Arise, O Lord! Save me, O my God! For you strike all my enemies on the cheek; you break the teeth of the wicked. Salvation belongs to the Lord; your blessing be on your people!

Psalm 3:7-8

Does trouble drive you to God or from God?

In Psalm 3, King David is facing a severe trial: the apparently successful insurrection of his son Absalom. He has had to flee his palace and his capital. Many men he counted as friends have turned against him.

What does David do? He takes his trial straight to the Lord. He recognizes—and we ought to be humble enough to recognize with him—that any life-transforming change, any ultimate solution, any lasting success is owing ultimately and finally to the Lord.

Who can bring deliverance from the enslavement of habitual sin? Who can set captives free? Who can take the burdens from people’s backs? Only and ultimately the Lord. Whether we’re bothered by a mere nuisance or we’ve been struck by awful tragedy, God alone brings deliverance.

Even when David’s foes surround him, he doesn’t try to take vengeance into his own hands. He recognizes that God strikes the winning blow, because it is God who is the one true source of lasting victory. So David cries out, “Arise, O LORD! Save me, O my God!” because he knows that “salvation belongs to the LORD.”

Notice, too, that David has more than deliverance for himself in view: “Your blessing be on your people,” he prays. Trials have a tendency to drive us in on ourselves—away from God and away from others. It’s so easy only to pray for ourselves when we are struggling. But David reminds us that even in life’s valleys, we are traveling together and need to keep our brothers and sisters in mind and in our prayers—and not only those who already believe, for God’s salvation is for any who would cry out to Jesus for help. Our neighbors, our colleagues, the stranger in line with us as we wait for our coffee—they all need this deliverance just as much as any of us.

If you desire victory in your life, you must first recognize, like David, that you can have none apart from God’s help. And if you are going be an instrument of grace to the people God has placed around you, you must also look beyond your own needs and call out for their blessing and deliverance to the only one who is mighty enough to grant it. He alone is our eternal hope, our great gift of salvation, the source of satisfaction for our every longing—in the valleys as much as on the mountaintops.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

1 Chronicles 29:10-14

Topics: Dependence on God Prayer Victory

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

Some of the Pharisees near him heard these things, and said to him, “Are we also blind?”

John 9:40

The great, and tragic, irony of the episode John recounts in chapter 9 of his Gospel is that while a blind man receives his sight, many of those who began with two working eyes reveal themselves to be utterly spiritually blind.

John included this event because it is one of the signs that has been “written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name” (John 20:31). As Jesus gave the blind man sight, so Jesus can give us life. Just as surely as He opened this man’s eyes physically, so Jesus can open the spiritual eyes of men and women.

And Jesus must open men and women’s eyes spiritually because, as the Bible teaches uncompromisingly, men and women are spiritually blind from birth. We may think we see truth clearly, but in rejecting Jesus, we show ourselves to be blind in the only sense that eternally matters. Sin has robbed us of our vision, and we are unable to make ourselves see spiritually any more than the blind beggar could overcome his lack of physical sight. Unless we are made aware of the true nature of our condition from the Bible—until our blind eyes are opened to see our true state and until our deaf ears are unstopped to hear this story—the proclamation of any antidote is irrelevant.

When the Bible says we are blind, it speaks to the awful way in which sin has permeated our condition. Sin affects our emotions, will, affections, and intellect. There is no little citadel in our experience to which we may go to find refuge from our fallen state.

We must not be lulled into thinking that the Bible doesn’t really mean what it says, that people aren’t really totally blind. The friends and neighbors to whom we go and tell the gospel are not living in some middle territory between belief and unbelief, between sight and blindness. They neither see truly nor even know what it means to do so. For this, they need divine intervention, just as we once did.

By nature, the gospel story is foolishness to us. We are born deaf to its appeal and blind to its wonder. Only the God who opened the eyes of the blind man can open our eyes too. What a wonder, and a cause for gratitude, that we are able to say with the blind beggar, “Though I was blind, now I see” (John 9:25). And what an encouragement for us to share all that God can do, for there is no greater joy than to speak of Jesus and then watch Him open blind eyes to see who He is and what He has done.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Matthew 9:27-31

Topics: Jesus Christ New Birth Regeneration

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg,

http://www.truthforlife.org

I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked … Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.

Revelation 3:15-17, Revelation 3:20

Laodicea was a financial center, and it had all the confidence and opulence that goes with wealth. It also was famous for its sheep and their soft, black wool, which was woven into expensive garments. Not only that but the city was known for its medical school, which had developed a salve that was useful for treating certain forms of eye conditions.

It was in this environment that the Laodicean church lived: in a financially prosperous city, skillful in its business practices and known for its medical facility. God had placed His people in the heart of that to reflect His light in the diversity of Laodicean life. But the church had been absorbed by the culture. They had lost their cutting edge and were compromised and self-deceived. Instead of reflecting their Savior, they reflected their society.

