Day by Day

[Soldier4Christ]

"Playing the Harps"

There on the poplars we hung our harps. Psalm 137:2
   

Harps make beautiful music. We often associate them with angels making music in heaven. Certainly they make appropriate instruments of praise. But in Psalm 137 we find Israel’s harps hung on trees, not being used. Why? God’s people grieve in Babylonian exile. Gone the temple in Jerusalem. Far away their homeland. They don’t want to accept the taunts of their captors to make music for them. They remain loyal to God. Repentant now, they long to return home and play their harps again in temple praise.

By contrast, Isaiah criticizes Israel for playing their harps at banquets with “no regard for the deeds of the LORD” (Isaiah 5:12). How easily we can be guilty of joining the world in loose living and disobedience against God. All the while we sing our songs and play our harps.

God wants us to repent and look to the Messiah for our deliverance. He came to make beautiful music in a dissonant world. He restored the harmony of creation by His death and resurrection. He brings us back home to Himself in our baptism. We dwell in the midst of His temple of living stones. Therefore we can take our harps off the poplars and play them beautifully in praise of Him. And someday we will join “the four living creatures and the twenty-four elders…before the Lamb” (Revelation 5: and use our harps to swell the new song eternally.

[Soldier4Christ]

"Clashing the Cymbals"

Praise Him with the clash of cymbals, praise Him with resounding cymbals. Psalm 150:5
   

The music goes on. Singers sing a song of praise to the Lord. Trumpets sound forth God’s glory. The psalmist pulls out all the stops and shouts, “Praise Him with the clash of cymbals, praise Him with resounding cymbals.” Yes, loud clashing cymbals. Unrestrained praise to the God of our salvation.

But cymbals can also be loudly out of place. They are used in a negative way by Paul in 1 Corinthians 13:1 to describe a loveless Christian, “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.” In other words, we may present ourselves to others in a showy fashion and worship in a form of high praise, but if we lack love we are no better than a loud cymbal. So often, instead of praising God, we make a discordant sound as people see our selfishness and lack of concern for others. We call attention negatively to ourselves and dishonor God.

God came into a discordant world in the person of His Son Jesus Christ. Good Friday resounded with the clanging cymbals of injustice, hatred, and prejudice. But Jesus endured the same, and His cry of “My God, My God, why have you forsaken Me?” (Matthew 27:46) was followed by the triumphant cry, “It is finished!” (John 19:30). Clashing with evil, His love won the day.

His love frees us to love others. We are attuned to praise Him, and therefore we can joyfully worship Him with the clash of cymbals forever.

[Soldier4Christ]

"Singing His Song"

Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord. Ephesians 5:19
   

Musical references fill the Bible. They speak of praise to God. In the next several devotions we look at the Christian life in terms of musical imagery. Yesterday we saw how we often sing a song of the world and a song of ourselves. Confessing our sin, we learn that the Lord is our song.

God’s song began with creation. He sang it from the mountains and valleys. Despite the discord and disharmony of sin, God kept singing His song with His merciful promises. He chose a people, preserved a remnant, and sent His Son to sing a song of love, peace, and victory on the cross. Risen and ascended, Jesus sings on in our world and into our hearts.

Because the Lord is our song, He fills our life with singing. We respond joyfully to the words of Paul in our text. We join with God’s people in regular worship and sing from our hearts in praise to the triune God. We continue singing in our hearts as we sit at the family dining table, drive in hectic rush hour traffic, and walk into our sometimes stressful place of employment. We join the psalmist, “Come, let us sing for joy to the LORD; let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation” (Psalm 95:1) – singing His song!

[Soldier4Christ]

"The Lord is My Song!"

“The LORD, the LORD, is my strength and my song; He has become my salvation.” Isaiah 12:2
   

What kind of song do you sing with your life – dull, flat, off-key, halfhearted or enthusiastic, vibrant, melodious? Isaiah gives us a glimpse of the songs we sing.

We often sing a song of the world. In Isaiah’s day the world was singing a very discordant song. Greed for wealth, vanity of clothes and jewelry, immorality and drunkenness, and exploitation of others blared loud and strident notes in the song of life. Our society, too, produces music which often jars the senses, splits the eardrums, and describes the very worst of life. We worship television, strive to keep up with the Joneses, drink excessively, take drugs, exploit others, and wallow in immorality.

