Daily Archives: April 14, 2017

Charles Stanley

Charles Stanley – What Really Happened at Calvary

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Hebrews 10:10-14

If asked what took place on Good Friday, many people could list the events of Calvary. Some might explain that Christ was nailed to the cross, Roman soldiers gambled for His garments, and darkness covered the land. Others would mention the crown of thorns, an earthquake, and Jesus’ mother watching with what must have been heartbreak and horror.

But no matter how many visible details one could mention, far more was going on than the eye could see: At the cross, sin was judged.

In giving His very first command in the garden of Eden, God warned that disobedience carried the death penalty (Gen. 2:17). So from the start, His judgment of sin was prophesied, and later it was also pictured in the elaborate sacrificial system He established. Under this system, each transgression required an animal’s blood to be sprinkled on the altar. The severity of the penalty—payment of a life—was a graphic way for our holy God to communicate how offensive and grievous sin actually is. It was also a foreshadowing of the Lamb of God, who would come to take away the sin of the world (John 1:29).

Jesus Christ was, on the cross, what that lamb was on the altar—but with a significant difference: Under the old covenant, every time sin was committed, another animal had to die. Jesus, however, willingly offered Himself once for all to atone for the sin of the entire world (Heb. 7:27).

Refusing to personally accept Christ’s substitutionary atonement leaves a person with the responsibility of paying his or her own sin debt. Won’t you thank the Savior for your amazing free gift—or receive it from Him now?

Bible in One Year: 1 Kings 3-5

 

http://www.intouch.org/

Our Daily Bread

Our Daily Bread — Remember the Cross

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Read: Mark 15:19–20, 33–39

Bible in a Year: 1 Samuel 25–26; Luke 12:32–59

“Surely this man was the Son of God!”—Mark 15:39

In the church I attend, a large cross stands at the front of the sanctuary. It represents the original cross where Jesus died—the place where our sin intersected with His holiness. There God allowed His perfect Son to die for the sake of every wrong thing we have ever done, said, or thought. On the cross, Jesus finished the work that was required to save us from the death we deserve (Rom. 6:23).

The sight of a cross causes me to consider what Jesus endured for us. Before being crucified, He was flogged and spit on. The soldiers hit Him in the head with sticks and got down on their knees in mock worship. They tried to make Him carry His own cross to the place where He would die, but He was too weak from the brutal flogging. At Golgotha, they hammered nails through His flesh to keep Him on the cross when they turned it upright. Those wounds bore the weight of His body as He hung there. Six hours later, Jesus took His final breath (Mark 15:37). A centurion who witnessed Jesus’s death declared, “Surely this man was the Son of God!” (v. 39).

The next time you see the symbol of the cross, consider what it means to you. God’s Son suffered and died there and then rose again to make eternal life possible. —Jennifer Benson Schuldt

Dear Jesus, I can’t begin to thank You enough for taking care of my sin when You died on the cross. I acknowledge Your sacrifice, and I believe in the power of Your resurrection.

The cross of Christ reveals our sin at its worst and God’s love at its best.

INSIGHT: In the two cameos provided in our reading today, we witness the injustice and horrors of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Verses 19-20 reveal the terrible indignity Jesus endured before going to the cross. Roman soldiers mocked, struck, and spit on Him. Next, a supernatural darkness came over the world (vv. 33-39). Many theologians believe it was then that the eternal fellowship of the Trinity—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—was disrupted as God the Son was made sin for us so that we might have right standing and relationship with God. The Father turned away from Him and in anguish Christ cried out: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” But because of God’s redeeming love, we will never be forsaken. How does this give you greater confidence in facing the future? Dennis Fisher

 

http://www.odb.org

Ravi Zacharias

Ravi Zacharias Ministry – The Absence of Beauty

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I stood in front of the painting long enough that my neck hurt from craning upward, long enough to make the connection that onlookers that day likely held a similar stance as they watched Jesus of Nazareth on the cross. Francisco de Zurbarán’s massive 1627 painting The Crucifixion hangs in gallery 211 of the Chicago Art Institute. Viewers must stand back from the piece and gaze upward in order to take it all in. Zurbarán depicts the point just before Christ takes his last breath. His body leans forward from exhaustion; his head hangs downward. All details of any background activity are absent, the black backdrop a jarring juxtaposition beside his pale, bruised skin. The artist’s use of light intensifies the stark pull of sympathy towards a body that is both clearly suffering and yet somehow beautiful. At the time, I wasn’t sure what I believed about Christianity. But there was something about the painting I couldn’t stop trying to grasp.

There is indeed something about beauty that for many of us is intensely spiritual. Whether peering into the natural beauty of a majestic waterfall or the exquisite lights of the Eiffel Tower, many describe a connection between beauty and the transcendent in religious terms—at times, even contradictingly so, our own theories of the world either undercutting or cutting off the very possibilities we want to espouse. For many of the minds I admire today, beauty is both a compelling part of their faith and compelling evidence for God’s existence. A blind and mechanistic universe cannot answer for the longings stirred by earthly beauty. Stated more personally, I could not account for the longings stirred by the beauty of a suffering God in person. Staring at Jesus in The Crucifixion, I could not explain the quality of beauty that seemed distinctive of his very soul—choosing even in pain and death to forgive tirelessly, though surrounded by people who do not. As a hen uses her wings to gather her chicks, there are indeed times I suspect the Spirit uses beauty to bring us quietly before the Son.

