A Christian Devotional

[Shammu]

Get rich quick!

1 Timothy 6:17 Charge them that are rich in this world, that they be not highminded, nor trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy;

A sailor was shipwrecked on a desert island and was captured by some of natives. They carried him off on their shoulders to their village, where he was sure he would end up being the main course. But instead, they put a crown on his head and made him king.

He was enjoying all the attention he was receiving but was growing a little suspicious. He started making inquiries and discovered that their custom was to crown a stranger king for a year and then send him to a deserted island where he would to starve to death.

Obviously, this plan did not appeal to the sailor. Since he was the king and the natives obeyed his every order, he ordered them to ship supplies to the island where he would eventually be sent. He had them clear the land and build him a hut and plant enough vegetables and fruits for an adequate garden. When he was finally banned to the deserted island, he lived in abundance.

How are we using the good gifts God has given us? Wealth and authority can be dangerous -- or they can be a blessing. They can be used to destroy and tear down, or to store up good things in heaven. The choice is ours.

Let's ask the Lord to help us to be wise stewards of all God's gifts to us, that we might not end up being rich on earth and poor with God.

[Shammu]

Who do you trust?

Psalms 20:7 Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will remember the name of the LORD our God.

I came across an old article about "fake physicians". According to this article, many American citizens could be receiving medical treatment from doctors who lied on their medical school loan applications and used the money to pay a broker for fake documents. One guy was arrested and later admitted that he was paid beaucoup bucks to hand out approximately a hundred phony medical documents claiming that his clients completed their training! Can you imagine?!

Not to scare anyone, but it wouldn't surprise me to find that this kind of thing is commonplace today -- we live in a world full of corruption and deceit.

But you know what really DOES surprise me? We would sooner trust in doctors we don't know and medicines we've never heard of than trust in the healing touch of the Lord! We've somehow, been conditioned to look for every possible physical solution to our health problems and finally, when those don't work, we throw up our hands and say "Oh well, there's nothing left to do but pray!"

Let's get real here! We need to go to God FIRST! Seek ye first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you! Haven't we heard this somewhere before? Let's start putting our trust first in the Lord today! There's so much work to be done!

[Shammu]

What's your worth?

Luke 12:6-7 Are not five sparrows sold for two farthings, and not one of them is forgotten before God? But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows.

A good friend sent us this story.

A well known speaker started off his seminar by holding up a $20 bill. In the room of two hundred, he asked, "Who would like this $20 bill?" Hands immediately started going up.

"I am going to give this $20 bill to one of you but first, let me do this." He proceeded to crumple the dollar bill up. He then asked, "Who still wants it?" Still hands were up in the air.

"Well," he replied, "What if I do this?" And he dropped it on the ground, spit on it and started to grind it into the floor with his shoe. He picked it up, now crumpled and dirty. "Still want it now?" Surprisingly, hands still didn't go down.

"My friends, I think we've all learned a valuable lesson here. No matter what I did to this money, you still wanted it because it did not decrease in value. It was worth twenty whole dollars no matter what I did to it."

"Often in our lives, we are dropped, crumpled, spit upon and ground into the dirt by the decisions we make and the circumstances that come our way. We feel as though we are worthless.

But here's the kicker. No matter what has happened, we will never lose value in God's eyes. To Him, dirty or clean, crumpled or finely creased, we are still priceless. The worth of our lives does not come in who we are but by whose we are! Let's give our lives back to the Lord today, our disappointments, our suffering, our feelings of worthlessness. He is the God of healing. He has made us clean and worthy of our calling in Him! And there's so much work to be done!!

[Shammu]

Where are your nails?

Proverbs 18:21 Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.

A friend sent us this powerful story.

There once was a boy who had a very bad temper. His Father gave him a bag of nails and told him that from now on, each time he lost his temper, he must hammer a nail into their beautiful white picket fence. The first day the boy drove in thirty-seven nails.

Over the next few weeks, he learned to control his anger -- the number of nails he hammered daily gradually dwindled down. He discovered it was easier to hold his temper than to go outside and drive those nails into the fence. When he told his father about this, he suggested that the boy now start pulling out a nail for each day that he was able to hold his temper. Finally, the day came when the young boy was able to tell his father that all the nails were gone.

That evening, he took his son by the hand and led him to the fence. He said, "Son, you have done well but look at the holes you've made here. Our beautiful fence will never be the same. When you say things in anger to the people you love, they leave deep, ugly holes just like these. It won't matter how many times you say I'm sorry, the wound will still be there".

I think this is a good reminder for us today. Our tongue is a powerful force! With it, we need to be bringing words of life and encouragement to those around us! There's so much work to be done!

[Shammu]

Change your landscape by planting some seeds!

Matthew 13:23 But he that received seed into the good ground is he that heareth the word, and understandeth it; which also beareth fruit, and bringeth forth, some an hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.

