Daily Archives: February 5, 2013

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The Requirements of Servanthood – Charles Stanley

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Luke 19:1-10

Over time believers should become increasingly like Christ. We’re never more like Him than when we are selflessly reaching out to meet somebody else’s needs.

As servants, we need to incorporate the following into our lives:

• Awareness. Jesus stopped under the sycamore tree because He was aware that Zaccheus was up there. How many needy people are “hiding in trees” while you walk by them without looking up?

• Availability. On spotting the tax collector, Jesus didn’t make an appointment to go see him a few weeks later. Being available was such a priority that He dropped whatever agenda He may have had and went right to Zaccheus’s house.

• Acceptance. Jesus did not wait until Zaccheus got cleaned up and straightened out his life. The Lord accepted him just as he was. We must never forget how Jesus embraced us, filthy rags and all.

• Abiding. When we are saved, we become grafted into the vine of Jesus Christ. Abiding in Him is the only way to find the resources to serve other people in the way that they need to be served.

• Abandonment. God calls us to abandon our selfish desires. Only in leaving behind self-seeking ways will we be free to truly serve others.

Jesus came, not as a superstar to be served, but as a servant who would give His life as a ransom for many (Matt. 20:28). He tells us to go and do likewise. When we’ve received Him as Savior and then yield to Him as Lord, our lives become a living expression of the One who came to be a servant to all.

 

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Our Daily Bread — The Lesson

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Romans 12:14-21

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. —Romans 12:21

One summer I was at a gathering of old high school acquaintances when someone behind me tapped me on my shoulder. As my eyes drifted over the woman’s name tag, my mind drifted back in time. I remembered a tightly folded note that had been shoved through the slot on my locker. It had contained cruel words of rejection that had shamed me and crushed my spirit. I remember thinking, Somebody needs to teach you a lesson on how to treat people! Although I felt as if I were reliving my adolescent pain, I mustered up my best fake smile; and insincere words began coming out of my mouth.

 

We began to converse. A sad story of a difficult upbringing and of an unhappy marriage began to pour out of her. As it did, the words “root of bitterness” from Hebrews 12:15 popped into my head. That’s what I’m feeling, I thought. After all these years, I still had a deep root of bitterness hidden within me, twisting around and strangling my heart.

Then these words came to my mind: “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good” (Rom. 12:21).

We talked. We even shared some tears. Neither of us mentioned the long-ago incident. God taught someone a lesson that afternoon—a lesson of forgiveness and of letting go of bitterness. He taught it to me. —Cindy Hess Kasper

Dear Lord, please help me not to harbor resentment

and bitterness in my heart. Through the power

of the Holy Spirit, enable me to let go of my

bitterness and forgive those who have hurt me.

 

Revenge imprisons us; forgiveness sets us free.

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Giving Forgiveness – Ravi Zacharias Ministry

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“I need to ask for your forgiveness,” the voice on the other end of the phone said to me. This friend from many years ago called to seek reconciliation with me for an old offense. We had worked together and in the course of our working-relationship our friendship was damaged. More often than I care to admit, I am the one who needs to ask for forgiveness. But in this case, I was the offended party.

I was surprised by this phone call, of course, since it came out of the blue and concerned events from quite some time ago. But I was more surprised by my own response. “Of course,” I intoned, “I forgive you.” And for the duration of the conversation, I really believed that I had forgiven my friend. But as I thought about the exchange, I brought back into the present what I had carefully stored away in my memory. Feelings of hurt and betrayal emerged just as if the event was happening all over again. In my heart, instead of feeling relief as a result of my friend’s phone call, I felt bitterness and anger choke me. And the desire to punish my friend—by withholding genuine affection or by issuing words of condemnation—became preeminent in my thoughts and feelings.

As a Christian, I am pained to admit that I have these feelings at all. After all, forgiveness is at the heart of Christianity, and having just come through the Advent Season where we celebrate God’s compassion towards the world in the sending of his Son Jesus, I should be overflowing with forgiveness. Instead, I felt more like the servant in Matthew’s gospel who even though forgiven of an enormous debt—a debt too large to ever repay—in turn, goes out, finds one who owes him a miniscule amount, and begins to choke this lesser debtor demanding immediate repayment. Instead, of extending the same generosity shown to him, this ungrateful servant punishes the other servant by throwing him in prison.(1)

My unforgiving spirit imprisoned my friend. But it also imprisoned me. An unwillingness to forgive locks us all up in bitterness, and throws away the key. It enslaves us to ingratitude, and chokes out gratefulness. It prevents us from experiencing the freedom that comes with free-flowing grace—both received and given—just as the ungrateful servant neither received nor extended grace in Jesus’s parable. The ensuing desire to punish those who have hurt us belies our smug, moral superiority that designates punishment as more fitting than grace.

