What Is God’s Love Like?

What Is God’s Love Like?

Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will. Ephesians 1:5(KJV)

Why does God love us as imperfect as we are? Because He wants to, it pleases Him. It’s in His very nature to love us, no matter how sinful our actions may be.

God conquers evil with good (see Romans 12:21). He does that by pouring out His limitless grace upon us so that when we sin, His grace becomes greater than our sin. And just as it is impossible for God not to love, so it is impossible for us to do anything to keep Him from loving us.

God loves because that is His nature. He is love (see 1 John 4:8). He may not always love everything we do, but He does love us. God’s love is the power that forgives our sins, heals our emotional wounds and mends our broken hearts (see Psalm 147:3). God’s love is unconditional; it is based on Him, not us! Once you realize that God loves you regardless of what you have or haven’t done, you can experience incredible breakthrough. You can quit trying to earn His love and simply receive it and enjoy it.

Prayer Starter: God, Your love is incredible. Focusing on Your love reminds me that it’s based on Your goodness, not my actions. Help me to receive Your love for me.

Jesus Betrayed by Judas

Jesus Betrayed by Judas
by Max Lucado

When betrayal comes, what do you do? Get out? Get angry? Get even? You have to deal with it some way. Let’s see how Jesus dealt with it.

Begin by noticing how Jesus saw Judas. “Jesus answered, ‘Friend, do what you came to do.’ ” (Matthew 26:50)

Of all the names I would have chosen for Judas it would not have been “friend.” What Judas did to Jesus was grossly unfair. There is no indication that Jesus ever mistreated Judas. There is no clue that Judas was ever left out or neglected. When, during the Last Supper, Jesus told the disciples that his betrayer sat at the table, they didn’t turn to one another and whisper, “It’s Judas. Jesus told us he would do this.”

They didn’t whisper it because Jesus never said it. He had known it. He had known what Judas would do, but he treated the betrayer as if he were faithful.

It’s even more unfair when you consider the betrayal was Judas’s idea. The religious leaders didn’t seek him, Judas sought them. “What will you pay me for giving Jesus to you?” he asked. (Matthew 26:15) The betrayal would have been more palatable had Judas been propositioned by the leaders, but he wasn’t. He propositioned them.

And Judas’s method … again, why did it have to be a kiss? (Matthew 26: 48–49)

And why did he have to call him “Teacher”? (Matthew 26:49) That’s a title of respect. The incongruity of his words, deeds, and actions—I wouldn’t have called Judas “friend.”

But that is exactly what Jesus called him. Why? Jesus could see something we can’t…

Jesus knew Judas had been seduced by a powerful foe. He was aware of the wiles of Satan’s whispers (he had just heard them himself). He knew how hard it was for Judas to do what was right.

He didn’t justify what Judas did. He didn’t minimize the deed. Nor did he release Judas from his choice. But he did look eye to eye with his betrayer and try to understand.

As long as you hate your enemy, a jail door is closed and a prisoner is taken. But when you try to understand and release your foe from your hatred, then the prisoner is released and that prisoner is you.

From
His Name is Jesus
© (Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2009) Max Lucado

The path of the just [is] as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day

 

The path of the just [is] as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day.

Not as though I had already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus.–Then shall we know, [if] we follow on to know the LORD.

Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.–We all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, [even] as by the Spirit of the Lord.–When that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.–For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.–Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.

Pr 4:18 Php 3:12 Ho 6:3 Mt 13:43 2Co 3:18 1Co 13:10,12 1Jo 3:2,3

God’s Mysterious Dealings

God’s Mysterious Dealings

“Thou shalt shut the door upon thee and upon thy sons” (2 Kings 4:4).

They were to be alone with God, for they were not dealing with the laws of nature, nor human government, nor the church, nor the priesthood, nor even with the great prophet of God, but they must needs be isolated from all creatures, from all leaning circumstances, from all props of human reason, and swung off, as it were, into the vast blue inter-stellar space, hanging on God alone, in touch with the fountain of miracles.

Here is a part in the programme of God’s dealings, a secret chamber of isolation in prayer and faith which every soul must enter that is very fruitful.

There are times and places where God will form a mysterious wall around us, and cut away all props, and all the ordinary ways of doing things, and shut us up to something Divine, which is utterly new and unexpected, something that old circumstances do not fit into, where we do not know just what will happen, where God is cutting the cloth of our lives on a new pattern, where He makes us look to Himself.

Most religious people live in a sort of treadmill life, where they can calculate almost everything that will happen, but the souls that God leads out into immediate and special dealings, He shuts in where all they know is that God has hold of them, and is dealing with them, and their expectation is from Him alone.

Like this widow, we must be detached from outward things and attached inwardly to the Lord alone in order to see His wonders. –Soul Food

In the sorest trials God often makes the sweetest discoveries of Himself. –Gems

“God sometimes shuts the door and shuts us in,
That He may speak, perchance through grief or pain,
And softly, heart to heart, above the din,
May tell some precious thought to us again.”

Daily Devotional Recommendations

 

Unshaken by the winds and waves

Welcome!

Today: Unshaken by the winds and waves

Passage: Eph 4

¹⁴ Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. (Eph 4, NIV)

Infants are interesting. Everyone loves infants

But no one likes an infant to be an infant all the time. We expect them to grow

God expects growth in us. We grow in every other area but in the things of God!

False teachers and prophets do the most harm to the children of God

Unless we take deep root in God, it is easy to be tossed back and forth, and some have even been uprooted; we need to have a deep foundation in the word of God

Jesus told the parable of the house that was built on sand and the one that was built on the rock

²⁴ “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. ²⁵ The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. (Mat 7, NIV)

One may look like a very religious person, but what matters is how a person reacts to the various storms and tests in life as well as to various wrong teachings

Those who have a strong foundation in God will stand strong and straight

Peter, one of the Disciples of Christ, was very unstable until he received the anointing of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost

Once Peter was anointed, the rivers of living water came out of him. In one preaching, 3000 people came to the saving knowledge of Christ

Peter never wavered after that. He was firm in God

When God’s word and Spirit takes us over, we will be much stronger

Daniel was a man who stood strong in the middle of adverse circumstances

He was neither shaken nor frustrated in a tempting or testing situation

Daniel was determined that nothing could affect his commitment

One of the reasons why the church becomes ineffective is because we don’t have much “Daniel”s, even among the leaders

There is a trend to compromise with the world and take the path of less resistance, which ultimately makes the church weak and ineffective

As it says in Eph 4: 11-13, it is the duty of the ministers to bring the people of God to maturity and enable them for works of service

May God help us to grow and be mature, strong children of God

God’s blessings!

BG

Prayer: Lord Jesus, thank you for being such a strong foundation for me. You are my rock, my salvation. Help me to have my roots in you, to be mature and to minister to many, not wavering in the winds and storms of life. Amen