1 Corinthians 15:33-34

In an ideal environment, all our relationships would draw us closer to the Lord. However, we live in a fallen world with sinful people, so that is not our reality. God wants us to influence those who aren’t walking obediently with Him, but unless we’re careful, we could easily end up following them. How are we to deal with relationships that drag us down instead of building us up?

Prayer: Your first step is to pray for the people who tend to pull you away from the Lord. It’s not your job to change them, but you can ask God to work in their lives. And don’t forget to ask Him to give you the wisdom and patience you need in your interactions with them.

Separation: You may have to break off a relationship if it’s hindering your Christian walk. However, this should be done only after much prayer and wise counsel. And remember, some relationships are meant to be permanent, so listen carefully to what God is telling you.

Perseverance: If the negative relationship never changes, and the Lord is not calling you to break off association with that person, then He wants you to persevere in the situation. Your goal is to walk faithfully with your heavenly Father despite any hindrances or opposition.

If you struggle with negative relationships, cultivate friendships with godly people who can help you grow in your faith. Spend time in God’s Word, filling your mind with truths that anchor your soul in stormy situations. Persevere in walking faithfully with Christ–you may even influence the other person.

In the days of Mordecai and Queen Esther the people of Israel set themselves to remember an eventful time in their history. Mordecai sent letters throughout the provinces calling for the memorializing of the month that was turned “from sorrow into gladness and from mourning into a holiday.”(1) Near and far, the call was sent to annually remember the day the tables were turned and the Jews received relief from their enemies. And so it was determined: “These days of Purim should never cease to be celebrated by the Jews, nor should the memory of them die out among their descendants.” These days were weighted with enough hope to press upon them the need to remember forever. Moreover, and most significantly, they saw the certain possibility that they might forget.

There are moments in our lives when we realize that we are beholding the carving of a day into the great tree of history. On the night before my wedding I scribbled anxiously in my journal, “It will never be this day again, but the seventeenth of every August will never be the same either.” I knew from that day forward it would be difficult (and detrimental) to forget that day on the calendar—it would carry the force of forgetting so much more.

Israel’s history is wrought with such commands to remember. God told the Israelites that they would remember the night of Passover before the night had even happened. “This day shall be for you a memorial day, and you shall keep it as a feast to the LORD; throughout your generations, as a statute forever.”(2) Moses and Aaron were told to instruct the whole community of Israel to choose a lamb without defect and slaughter it at twilight. They were then to take some of the blood and put it on the doorposts of their houses. “The blood will be a sign,” the LORD declared. “And when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike the firstborns of Egypt.”

From that day onward, celebrating the Passover was nonnegotiable, and with good reason. God had spared his people by the blood of a lamb. From that day onward, the command was passed down from generation to generation: “You shall remember this day as a statute forever.” And so they remembered the Passover each year.

But just as we recall more than the wedding itself on an anniversary, the act of birth on a child’s birthday, or the grave events of a tragic day in history, the Israelites were remembering far more than the act of Israel’s exodus from Egypt; they were remembering the God of that Exodus—the faithful hand that moved and moves among them, the mighty acts which indeed shout of God’s timely remembering of God’s people. They were remembering God among them.

Centuries later, the disciples sat around the table celebrating their third Passover meal with Jesus, an observance they kept long before they could walk. Everything perhaps looked ceremoniously familiar. The smell of lamb filled the upper room; the unleavened bread was prepared and waiting to be broken. Remembering again the acts of God in Egypt, the blood on the doorposts, the lives spared and brought out of slavery, they looked at their teacher as he lifted the bread from the table and gave thanks to God. Then Jesus broke the bread, and gave it to them, saying something entirely new: “This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me” (Luke 22:19).

I have always wished that Luke would have described a little more of the scene that followed. Did a hush immediate fall over the room? Were the disciples once again confused at his words? Or did their years of envisioning the blood-marked doorposts cry out at the new and faultless Lamb before them?

They had spent their entire lives remembering the power and mercy of God in the events of the Passover, and on this day, Jesus tells them that there was yet even more to see: In this Passover lamb, in this the broken bread is the reflection of me. As you remember God in history, so remember me. For on this day, God is engraving across all of time the promise of Passover: “I still remember you.”

I imagine from that day forward the disciples knew it would be difficult to forget that day on the calendar.  And for us today there is no doubt something that still weights that day with hope. Forgetting what was witnessed in the upper room on that Passover carries the force of forgetting so much more.

Jill Carattini is managing editor of A Slice of Infinity at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Atlanta, Georgia.