It is unsurprising, then, that when the Son of Man looked at the church in Laodicea, He found little to His liking. They were stagnant. Wealth had bred in them a sense of self-sufficiency. They wore nice clothes but were oblivious to their spiritual nakedness. While their city’s physicians could help restore physical sight, the members of its church were spiritually blind.

Yet was Christ about to abandon them? Not yet. His assessment was not good, the prognosis was poor, and the warning was real. But He didn’t send them away. Instead, He invited them to dinner: “If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.” The word used here for “eat” is deipnēsō, which refers not to a meal eaten on the fly but to a full dining experience, where you sit for a long time as an expression of companionship, enjoyment, friendship, and fellowship.

Do you ever congratulate yourself on your prosperity? Do you think about your material possessions more than your Lord’s appraisal of your life? Be careful! A lukewarm faith that goes through the motions while embracing materialism and holding Christ at arm’s length is, in fact, no faith at all. But be encouraged, too: the Lord is knocking, and He is inviting you into a deeper fellowship with Him, a closeness that will fire your heart once more so that you will sing again:

Riches I heed not, nor vain, empty praise
Thou mine inheritance, now and always
Thou and Thou only first in my heart
High King of heaven, my treasure Thou art.^[1]

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Revelation 3:14-22

Topics: Materialism Possessions Pride

FOOTNOTES

¹ Trans. Mary Elizabeth Byrne, “Be Thou My Vision” (1905).

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg,

http://www.truthforlife.org

To the angel of the church in Philadelphia write: “The words of the holy one, the true one, who has the key of David, who opens and no one will shut, who shuts and no one opens. I know your works. Behold, I have set before you an open door, which no one is able to shut. I know that you have but little power, and yet you have kept my word and have not denied my name”

Revelation 3:7-8

In the book of Revelation, the key is a symbol of Christ’s authority and the door is a symbol of an opportunity. So as He writes to the Philadelphian church, Jesus is declaring Himself to be the holder of the key that opens the door in to salvation and opens the door out to service. In other words, once we have walked through the narrow gate that leads to life, we discover that life to be a life of service.

The Philadelphians had entered the door into salvation but now were confronted by opposition and the threat of future tribulation. So far, they had “not denied [Christ’s] name”—they had not shrunk from declaring the truth about their Lord and Savior in the city He had placed them in. Yet, recognizing that the storm clouds were now gathering, they may have been tempted to simply circle the wagons, sound the retreat, and decide that it was not a good time for evangelism. Considering all that confronted them, they easily could have concluded that such a life of service would need to wait for a more opportune moment.

Christ, however, urged them not to turn back from their calling. The door was open; now they had to go through it! While they would not be spared from suffering, He promised to uphold them when they faced it. He told these hard-pressed believers that if they would boldly march through the door and be faithful to their calling, they would see converts from among those who opposed them (Revelation 3:9).

What about us? Are we prepared to walk through the door of opportunity, knowing that Jesus calls people to saving faith through the words of those who refuse to deny His name? Are we willing to say, “Lord Jesus Christ, I feel I have little strength, but anywhere, anytime, anyone, I’m ready to speak”?

Pray that when you meet the moment of opportunity, you will say and do something. Pray that you would be imaginative and creative, with one foot in the Bible and the other foot in the culture, so that you speak the truth about Jesus in a way that connects with those who are listening. If you do not shrink back but rather continue sharing the gospel imaginatively, humbly, sensitively, and creatively, then by the power of His Spirit and the might of His word, those who today see you as an enemy may one day become your brothers and sisters.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Revelation 3:7-13

Topics: Evangelism Salvation Service

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

I have a few things against you: you have some there who hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to put a stumbling block before the sons of Israel, so that they might eat food sacrificed to idols and practice sexual immorality.

Revelation 2:14

External pressure to conform is not the only danger to our faith that we face.

The church in Pergamum had been successful in resisting the lures of Satan and of pluralism (Revelation 2:13). They had failed, however, to take care of their own internal problems. Despite the loyalty of some, these believers were guilty of tolerating a heresy that combined idolatry and sexual immorality. The reference to “the teaching of Balaam” here does not refer to some book or body of doctrine. Rather, it is intended to call to mind the activity of the false prophet Balaam in the Old Testament. He advised the Midianite women on how to seduce the Israelites and thereby infiltrate and cause destruction among God’s people (Numbers 31:16). One commentator notes that Balaam’s clever idea was to break down Israel’s power by an indirect attack on their morality: “Pagan food and pagan women were his powerful tools against the rigidity of the Mosaic Law.”^[1]

Balaam therefore serves as a prototype of all the corrupt teachers who followed his example, promoting an “antinomian” approach to life. Antinomian is from the Greek anti, “against,” and nomos, “law”—“against the law”; it describes a libertine, licentious way of thinking that sets aside all that the Bible has to say about holiness, purity, and the fear of the Lord being the beginning of wisdom (Psalm 111:10; Proverbs 1:7; 9:10).