We also sing a song of self. Our age capitalizes the “I.” I want. I need. I think. I feel. Going far beyond a healthy self-image, we insist on our rights, satisfy our every desire, and live only for the moment. Children rebel. We work hard for the good life for ourselves and sometimes ignore God, country, and others. How enthusiastically we sing the song of the world and the song of self!

We need to sing a song of confession. Israel ultimately repented. In the Babylonian exile God’s people sang a song of confession and looked to God for help with a humble desire to return home. We admit that worldly, selfish songs only lead to fear, defeat, guilt, and unhappiness. We sing a song of confession to God, admitting our sin and our need for Him.

Isaiah tells us that the Lord is our Song. God’s people in their repentance looked to Him and His promised Messiah. He became their Strength and their Song. He gave them hope and filled them with joy, so that they could sing a different kind of song – a song of praise! Jesus, the crucified and risen Savior, is our song!

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"From Downcast to Upraised"

Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God. Psalm 43:5
   

Have you ever felt downcast? Head bowed. Eyes on the ground. Shoulders slumped. Sighs of heaviness. Everything wrong. The world against you. Circumstances hopeless. Trouble near. God so far away. You dread mornings and the pressures of a new day. You feel tired by mid-morning and exhausted by late afternoon. Thoughts race through your mind without focus and clarity. Gloom overwhelms you.

The psalmist feels cut off from God, longs for worship in the temple, and experiences the depression of emptiness. He cries out, “Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me?” He answers his own question with a glance upward. “Put your hope in God.” The human predicament provides no hope. Sin grips our hearts and makes us downcast. But God provides hope of forgiveness and salvation through the promised Messiah, Jesus Christ.

We need hope in God. He comes to us in our discouragement. He knows our depression. Jesus’ shoulders were slumped with the weight of our sins. His head bowed in death. But by His death Jesus won the victory and brings hope through His resurrection. No longer do we need to be downcast.

Now the psalmist lifts upraised hands to God: “I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God.” He longs for the temple worship and begins to praise with his lips. God lifts him up and empowers him for praise.

Similarly, God takes us where we are – downcast, hopeless, discouraged, afraid, uncertain, self-pitying – and lifts our hands to praise Him, our Savior and our God. Filled with the hope of Christ’s resurrection, we long for regular worship in God’s house and praise Him day by day. We have moved from downcast hearts to hands upraised in praise!

[Soldier4Christ]

"The Ability to Be Wrong"

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:9
   

A few years ago the editor-in-chief of “Time” magazine gave a commencement address at New York University on a subject not taught at any American university: “The Ability to Be Wrong.” How many domestic quarrels start and continue because neither husband nor wife has the ability to be wrong? The man of the house is accused of spending too much time away from home. The wife is chided for petty jealousy. Neither will budge. The barrier between teenagers and parents often is caused by the same inability to be wrong.

In the business world the ability to be wrong is also needed. The young junior executive, fresh out of college, offers a fistful of progressive ideas, challenging the traditional operation. The experienced senior executive disdains the cocky, know-it-all newcomer. They hold each other at arm’s length, each convinced of the other’s wrong position. Political viewpoints harden in a similar fashion, giving rise to bitter controversy and a reluctance to back down. All because of the inability to be wrong.

John clearly addresses this issue, “If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us” (1 John 1:. Not one of us has the right to say that we are always right. The husband and wife, the teenager, the young or older executive, and the politician suffer from the same malady – sin. We need to get down on our knees daily and confess our wrongs, asking for God’s forgiveness. Then, as John reminds us, “He will forgive and renew us.” God sent His Son to suffer and die for our wrongs. God declares us righteous for Jesus’ sake. Forgiven, we are free to admit our wrongs to our neighbor at home, at work, and in the community. Only God gives us the ability to be wrong. Think what a difference a good dose of that ability could make in our world today.

[Soldier4Christ]

"More Thoughts on Rainy Joy"

“Your joy will be complete.” John 16:24
   

Yesterday we looked at the song “Joy is Like the Rain.” Jesus really meant it when He said, “Your joy will be complete.”

