We will not hide them from their descendants; we will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done.
TO PONDER
I wonder when faith became such a private and individual thing? When you look at the early church in the book of Acts, and the efforts of the apostles in those early years to teach and proclaim Jesus to all the world, people shared not only Jesus but they shared everything they had (Acts 4:32).
We might not have first hand experience of crossing a sea on dry land while God held back the waves, we may not have personally spent 3 days in the belly of a big fish, likewise, we may not have been called by God to go and slay a literal giant with a sling and some stones. However, each of us have a story which includes a God who is active and present in our lives. why would we hide those encounters with God from others and not share them excitedly with our friends and family.
Every time God answers a prayer we have another praiseworthy deed to share and pass on to the next generation. Yes we also should pass on the wonderful things God has done and which have been recorded in Scripture, but God is not done showing us his faithfulness.
When you pray, pay attention. When God answers, don't be shy about sharing what he has done and how he has answered with others.
PRAYER: Lord God, you alone are worthy of all glory honour and praise. Please help me to be more aware of the ay you are at work in my life and in the world around me so that I too can proclaim to the next generation all the praiseworthy and wonderful ways you continue to love and care for us. Amen
Today's devotion written by Mathew von Stanke, LifeWay Newcastle
I will make an everlasting covenant with them: I will never stop doing good to them, and I will inspire them to fear me, so that they will never turn away from me.
TO PONDER
I heard an old debate on YouTube recently between famous atheist Richard Dawkins and Christian apologist, mathematician, and philosopher, John Lennox. Dawkins claimed that Christian faith is a faith that is blind faith, that it has no evidence to back it up. In response Lennox asked Dawkins with the following question, "Do you trust that your wife loves you and what's your evidence?
Dawkins replied with a whole list of things, the affection that she shows, the look in her eye, the gifts that she gives, the acts of service and care that she performs.
Lennox replied that this is exactly the same kind of evidence on which Christian faith is held. God has been at work since the very beginning of creation doing good to us, demonstrating and revealing his love for us, showing us how he cares, serves and gives his life for us. Surely that kind of evidence should give us confidence to trust in God's promises.
PRAYER: Heavenly Father, Thank you for the way you work at showing and proving your love and faithfulness to me. Forgive me for the times when I fail to see or trust that you are at work in my life, and help me to trust you more. Amen
Today's devotion written by Mathew von Stanke, LifeWay Newcastle
This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel
after that time, declares the Lord.
I will put my laws in their minds
and write them on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
TO PONDER:
Dad taught me to drive at the age of 8. We would often go up to the school that was being built and have to drag the sprinklers around on the oval that was being established. We would hook them up to the tow bar and drag the heavy hoses from place to place. It was strange learning to change gears when you first began. You would often look down and make sure you were going from second to third etc. But after a while, it becomes second nature. You don't even think about what you are doing, you just do it. So today, if I have to drive a manual car, after not having driven one for a while, it's second nature to with between an automatic and a manual.
The writer to the Hebrews picks up on the words that Jeremiah spoke to the people about the new covenant that God would establish with his people. The first covenant was written in stone...the Ten Commandments given on Mt. Sinai...but the new covenant God says will be written on our hearts. In other words living God's way will become second nature to us. This new relationship with God, not mediated through another person but where we have direct access to God, where we can connect with God, communicate with God, receive from God, share with God, commune with God will be so natural and life-transforming, that we don't give it a second thought. It's just the way we live. How is your relationship with God so natural, so second nature to you that you don't even have to think about it but prayer, reading the Word, listening to God, serving God, seeking God is the most natural thing that you do? If it is not, may there are things that you need to practice more often, so they become second nature and a delight to do!
PRAYER:
Jesus, transform my life more and more each day, so that living in your presence, your way, is second nature and the most natural thing in the world for me. Amen.
Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.
TO PONDER
Recently, I bought a new pair of sunglasses. As I tried on all sorts of different pairs, the person helping me gave me all different options. There was orange tints, blue tints, grey tints, brown tints, black tints. Each tint gave a slightly different perspective on the world around me. It was the same picture but a different hue. As Christians, the Holy Spirit calls, gathers and invites us to see the world through heavenly glasses that will radically change the perspective from which we view life. One way we can do this is by practicing the presence of Christ.
Years ago I read a book 'The Practice of the Presence of Christ' by Brother Lawrence. He was a soldier who died in 1691, who witnessed the horrors of war and ended up wounded and lame himself. One day when he was going at a dead tree, he says it as a parable of his own lifeless state, yet he knew that God had life waiting for him, just like the season of spring would bring fullness of life to a tree. It ignited in him a deep desire for an unceasing love for God. Brother Lawrence ended up in a French monastery, where he took the jobs of being a dishwasher and a cook. As he went about these mundane tasks, he invited God into them and found joy and fulfilment by seeing these everyday tasks as experiences that were filled with God's presence. That's exactly what our reading is talking about. What would it look like for you to invite Christ into everything you do today, to talk to God about the phone call you have to make, the meeting that you go into, the clothes that you are washing, the house that you are tidying, the conversation that you are having, the journey you are taking in the car, the child that you are feeding, the email that you are writing, the song that you are composing? Try it...and see how Christ will transform that moment into something of heavenly beauty!
PRAYER:
Lord Jesus, help me fix my eyes on you today, that I can see your presence in every moment I face today. Amen.
No, a person is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code.Such a person’s praise is not from other people, but from God.
TO PONDER:
Is your head spinning trying to work out what this text is all about. For the people to whom Paul was writing, it would have made their head spin too! .
