Monday, May 9, 2011

MondaythruFriday: My Utmost for His Highest



Last Call Devotional Network

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"MondaythruFriday" Devotional Series

 

 

 

MondaythruFriday 


 

My Utmost For His Highest


 

Monday

MAY 9 MORNING

 

 

GRASP WITHOUT REACH

 

 

"Where there is no vision, the people cast off restraint." Proverbs 29:18 (R.V.)

There is a difference between an ideal and a vision. An ideal has no moral inspiration; a vision has. The people who give themselves over to ideals rarely do anything. A man's conception of Deity may be used to justify his deliberate neglect of his duty. Jonah argued that because God was a God of justice and of mercy, therefore everything would be all right. I may have a right conception of God, and that may be the very reason why I do not do my duty. But wherever there is vision, there is also a life of rectitude because the vision imparts moral incentive.

Ideals may lull to ruin. Take stock of yourself spiritually and see whether you have ideals only or if you have vision.

 

"Ah, but a man's reach should exceed his grasp,
Or what's a heaven for?"

"Where there is no vision. . . ." When once we lose sight of God, we begin to be reckless, we cast off certain restraints, we cast off praying, we cast off the vision of God in little things, and begin to act on our own initiative. If we are eating what we have out of our own hand, doing things on our own initiative without expecting God to come in, we are on the downward path, we have lost the vision. Is our attitude to-day an attitude that springs from our vision of God? Are we expecting God to do greater things than He has ever done? Is there a freshness and vigour in our spiritual out look?


 


 


 

 

 

Tuesday

MAY 10 MORNING


 

TAKE THE INITIATIVE

 

 

"Add to your faith virtue. . ." ("Furnish your faith with resolution.") (MOFFATT.) 2 Peter 1:5

"Add" means there is something we have to do. We are in danger of forgetting that we cannot do what God does, and that God will not do what we can do. We cannot save ourselves nor sanctify ourselves, God does that; but God will not give us good habits, He will not give us character, He will not make us walk aright. We have to do all that ourselves, we have to work out the salvation God has worked in. "Add" means to get into the habit of doing things, and in the initial stages it is difficult. To take the initiative is to make a beginning, to instruct yourself in the way you have to go.

Beware of the tendency of asking the way when you know it perfectly well. Take the initiative, stop hesitating, and take the first step. Be resolute when God speaks, act in faith immediately on what He says, and never revise your decisions. If you hesitate when God tells you to do a thing, you endanger your standing in grace. Take the initiative, take it yourself, take the step with your will now, make it impossible to go back. Burn your bridges behind you - "I will write that letter"; "I will pay that debt." Make the thing inevitable.

We have to get into the habit of hearkening to God about everything, to form the habit of finding out what God says. If when a crisis comes, we instinctively turn to God, we know that the habit has been formed. We have to take the initiative where we are, not where we are not.

 

 

Wednesday

MAY 11 MORNING


YOU WON'T REACH IT ON TIPTOE

 

 

"Add to your brotherliness . . . love." 2 Peter 1:7

Love is indefinite to most of us, we do not know what we mean when we talk about love. Love is the sovereign preference of one person for another, and spiritually Jesus demands that that preference be for Himself (cf. Luke 14:26). When the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, Jesus Christ is easily first; then we must practise the working out of these things mentioned by Peter.

The first thing God does is to knock pretence and the pious pose right out of me. The Holy Spirit reveals that God loved me not because I was lovable, but because it was His nature to do so. Now, He says to me, show the same love to others - "Love as I have loved you." "I will bring any number of people about you whom you cannot respect, and you must exhibit My love to them as I have exhibited it to you." You won't reach it on tiptoe.Some of us have tried to, but we were soon tired.

"The Lord suffereth long. . . ." Let me look within and see His dealings with me. The knowledge that God has loved me to the uttermost, to the end of all my sin and meanness and selfishness and wrong, will send me forth into the world to love in the same way. God's love to me is inexhaustible, and I must love others from the bedrock of God's love to me. Growth in grace stops the moment I get huffed. I get huffed because I have a peculiar person to live with. Just think how disagreeable I have been to God! Am I prepared to be so identified with the Lord Jesus that His life and His sweetness are being poured out all the time? Neither natural love nor Divine love will remain unless it is cultivated. Love is spontaneous, but it has to be maintained by discipline.

 

 

Thursday

MAY 12 MORNING


 

MAKE a HABIT of HAVING no HABITS

 

 

"For if these things are yours and abound, they make you to be not idle nor unfruitful." 2 Peter 1:8 (R.V.)