Jesus tells this parable of the unforgiving servant in response to a question from his disciple Peter. Peter asks the question, “Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to seven times?” Jesus answers, “I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven.”(2) In other words, Jesus is saying that forgiveness is unlimited, and forgiveness by nature is something that cannot be measured in its appropriation. When we fail to forgive, we fail to recognize our own debt, and we fail to appreciate the reality of the limitless scope of forgiving grace on our account. Peter wanted to know at what point he could cease from offering forgiveness—after the seventh offense. But in answering Peter’s question by telling this story, Jesus demonstrates that none of us are in the position to withhold forgiveness from each other. In the end, we are all in need of forgiveness, and to withhold it demonstrates unparalleled ungratefulness for God’s gracious action towards the debt we could never repay to God.

To be sure, dealing with our human hurts and offenses, and becoming generous people who freely forgive takes time and effort. And for some of us, the hurts we have suffered and endured may never result in phone calls that attempt to reconcile and restore relationship. Nevertheless, the cultivation of a forgiving heart frees us from bondage and opens us to the possibilities of giving forgiveness instead of punishment. For the one who understands first and foremost her own need for forgiveness, and the one who then opens his heart up to forgive others, enters (perhaps even unknowingly) into the very heart of God. “And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven us.”(3)

Margaret Manning is a member of the speaking and writing team at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries in Seattle, Washington.

(1) Matthew 18:21-35

(2) Matthew 18:21.

(3) Ephesians 4:32.

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Charles Spurgeon’s Morning and Evening

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Morning  “The Father sent the Son to be the Saviour of the world.” / 1 John 4:14

It is a sweet thought that Jesus Christ did not come forth without his Father’s permission, authority, consent, and assistance. He was sent of the Father, that he might be the Saviour of men. We are too apt to forget that, while there are distinctions as to the persons in the Trinity, there are no distinctions of honour. We too frequently ascribe the honour of our salvation, or at least the depths of its benevolence, more to Jesus Christ than we do the Father. This is a very great mistake. What if Jesus came? Did not his Father send him? If he spake wondrously, did not his Father pour grace into his lips, that he might be an able minister of the new covenant? He who knoweth the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost as he should know them, never setteth one before another in his love; he sees them at Bethlehem, at Gethsemane, and on Calvary, all equally engaged in the work of salvation. O Christian, hast thou put thy confidence in the Man Christ Jesus? Hast thou placed thy reliance solely on him? And art thou united with him? Then believe that thou art united unto the God of heaven. Since to the Man Christ Jesus thou art brother, and holdest closest fellowship, thou art linked thereby with God the Eternal, and “the Ancient of days” is thy Father and thy friend. Didst thou ever consider the depth of love in the heart of Jehovah, when God the Father equipped his Son for the great enterprise of mercy? If not, be this thy day’s meditation. The Father sent him! Contemplate that subject. Think how Jesus works what the Father wills. In the wounds of the dying Saviour see the love of the great I AM. Let every thought of Jesus be also connected with the Eternal, ever-blessed God, for “It pleased the Lord to bruise him; he hath put him to grief.”

 

Evening  “At that time Jesus answered.” / Matthew 11:25

This is a singular way in which to commence a verse–“At that time Jesus answered.” If you will look at the context you will not perceive that any person had asked him a question, or that he was in conversation with any human being. Yet it is written, “Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father.” When a man answers, he answers a person who has been speaking to him. Who, then, had spoken to Christ? his Father. Yet there is no record of it; and this should teach us that Jesus had constant fellowship with his Father, and that God spake into his heart so often, so continually, that it was not a circumstance singular enough to be recorded. It was the habit and life of Jesus to talk with God. Even as Jesus was, in this world, so are we; let us therefore learn the lesson which this simple statement concerning him teaches us. May we likewise have silent fellowship with the Father, so that often we may answer him, and though the world wotteth not to whom we speak, may we be responding to that secret voice unheard of any other ear, which our own ear, opened by the Spirit of God, recognizes with joy. God has spoken to us, let us speak to God–either to set our seal that God is true and faithful to his promise, or to confess the sin of which the Spirit of God has convinced us, or to acknowledge the mercy which God’s providence has given, or to express assent to the great truths which God the Holy Ghost has opened to our understanding. What a privilege is intimate communion with the Father of our spirits! It is a secret hidden from the world, a joy with which even the nearest friend intermeddleth not. If we would hear the whispers of God’s love, our ear must be purged and fitted to listen to his voice. This very evening may our hearts be in such a state, that when God speaks to us, we, like Jesus, may be prepared at once to answer him.

