Latest Thoughts of the Day

Genesis 11:1

7/30/2014

Now the whole world had one lamguage amd a common speech.

In the beginning the whole population spoke the same language. A change was not inevitable. Man’s determination to band together to resist God provoked the wonder of Babel as a judgment, but even more as a challenge. Man could no longer work easily with one another. Now it was necessary to study and learn and work to clear away the obstacle of non-communication. Those who spoke a particular language banded together because they understood each other, but they moved away to new territory because of the hassles of dealing with outsiders. The result was a populating of the whole earth (which was what God had commanded and man said that he wouldn’t do.) The result was a display of amazing richness, as cultures developed independently of one another. Beauty and good have come out of God’s judgment.

Revelation 6:12

7/29/2014

I watched as he opened the sixth seal. There ws a great earthquake. The sun turned black like sackcloth made of goat hair, the whole moon turned blood red,

We can’t think what we call “scientifically” about this at all. The moon simply reflects the sun, and if it is black the moon can’t be any color at all. Our understanding of stars would not allow them to “fall” at all, but that is what John will say that the stars will do. God is showing John something, and it has filled him with awe. God’s power over the light without which we cannot see is awesome. God’s power to change the color of the moon is awesome. God’s power to shake the whole earth and to roll up the sky is awesome. Lord, we are awe-struck by You. Thank You for Jesus, and our safety in Him.

Jude 8

7/28/2014

In the very same way, these dreamers pollute their own bodies, reject authority and slander celestial beings.

Jude sees such people in his day, and we see them in ours. Sexual immorality pollutes the body of the one who engages in it. STDs are bad enough, but even “safe sex” leaves a pollution on the person who uses his body in a way outside the purpose of God. Choosing to live in such a way is a rejection of authority. Using heavenly allusions and pet names to describe their delight slanders the realities they mock by using them. This kind of person still exists in this day, and God’s attitude toward them has in no way changed. “Woe to them”, Jude goes on to say. Lord, help us take seriously Your word and not grow callous to wickedness. Keep us pure, and help us help others who destroy themselves.

3 John 5

7/27/2014

Dear friend, you are faithful in what you are doing for the brothers, even though they are strangers to you.

We are called as Christians to support the work of other Christians laboring to serve Christ in places we cannot visit. Our trust and confidence in them is appropriate, and it will be God’s way of providing them with the resources they need to carry on their work. They have responsibility to remain faithful and diligent, and we must trust the Spirit of God to work in their hearts and consciences, along with the overseeing churches who try to monitor their labors and help them stay on course. That they are brothers in Christ is a reason we should seek to support them. Lord, thank You for prompting us as You do to give to missions. Help those laboring and those overseeing to be faithful to Jesus.

2 John 5

7/26/2014

I ask that we love one another

No one ever asks us to breathe because life itself would not go on for us if we didn’t, and there is an urgency to do so built in. Loving other Christians is a choice for us, but it springs from a work of grace in our hearts, and an inclination to respond prompted by the Holy Spirit. When we do not love other Christians, we always know that we are in the wrong. John asks us to do what our hearts prompt us to do and what our minds, renewed by the Holy Spirit understand and believe we ought to do. It is the way God works in a person. We must choose to respond to promptings within, instructions from without, and exhortations from other Christians. Help us to do this today, Lord Jesus. We want to honor You.

1 John 5:1

7/25/2014

Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves the father loves his child as well.

Two marks of a Christian. Believing is knowing, trusting and submitting to Jesus Christ as the actual and real mediator between us and the living God. It is more than just words. It has been received by the illumination of the Holy Spirit of God in our individual souls. This is what John means when he speaks of believing. John also speaks of loving those whom God has brought into this relationship with Himself.
We actually and truly love the one who has placed faith in Jesus as their Christ. The Enemy will do what he can to stir criticism and resentment toward those whom Jesus has loved, but we must resist the Devil. We must respond to our better impulses for Jesus’ sake.

2 Peter 3:1

7/24/2014

Dear friends, this is now my second letter to you. I have written both of them as reminders to stimulate you to wholesome thinking.

Peter is conscious that much of what he has written in both his letters was already known by those to whom he wrote. There have been enlargements of concepts and focusing of details and particular applications which have all served to fill out what they had already received by faith, but the fundamental truths have been things already known and believed. Wholesome thinking for us today will be on the same pattern. We learn, we meditate, we deepen in our knowledge, but it is all an opening out and an application of the Truth, of Jesus, Whom we have received in all His fullness. Lord, help us this day to learn more of You. You are the Truth we long better to know.

1 Peter 3:1

7/23/2014

Wives, in the same way be submissive to your husbands so that, if any of them do not believe the word, they may be won over without talk by the behavior of their wives,

“In the same way” is reminding women of the way Jesus bore reproach and misunderstanding and rejection and ridicule by quietly living out His commitment to do the will of God. Our own lives have been moved to trust in Him because of what He bore in silent witness as much as by what He said. There is a time for speaking, and there is a time for living out what we have said, even unto physical death. Being married to an unsaved man provides that wonderful opportunity and may be wonderfully used by God to bring him to faith. But whether or not, quiet trust in Jesus Christ is the appropriate response.