Just think about it. Joy is tried by storm. Picture yourself on the troubled Sea of Galilee. The thunder rolls across the sky and whips the waves to a frothy and frightening intensity. Your life’s boat is almost torn apart, and your heart is full of fear. All seems lost.

There is no joy. But then you remember. Christ is asleep in your boat – your Christ, your powerful, loving, living Christ. And your joyful, victorious shout cannot be silenced by the storms of life. You are whipped by wind, yet still afloat. And you live to see the calm. Yes, joy is tried by storm.

Just think about it. Joy is like the rain. The waters pound the earth, and the rivers, growing from a tiny rivulet to a mighty, roaring stream, rush through the valleys and plains to the vast oceans of the world. Joy in Christ starts small, but it can grow and grow as you experience the love of God. On and on it grows, bit by bit – the still, small voice of God within your soul; the daily yet timeless riches of His precious Word; the love of your brothers and sisters in Christ, understanding, accepting, forgiving, strengthening; the endless meetings with God, in a cloud, in a flower, in a church, in a helpful stranger, in a friend, in a deep conversation which is honest and loving. Yes, joy is like the rain.

All this, and more, from a rainy day and a song about joy. God is alive. He speaks. He gives. He loves. He brings joy, complete joy, like the rain.

[Soldier4Christ]

"Joy is Like the Rain"

“No one will take away your joy.” John 16:22
   

After a rainy day in May, I’ve been thinking about a song entitled “Joy is Like the Rain.” These reflections give new meaning to Jesus’ words regarding joy coming forth out of sorrow. “No one will take away your joy.”

Just think about it. Joy is like the rain. Look at the raindrops on your window. Fresh, beautiful raindrops, bringing life to the soil, changing brown, dying grass to a healthy green, watering the parched earth. Watch those drops streaking your window and disappearing in a stream of water. Isn’t joy like that? A moment of wonder and happiness – in your loved one's arms or at a candle-lit dinner table, at the lake or seashore, on a picnic with the delightful squeals of your laughing children, at peace with God. Then the moment fades; the laughter ceases; the bitterness comes; the loneliness, the boredom, the envy, the anger. But the joy comes again with the touch of the heavenly Father, a new burst of His love, the beauty of a sunset, the caring of a loved one, the understanding of a friend, the simplicity of a child’s faith, the reassuring hand of the Master, Jesus, the Savior, the crucified, the risen One.

Just think about it. Joy is like a cloud. Sometimes silver, sometimes gray, always sun not far away. Are their clouds on the horizon of your life? Do you fret over financial problems, marital problems, labor-management quarrels, medical needs for your family, automobile insurance? Can you see the silver lining in your clouds? Are you looking for the Father’s hand? Are you listening for His voice? Will you let the clouds deepen your life? Won’t the sun seem all the brighter and more glorious when the clouds pass? Is Christ your Sun of righteousness? Yes, joy is like a cloud.

[Soldier4Christ]

"More Dinner Talk"

They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts. Acts 2:46
   

Jesus’ last meal in the upper room with His disciples certainly stands in sharp contrast to our typical dinners together in the family. However, looking at the regular gathering of the early Christians for meals gives us reason to reflect further on our dinner talk.

What do you talk about around the dinner table? Sports, the weather, newspaper headlines about strikes or international tensions, parking problems downtown, your grocery list? Perhaps what you say is less important than how and why you say it. The evening meal may provide the only opportunity all day for your whole family to gather together. You can share with each other and show that you really care about one another and about the problems of each individual.

The meal can either draw you closer together or split you into warring factions. If you eat in silence, you may build a barrier of distrust and disinterest. If you make supper a gripe session, you gradually fray nerves and create tension. If you talk only about senseless, superficial things, you may never really get to know the members of your own family.

The early Christian community used to capitalize on meals together. They took the opportunity to build each other up. They could laugh together and talk about common problems. They could even talk freely about their faith in Jesus Christ, the crucified and risen One who had changed their lives. As Paul suggests, “Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen” (Ephesians 4:29).

What will you talk about around the dinner table?

[Soldier4Christ]

"Dinner Talk"

“I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer.” Luke 22:15
   

What do you talk about around the dinner table? Do you just sit there in silence surrounded only by the sounds of tinkling glass and fork hitting plate? “Pass the butter, please.” “I’ll take a little more gravy.” Is your evening meal a race to see who finishes first? “May I be excused? My television program is starting.” “I have to leave for bowling.” “I’m going over to George’s to do homework.”