While some believers in Pergamum had fully embraced such teaching, others within the fellowship merely tolerated it—yet in allowing it, they were as culpable as the rest. John Stott writes that “the risen Christ, the Chief Shepherd of His flock, was grieved both by the waywardness of the minority and by the nonchalance of the majority.”^[2] In failing to act, they made it possible for heresy to spread, to the great harm of God’s people. And so, though the majority were commended for holding fast to their right belief, they were also rebuked for failing to deal seriously with those who were guilty of wrong behavior.

If Satan cannot wreak havoc in a church as a result of external challenges, he will seek to do it by the insidious work of internal compromise. So, be on guard. It will always be easy to find a “spiritual guide” who is more than willing to tell you that it’s fine to indulge your desires and follow your heart. That is not true Christianity, which not only believes correctly but also behaves properly, exalting Christ and promoting holiness. And it will be even easier to stay quiet rather than humbly challenge those in your church who are putting their desires above their holiness. So ask yourself: What stumbling block may have been placed in my own path of obedience? And what stumbling block may the Lord be calling me to help another identify? Our church’s holiness, as well as our own, is to be our concern.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Jude 1:17-25

Topics: Church Life Compromise Holiness

FOOTNOTES

¹ E.M. Blaiklock, The Seven Churches: An Exposition of Revelation, Chapters Two and Three (The Institute Printing and Publishing Society, n.d.), p 35.

² What Christ Thinks of the Church (Harold Shaw, 1990), p 44.

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg,

http://www.truthforlife.org

I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.

Revelation 2:4-5

It’s tragic to see a marriage in which the spouses have grown cold toward each other. Though they’re still together, loneliness and isolation abound. There’s a rigid, lifeless formality to it, seen in their eyes and understood in their expressions. The vibrancy and fresh discoveries that marked their early love are missing, having slipped away with the passing years.

The Ephesian church was a task-oriented, tough-minded, truth-telling fellowship, and for this they were commended (Revelation 2:2-3). But in His words to them, Jesus revealed their Achilles’ heel: though they were seeking to hold fast to the truth, they had abandoned love. One commentator writes, “If the price paid by the Ephesians for the preservation of true Christianity was the loss of love, the price was too high, for Christianity without love is a perverted faith.”^[1]

Was it that they had lost their love for Christ? For each other? For the unbelieving community around them? It isn’t necessary to choose between those options. For when love for Christ is not as it should be, then our love for all else will be affected.

For those of us who are committed to doctrinal faithfulness, here is a challenging reminder that the ultimate measure of a church is found not in its programs, achievements, reputation, or doctrinal orthodoxy but in its love. Christianity, as the Puritan Thomas Chalmers eloquently put it, is about “the expulsive power of a new affection”—about falling in love with Christ, about a sense of the immensity of His pursuing, energizing, loving grace. If that love for Jesus begins to wane, we will begin to look a lot like the church in Ephesus: impressive from the outside but internally loveless. And Jesus warns that this is no small matter; removing the Ephesian church’s lampstand means removing His recognition of them as His church, His people. A loveless church is, in truth, not a church at all.

Perhaps you realize that you do not love God the way you once did. This can creep up on us so easily, our eyes growing dry, our prayers growing cold. What can we do?

Jesus says the remedy for lost love is first to “remember.” We need to recall what it was about Jesus that caused us to love Him in the first place and then use that as a spur for forward momentum. We need to restore our commitment to the things we did at first—which typically means going back to the basics. In short, we need to look again at Jesus, lifting our eyes from what we do—our programs, our efforts, our ministries—to the beauty and love of the one who died for us and who dwells in us. Love is rekindled by looking at that which is lovely. So if your love has grown cold, gaze at Jesus as He reveals Himself to you in His word—and joy and vibrancy will surely return.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Hebrews 1:1-13

Topics: Jesus Christ Love of God Loving Others

FOOTNOTES

¹ G. R. Beasley-Murray, The Book of Revelation (Wipf and Stock, 2010), p 75.

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance, and how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and found them to be false. I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name’s sake, and you have not grown weary.

Revelation 2:2-3

The 1980s British prime minister Margaret Thatcher was nothing if not determined. Whatever view we take of her politics, she was certainly a woman of conviction, famously declaring at a moment when many of her political allies were telling her to change course, “You turn if you want to. The lady’s not for turning.”

That kind of fortitude and conviction was also evident in the first-century church in Ephesus. When Jesus commended them, it was primarily on account of their principled dedication. They were committed to the task, persevering in it and dedicated to the truth.

