Daily Archives: December 21, 2017

Charles Stanley

Charles Stanley – The Gift of Teaching

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Romans 12:6-8

God has given each believer at least one spiritual gift to build up the body of Christ and to minister in this hurting world. If our gift is prophecy, we’ll proclaim God’s view of right and wrong. If it is service, we will desire to meet others’ needs. The gift of teaching has these characteristics:

Organized. Whether in conversation or in a more formal setting, we will seek to communicate information clearly so the listener can follow. God has wired us to analyze material and present it logically.

Thorough. We want others to understand not simply the conclusion but the steps leading up to it. We also desire to help them think matters through.

Accurate. Our priority is to know the truth, so we ask questions in an attempt to validate the accuracy of what we learn. We will also inquire about the trustworthiness of our source of information.

Studious. We derive great delight from studying and researching and are strongly motivated to share what we learn. Truth is presented not simply to share knowledge but with the goal that God will transform the hearer’s life.

Bible-oriented. With this gift comes a strong desire to know what the Lord has to say. While we may recognize the value of others’ experiences, we are less motivated by personal illustrations than by the actual words of Scripture.

All of the spiritual gifts can be used in the workplace, in our communities, and in our homes. If your gift is teaching, allow the Spirit to direct your ability for God’s glory and others’ gain.

Bible in One Year: Hebrews 12-13

 

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Our Daily Bread

Our Daily Bread — Home for Christmas

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Read: Genesis 28:10–17

Bible in a Year: Micah 4–5; Revelation 12

I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land.—Genesis 28:15

One year Christmas found me on assignment in a place many of my friends couldn’t locate on a map. Trudging from my worksite back to my room, I braced against the chill wind blowing off the bleak Black Sea. I missed home.

When I arrived at my room, I opened the door to a magical moment. My artistic roommate had completed his latest project—a nineteen-inch ceramic Christmas tree that now illuminated our darkened room with sparkling dots of color. If only for a moment, I was home again!

As Jacob fled from his brother Esau, he found himself in a strange and lonely place too. Asleep on the hard ground, he met God in a dream. And God promised Jacob a home. “I will give you and your descendants the land on which you are lying,” He told him. “All peoples on earth will be blessed through you and your offspring” (Gen. 28:13–14).

From Jacob, of course, would come the promised Messiah, the One who left His home to draw us to Himself. “I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am,” Jesus told His disciples (John 14:3).

That December night I sat in the darkness of my room and gazed at that Christmas tree. Perhaps inevitably I thought of the Light that entered the world to show us the way home. —Tim Gustafson

Lord, no matter where we are today, we can thank You for preparing a place for us to be with You. And we have the presence of Your Spirit today!

Home is not so much a place on a map, as it is a place to belong. God gives us that place.

INSIGHT: Sometimes our perceptions of God get a startling adjustment. That was the case for Jacob in today’s passage. From our perspective we know through the Old and New Testament Scriptures that God is everywhere and is always with us. But Jacob’s knowledge was limited. His statement in Genesis 28:16 hints that he thought he was out of “God’s area.” How comforting it must have been to Jacob to realize that though he had left his family and his home, he was still in the presence of God.

How does knowing that God is always present comfort you? J.R. Hudberg

 

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Ravi Zacharias

Ravi Zacharias Ministry – Nativity Scenes

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A general position on December birthdays (particularly for those of us who hold them) seems to be that its proprietors are easily neglected. We are over-shadowed by Christmas decorations in November and over-looked in December by relatives busy with Christmas errands and office parties. And yet, I suspect that others, like me, have always secretly loved it. In the season of our births, the world was awake, decking the halls, and a great number of them were looking to the birth of another infant. The spirit of Christmas seems a part of our own, the birth of Christ reminding us each year that we, too, were born, that we were fragile, that we were held. For those born in December (and for any who remember their own beginnings in the scenes of Advent), the season offers a time of contemplating infantile beginnings, a lesson in what it means to be human like no other. Stories and celebrations of one’s birth are juxtaposed with a nativity story told long before we were born and one that will continue to be told long after us.

In fact, the story of Christianity is a story filled with nativity scenes. In these stories, we find a God present before we have accomplished anything and longing to gather us long before we know it is happening. Thus David can pray, “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well.” And God can say to the prophet Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.” And those who witnessed the miracle of Elizabeth and Zechariah can rightly exclaim God’s hand upon the child before that child could say his own name: “The neighbors were all filled with awe, and throughout the hill country of Judea people were talking about all these things. Everyone who heard this wondered about it, asking, ‘What then is this child going to be?’ For the Lord’s hand was with him.”(1)

In a world where significance and identity are earned by what we do, by what we have accomplished, by what we own, by what we earn, and Christmas is about the lines we fought, the lists we finished, the gifts we were able to secure, the kingdom of God arrives scandalously, jarringly—even offensively—into our captive and often content lives. In this kingdom, a person’s value begins before she has said or done the right things, before he has accumulated the right lifestyle, or even made the right lists. In this kingdom, God not only uses children in the story of salvation, not only calls us to embrace the kingdom as little children, but so the very God of creation steps into the world as a child.

