exist. The chains of Rome did not stop the gospel, nor should anything stand in my way. May I be bold, continuing the acts of the disciples into the 21st century.

Amen

Daily Question

How much time does someone have to spend around you until they hear about Jesus?