When we begin to form a habit we are conscious of it. There are times when we are conscious of becoming virtuous and patient and godly, but it is only a stage; if we stop there we shall get the strut of the spiritual prig. The right thing to do with habits is to lose them in the life of the Lord, until every habit is so practised that there is no conscious habit at all. Our spiritual life continually resolves into introspection because there are some qualities we have not added as yet. Ultimately the relationship is to be a completely simple one.

Your god may be your little Christian habit, the habit of prayer at stated times, or the habit of Bible reading. Watch how your Father will upset those times if you begin to worship your habit instead of what the habit symbolizes - I can't do that just now, I am praying; it is my hour with God. No, it is your hour with your habit. There is a quality that is lacking in you. Recognize the defect and then look for the opportunity of exercising yourself along the line of the quality to be added.

Love means that there is no habit visible, you have come to the place where the habit is lost, and by practice you do the thing unconsciously. If you are consciously holy, there are certain things you imagine you cannot do, certain relationships in which you are far from simple; that means there is something to be added. The only supernatural life is the life the Lord Jesus lived, and He was at home with God anywhere. Is there anywhere where you are not at home with God? Let God press through in that particular circumstance until you gain Him, and life becomes the simple life of a child.

 

 

 

Friday

 

MAY 13 MORNING


 

The HABIT of a GOOD CONSCIENCE

 

 

"A conscience void of offence toward God, and toward men." Acts 24:16

God's commands are given to the life of His Son in us, consequently to the human nature in which His Son has been formed, His commands are difficult, but immediately we obey they become divinely easy.

Conscience is that faculty in me which attaches itself to the highest that I know, and tells me what the highest I know demands that I do. It is the eye of the soul which looks out either towards God or towards what it regards as the highest, and therefore conscience records differently in different people. If I am in the habit of steadily facing myself with God, my conscience will always introduce God's perfect law and indicate what I should do. The point is, will I obey? I have to make an effort to keep my conscience so sensitive that I walk without offence. I should be living in such perfect sympathy with God's Son, that in every circumstance the spirit of my mind is renewed, and I "make out" at once "what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God."

God always educates us down to the scruple. Is my ear so keen to hear the tiniest whisper of the Spirit that I know what I should do? "Grieve not the Holy Spirit." He does not come with a voice like thunder; His voice is so gentle that it is easy to ignore it. The one thing that keeps the conscience sensitive to Him is the continual habit of being open to God on the inside. When there is any debate, quit. "Why shouldn't I do this?" You are on the wrong track. There is no debate possible when conscience speaks. At your peril, you allow one thing to obscure your inner communion with God. Drop it, whatever it is, and see that you keep your inner vision clear.

 

 



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MondaythruFriday: Daily Light



Last Call Devotional Network

(on Blogger)

lastcalldevotionalnetwork@gmail.com

"MondaythruFriday" Devotional Series

 

 

 

MondaythruFriday 


 

Daily Light


 

Monday

MAY 9 MORNING

 

 

Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.HEB. 11:1.

 

 

If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.

 

Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit.—After that ye believed ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession.

 

Jesus saith unto him, Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed; blessed are they that have not seen, and yet have believed.—Whom having not seen, ye love; in whom, though now ye see him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.

 

We walk by faith, not by sight.—Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompence of reward.

 

I Cor. 15:19.I Cor. 2:9,10. -Eph. 1:13,14. -John 20:29. -I Pet. 1:8,9.II Cor. 5:7. -Heb. 10:35.

MAY 9 EVENING


 

It is I; be not afraid.JOHN 6:20.


 

When I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.—I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins.

 

Woe is me! for I am undone; . . . mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts. Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: and he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged.—I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins: return unto me; for I have redeemed thee.

 

If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

 

Rev. 1:17,18. -Isa. 43:25.Isa. 6:5-7. -Isa. 44:22.I John 2:1

 


 


 

 

 

Tuesday

MAY 10 MORNING


 

For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.I JOHN 3:8.


 

We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.—Forasmuch . . . as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death. that is, the devil.—And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them.—I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.

 

Thanks be to God, which giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.

 

Eph. 6:12. -Heb. 2:14. -Col 2:15. -Rev. 12:10,11.I Cor. 15:57.


 


MAY 10 EVENING


 

Vanity of vanities; all is vanity.ECCL. 1:2.


 

We spend our years as a tale that is told. The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away.

