Month: August 2020

13.q. “He gives showers of rain to all people”

Zachariah 10:1  Ask the Lord for rain in the springtime; it is the Lord who sends the thunderstorms. He gives showers of rain to all people, and plants of the field to everyone.

Psalms 65:9    You visit the earth and water it; you greatly enrich it; the river of God is full of water; you provide their grain, for so you have prepared it.

Ezekiel 34:26     And I will make them and the places all around my hill a blessing, and I will send down the showers in their season; they shall be showers of blessing.

Job 36:27  For he draws up the drops of water; they distill his mist in rain,  which the skies pour down and drop on mankind abundantly.  Can anyone understand the spreading of the clouds, the thunderings of his pavilion?  Behold, he scatters his lightning about him and covers the roots of the sea.  For by these he judges peoples; he gives food in abundance.

How often do we take rain as a given act of nature?  It is God who supplies it.  It is in God’s timing for His glory and honor, but how often do we thank Him for it?  This blessing of rain we take for granted is an opportunity each and every time to thank God.   How many times do we acknowledge the routine things in life as being from and provided by God?  How many times have you heard “boy we sure need some rain”?  Shouldn’t it rather be said, “God please send us rain”?  But we seem to think rain is an uncontrollable act of nature and God is not in control of it.  He sends the rain, and as well, He withholds it.  Both are for His plans and purposes.  By faith, we trust God for forgiveness, redemption, and salvation.  This mysterious act of grace, mercy, and love toward us is so far above our ability to understand that we can only believe and trust in God.  Like the early and late rains that are considered by many an act of nature and deny God His glory and honor for it, so are there many who deny the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  They believe God is not in control of the very “nature” He created.  They believe either that God does not exist or that He is not in control of their eternal destiny.  There is nothing created in heaven or earth that God is not in control of.  Just as He sends showers of rain and man can deny or believe it is of God so it is when He sent His Son. We can either believe and thank, honor, and glorify Jesus Christ for His gift of salvation or deny it.  The only difference is to deny God sends the rain has no eternal consequences but to deny that He sent His Son to forgive and redeem has eternal “forever” consequences.  “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.

13.p. “Surely his salvation is near to those who fear Him”

Zachariah 9:9  Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion! Shout, Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

He will proclaim peace to the nations. His rule will extend from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth.

Matthew 21:4-5   This took place to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet, saying,  “Say to the daughter of Zion, ‘Behold, your king is coming to you, humble, and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden.’”

John 12:13-15  So they took branches of palm trees and went out to meet him, crying out, “Hosanna! Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord, even the King of Israel!”  And Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, just as it is written,  “Fear not, daughter of Zion; behold, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey’s colt!”

Psalms 85:9-12    Surely his salvation is near to those who fear him, that glory may dwell in our land.  Steadfast love and faithfulness meet; righteousness and peace kiss each other.  Faithfulness springs up from the ground, and righteousness looks down from the sky.

Sometimes the darkness of this world makes it appear that evil is winning over good — but be encouraged: There is no alternate ending to the Bible! There is no scenario … not in politics, not in this pandemic, not in your personal battles … where the devil wins.  Jesus Christ, God’s only Son, was sent to redeem those, who by faith, rely on, cling to, and trust in Him alone for forgiveness, redemption, and salvation.  There is no other way by which man can be saved.  There is no other way to heave but through Jesus Christ.  It is through is sacrifice on the cross for our sin that we have hope, faith, and reliance on eternity in heaven.

13.o.

Zachariah 8:18  The word of the Lord Almighty came to me. This is what the Lord Almighty says: “The fasts of the fourth, fifth, seventh and tenth months will become joyful and glad occasions and happy festivals for Judah. Therefore love truth and peace.”

2 Kings 25:3-4    On the ninth day of the fourth month the famine was so severe in the city that there was no food for the people of the land.  Then a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war fled by night

Jeremiah 52:12-15    In the fifth month, on the tenth day of the month—that was the nineteenth year of King Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon—Nebuzaradan the captain of the bodyguard, who served the king of Babylon, entered Jerusalem.  And he burned the house of the LORD, and the king’s house and all the houses of Jerusalem; every great house he burned down.  And all the army of the Chaldeans, who were with the captain of the guard, broke down all the walls around Jerusalem.

Jeremiah 41:1-3   In the seventh month, Ishmael the son of Nethaniah, son of Elishama, of the royal family, one of the chief officers of the king, came with ten men to Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, at Mizpah. As they ate bread together there at Mizpah,  Ishmael the son of Nethaniah and the ten men with him rose up and struck down Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, with the sword, and killed him, whom the king of Babylon had appointed governor in the land.

Jeremiah 52:4    And in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, on the tenth day of the month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came with all his army against Jerusalem, and laid siege to it. And they built siegeworks all around it.

The fasts recorded in vs. 19 were instituted by man in the remembrance of their sin and the curse of God that fell upon them.  They wanted to remember how they did not honor, glorify, or obey God, and because of this they angered God and were punished.  They did not want to repeat this again.  Here we read of God promising blessing.