The word used for “works” is the complete opposite of idleness and inactivity. Jesus recognized that these Ephesian believers weren’t intimidated by the challenges that came from living out the faith of the gospel. They were prepared to extend themselves again and again for the name of Christ.

Twice in the space of just a few words, Jesus also speaks of their endurance or enduring—their perseverance. The Ephesian church wasn’t afraid of hard work, but they were also sticking with that work and seeing it through, steadfast and immovable. As William Barclay writes, their toughness was “the courageous gallantry which accepts suffering and hardship and loss and turns them into grace and glory.”^[1]

Further, these believers were also committed to the truth. They weren’t susceptible to every passing wind of doctrine but were prepared to test those who came with new claims, willing to reject them if they proved to be spurious. They stood steadfastly for the truth even against a heretical group that attempted to offer religious experiences that wouldn’t impinge upon self-indulgent lifestyles (Revelation 2:6).

What would Jesus say about us today? How committed are we as a 21st-century church? Are we strong, steadfast, and persevering? Do we have enough courage and conviction to stand for the truth and say, I hate these practices, for I know that Jesus does too? Or are we in danger of growing “weary of doing good” (Galatians 6:9)? When others suggest compromise in our commitment or obedience to Christ, are we willing to say, “You turn if you want to. I am not for turning”?

As Jesus looks upon you, as He does, may He have much to commend in you as a follower who models spiritual conviction, perseverance, and a determination to live in the real world with a dedicated love for Christ.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

2 Timothy 3:1-9

Topics: The Church Perseverance Truth

FOOTNOTES

¹ Quoted in Leon Morris, Revelation: An Introduction and Commentary, The Tyndale New Testament Commentaries (Eerdmans, 2002), p 59.

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Beg

http://www.truthforlife.org

I said in my heart, “Come now, I will test you with pleasure; enjoy yourself.” But behold, this also was vanity.

Ecclesiastes 2:1

Ecclesiastes is an ancient book, yet its words are compellingly relevant. Although it was written around 3,000 years ago, you might think that the author had his finger on the pulse of our contemporary life. And indeed, as you read, you find yourself being walked down a number of dead-end streets representing the common paths we often tread in our search for satisfaction.

One route through which we try to find meaning in life is education. Experts constantly assert that the problems of substance abuse, sexual abuse and misconduct, and other societal ills can be solved if only people can be better educated. Yet experience shows us that mere information cannot in and of itself satisfy the needs of the heart, nor is it capable of taming the unruliness of the soul. Judged by many yardsticks, Western nations are the best-educated in human history, but they do not appear to be the happiest, and they may well be those that most thirst for instant gratification.

So if education doesn’t satisfy us, we might turn down the pathway of pleasure. We decide to let the good times roll. At first, we might find something resembling happiness—but we eventually discover that the pleasure it brings is only fleeting. It turns out to be a form of escapism, luring us into a make-believe, rose-colored, self-focused life that sounds great but is empty.

Much of the world that surrounds us is set up to call us down dead-end streets like these. Now, it would be a dreadful misunderstanding to think that Christianity is disinterested in education and pleasure. Nothing could be further from the truth! Yet the author of Ecclesiastes shows us that none of these pursuits will in and of themselves make sense of our lives or answer our deepest longings. Only when we come to know the true and living God does the enjoyment of life’s blessings feed into lasting joy.

These dead-end streets contain some hope, however—for Christ can break through and save us, drawing us onto the narrow path that leads to life (Matthew 7:13-14). Maybe that’s exactly what happened for you. Or perhaps you’re tempted to resist the warning of Ecclesiastes and go down one of these paths instead of the road of faithful obedience to the Lord—or you are tempted to implicitly or explicitly encourage your loved ones to go down them. If the temptation to see education or enjoyment as the one thing you must have calls your name, remember this: one day you will stand before the throne of God, and you will have to give an account. Which path will you walk along?

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Matthew 7:13-14

Topics: Contentment Culture Joy

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” Submit yourselves therefore to God.

James 4:6-7

It seems hard to imagine now, but there was a time in the not-so-distant past when people hardly ever wore seat belts, and children weren’t required to have the sort of car seats they must have now. Without belts and latches to restrain them, it could prove rather difficult to get children to sit and stay sitting. The story is told of a young boy who found himself in the car with his mother. He was in the back seat, and, as boys tend to do, he found himself getting restless, so he was up and down and moving around. His mother, of course, told him he needed to sit. Finally, after repeated requests and repeated refusals, his mother felt the need to stop the car and exercise appropriate discipline. She then got him back in his seat and set off down the road again. A few seconds later, the boy mumbled from the back seat, “I may be sitting down on the outside, but I am standing up on the inside.”