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Joyce Meyer

Joyce Meyer – Be Decisive!

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But above all [things], my brethren, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or by any other oath; but let your yes be [a simple] yes, and your no be [a simple] no, so that you may not sin and fall under condemnation.— James 5:12

Indecision is a miserable state to be in and certainly is not a fruit of the simple life. The apostle James said the double-minded man is unstable in all his ways.

Being indecisive because you’re afraid you’ll make wrong decisions will get you nowhere. How much time do you think we waste when we can’t make up our minds?

We often labor over the choices before us when we just need to make a decision and let it stand. This may be a simple example, but think about it: When you stand in front of your closet in the morning looking at all your clothes, just choose something and put it on. Don’t go back and forth until you make yourself late for work!

Let me encourage you to start making decisions without second-guessing yourself or worrying about the choices you make. Don’t be double-minded or wishy-washy because doubting your decisions after you make them will steal the enjoyment from everything you do. Make the best decisions you can and trust God with the results.

 

http://www.joycemeyer.org

Campus Crusade for Christ

Campus Crusade for Christ; Bill Bright – The Holy Spirit Promised

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“But when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, you will receive power to testify about Me with great effect, to the people in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth, about my death and resurrection” (Acts 1:8).

Evangelists were gathered in Amsterdam, Holland, from more than 130 countries around the world to attend the International Conference for Itinerant Evangelists sponsored by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. On the third night of this historic event I was asked to bring the address on “How to be Filled With the Holy Spirit.” Just before I was to speak, a note from Billy Graham was handed to me. It said, “I consider this one of the most important addresses of the entire conference.”

According to the hundreds of thousands of surveys which our ministry has taken all over the world, 95 percent of the professing believers do not understand the ministry of the Holy Spirit. This includes a majority of pastors, evangelists and missionaries. In fact, if I had only one message to give to the Christian world, it would be how to be filled with the Holy Spirit and how to walk moment by moment in the fullness of His power. Indeed if I had to choose between introducing a non-believer to Christ or helping a defeated, fruitless, impotent Christian to understand the ministry of the Holy Spirit and share his faith in Christ with others, I would choose the latter because inevitably the end result would be far greater in terms of the number of people who would be introduced to Christ. The one great need of the Body of Christ today that transcends all other needs is to be awakened to the person and ministry of the Holy Spirit, to be empowered and controlled by Him, to allow Him to exalt and honor our Lord Jesus Christ in and through us, for that is the purpose of His coming. “He (the Holy Spirit) shall praise Me and bring Me great honor by showing you My glory” (John 16:14).

On hundreds of occasions throughout the world I have spoken on this subject and always, when the invitation is given, a good percentage indicate their desire to be filled with the Spirit. The Scripture promises, “Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled.” Do you hunger and thirst after righteousness? If so, you are a candidate for the fullness of God’s Spirit. You can by faith appropriate His fullness right now by claiming His promise that God will release His power through you in order that you may be an effective witness for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Bible Reading: Romans 15:15-21

TODAY’S ACTION POINT: Today I will claim by faith the fullness of God’s Spirit in order to live the supernatural life and to be a more fruitful witness for the Lord Jesus Christ. I know that it is the Holy Spirit who will enable me to live that exciting, supernatural life.

 

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Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Jesus Makes Room

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Listen to Today’s Devotion

Some of the saddest words on earth are we don’t have room for you.  Jesus knew the sounds of those words. He was still in Mary’s womb when the innkeeper said, “We don’t have room for you.” And when He hung on the cross, wasn’t the message one of utter rejection? We don’t have room for you in this world.

Today Jesus is given the same treatment. He goes from heart to heart, asking if He might enter. Every so often, He’s welcomed. Someone throws open the door of his or her heart and invites Him to stay. And to that person Jesus gives this great promise, “In my Father’s house are many rooms…” (John 14:2). We make room for Him in our hearts. And Jesus makes room for us in His house!

Read more God Came Near

For more inspirational messages please visit Max Lucado.

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Denison Forum

Denison Forum – Woman gives birth to child who is only a year younger than she is

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Tina Wren gave birth to a daughter named Emma last month. The mother was twenty-five years old at the time. Her daughter was twenty-four. How is this possible?

Tina and her husband Benjamin married seven years ago, but the couple assumed they could not have biological children because Benjamin has cystic fibrosis, which often results in infertility. They fostered a few children, until Tina’s father suggested embryo adoption.

This is the process by which couples who use in vitro fertilization (IVF) donate unused frozen embryos to other couples. The Wrens went to the National Embryo Donation Center in Knoxville, Tennessee, where they received a donated embryo. It turns out, that embryo had been created through IVF and frozen twenty-four years earlier.

Tina gave birth to the baby she received. She told reporters, “This embryo and I could have been best friends.” As it is, they are now mother and daughter.

If Tina and Benjamin had another way to become pregnant, it seems likely that they would not have chosen this route. But they know that their new daughter is indeed a miracle.

Responding to “unexpected opportunities”

Many of the choices we make aren’t really choices. If we have only one option, it becomes the best option.

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