Campbell Morgan said of these man-appointed fasts: “None of these things had been in the purpose of God for His people; they had resulted from their sins. The fasts, therefore, were the result of their sins. In jealousy and fury, the outcome of love, Jehovah would put away their sins, and so restore them to true prosperity. On that day, let them still remember and observe, only let the observance be a feast in celebration of God’s grace, instead of a fast in memory of their sin.”  We can get hung up on our past sins and forget the blessings of forgiveness.  Peter put it this way;  2Peter 1:3  His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire.  For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge,  and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness,  and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love.  For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins.  Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall.

13.n. “Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer; they will seek me diligently but will not find me.”

Zachariah 7:8   And the word of the Lord came again to Zechariah: “This is what the Lord Almighty said: ‘Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor. Do not plot evil against each other.’ “But they refused to pay attention; stubbornly they turned their backs and covered their ears. They made their hearts as hard as flint and would not listen to the law or to the words that the Lord Almighty had sent by his Spirit through the earlier prophets. So the Lord Almighty was very angry. “‘When I called, they did not listen; so when they called, I would not listen,’ says the Lord Almighty. ‘I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations, where they were strangers. The land they left behind them was so desolate that no one traveled through it. This is how they made the pleasant land desolate.’”

2 Kings 17:13-15    Yet the LORD warned Israel and Judah by every prophet and every seer, saying, “Turn from your evil ways and keep my commandments and my statutes, in accordance with all the Law that I commanded your fathers, and that I sent to you by my servants the prophets.”  But they would not listen, but were stubborn, as their fathers had been, who did not believe in the LORD their God.  They despised his statutes and his covenant that he made with their fathers and the warnings that he gave them. They went after false idols and became false, and they followed the nations that were around them, concerning whom the LORD had commanded them that they should not do like them.

2 Chronicles 33:10   The LORD spoke to Manasseh and to his people, but they paid no attention.

Nehemiah 9:29     And you warned them in order to turn them back to your law. Yet they acted presumptuously and did not obey your commandments, but sinned against your rules, which if a person does them, he shall live by them, and they turned a stubborn shoulder and stiffened their neck and would not obey.

Proverbs 1:24-32     Because I have called and you refused to listen, have stretched out my hand and no one has heeded,  because you have ignored all my counsel and would have none of my reproof,  I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when terror strikes you,  when terror strikes you like a storm and your calamity comes like a whirlwind, when distress and anguish come upon you.  Then they will call upon me, but I will not answer; they will seek me diligently but will not find me.  Because they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of the LORD,  would have none of my counsel and despised all my reproof,  therefore they shall eat the fruit of their way, and have their fill of their own devices.  For the simple are killed by their turning away, and the complacency of fools destroys them;

Jeremiah 44:16     “As for the word that you have spoken to us in the name of the LORD, we will not listen to you.

Hebrews 12:25     See that you do not refuse him who is speaking. For if they did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape if we reject him who warns from heaven.

They refused to listen; they resisted the warners; they exhibited open contempt for them.  They willfully were ignorant and would not consider nor want to understand.  What level of contempt is it when a person sets their heart hard as stone so that their ears are deaf to the Word of God? Do you ever wonder if people consider the Word of God a burden?  Is this why they harden their heart to God?  Think about this.  The Word of God proclaims a righteous, pure, and holy Creator God.  It proclaims the fall of mankind.  It exposes the sinful nature of man.  It proclaims the separation between God and man due to this fallen sinful state. It proclaims God’s wrath, anger, and judgment. It proclaims God’s grace, mercy, and love toward mankind with promises of restoration, redemption, and salvation.  It proclaims blessings.  It is a guide and restraint to the sinful nature of our hearts.  It proclaims the wonders and mystery of God.  It proclaims the promises of God.  It proclaims warnings.  It yields hope, joy, peace, refuge, courage, power, kindness, forgiveness, and rest for those who have open hearts, minds, souls, and ears to hear, believe, obey, and trust in what God proclaims.  It also yields hardened hearts, minds, souls, and ears to those who defy, deny, and resist what God proclaims.  It promises eternity in heaven for those who believe.  It promises eternity in hell for those who do not believe.

Is it a burden to live for God?  Is it a burden to live holy, righteous, and pleasing to the God of all there is?  Is it a burden to live to honor, glorify, worship, magnify, and praise to God?  Is it a burden to live in loving kindness?  Is it a burden to live showing mercy and grace to others?  It is not a burden but a blessing to be loved by God and in a restored relationship with Him.  What is the alternative to our lives should we choose to deny and defy God?  Isn’t the true burden of life trying to live as though God does not exist?  Every day Creation screams out the existence of God and every day the heart of the deniers must harden more and try to make sense and purpose of this life.  Every day the burden of denial becomes heavier and heavier.  The denying soul will find that the burden of life brings no pleasure or satisfaction even though they search diligently for it in the things this world has to offer.  The Word of God is not a burden.  It is a wondrous blessing from God to His creation.