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The Joy of Faithful Service – John MacArthur

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“Paul and Timothy, bond-servants of Christ Jesus” (Phil. 1:1).

The metaphor of Christians as slaves to Christ is common in Paul’s writings. It is one his readers would have readily understood because of the prevalence of slavery in the Roman Empire.

Peter, James, John, and Jude used the same metaphor of their own ministries, as did Jesus in Mark 10:45: “The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” In Philippians 2:7 Paul refers to Christ as a bond-servant who set aside the glory He was due and humbled Himself to the point of death.

The Greek word translated “bond-servant” in Philippians 1:1 was commonly used of those who, out of devotion to their masters, chose to remain as slaves when having the opportunity to be released. They were also known as love slaves because they served out of love, not compulsion.

That is a beautiful picture of the believer. We are God’s bond-servants (Rev. 1:1), having been freed from sin and enslaved to Him (Rom. 6:22).

While slavery brings to mind deprivation and inhumane treatment of one’s fellow man, slaves in the Roman Empire usually were treated with dignity and respect. Although most had no personal possessions, their masters supplied everything they needed for life and health. Additionally, many were entrusted with significant responsibilities in their master’s home.

A disobedient or self-willed slave was of no use to his master, but faithful slaves, who set aside their personal interests to accomplish their master’s will, were a precious possession.

Jesus said, “My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to accomplish His work” (John 4:34). As God’s bond-servant that should be your goal as well. Be faithful so God can use you mightily.

Suggestions for Prayer:  Thank God for the privilege of serving Him.

Seek wisdom to appropriate your spiritual resources as you perform the tasks God has entrusted to you.

For Further Study:  Philemon is a letter Paul wrote to accompany Onesimus, a runaway slave, whom Paul had led to the Lord and was now returning to his master, Philemon.

Read Philemon.

What was Paul’s desire for Onesimus?

What does this letter reveal about Philemon’s character?

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A Lesson from the Sower – Greg Laurie

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So then neither he who plants is anything, nor he who waters, but God who gives the increase —1 Corinthians 3:7

The parable of the sower is an illustration Jesus used that shows different reactions to the gospel message. In this story, a sower goes out and sows seed, and it falls on four different types of soil. Today, we might go and prepare the ground, carefully put in the seed, and use an irrigation system and all kinds of sophisticated hardware to help us get the job done well. But back then, it was a little more primitive.

Basically, the sower would reach into his sack with his hand and then throw out the seed . . . to the left . . . to the right . . . forward . . . backward. And wherever the seed went, it went. Some of it fell on good ground, some of it fell on rocky ground, and some of it fell along the roadside and so forth. Finally, some fell and was very productive. The actual act of plowing was done later, and then the sower would harvest whatever kind of crop he had.

The same could be said of so-called crusade evangelism, or proclamation evangelism. At Harvest Ministries, we throw out the seed in a stadium. We throw it out over the Internet. Then we throw it out over the radio. And so the seed gets thrown out further and further and further, but it is God who ultimately does the work of conversion. Jesus said, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him . . .” (John 6:44).

Some people are critical of this type of evangelism. But my question is, why wouldn’t we want to reach as many people as possible, using every form of media available? Our job is to reach as many as we can.

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Something Better – Max Lucado

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When my daughter, Jenna, was little I often took her to a park near our home. One day as she played in a sandbox, I bought her ice-cream, but when I turned to give it to her, her mouth was full of sand. Where I had intended to put a delicacy, she had put dirt. Did I love her with dirt in her mouth?  Absolutely. Was I going to allow her to keep the dirt in her mouth? No way!  I loved her where she was, but I refused to leave her there.  Why?  Because I love her.

God does the same for us.  “Spit out the dirt, honey,” our Father urges. “I’ve got something better for you.” “I can eat dirt if I want to!” we pout and proclaim.  We can.  But if we do, the loss is ours.  God has a better offer.  He wants us to be just like Jesus!

“Create in me a pure heart, God, and make my spirit right again.” (Psalm 51:10 NCV).