 (1) Esther 9:22.
(2) Exodus 12:14

Morning   “Thou hatest wickedness.”   Psalm 45:7

“Be ye angry, and sin not.” There can hardly be goodness in a man if he be not

angry at sin; he who loves truth must hate every false way. How our Lord Jesus

hated it when the temptation came! Thrice it assailed him in different forms,

but ever he met it with, “Get thee behind me, Satan.” He hated it in others;

none the less fervently because he showed his hate oftener in tears of pity than

in words of rebuke; yet what language could be more stern, more Elijah-like,

than the words, “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye devour

widows’ houses, and for a pretence make long prayer.” He hated wickedness, so

much that he bled to wound it to the heart; he died that it might die;

he was buried that he might bury it in his tomb; and he rose that he might

forever trample it beneath his feet. Christ is in the Gospel, and that Gospel is

opposed to wickedness in every shape. Wickedness arrays itself in fair garments,

and imitates the language of holiness; but the precepts of Jesus, like his

famous scourge of small cords, chase it out of the temple, and will not tolerate

it in the Church. So, too, in the heart where Jesus reigns, what war there is

between Christ and Belial! And when our Redeemer shall come to be our Judge,

those thundering words, “Depart, ye cursed” which are, indeed, but a

prolongation of his life-teaching concerning sin, shall manifest his abhorrence

of iniquity. As warm as is his love to sinners, so hot is his hatred of sin; as

perfect as is his righteousness, so complete shall be the destruction of every

form of wickedness. O thou glorious champion of right, and destroyer of wrong,

for this cause hath God, even thy God, anointed thee with the oil of gladness

above thy fellows.

 

Evening   Cursed be the man before the Lord, that riseth up and buildeth this city

Jericho.”    Joshua 6:26

Since he was cursed who rebuilt Jericho, much more the man who labours to

restore Popery among us. In our fathers’ days the gigantic walls of Popery fell

by the power of their faith, the perseverance of their efforts, and the blast of

their gospel trumpets; and now there are some who would rebuild that accursed

system upon its old foundation. O Lord, be pleased to thwart their unrighteous

endeavours, and pull down every stone which they build. It should be a serious

business with us to be thoroughly purged of every error which may have a

tendency to foster the spirit of Popery, and when we have made a clean sweep at

home we should seek in every way to oppose its all too rapid spread abroad

in the church and in the world. This last can be done in secret by fervent

prayer, and in public by decided testimony. We must warn with judicious boldness

those who are inclined towards the errors of Rome; we must instruct the young in

gospel truth, and tell them of the black doings of Popery in the olden times. We

must aid in spreading the light more thoroughly through the land, for priests,

like owls, hate daylight. Are we doing all we can for Jesus and the gospel? If

not, our negligence plays into the hands of the priestcraft. What are we doing

to spread the Bible, which is the Pope’s bane and poison? Are we casting abroad

good, sound gospel writings? Luther once said, “The devil hates

goose quills” and, doubtless, he has good reason, for ready writers, by the

Holy Spirit’s blessing, have done his kingdom much damage. If the thousands who

will read this short word this night will do all they can to hinder the

rebuilding of this accursed Jericho, the Lord’s glory shall speed among the sons

of men. Reader, what can you do? What will you do?

 

This I call to mind, and therefore I have hope.   Lamentations 3:21

Memory is frequently the slave of despondency. Despairing minds remember every dark prediction in the past and expand upon every gloomy feature in the present; in this way memory, clothed in sackcloth, presents to the mind a cup of bitter-tasting herbs.

There is, however, no necessity for this. Wisdom can readily transform memory into an angel of comfort. That same recollection that on the one hand brings so many gloomy omens may be trained instead to provide a wealth of hopeful signs. She need not wear a crown of iron; she may encircle her brow with a tiara of gold, all spangled with stars.

Such was Jeremiah’s experience: in the previous verse memory had brought him to deep humiliation of soul: “My soul continually remembers it and is bowed down within me”; but now this same memory restored him to life and comfort. “But this I call to mind, and therefore I have hope.” Like a two-edged sword, his memory first killed his pride with one edge and then slew his despair with the other.

As a general principle, if we would exercise our memories more wisely, we might, in our very darkest distress, strike a match that would instantaneously kindle the lamp of comfort. There is no need for God to create a new thing upon the earth in order to restore believers’ joy; if they would prayerfully rake the ashes of the past, they would find light for the present; and if they would turn to the book of truth and the throne of grace, their candle would soon shine as before.

Let us then remember the loving-kindness of the Lord and rehearse His deeds of grace. Let us open the volume of recollection, which is so richly illuminated with memories of His mercy, and we will soon be happy. Thus memory may be, as Coleridge calls it, “the bosom-spring of joy,” and when the Divine Comforter bends it to His service, it is then the greatest earthly comfort we can know.

The family reading plan for May 28, 2012

Isaiah 29 | 3 John 1