There was a mailman, John Hand, who rode his mail truck through Los Altos Hills of California on his 50 mile route each day. The route was plain, all brown and virtually no color. One day he began to throw wild flower seeds out of the window as he drove. Today, if you travel his route in the Los Altos Hills you'll find beautiful patches of flowers throughout, blossoming in many colors.

We all travel different roads. Sadly, many of us miss wonderful opportunities to change and bring added beauty to our landscapes. In our families, at our jobs, in the world around us, God has given us opportunies to color those landscapes! It's far easier for us to complain and resign ourselves to settling for those landscapes, than it is to be the catalysts of change. From this point on, let's resolve to stop complaining about the lifelessness around us and do something about it! God has given us the power and anointing to change those landscapes!

Let's start sowing the seeds of the Gospel, the seeds of salvation and new life. Let's sow the seeds of love, joy, righteousness and all the tasty fruits of the Spirit. As we sow them throughout our daily lives, those dull, dry landscapes will begin blossom into something beautiful and we, like that mailman, John Hand, will be remembered as the ones who sowed those seeds.

[Shammu]

Look ahead!

Luke 9:62 And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.

Some time ago, I wrote a devotional about not worrying for tomorrow because tomorrow holds its own worries. But it occurred to me recently, that just about as often as we worry for tomorrow, we worry for yesterday! How many times do we find ourselves saying, "I wish things could be the way they were, I wish I was younger, I wish I could fit into those jeans again, I wish……you fill in the blank"?

The Lord doesn’t want us looking back at what once was. Our enemy does -- he wants us to feel discouraged and helpless over what we face today and drown in self-pity about how it was in the past. But God wants us to look ahead to new endeavors! He wants us to say "forget the old – there are great things for the future – I’m gonna look ahead!"

Let’s forget the past – it’s long gone already. Let’s move ahead and press toward the new things that the Lord wants to do in our lives.

[Shammu]

Keep close!

Ephesians 4:3-6 Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body, and one Spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling; One Lord, one faith, one baptism, One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.

Aesop wrote a fable about four bulls who were the best of friends. They always kept close to each other so that in the event that danger came their way, they would face it together. They traveled together, grazed together, and lay down to rest together.

One day, a hungry lion who lived nearby spotted these four friends and became determined to catch one. He was no match for all four of them at once, so he would follow them and watch carefully, hoping to catch one alone. Every time he saw one lagging the least bit behind, he would sneak up and whisper to him that the others had been saying unkind things about him. This, he did with each bull until finally all four began to feel suspicious and uneasy around one another. Each thought that the other three were plotting against him.

When the lion succeeded in breaking the trust among them, the bulls went their separate ways...and one by one, he devoured them.

I'm sure you can see the analogy here. The enemy would love nothing more than to divide us and break the trust among us in the body of Messiah. He knows full well that if he can just get us separated, he can come in for the kill!

Let's not allow the devil to play out his wicked scheme! Be on guard! Don't gossip -- overlook offenses -- pray with one another and be determined to stick together, so that we may accomplish great and mighty things for God's kingdom! There's power in numbers -- and there's SO much work to be done!

[Shammu]

Don't crash!

John 8:36 If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.

We know a Christian woman who has struggled with her past for years. She rarely thinks or speaks of anything else. And as a result, her life has just spiraled downward, despite all our attempts to minister to her. It breaks our hearts to see.

Have you ever tried looking in your rearview mirror while you drive your car forward? Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? But this is what we're actually doing when we constantly think about our past as we try to move forward in the Lord! It's a surefire way to crash.

We need to learn from the past, not live in it. We cannot move forward unless we stop looking backward and focus on the great things God has for us ahead! There's so much work to be done!!

[Shammu]

It's time to light the fire!

1 John 5:20 And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.

There is a tale told of that great English actor Macready. An eminent preacher once said to him: "I wish you would explain to me something."

"Well, what is it? I don't know that I can explain anything to a preacher."

"What is the reason for the difference between you and me? You are appearing before crowds night after night with fiction, and the crowds follow you wherever you go. I am preaching the essential and unchangeable truth, and I am not getting any crowd at all!"

Macready's answer was this: "This is quite simple. I can tell you the difference between us. I present my fiction as though it were truth; you present your truth as though it were fiction."

It is easy to know when something is aflame. It ignites other material. Can you imagine how quickly the truth of Jesus could spread, if we were only passionate about living it and sharing it?! We who know God need to be on fire, igniting the world around us!

Let's give our inhibitions and fears to the Lord and ask Him to light the fire in our hearts for the lost! There's so much work to be done!

[Shammu]

Come let us go up to the mountain of the Lord!

Matthew 14:23 And when he had sent the multitudes away, he went up into a mountain apart to pray: and when the evening was come, he was there alone.

There were times that Jesus separated himself from the multitudes -- and there are times when we need to separate ourselves from our lives and ministry, and spend some time with our Lord.

I love how Jesus climbed a mountain. It made me think of an interesting analogy. Picture the shape of a mountain. It starts out wide at the bottom -- the higher we climb, the narrower it becomes -- and the more we must stay close to the center. As we go even higher yet, there's less room to move to the left or the right -- and there's less and less ground that can be compromised -- the more focused we need to be and the less we can afford to be distracted. The higher we go, the less room we have to fool around!

