Tag Archives: Max Lucado

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – God Gives Hope

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God gives hope! So what if someone was born thinner or stronger, lighter or darker than you? Why count diplomas or compare resumes? What does it matter if they have a place at the head table? You have a place at God’s table! And he’s filling your cup to overflowing. Hasn’t our Father given us a strong wall of grace to protect us? A sure exit to deliver us? Of whom can we be envious? Who has more than we do?

Rather than want what others have, shouldn’t we wonder if they have what we do? Instead of being jealous of them, how about zealous for them? Hold out the cup! There’s enough to go around. One thing is certain. When the final storm comes and you are safe in your Father’s house, you won’t regret what he didn’t give. You will be stunned at what he did.

From Traveling Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – The Good Shepherd

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If the Gospels teach us anything, they teach us that Jesus is a Good Shepherd. In John 10:11, Jesus announces, “The good shepherd gives his life for the sheep.” Didn’t Jesus spread the oil of prevention on his disciples? He prayed for them. He equipped them. He revealed to them the secrets of the parables. He calmed their fears. Because he was a good shepherd, he protected them…and protected them against disappointments.

Jesus tends to his sheep. And he will tend to you. Go to him. Others may guide us to God. Others may help us understand God. But no one can do the work of God, for only God can heal. Psalm 147:3 promises God “heals the brokenhearted.” Your first step? Go to God. Then bow before God. Trust in Him. Go. Bow. Trust! Worth a try, don’t you think?

From Traveling Light

Our Daily Bread

Our Daily Bread — Calming The Storm

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Read: Mark 4:35-41

Bible in a Year: 1 Chronicles 28-29; John 9:24-41

He arose and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace, be still!” And the wind ceased and there was a great calm. —Mark 4:39

While Hurricane Katrina headed toward the coast of Mississippi, a retired pastor and his wife left their home and went to a shelter. Their daughter pleaded with them to go to Atlanta where she could take care of them, but the couple couldn’t get any money to make the trip because the banks were closed. After the storm had passed, they returned to their home to get a few belongings, and were able to salvage only a few family photos floating in the water. Then, when the man was taking his father’s photo out of its frame so it could dry, $366 fell out—precisely the amount needed for two plane tickets to Atlanta. They learned they could trust Jesus for what they needed.

For the disciples, trusting Jesus in a storm was the curriculum for the day in the dramatic narrative of Mark 4:35-41. Jesus had instructed His disciples to cross to the other side of the Sea of Galilee and then He went to sleep in the boat. When a quick and violent storm blew in, the disciples dripped as much with fear and anxiety as water from the waves. They woke Jesus, saying, “Teacher, don’t you care if we drown?” (v.38 NIV). Jesus stood up and with three words, “Peace, be still!” He muzzled the storm.

We all experience storms—persecutions, financial troubles, illnesses, disappointments, loneliness—and Jesus does not always prevent them. But He has promised never to leave us nor forsake us (Heb. 13:5). He will keep us calm in the storm. —Marvin Williams

Are you in a storm? What do you know about God’s character that could help bring calm to your heart?

In the storms of life, we can see the character of our God.

INSIGHT: Mark 4:35–5:43 records four miracles that answer the question asked in 4:41: “Who can this be . . . ?” They demonstrate Jesus’ absolute power over nature (4:35-41), the spiritual world (5:1-20), physical illnesses (5:21-34), and death (5:35-43). Each miracle shows Jesus as the Omnipotent Sovereign God. In Jewish minds the power to control the sea and the waves was exclusive to God (Job 38:8-11; Ps. 65:5-7; Isa. 51:10; Nah. 1:3-5). It’s interesting, however, that in today’s passage Mark provides an amazing contrast. Just before Jesus displayed the awesome powers of His deity by calming the sea, we are given a touching picture of His frail humanity: Jesus was so tired that even the violent tossing of the waves did not wake Him (4:38).

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Loneliness

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We’ll try anything to get rid of our loneliness. But should we? Should we be so quick to drop it? Could it be that loneliness is a gift? A gift from God? A friend turns away. The job goes bad. Your spouse didn’t understand. The church is dull. One by one he removes the options until all you have left is God. He would do that?  Hebrews 12:6 tells us, “The Lord disciplines those he loves.” If he must silence every voice, he will. He wants you to discover what David discovered and to be able to say what David said, “You are with me.”

Loneliness. Could it be one of God’s finest gifts? Scripture says, “Perfect love casts out fear.” If a season of solitude is his way to teach you to hear his song, don’t you think it’s worth it? So do I.