What do you talk about around the dinner table? Do you take out your frustrations from the day? “Mother, why did you have to make this same old hamburger dish again tonight? I’m tired of it.” “I had a terrible day at the office. No one was willing to cooperate. I’ve got a splitting headache.” “How was school today, Sue?” No answer. “How was school today, Sue?” No answer. “How was school today, Sue? Are you deaf?” “None of your business. You wouldn’t be interested anyway. What’s the matter? Are you afraid I got in trouble or something?”

How different that meal in the upper room when Jesus celebrated the Passover for the last time with His disciples. Yes, the disciples argued among themselves and accused each other. But Jesus focused their thoughts on the new covenant of His blood to be sealed by His death.

The Lord Jesus hosts us in the upper room as He gives us His own body and blood. By grace He prepares for us the heavenly feast where we will dine with Him forever. And He is present with His forgiving love at every meal we eat, whether hamburger or T-bone steak. He makes it possible for us to care for each other and speak helpful, encouraging words and to gather around His Word together. What do you talk about around the dinner table?

[Soldier4Christ]

"Hope Beyond"

If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men. 1 Corinthians 15:19
   

People often live only for this life. They deny any life beyond the grave. They hope and dream, make plans and carry them out, but only for this life. They may secure an outstanding education, succeed in business, gain great wealth, receive national honors, and help other people. But the hopes fade and the sand falls to the bottom of the hourglass.

Apparently some in Corinth were questioning whether there is such a thing as a resurrection from the dead. Paul points out that our very faith hangs in the balance on this question. With ringing certainty he declares, “But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Corinthians 15:20). “Firstfruits” implies that more is to come. Because Christ, “the firstfruits,” died for us and rose physically from the dead on the third day, we who believe in Him will also rise physically from the dead on Judgment Day – and thus complete the harvest, so to speak. We have hope not only here, but also beyond this life.

Hope beyond the grave through Christ’s resurrection leads us to live hopefully here. We seek God’s purpose for our lives, tell others about His resurrection, and live daily with the quiet assurance that He will take us to heaven. Easter lives on all year long. Eternity beckons with the open, inviting arms of our risen and ascended Lord. Thank God for the hope beyond!

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"Daily Burdens Transformed"

Praise be to the LORD, to God our Savior, who daily bears our burdens. Psalm 68:19
   

Daily burdens mount. Strife in the family at breakfast. Angry words. Clutter left behind – dirty dishes, towels. Traffic heavy. Late arrival at work and school. Headache begins. Pressures increase. A pile of unfinished work. Decisions to be made. Rushed lunch break. Complaints. Traffic heavy. Home for rest. No quiet. More demands. Children’s arguments. Telephone ringing during supper. Meetings to attend. Late to bed. Sleep and the thought of a new day. Daily burdens.

Do you experience daily burdens? When the harried days compound each other, the burdens seem unbearable. Our hectic, modern society is not the only one to claim daily burdens. Israel of old experienced similar problems, the result of sin and selfishness. Nations threatened destruction. Rulers made demands. Each family struggled for survival.

But in our text the psalmist brings a message of joyful praise. God, who brought Israel out of Egypt and into the Promised Land, would also lead Israel in triumphal procession back from captivity to Jerusalem. He who would send a Messiah also daily cared for the needs of His people.

Replay the daily burdens from breakfast to bed. Picture the Lord present to bear them. See Him as the great Burden-Bearer. See Him empowering us to praise Him in the midst of problems and troubles, See Him using us to bear the daily burdens of others. Begin the day with the sign of the cross. Remember your baptism. Fall asleep at day’s end with the confidence that all your sins and shortcomings have been fully forgiven in His blood. Look forward with eagerness to the new day. Daily burdens become daily blessings.

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"God's Spacious Place"

He brought me out into a spacious place; He rescued me because He delighted in me. Psalm 18:19
   

Americans have traditionally loved the wide-open spaces. Much of the frontier push to occupy this spacious land was motivated by a desire to own a comfortable plot which could be called home. The move from crowded cities to gracious suburban living reveals the same desire for space. Yet we often feel crowded and limited. Cars jam the freeways. We often work among hundreds or thousands of people in a confined space. In short, we often live in narrow, confined prisons of human making.