That little story is likely to prompt us to smile—but it also sounds something of a warning for us. This boy, while outwardly obeying, was inwardly rebelling. How often might that characterize our own behavior toward God? Perhaps we outwardly do and say the right things, especially when we are in public and most of all in church, but inwardly we are thinking and feeling just the opposite. As innocent and normal as the scenario may seem, it was pride rearing up in that small boy’s heart that provoked that defiant comment—and it is pride that is rearing up in our own hearts when we sit down outwardly but stand up internally. And God sees all.

Real submission to God is the outworking of a truly humble heart. To submit to God is to align ourselves under His authority. By nature, we oppose authority and do not like to be told what to do. But obedience to God ought never to be grudging. We should submit with a joyful, happy abandonment to God’s will as it is revealed to us in His word. It is our delight to discover His truth and act accordingly.

Such joyful submission is possible because of the nature of the one to whom we submit. When we submit to the Lord Jesus Christ, we give ourselves to true freedom (Galatians 5:1). We yield to a light burden and an easy yoke (Matthew 11:30). So, take a close look at your own life and heart today. Are there ways in which you are sitting down on the outside but standing up on the inside—obeying God but grumbling about it and begrudging having to do it? There is always more grace for such pride, but it does need to be humbly repented of. What is it that you need to remember about God in order to do that, and then to submit willingly, joyfully, and wholly to His will for you?

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Romans 6:15-23

Topics: Humility Obedience Pride

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

It was the will of the Lord to crush him; he has put him to grief … Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied; by his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities.

Isaiah 53:10-11

One of the most powerful aspects of the Gospel accounts of the crucifixion of Christ is the way that again and again and again they record how the events of the day fulfilled Old Testament prophecies made hundreds of years before.

When the chief priests and scribes delivered Jesus to Pilate, the Roman governor was perplexed at His choice not to publicly defend Himself. When Pilate asked, “Are you the King of the Jews?” Jesus replied enigmatically, “You have said so” (Matthew 27:11). When the religious leaders continued making accusations, Pilate asked again, “Have you no answer to make? See how many charges they bring against you” (Mark 15:4-5). Yet Christ did exactly as Isaiah 53:7 had foretold: He “opened not his mouth,” but instead waited in silence to be sentenced to death.

Later that day, only hours before Jesus breathed His last, the noonday sun was suddenly and dramatically swallowed up in darkness (Matthew 27:45). The Jewish people who were present ought to have understood the significance of that event from what had happened at the first Passover. They knew that in Egypt, the ninth plague, which preceded the death of the firstborn, was the plague of darkness (Exodus 10:21-29). The darkness on the day of crucifixion mirrored that very plague, identifying the need for blood to be shed, for a lamb to be slain, and for provision of shelter from the judgment of which the darkness itself spoke.

The Gospels show us that Jesus knew He was the one who had been promised, the one who would bear our sin to win our salvation. He lived out the prophetic words of Isaiah 53, and He operated of His own will according to the plan of Almighty God, expressing God’s love and sacrificing everything for those who deserve nothing except judgment.

As Old Testament prophecy was fulfilled before their eyes on the day that Christ was crucified, the biggest question that Pilate and the Jews each faced was essentially “What shall I do with Jesus?” And that is the great question that we all face every day. By our very nature, we neglect His wisdom, rebel against His authority, and doubt His goodness. That is why “it was the will of the LORD to crush him,” for God had purposed that He Himself would “bear [our] iniquities.” The realization that God had planned His Son’s sin-bearing death centuries before He hung on the cross—in fact, had planned it before the creation of the world—ought to bring us to our knees in awe, not just at the sovereignty of God’s plan but also at the love that brought it into being, the love that wrought its climax at Calvary. Christ remained silent as He stood before Pilate; there is no reason or excuse for us to remain silent as we kneel before Him and consider all He has done for us.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Luke 4:16-21

Topics: Preaching Christ from the Old Testament Prophecy Sovereignty of God

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt.

Hebrews 8:8-9

When God’s people cannot rise to the heights of His standards, the Lord does not lower His standards to match their abilities. Instead, He determines to transform His people through the person and work of His Son, Jesus.

According to Old Testament practices, every high priest was appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices on behalf of the people. However, when Jesus came to fulfill the role of our Great High Priest, He ushered in the new and perfect covenant by offering Himself as the final sacrifice. By His death and resurrection, Jesus secured a covenant that cannot be broken—a covenant that these words had looked forward to when the prophet Jeremiah first spoke them (Jeremiah 31:31-32); a covenant that transforms the hearts of those with whom it is made. But how does this transformation take place?

Following His resurrection, Jesus ascended into heaven and sat down “at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven” (Hebrews 8:1). This decisive act not only signified that His work was complete but also initiated the coming of the Holy Spirit. Prior to His death and resurrection, Jesus essentially told His disciples, It is necessary for Me to go away. If I’m here, I’m just here, in this body and in this place. But when I go, when I send the Holy Spirit in all of His fullness, He will not only be with you, but He will be in you—all of you, wherever you are. And He will take the things that are Mine, and He will make them precious to you.