From Traveling Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Get Over Yourself

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Proverbs 16:5 says, “The Lord despises pride.” So, get over yourself!

An elementary boy came home from tryouts for the school play. “Mommy, mommy” he announced, “I got a part. I’ve been chosen to sit in the audience and clap and cheer.” When you have a chance to clap and cheer, do you take it? If you do, your head is starting to fit your hat size.

Demanding respect is like chasing a butterfly. Chase it, and you’ll never catch it. Sit still, and it may light on your shoulder. The Bible says in Proverbs 27:2, “Don’t praise yourself. Let someone else do it.” Does your self-esteem need attention? You need only pause at the base of the cross and be reminded of this: The maker of the stars would rather die for you than live without you. And that’s a fact!

From Traveling Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Nothing to Be Proud About

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Do art critics give awards to the canvas? Can you imagine a scalpel growing smug after a successful heart transplant? Of course not. And the message of the Twenty-Third Psalm is that we have nothing to be proud about either. We have rest, salvation, blessings, and a home in heaven—and we did nothing to earn any of it. Who did the work? The answer threads through the Psalm. . .

He makes me. . .

He leads me. . .

He restores my soul. . .

You are with me. . .

Your rod and staff comfort me. . .

You prepare a table. . .

You anoint my head. . .

And just to make sure we get the point, right in the middle of the poem, David declares, the shepherd leads his sheep, not for our names’ sake, but for “His name’s sake!”

From Traveling Light

 

 

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – God Loves Humility

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God loves humility. Could that be why he offers so many tips on cultivating it?

Assess yourself honestly. Romans 12:3 says, “Don’t cherish exaggerated ideas of yourself, but try to have a sane estimate of your capabilities.”

Don’t take success too seriously. Deuteronomy 8:13 warns, “When your silver and gold increase your heart will become proud.” Ponder your success and count your money in a cemetery, and remember neither of the two is buried with you.

Celebrate the significance of others. Philippians 2:3 says, “In humility consider others better than yourselves.”

Speak humbly. 1st Samuel 2:3 warns, “Let no arrogance come from your mouth.” Don’t be cocky. People aren’t impressed with your opinions. In Galatians 6:14, Paul said, “The cross of our Lord Jesus Christ is my only reason for bragging!” So if you need to brag—brag about that!

From Traveling Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – None Righteous

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All of us occasionally do what is right. A few predominantly do what is right. But do any of us always do what is right?  According to Paul we don’t!  Romans 3:10 says, “There is no one righteous; no, not one.” Some beg to differ. I’m not perfect, but I’m better than most. I’d say I was a righteous person. I used to try that one on my mother. My brother’s room was always messier than mine. I’d say, “See, my room is clean; just look at his.” It never worked. She would show me her room and say, “This is what I mean by clean.”

God does the same. He points to himself and says, This is what I mean by righteousness. David said, “He leads me in the paths of righteousness.” God’s way is a narrow winding path up a steep hill. At the top of the hill is a Cross!

From Traveling  Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Life’s a Jungle

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For many people, life is—well, life is a jungle. Not a jungle of beasts and trees. Would that it were so simple. Our jungles are thickets of failing health, broken hearts, and empty wallets. Our forests are framed with hospital walls and divorce courts. It is a jungle out there. And for many, hope is in short supply.

Let’s see if we can brighten up the picture. The first answer would be a person. Someone to look you in the face and say, Don’t give up. There’s a better place and I’ll lead you there. David says in Psalm 23, “He restores my soul.” God is our good Shepherd and He majors in restoring hope to the soul. When God comes, your loneliness diminishes, your despair decreases, and your confusion begins to lift.  You haven’t left the jungle, but you have hope because you have someone who can lead you out.

From Traveling Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Whaddif’s

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Worry is the burlap bag of burdens—overflowing with whaddifs! Whaddif it rains at my wedding? Whaddif after all my dieting, they discover lettuce is fattening and chocolate isn’t? The burlap bag of worry!

No one wants your worries. Truth be told, you don’t want them either. No one has to remind you the high cost of anxiety, but I will anyway. Worry isn’t a disease, but it causes diseases—high blood pressure, heart trouble, migraines, and a host of stomach disorders. Jesus said in Matthew 6:27, “You cannot add any time to your life by worrying about it.” Worrying is one job you can’t farm out, but you can overcome it. David declares in Psalm 23:2, “He leads me beside the still waters.” He leads me. He is ahead of me. He is in front. God leads us! And what a difference that makes!