 

If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.—Here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come.—I am the Lord, I change not.—Our conversation (citizenship) is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ; who shall change our vile body that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious body, according to the working whereby he is able even to subdue all things unto himself.—The creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly but by reason of him who hath subjected the same in hope.

 

Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever.—Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come.

 

Psa. 90:9,10.I Cor. 15:19. -Heb. 13:14. -Mal. 3:6. -Phi. 3:20,21. -Rom. 8:20.Heb. 13:8. -Rev. 4:8.

 

 

 

Wednesday

 



MAY 11 MORNING

 

Awake to righteousness, and sin not.I COR. 15:34.


 

Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day. Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober.

 

It is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light.—Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.—Cast away from you all your transgressions, whereby ye have transgressed: and make you a new heart and a new spirit.—Lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls.—Little children, abide in him that, when he shall appear, we may have confidence, and not be ashamed before him at his coming. If ye know that he is righteous, ye know that every one that doeth righteousness is born of him.

 

I Thes. 5:5,6.Rom. 13:11,12. -Eph. 6:13. -Ezek. 18:31. -Jas. 1:21. -I John 2:28,29.

 

 

 MAY 11 EVENING


 

My sheep hear my voice.JOHN 10:27.


 

Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: If any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.

 

I sleep, but my heart waketh: it is the voice of my beloved that knocketh, saying, Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my undefiled. I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer.

 

Speak; for thy servant heareth.—When Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zacchaeus, make haste and come down; for to day I must abide at thy house. And he made haste, and came down, and received him joyfully.—I will hear what God the Lord will speak: for he will speak peace unto his people, and to his saints: but let them not turn again to folly.

 

Rev. 3:20.Song 5:2,6.I Sam. 3:10. -Luke 19:5,6. -Psa. 85:8.

 

 

Thursday

 


MAY 12 MORNING


 

Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.I JOHN 4:7.


 

The love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us.—Ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God.—He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself.

 

In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through him.—In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace.—That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus.

 

Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.

 

Rom. 5:5. -Rom. 8:15,16. -I John 5:10.I John 4:9. -Eph. 1:7. -Eph. 2:7.I John 4:11.

 

MAY 12 EVENING


 

Reproach hath broken my heart.PSA. 69:20

.

 

Is not this the carpenter's son?—Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth?—Say we not well that thou are a Samaritan, and hast a devil?—He casteth out devils through the prince of the devils.—We know that this man is a sinner.—He deceiveth the people.—This man blasphemeth.—Behold a man gluttonous and a winebibber, a friend of publicans and sinners.

 

It is enough for the disciple that he be as his master, and the servant as his lord.—This is thankworthy, if a man for conscience toward God endure grief, suffering wrongfully. For even hereunto were ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow his steps. Who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth: who when he was reviled, reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not; but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously.—If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye.

 

Matt. 13:55. -John 1:46. -John 8:48. -Matt. 9:34. -John 9:24. -John 7:12. -Matt. 9:3. -Matt. 11:19.Matt. 10:25. -I Pet. 2:19-23. -I Pet. 4:14.

 

 

Friday

 

MAY 13 MORNING


 

Pray everywhere, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting.I TIM. 2:8.


 

The true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.—Then shalt thou call, and the Lord shall answer; thou shalt cry, and he shall say, Here I am.—When ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any.

 

Without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.—Let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive anything of the Lord.

 

If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.—My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous: and he is the propitiation for our sins.

 

John 4:23,24. -Isa. 58:9. -Mark 11:25.Heb. 11:6. -Jas. 1:6,7.Psa. 66:18. -I John 2:1,2.

 

 

MAY 13 EVENING


 

My heart panteth, my strength faileth me.PSA. 38:10.

 

Hear my cry, O God; attend unto my prayer. From the end of the earth will I cry unto thee, when my heart is overwhelmed: lead me to the rock that is higher than I.

 

He said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For when I am weak, then am I strong.

 

When (Peter) saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him, and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?—If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.—He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength.—The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms.—Strengthened with all might, according to his glorious power.

 

Psa. 61:1,2.II Cor. 12:9,10.Matt. 14:30,31. -Prov. 24:10. -Isa. 40:29. -Deut. 33:27. -Col. 1:11.

 

 

 



Yes! Jesus is Coming!  

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SUNDAY on MONDAY: David Jeremiah "TURNING POINT" (05/08/11)

 
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Turning Point

TURNING POINT
Dr. David Jeremiah
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Yes! Jesus is Coming!  

 -The Classic Christian Network-  -Biblical Prophecy Today Network-  -Last Generation News Report-

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