It’s the ministry of the Holy Spirit, then, to transform and renew our hearts so that God’s law will be written on them and so that it will be our delight to do His will (Jeremiah 31:33). Previously, God’s ways were irksome to us. Previously, His law was only condemnation to us. But now it has become a joyful reality. To live in purity, wholeness, and faithfulness has now become our delight.

The new covenant also enables us to know God through His word. Our knowledge of God doesn’t come primarily through sacraments, a hierarchy of priests, or teachers and pastors. Instead, all of us, from the least to the greatest, can know God (Hebrews 8:11). When we know God personally and intimately, we are assured of our forgiveness; and when we see Christ personally and intimately in His word, we are transformed by the Spirit to become more like Him (2 Corinthians 3:18).

This is the wonder of what Jesus has done as our Great High Priest. He has secured our forgiveness, and He has sent His Spirit. In what ways are you struggling to obey God, or even really to want to obey Him? Ask Him to work through you, by His Spirit, to transform your view of His law and to enable your obedience of it. What you could never do on your own, you can do as you keep in step with Him.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

John 16:5-15

Topics: Christ as Priest Holy Spirit Obeying God

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

Then David arose from the earth and washed and anointed himself and changed his clothes. And he went into the house of the Lord and worshiped.

2 Samuel 12:20

When David’s child, born as a result of his adultery with Bathsheba, was afflicted with sickness, it awakened within the king a spiritual zeal that had been dormant. David began to seek God, and he prayed desperately that God might spare his little boy. He refused to eat, and he no longer lived his life as usual while his child’s life hung in the balance.

David had previously attempted to cover over his sin by trying to pawn off his child on the unsuspecting Uriah, whose wife he had slept with. But when God, in His mercy, confronted David with his sin, the king’s posture completely changed. David sought God because God had first sought David and softened his heart. Such a change could only be brought about by the work of God.

Then came the dreadful news: the child had died. The late theologian Alec Motyer compared repentance to gathering back a stone that has been thrown into a pool: you can get the stone back, but the ripples upon the water will continue to spread.^[1] David repented of his abuse and adultery, and God, in His mercy, accepted David’s repentance. But God did not stop the ripples.

Yet God was still able to use this tragedy to form David into the man that he needed to be. David responded in a strange and unexpected way: he arose, cleaned himself up, and went into the house of the Lord. The one who had been hiding from God now went to meet with God. The tragic death of David’s son did not lead David to stay at arm’s length from God. No, it led him into an even deeper relationship with Him.

When he entered the house of the Lord, David would have needed to bring a lamb without blemish as a sacrifice. But that was not the only sacrifice he brought. He also offered the only damaged sacrifice that is acceptable to bring into God’s house: as David later wrote, “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise” (Psalm 51:17).

God did not leave David to cover up his sin, and He did not leave him alone in dealing with the consequences of his sin. God’s treatment of David reveals that He cares deeply about the state of His children’s hearts. He will go to great lengths to bring you back when you wander away from Him. More than anything else, God wants you to have a broken and contrite heart before Him. When He makes you confront your sin, or afflicts you, or doesn’t give you what you desire, don’t assume that it is because He doesn’t love you. It is because He is graciously drawing you closer to Himself.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

2 Samuel 12:1-10

Topics: Repentance Restoration Sin

FOOTNOTES

¹ Treasures of the King: Psalms from the Life of David (InterVarsity UK, 2007), ch. 13.

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well.

James 2:8

The last time you said you loved someone or something, what did you mean?

In our age, we often equate love with a certain emotional experience. People declare “love” based on how they feel. It’s no surprise, then, that the idea of acting lovingly out of a sense of duty sounds strange to our ears. Surely if an action is dutiful, it cannot be done out of love?

The book of James offers quite a different view of the relationship between love and duty. When James wants to summarize the law of God, he does so with the words “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” The law, in other words, is fulfilled by love. We must therefore make it a priority to understand what love is and what it is not.

James does not mean that the law is fulfilled when we feel a certain way about our neighbors. Anyone who has read James—or much of the Bible at all, for that matter—knows this cannot be the case. For one thing, the Ten Commandments, which are the heart of the Old Testament law, say very little about how we ought to feel but quite a lot about what we ought to do. The commands against murder, adultery, lying, and stealing are aimed at our actions. And laws like these, says James, can be summarized as “Love your neighbor.” How do we love our neighbor, then? By doing the right thing.

Consider also the significance of James’ phrase “as yourself.” How often do any of us feel really great about ourselves and find ourselves truly and wholly lovely? Rarely, I would guess. And yet, despite how we feel about ourselves, we most likely see to it that we are cared for. Our love for others ought to be in this way as well. The absence of emotional intensity does not excuse us from obedience.