From Traveling Light

 

 

Our Daily Bread

Our Daily Bread — Motivated By Love

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Read: 2 Corinthians 5:11–17

Bible in a Year: 2 Kings 24-25; John 5:1-24

The love of Christ compels us. —2 Corinthians 5:14

In the 1920s, Bobby Jones dominated the golfing world, despite being an amateur. In one film about his life, Bobby Jones: Stroke of Genius, there is a scene where a professional golfer asks Bobby when he is going to quit being an amateur and grab for the money like everyone else does. Jones answers by explaining that the word amateur comes from the Latin amo—to love. His answer was clear: He played golf because he loved the game.

Our motives, why we do what we do, make all the difference. This certainly applies to those who are followers of Jesus Christ. In his letter to the Corinthian church, Paul gives us an example of this. Throughout the epistle he defended his conduct, character, and calling as an apostle of Christ. In response to those who questioned his motives for ministry, Paul said, “Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again” (2 Cor. 5:14-15 NIV).

Christ’s love is the greatest of all motivators. It causes those who follow Him to live for Him, not for themselves. —Bill Crowder

What are some of the ways your understanding of Christ and His love has shaped your motives and your actions? In what ways would you like to see God work in you now?

We are shaped and fashioned by what we love most.

INSIGHT: In 2 Corinthians Paul was writing to a church that he founded—yet a church that had, in a sense, turned on him. This makes it very different from 1 Thessalonians, where Paul was writing to men and women with whom he had a strong and loving relationship. Because of these different relationships, in 1 Thessalonians 2–3 Paul was describing his ministry while in 2 Corinthians was defending it.

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Eternal Creatures

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We are eternal creatures. We ask eternal questions. Where did I come from? Where am I going? Is there life after death? These are the primal questions of the soul. And if left unanswered, such questions steal our rest.

Only one other living creature has as much trouble resting as we do. Not dogs…they doze. Cats invented the catnap. Most animals know how to rest—with one exception. These creatures are woolly, simpleminded, and slow. Sheep! Sheep can’t sleep. For them to do so everything must be just right. No tension in the flock…no hunger in the belly…everything has to be just so. Unfortunately sheep cannot find safe pasture or find food. They need help. They need a shepherd to lead them, and help them to lie down in green pastures. Without a shepherd they can’t rest. Without a Shepherd, neither can we!

From Traveling Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – A Big Deal About Rest

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Life can get so loud we forget to shut it down. Maybe that’s why God made such a big deal about rest in the Ten Commandments! Of the ten, which one occupies the most space? Murder…adultery…stealing? You’d think so. But curiously, these commands are tributes to brevity. God needed only five English words to condemn them all.

But when it came to the topic of rest, it took a paragraph in Exodus 20: 8-11. But. . .but. . .who’s going to run the store? We offer up one reason after another, but God silences them all with one poignant reminder. “In six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day.” God’s message is plain. If creation didn’t crash when I rested, it won’t crash when you do!

From Traveling Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – Change Your Focus and Relax

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Psalm 23:2 says, “He makes me to lie down in green pastures; leads me beside the still waters.” Note the two pronouns preceding the two verbs. He makes me. . .He leads me. Who is the active one? Who is in charge? The Shepherd!

We see the waves of the water rather than the Savior walking through them. We focus on our paltry provisions rather than on the One who can feed five thousand hungry people. Change your focus—and relax! While you’re at it, change your schedule and rest! Life can get so loud we forget to shut it down. When David says, “He makes me lie down in green pastures,” he is saying my shepherd makes me lie down in his finished work. His pasture is his gift to us. This is not the pasture you’ve made. It is a gift from God, and your Shepherd invites you there!

From Traveling Light

Alistair Begg

Alistair Begg – Humility, Happiness, Holiness

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I will love him and manifest myself to him.

John 14:21

The Lord Jesus gives special revelations of Himself to His people. Even if Scripture did not declare this, many of the children of God could testify to the truth of it from their own experience. They have had manifestations of their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, in a peculiar manner, such as no mere reading or hearing could afford.

In the biographies of eminent saints, you will find many instances recorded in which Jesus has been pleased in a very special manner to speak to their souls and to unfold the wonders of His person; in this way their souls have been steeped in happiness, and they have thought themselves to be in heaven. Although they were not there, they were close to the threshold of it–for when Jesus manifests Himself to His people, it is heaven on earth; it is paradise in embryo; it is bliss begun.