12.m. This was a daily devotion from Pathway to Victory; 31 July 2020

If somebody asked your best friend to describe you in one word, what word would they use? Is there one word that captures who you are? Maybe they would say, “Oh, he is funny.” Does that mean you’re funny all the time? No, there are probably times you are serious. You probably don’t laugh through that many funerals. Or they might say, “Oh, she’s spontaneous.” Does that mean you’re always spontaneous? There are probably a few things you plan for as well. The truth is, there’s probably no single word that describes you. And that would be true about God as well. God is a number of characteristics. He is omnipotent: all-powerful. He’s omniscient: all-knowing. He is immutable: unchangeable. Those are things that are true about God all the time. But even though those things are true about God all the time, there is no single word that sums up God. God is greater than all His attributes combined just as you are greater than all your attributes combined.

But if we had to pick a single characteristic of God that transcends all others, it would be the word “holy.” When the prophet Isaiah saw a vision of the Lord high and lifted up, he saw angels circling the throne of God and crying out, “Holy, Holy, Holy, is the Lord of hosts, the whole earth is full of His glory” (6:3). It is interesting that the seraphim did not cry out, “Love, love, love” or “Justice, justice, justice” or “Omnipotent, omnipotent, omnipotent.” Instead the single attribute of God they cried out about was His holiness. Holy, holy, holy.

What does the word “holy” mean? It comes from a Hebrew word that means “to cut” or “to separate.” When we say God is holy, we’re saying He is a cut above anyone in heaven or earth. When Isaiah saw the separateness of God, how did he respond? In Isaiah 6:5, he said, “Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts.” The true God is different than any other god. Pagan religions picture their gods as participating in evil, but not the true God. Habakkuk said this about the true God: “Your eyes are too pure to approve evil, and You can not look on wickedness with favor” (1:13). God has zero tolerance for sin. We are so fallen as human beings we imagine ourselves to be more tolerant and loving than God is. We say, “Why can’t God be accepting of people like we are? We hang around sinners, and we don’t mind it. And we’re able to overlook sin in our life as well as the sin in other people. Why can’t God be more like that?” Our ability to tolerate sin in ourselves and others is not a sign of our godliness; it’s a sign of our ungodliness. We are comfortable with sin because we are sinners, but God is absolute purity and holiness, so He has no tolerance for sin of any kind. And it is that zero tolerance for sin that creates distance between God and us. God is not like we are. He is the one true God who is holy, who is different, and who can only be approached in one way. And the old way was one way.

12.l. “He died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.”

Zachariah 7:1  In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the Lord came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, the month of Kislev. The people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regem-Melek, together with their men, to entreat the Lord by asking the priests of the house of the Lord Almighty and the prophets, “Should I mourn and fast in the fifth month, as I have done for so many years?” Then the word of the Lord Almighty came to me: “Ask all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for the past seventy years, was it really for me that you fasted? And when you were eating and drinking, were you not just feasting for yourselves? Are these not the words the Lord proclaimed through the earlier prophets when Jerusalem and its surrounding towns were at rest and prosperous, and the Negev and the western foothills were settled?’”

Isaiah 58:1  “Cry aloud; do not hold back; lift up your voice like a trumpet; declare to my people their transgression, to the house of Jacob their sins.Yet they seek me daily and delight to know my ways, as if they were a nation that did righteousness and did not forsake the judgment of their God; they ask of me righteous judgments; they delight to draw near to God.‘Why have we fasted, and you see it not? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you take no knowledge of it?’ Behold, in the day of your fast you seek your own pleasure, and oppress all your workers. Behold, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to hit with a wicked fist. Fasting like yours this day will not make your voice to be heard on high. Is such the fast that I choose, a day for a person to humble himself? Is it to bow down his head like a reed, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Will you call this a fast, and a day acceptable to the LORD?“Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh?Then shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up speedily; your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’ If you take away the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness, if you pour yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness and your gloom be as the noonday. And the LORD will guide you continually and satisfy your desire in scorched places and make your bones strong; and you shall be like a watered garden, like a spring of water, whose waters do not fail.

Romans 14:17-18   For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

1 Corinthians 10:31   So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

2 Corinthians 5:15    and he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.

Colossians 3:23    Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men,

The Law of Moses only commanded one fast day, on the Day of Atonement. In addition to this day, during the exile, the Jewish people instituted four more fasts to remember key dates in the tragic defeat of their nation.  These additional fasts were not commanded by God, but instituted by man. Yet because they were traditionally practiced for so long (at least 70 years), they developed an authority of their own.  God’s word through Zechariah rebuked the people of God for what their fasting had become – indulgent pity-parties instead of a time to genuinely seek God. Their lives were not right when they did eat and drink – that they did for themselves, not for the LORD. A few days of fasting every year could not make up for the rest of the year lived for self.   Because their hearts were not right with God, their rituals were not right before God. Everyday obedience would make their times of fasting meaningful, but their neglect of everyday obedience made their fasting hypocritical.  Instead of actively performing and pretending, God wants us to focus on active obedience and an active walk with Him. Think about this; these additional fasts were established by man to remember what had happened to them when they were disobedient to God and they became a man-made way of getting right before God.  They established special days where they would piously observe fasting and yet the rest of the time they lived for self.  This is not obedience but rather ritual.  A heart for God will be a heart for God every day, every moment, and in every fiber of the fabric of their soul, not just on special days.