This does not mean that the right response is to be content with a cold heart as long as we are gritting our teeth and doing the right thing. We should want our affections toward others to match our actions, and we ought to pray toward that end. But we should also understand the role our emotions play in our love. Emotions make a great servant but a poor master. They can serve us in doing the right things, but they cannot be our guide for what we should and shouldn’t do. Indeed, sometimes it is only once we have decided to act in love that our feelings catch up. Pray today, then, for your affections to be pleasing to God, and for you to fulfill His royal law as you act in love toward your neighbors by obeying Him.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

James 2:8-17

Topics: Law Loving Others

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

When they came to the place that is called The Skull, there they crucified him, and the criminals, one on his right and one on his left.

Luke 23:33

The Gospel writers, without exception, do not dwell on the manner in which Jesus was crucified. Indeed, if you search the Gospels, you will discover that there are very few details concerning Christ’s physical suffering. Given the exceptionally brutal manner in which He was executed and the fact that all of Scripture moves us toward the cross, this absence of detail should give us pause, causing us to wonder why the Savior’s death is captured only in that simple phrase “There they crucified him.”

Presumably, the Gospel writers understood that if they focused on the physical sufferings of Jesus, then we could very easily stop at that. We might mistakenly think that once we have been gripped, stirred, and moved by this dreadful scene, we have come to terms with it. In point of fact, though, to focus on the outward aspects—the physicality—of this terrible event is to miss the purpose of the cross altogether.

For this reason, the Gospel writers did not explain much of what Jesus’ physical suffering was like but rather point to what was happening to Him spiritually as He hung there. Their focus is more on the purpose of the cross than on the cross itself.

Throughout Scripture—indeed, from the very beginning of it all, in the book of Genesis—the greatest need of humanity is atonement. As soon as the first man and woman turned their backs on God in the Garden of Eden, they were alienated from Him on account of their disobedience. Ever since, humanity has followed in our first ancestors’ steps: we, too, turn our backs on God and live in His world in rebellion against Him. This sin, this alienation, must be atoned for, and no amount or doing or trying on our part can reconcile us to God.

But in Jesus, “the righteousness of God has been manifested” to us (Romans 3:21), and we are reconciled to the Father through faith in the Son, “whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith” (Romans 3:25). This is atonement. This is the place where the Father’s wrath over sin was turned away from sinners and onto another—onto His own Son. This is the purpose, the great and wondrous achievement, of the cross.

There is all the difference in the world between sympathy for Jesus as the perfect sufferer and faith in Christ as our personal Savior. Stop and consider what He hung on the cross to do. Reflect on His spiritual suffering—the agony of bearing the judgment of His Father. Do not gaze on Him so that you feel sorry for Him, but until you are worshiping Him.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Mark 15:33-39

Topics: The Cross Imputed Righteousness Substitutionary Atonement

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

The Lord said to Samuel, “How long will you grieve over Saul, since I have rejected him from being king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil, and go. I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have provided for myself a king among his sons” … Samuel did what the Lord commanded and came to Bethlehem.

1 Samuel 16:1, 1 Samuel 16:4

Samuel stands out in the pages of biblical history but neither on account of the originality of his ideas nor because he was an initiative-taker. No, his distinction is that he was a man who simply did what God told him. After Saul’s rebellion against God, the Lord rejected Saul as king—and Samuel was the one who was told to inform the king of this. So he did (1 Samuel 15:10, 26-29). God then told Samuel that the season of grieving was over and that it was time for him to move on to his next assignment: anointing the next king of Israel. So he did. God said it, and Samuel did it.

The instruction given to the prophet to prepare some oil, go to the small, insignificant town of Bethlehem, and meet with a man called Jesse probably didn’t seem incredibly spectacular to Samuel. But he could never have understood the extent to which his obedience would bring him into the heart of a climactic moment in the ongoing story of God’s salvation of His people.

It was in the town of Bethlehem that, decades earlier, God had provided a husband for the young widow Ruth. Her grandson Jesse was the man that God sent Samuel to meet, and her great-grandson, David, was the boy whom God would tell Samuel to anoint as king. A thousand years later, in Bethlehem, God would bring forth His Anointed One, Jesus—a descendant of David (Matthew 1:1, 5-6), whom Samuel anointed that day—to be ruler and shepherd over all His people (2:6). Samuel’s obedience to all that God told him to do put him on the stage as this next scene of God’s sovereign plan unfolded. But Samuel did not know any of that as he filled his horn with oil and began his journey to Bethlehem.

Most of the commands of God don’t involve any impressive deeds or great drama. Many of us will not understand the significance of our obedience. Often we will obey not because we can see what God is doing but simply because we have committed ourselves to obeying Him. We may live our lives never knowing what a particular act of obedience has meant in His plans. Be careful, then, to faithfully obey even the seemingly inconsequential instructions of God, for obedience to His command is always right, and you never know beforehand how He will use it.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Mark 14:3-9

Topics: Obedience Sovereignty of God

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

Through the greater and more perfect tent (not made with hands, that is, not of his creation) he entered once for all into the holy places, not by means of the blood of goats and calves but by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.