Special manifestations of Christ exercise a holy influence on the believer’s heart. One effect will be humility. If a man says, “I have had such-and-such spiritual communications, I am a great man,” he has never had any communion with Jesus at all; for “the LORD regards the lowly, but the haughty he knows from afar.”1 He does not need to come near the haughty to know them and will never give them any visits of love. Another effect will be happiness; for in God’s presence there are pleasures forevermore. Holiness will be sure to follow. A man who has no holiness has never had this manifestation. Some men profess a great deal; but we must not believe anyone unless we see that his actions agree with what he says. “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked.”2 He will not bestow His favors upon the wicked, for He will neither cast away a perfect man, nor will He respect an evildoer. Thus there will be three effects of nearness to Jesus–humility, happiness, and holiness. May God give them to you, Christian!

1) Psalm 138:6    2) Galations 6:7

Devotional material is taken from “Morning and Evening,” written by C.H. Spurgeon, revised and updated by Alistair Begg

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – What Really Matters

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A man once went to a minister for counseling.

“I’ve lost everything,” he told the minister.

“Oh I’m so sorry to hear you’ve lost your faith,” the minister responded.

“No,” the man corrected him, “I haven’t lost my faith.”

“Well, then I’m sad to hear you’ve lost your character.”

“I didn’t say that,” the man corrected. “I still have my character.”

“I’m so sorry you’ve lost your salvation,” said the minister.

“That’s not what I said,” the man objected.

“You have your faith, your character, and your salvation. Seems to me,” the minister observed, “that you’ve lost none of the things that really matter.”

You and I could pray like the Puritan. He sat down to a meal of bread and water.  He bowed his head and declared, “All this and Jesus, too?” What will you gain with contentment? You may gain joy—and the faith to say, “The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want!”

From Traveling Light

 

 

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – The Power of Love

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May I meddle for a moment? What’s the one thing separating you from joy? How do you fill in this blank: “I will be happy when____?” When I’m healed…when I’m promoted…when I’m married…when I’m single…when I’m rich?  With your answer firmly in mind, answer this. If your dream never comes true, if the situation never changes, would you be happy? If not, then you’re sleeping in the cold cell of discontent.

You need to know what you have in your Shepherd. You have a God who hears you, the power of love behind you, the Holy Spirit within you, and all of heaven ahead of you. If you have the Shepherd, you have grace for every sin, direction for every turn, a candle for every corner, and an anchor for every storm. You have everything you need!

From Traveling Light

Presidential Prayer Team

Presidential Prayer Team; C.H. – Pray, Listen, Repeat

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Conversation is an interaction of two people who talk, listen and respond. In today’s technology-driven world, some might say face-to-face exchange is a lost art. Statistics show many prefer texting over an actual phone call. Despite current trends, God prefers one-on-one time with His children.

As for Ishmael, I have heard you; behold, I have blessed him and will make him fruitful.

Genesis 17:20

In today’s passage, Abraham and God discuss His covenant. While God promised to create many nations through Isaac, Abraham asked about his son Ishmael – and the Lord listened and responded. Have you taken your concerns for this nation’s future to your Heavenly Father? It’s time America made a move back to real conversation with the Lord through prayer.

Take some time today to talk, listen and respond to God. Remember, He often speaks through His Word. If you struggle with daily prayer time, tell God about it. Ask Him to strengthen your prayer life as well as that of your nation’s leaders. Pray specifically for the 2016 presidential hopefuls to have a daily encounter with God through prayer.

Recommended Reading: Philippians 4:4-9

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – In Prison

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Are you in prison? You are if you feel better when you have more and worse when you have less. If happiness is one delivery away…you are in prison—the prison of want! That’s the bad news. The good news is, you have a visitor. Look across the visiting table at the psalmist, David. He whispers, I have a secret to tell you, the secret of satisfaction. “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” It’s as if David is saying what I have in God is greater than what I don’t have in life.

Contentment comes when we can honestly say with Paul, “I have learned to be satisfied with the things I have. I know how to live when I am poor, and I know how to live when I have plenty.” You think you and I could learn to say the same?

From Traveling Light

Max Lucado

Max Lucado – An Illustration of God

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When David, who was a warrior, minstrel, and ambassador for God, searched for an illustration, he remembered his days as a shepherd. He remembered how he lavished attention on the sheep day and night. How he slept with them and watched over them. And the way he cared for the sheep reminded him of the way God cares for us. David rejoiced to say, “The Lord is my shepherd,” and in doing so he proudly implied, “I am his sheep.”

Of all God’s animals, the sheep is the least able to take care of himself.  And yet, we so often hang on to our chest of self-reliance. Why is it that the ones who most need a shepherd resist him so? Scripture says, “Do it God’s way.” Experience says, “Do it God’s way.” And, every so often—we do!

From Traveling Light