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Joyce Meyer

Joyce Meyer – Our Best Help

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I will lift up my eyes to the hills—from whence comes my help? My help comes from the Lord, Who made heaven and earth.—Psalm 121:1-2 NKJV

We should be maturing in our faith to the point that we don’t run to someone else every time we need to know what to do. I am not implying that asking for a word of counsel from people we feel are wiser than we are is wrong, but I do believe asking for people’s opinions excessively and relying on them too heavily is wrong and insulting to God.

As you can tell from today’s verse, David sought God first and knew God was his only help. The same is true for us, so we must be like David and always look to God first. We need to develop a habit of seeing God as our “first choice” for advice, not as our last resort.

God may use a person of His choice to clarify things, offer additional insight, or confirm what He has already told us, so seek Him first and if He leads you to a person, follow His leading.

In Numbers 22:20-28, God even used a donkey to speak to someone. He wants to speak to us so much that He will use whatever means is necessary. You can be assured that if you are trusting God to speak that He will find a way to get His message through to you.

From the book Hearing from God Each Morning: 365 Daily Devotions by Joyce Meyer.

 

http://www.joycemeyer.org

Campus Crusade for Christ

Campus Crusade for Christ; Bill Bright – Destroying the Devil’s Works 

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“But if you keep on sinning, it shows that you belong to Satan, who since he first began to sin has kept steadily at it. But the Son of God came to destroy these works of the devil” (1 John 3:8).

A young Christian came to inquire of me one day, “How do you account for the fact that so many Christian leaders, many of them famous personalities, pastors and heads of Christian organizations are involved in moral and financial scandals?”

He named several well-known pastors and Christian leaders to illustrate his point.

Sadly I acknowledged his statement to be true. It seems there is an all-out attack of Satan to destroy the credibility of the Christian message. My explanation to him was that our Lord and the apostle Paul dealt with the same problem because, even though the disciples had been with the Lord Jesus three years or more, Judas betrayed Him and the others deserted Him.

The apostle Paul spoke of several who had deserted him. Those included Demas, who loved the present world, and Hymenaeus, Alexander and Philetus, who strayed from the truth.

Only one person can help us live holy lives that will honor our Lord, who came to destroy the works of the devil, and that is the third person of the Trinity – God the Holy Spirit. As long as we cast our ballot for the Spirit in our warfare against the flesh, we can live supernaturally every day in the joy, the wonder, the adventure and the power of the resurrection. It is simply a matter of our will; the decision is ours.

Bible Reading: I John 3:4-10

TODAY’S ACTION POINT:  “Oh, God, thank You that You sent Your Son to destroy the works of the devil. I will claim the supernatural power of the Holy Spirit so that I may live victoriously and never bring scandal or disgrace to Your name.”

 

http://www.cru.org

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Reconciliation

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The most notorious road in the world is the Via Dolorosa, “the Way of Sorrows.” According to tradition, it’s the route Jesus took from Pilate’s hall to Calvary. The path is marked by stations frequently used by Christians for their devotions—each one a reminder of the events of Christ’s final journey. No one actually knows the exact route Jesus followed that Friday. But we do know where the path began. In heaven. Jesus began his journey when he left his home in search of us.

The Bible has a word for this quest: reconciliation. “God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself” (2 Corinthians 5:19 NKJV). Reconciliation restiches the unraveled, reverses the rebellion, and rekindles the cold passion. Reconciliation touches the shoulder of the wayward and woos him homeward. The path to the cross tells us exactly how far God will go to call us back.

From He Chose the Nails

For more inspirational messages please visit Max Lucado.

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Denison Forum

Denison Forum – Inspiring insight from United Airlines firestorm

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The daughter and attorney of Dr. David Dao held a news conference yesterday morning. The attorney told reporters that when his client was forcibly evicted from the United flight last Sunday, he suffered a concussion and broken nose and lost two front teeth. Dr. Dao’s daughter stated, “What happened to my dad should’ve never happened to any human being.”

As the United firestorm continues, a dear friend shared an insight with me that I asked his permission to share with you. Dr. David Dykes is the longtime pastor of the amazing Green Acres Baptist Church in Tyler, Texas. Regarding the man pulled from the flight, his first thought was, “When they are dragging this bleeding man off the plane, why didn’t someone stand up and say, ‘Let him go. I’ll take his place. Take me instead’?

“I suppose all the passengers were shocked and stunned into silence. I’m just glad that 2,000 years ago when I should have been the one rejected and bloodied, Jesus stepped forward and said, ‘Let him go. I’ll take his place. Take me instead!'”

St. Melito, bishop of Sardis (died AD 180), described well what Jesus experienced on Good Friday: he “endured every kind of suffering in all those who foreshadowed him. In Abel he was slain, in Isaac bound, in Jacob exiled, in Joseph sold, in Moses exposed to die. He was sacrificed in the Passover lamb, persecuted in David, dishonored in the prophets.”

How should we respond to such sacrificial grace?

In Psalm 101, David vowed: “I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless” (v. 3). After a long discussion of foods that are suitable for eating, the Lord concludes: “Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:44). Paul encouraged us to “cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God” (2 Corinthians 7:1). He added that “God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness” (1 Thessalonians 4:7). Job testified, “I have made a covenant with my eyes; how then could I gaze at a virgin?” (Job 31:1).

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