Paul is turning things on their head. He basically says that there are some uncircumcised godless Gentiles that are closer to God than the the Jew who is circumcised. Still confused? Paul says, "It's not just a matter of the outward things that you do, it's what on the inside that counts." It's not going through the motions of getting circumcised, circumcision was a seal of someone's commitment to the Lord, in the same way that the wedding ring on my finger announces to everyone that I am married. But what Paul is saying is that you can be circumcised and still not be devoted to the Lord, you could wear a wedding ring, but live in a way where your heart and affection is for someone else. Faithfulness to God is that the desires, the affections of your heart, are devoted to the Lord. You delight in, you desire, you treasure God's ways. What is happening on the inside will reveal itself on the outside. The change of heart, the new heart, that the Spirit gives to us, will lead to changes on the outside which people can see. So take some time today to reflect on how you have changed inwardly over the past six months...and how is that showing on the outside?
PRAYER
Change my heart O God, make me ever true. Change my heart O God, may I be like you. Amen.
How priceless is your unfailing love, O God!
People take refuge in the shadow of your wings.
TO PONDER:
"Priceless!" It was a meme before there were memes. The tagline of the Mastercard campaign, "There are some things that money can't buy. For everything else there's MasterCard." It became one of the most successful ad campaigns, going viral before social media ever existed. and it changed the fortunes of the company.
The campaign creators picked up on the things that are priceless and cannot be bought. The relationship between a father-son, a family watching a movie together...things which, when all is said and done...are priceless.
But they missed the most priceless thing of all. The relationship between God and his people. " How priceless is your unfailing love, (your devotion to us your people), O God." A devotion that made you willing to give up your only Son so we could experience the fullness of your faithful, kind, loyal, merciful and perfect love. Priceless! It can't be bought, because it is worth far more than anything in all the world, more precious and rare than the greatest human version of love we experience in this world. What's more it's a love that is for all people...whether you are someone, no-one or anyone in between, God calls you his 'people' and offers you a place of safety, security and protection in his unfailing love. That's priceless and you get to enjoy that love today...and everyday...as his gift to you!
PRAYER:
How priceless is your love for me, O God. Help me never take it for granted, but to live fully in the beauty of your unfailing devotion for me. Amen.
Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
TO PONDER:
Love. It's the most overrated word in our English language. Just think about how we use the term. We love our football team (and hate them with they disappoint us). We love holidays. We love food. We love what people are wearing. We love a post on instagram or LinkedIn or Facebook! You hear people all the times saying as they say goodbye to someone they know, "love you". Love...it seems...is a word that we use whenever we feel good about something and, as a culture, we are obsessed with feeling good.
One of Jesus' closest friends tells us in his first letter, that love is not a feeling, it is not feeling good. But love is experienced, known only in relationship to the source of love...God himself. God is love. It's not something he does, it's not something he feels, it's his very being. In his presence, we experience the fullness, the wonder of what it means to be truly known, accepted, desired...loved. Forever and completely.
When that love fills you...it flows from you!
PRAYER:
Loving God, may your love in me overflow today. Amen.
No longer will they teach their neighbor,
or say to one another, ‘Know the Lord,’
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest,”
declares the Lord.
“For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more.”
TO PONDER:
From dependence to independence. That's something we have all experienced in life. From needing help to get dressed and tie our shoes, to learning to dress ourselves and tie our own shoes. As parents, our goal is to raise independent children who can do things themselves. Yet many times in life, in raising our children, or when there was frustration about how long things were taking, there were times when we would just have to say, "let me do it for you."
In many ways, this is exactly what God is saying here to his people. "Just let me do it for you." He had tried so many times to tell his people to return to him, to repent of their ways, to live in the relationship that he had established with them. But they failed to listen, They refused to listen. They thought they could find political solutions to their troubles without changing their ways while continuing to sin and all that God them was misery and time in exile.
So God says, "Let me do it for you." Let me make a new covenant. Let me remove all the obstacles. Let me complete all that needs to be done, so you can be with me forever and live in freedom. Let me do for you what you can never do by yourself...live in relationship with me. That is what God has done...from the least to the greatest. That is what Christ has won...for the least and the greatest...through his finished work on the cross. Will you give up trying to do it all yourself and failing? Will you acknowledge your dependency on Christ and delight in that, grow in that and enjoy the blessings of that? That's the question God asks today, "I have done everything for you...will you receive it?"
PRAYER:
Faithful God, from the least to the greatest, you hear our cries. From the least to the greatest you know our need. Thankyou that from the least to the greatest you grant your forgiveness by doing everything for us so we may have a place in your presence. Help me live in that grace today. Amen.
The Lord appeared to us in the past, saying:
“I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness.
TO PONDER:
Are you a person who wears their heart on their sleeve? Does everyone around you know when you are happy, sad, passionate or angry about something? To wear one’s heart on one’s sleeve means to be transparent and open about one's feelings, emotions. It's obvious!
God wears his heart on his sleeve too. He never leaves us guessing about how he feels about us, about the the relationship he desires with us. God loves us with an everlasting love. He always has, always will. In the book of Jeremiah, we see God wearing his heart of his sleeve over and over again. It's a heart that aches to be in relationship with his people, that desires nothing more for people to return to ohm and the blessings he wants to to bestow on their lives. It reveals a heart that doesn't given up on people, despite their stubbornness, their stiff-necked behaviour, their refusal to walk his way. Despite everything, God's heart is there for all to see. It's a heart that culminated in giving his only son, that whoever believes in him will live forever.
Will you stop and see the heart of God on display in this world...in your own life. Will you see his deep desire to be fully engaged in your life, for you to be fully engaged in his life? His heart for you in plain to see...he never hides it!
PRAYER:
God, thank you that you never hide how you feel about me. Open my eyes to see your love, to experience your love and give me the courage to live in your love every day. Amen.