Whatever you may be dealing with, you may just need to separate yourself and climb up to spend time with the Lord -- get centered on Him and focused on what He's calling you to.

God wants us to learn to climb to the top and focus all of our lives on His will!

[Shammu]

Do you know who you are?

Psalms 100:3 Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

My wife was a preschool teacher in Philadelphia years back when she was new believer. She told me once, how sometimes, when her little students would have a quarrel amongst themselves, one would inevitably come running to her crying "So and so called me stupid!" My clever wife would always reply, "Well -- are you stupid?" Without fail, that little red-faced, button-nosed three or four year old would ponder for a moment, shrug back, look up at her and timidly say no. Well, okay then -- so go and play! And just like that, the quarrel was over and playtime would resume as if nothing happened.

We need to take a lesson from those little preschoolers! Our enemy loves to be mean and call us names -- but we must take a moment and remember who we are! We're not stupid -- we're not ugly -- we're not defeated -- we're not useless!

On the contrary! We are fearfully and wonderfully made! We are loved and cared for dearly! We're victorious! We are kings and priests! We have a divine purpose and calling to fulfill today!

Let's not allow anyone to dictate who or what we are! God has already made it very clear who we are -- and we need to memorize what He said and not forget -- especially when the accuser comes our way!

[Shammu]

Have you been in the dark?

1 John 2:15-17 Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever.

Once upon a time, Aesop wrote, the beasts and the fowls were engaged in war. A doublehearted bat was trying to belong to both parties. When the birds were victorious, he would fly around telling everyone he was a bird, and when the beasts won, he would walk around assuring everyone that he was actually a beast. His insincerity was soon discovered and the devious bat was rejected by both the beasts and the birds. From that time on and forevermore, the bat would be banned from the light and would be only allowed to appear openly at night.

So often, we try to hold onto the world with one hand and the Lord with the other. But clearly, God will not have it! If we want to be filled with the love and peace and joy of the Lord, we must let go of the things of the world.

Let's give up the worldly things we've been holding on to! Those things are merely counterfeit but what God offers us is the real deal -- so let's grab it with both hands and hold on tight!

[Shammu]

Relax!

Matthew 8:26-27 And he saith unto them, Why are ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm. But the men marvelled, saying, What manner of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him!

Whew! What must the disciples have felt back then as they saw the waves crashing against their boat? They we're being swayed from side to side in the deep dark sea. They were afraid for their lives! But our Lord was there all along. He just wanted them to trust.

So often we find ourselves in that same boat, don't we? Lord, are you there?! Don't you see these waves about to consume me?!

But He does! He sees all, hears all, knows all. He is the same Lord that calmed that storm two thousand years ago and He can cause the winds and the seas, and the trials of our lives to become calm in an instant! Ahh, but it's usually in the storms that He will display His awesome power!

Let's renew our trust in the Lord today. God has great plans for those who will put their trust in Him.

[Shammu]

Don't be mopey!

Acts 22:15 For thou shalt be his witness unto all men of what thou hast seen and heard.

Many times, our unbelieving family and coworkers -- society in general, can make us feel small and inferior -- like second class citizens -- because we are Christians. Unfortunately, somewhere along the line, somehow, we begin to believe it! We become what I like to call "mopey Christians," just moping around, keeping our faith hidden under a bushel, feeling afraid to say a word about Jesus, in fear that we might offend someone! And that's precisely what the enemy wants us to feel!

But we can choose whether or not to give in to his foolishness today! Jesus said that those who follow after Him shall never hunger or thirst -- they have been set free from the law of sin and death -- they've been renewed, cleansed, forgiven, loved with an everlasting love! How on earth can we mope about that??

We need a reality check. We should be holding our heads high today and ready to tell people about the great work he's done in us! We have been redeemed!

[Shammu]

Investing 101.

Matthew 6:19-21 Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

Ever heard of "shorting the dollar"? I have to admit, don't know a whole lot about financial investing, but I do know that there are people who invest in other currencies, hoping the dollar will continue to decrease in order to increase their own wealth.

"Well, that's not very nice," you might be saying. But there may be a lesson to be learned from them. What these people are actually doing is looking at a bigger picture. They examine the way the dollar is functioning in the global economy and then make an educated investment. These guys recently made billions.

We too, need to be looking at the big picture and become wise investors today -- but not just in earthly opportunities. Yes, we need to be wiser stewards of the finances God has entrusted to us. Perhaps God is calling us to be a Joseph, storing up goods to help others in future hardships. That is our heart's desire here in the Land. But most importantly, we need to step up as believers and realize how the investments we now make in prayer and sharing the Gospel transform into eternal investments -- with a guaranteed rate of return that will exceed our wildest imagination!

Let's not settle for small-time investments -- let's get serious about investing in the Kingdom of God! There's so much work to be done!