Hebrews 9:11-12

The wonder of the Bible’s story is that God—seeing us in our inability to know Him, to love Him, to understand Him, and to serve Him—came to redeem and restore us. God secured our redemption through a series of mighty acts, culminating in the Lord Jesus Christ, whom He sent in order to bring us back into relationship with Himself. In bridging the chasm between God and us, Jesus fulfills His role as our Great High Priest.

As Jewish Christians, the first recipients of the letter to the Hebrews had experienced tremendous changes as a result of following Jesus, particularly in their worship. Their devotion was no longer marked by the grandeur of the temple and all of its accompanying sights, sounds, and fragrances, and they no longer participated in witnessing the high priest coming out on the Day of Atonement.

All of this had changed when Jesus, by His death on the cross, became both the sacrifice and the scapegoat for sins. In the same way that the high priest had previously emerged from behind the temple curtain as an indication that God had accepted the people’s sacrifice for sin, the Lord Jesus had come forth from the tomb to declare His sacrifice accepted by the Father. The curtain had been torn (Matthew 27:51; Mark 15:38; Luke 23:45). The door of heavenly access was now open.

By fulfilling the priestly role, Jesus has secured our access to God once and for all. There is no need for repetition—no need for another sacrifice. In contrast to the Old Testament high priests, who stood daily, “offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins,” Christ “offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins,” and then “he sat down at the right hand of God” (Hebrews 10:11-12).

The wonder in this, of course, is that Jesus did what no one else could do. He was the priest who made the offering and at the same time He was the offering. He voluntarily bore the punishment that was due to us on account of our sin, in order that we might enjoy full pardon from and reconciliation with God.

What difference does this make to us? First, it inspires constancy in our hearts. The first readers of the letter to the Hebrews seem to have been tempted to turn back to their Jewish rites. But Jesus is the ultimate and final High Priest and sacrifice. There is no need to go anywhere else, and there is nowhere else to go. Second, it brings confidence to our prayers. For as we approach God on His throne through Christ, we do so without fear, knowing we are forgiven and are speaking to our heavenly Father. Do you struggle with constancy or with confidence? See Jesus, your High Priest, who has entered into the presence of God, in the heavenly tent—and know that in Him, and Him alone, you have all you need.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Hebrews 3:1-6

Topics: Christ as Priest Redemption Substitutionary Atonement

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org

The tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”

Luke 18:13

One of our world’s great tragedies is that churches sometimes perpetrate falsehoods about God. This happens whenever a person or an institution confuses the gospel of grace with religious routine.

Perhaps you’ve heard before, or have been given the impression, that what you need to do is get yourself as fit as you possibly can in order to approach God: that God will not accept you unless you come acceptably to Him, unless you have something good you can show for yourself. Nothing could be further from the truth! All the fitness that God requires is that you see and confess your need of Him.

By our very nature, we do not see our need for God. Instead, we resist Him: “No one seeks for God … No one does good, not even one” (Romans 3:11-12). It is therefore a great and glorious experience when suddenly, perhaps taking even ourselves by surprise, we find ourselves saying, You know, this wonderful offer of salvation in Jesus is exactly the thing that I need. To see, to know, to feel, and to experience the depth of our insufficiency and then begin to see the light of God’s mercy is nothing short of a miracle.

When Jesus told the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector who came to the temple, He had exactly this sort of humble self-recognition in mind. The Pharisee pleads his righteousness and is proud that he is “not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector” (Luke 18:11). The tax collector, however, takes an utterly different approach. He has no confidence in himself and no sense that he deserves an audience with a holy God. All he can muster are these precious words: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” And yet it is this man, the tax collector, who Jesus says “went down to his house justified, rather than the other” (v 14).

This parable is a wonderful invitation to those of us who know we have messed up in life. It is also a great challenge to those of us who have been Christians for years—for the devil loves to point us to our good works and suggest that we now deserve acceptance from God. As the religious expert, the Pharisee should have known better, but his religious uprightness blinded him to grace. Don’t be fooled as he was. In the end, all that you ever bring to God is an empty cup for Him to fill. You are never anything other than a sinner in need of mercy—but you need never be anything other than that, for God loves to be merciful to sinners. Come freely. Come with empty hands. Come without worry. He has mercy for you.

Questions for Thought

How is God calling me to think differently?

How is God reordering my heart’s affections — what I love?

What is God calling me to do as I go about my day today?

Further Reading

Luke 18:9-14

Topics: Grace of God Mercy Repentance

Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotionals by Alistair Begg

http://www.truthforlife.org