David in the psalm verse describes God’s spacious place. He reviews his life and the many harrowing escapes from his enemies. He knows the meaning of being cramped for space, hemmed in on every side. He was forced to flee home and hide from Saul in caves and behind rocks in the desert. No place to call his own. How confined and bottled up he had felt!

But David rejoices that God “brought me out into a spacious place; He rescued me because He delighted in me.” Yes, God gave David and Israel the Promised Land and larger borders than at any other time in their history. But more important, David learned that God always provides a spacious place for us in the freedom of His promises. He rescues us in His Son, the promised Messiah.

Whether we live in a one-room apartment or a four-bedroom ranch, whether we work on a factory assembly line or as a farmer on a section of land, God brings us out into the spacious place of His love in Jesus Christ. Jesus narrowed His road to an appointment in Jerusalem. He was hemmed in by His accusers, confined to a cross between two thieves, and laid in a cave-like tomb behind a huge stone. But God rolled away the stone, and Jesus came out into a spacious place, where He rules the universe. We are free now to praise God wherever we are and can joyfully anticipate the spacious heavenly places forever.

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"Are You Bearing Fruit?"

“Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in Me.” John 15:4
   

Gardening time. Looking for produce and productivity, both quantity and quality. Last winter, from our freezer, we enjoyed home-grown peaches, blueberries, apples, and cherries for home-baked pies. Applied to the Christian life, the gardening question comes from John 15: “Are you bearing fruit?”

Scripture suggests the following fruit-bearing possibilities:
(1) Bad fruit. Jesus says, “A bad tree bears bad fruit” (Matthew 7:17). Backbiting, badmouthing, and gossip all evidence bad fruit in a life. Does bitterness not qualify as sour grapes?
(2) No fruit. Jesus says, “He cuts off every branch in Me that bears no fruit” (John 15:2). If bad fruit represents sins of commission, no fruit describes sins of omission – a lack of love, joy, peace and the other fruits of the Spirit.
(3) Little fruit. “Every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful” (John 15:2). Sometimes unnecessary leaves and shoots drain off nourishment needed to produce fruit. The result – little fruit in both quantity and quality. We are bogged down by the world and its cares.
(4) Good fruit. “If a man remains in Me and I in him, he will bear much fruit” (John 15:5). The godly person is like a tree “which yields its fruit in season” (Psalm 1:3). The fruits of the Spirit are evident, and a life of witnessing brings many into the kingdom of God.

How can we bear much good fruit? Simply Jesus says, “I am the Vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in Me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). Jesus chose us. He died on the cross for us. He grafted us into Himself. His life flows through us as we feed on His Word, so that we bear much fruit.

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"Tell Your Family"

“Go home to your family and tell them how much the Lord has done for you, and how He has had mercy on you.” Mark 5:19
   

A great miracle has occurred. A demon-possessed man, a maniac, has been healed by Jesus.

Now the grateful man pleads to go with Jesus and tell the world about God’s great miracle. He wants to be an itinerant evangelist. But Jesus has other plans for him: “Go home to your family and tell them…” What a challenge, probably more difficult than going with Jesus, certainly a more effective form of witnessing. His family must have felt totally estranged by his madness. Would they now be able to accept him as a new person in Christ? Would they forget his past behavior? Would his new peace and sanity continue? The man obeyed Jesus and returned home. Apparently the miracle of readjustment to family and friends also worked, because we are told that the whole region was amazed at what Jesus had done.

Jesus Christ has also worked a great miracle within you. By nature estranged from God and controlled by selfish lusts, you have been cleansed by the blood of Jesus Christ, shed on the cross. In Baptism you have become a special child of God. Clothed in His righteousness, you are in your right mind, a mind new in Christ Jesus.

Grateful, you want to tell the world about Christ, but He has other plans for you: “Go home to your family and tell them …” what a challenge! Your family knows you, your shortcomings, your bad habits, your thoughtless, selfish words and actions. Will they accept your witness? Will they see Christ in you and rejoice at God’s mercy? Jesus gives you the power to obey and return home. Just think how great a miracle would occur throughout our land if families everywhere would experience the healing of God and join in telling other families about God’s mercy to them in Jesus Christ!