God's Word For Every Day

Isaiah 2:1-5 The Word of God encourages us to look beyond the here and now. It gives us a glimpse of "the last days" (Isaiah 2:2). God knows the end as well as the beginning - and He show it to us (Isaiah 2:2). We say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord ... He will teach us about His ways so that we may walk in His paths ... Come and let us walk in the Lord's light" (Isaiah 2:3,5). Our world would be a very different world if more people were looking to the Lord and learning from Him, turning to the Lord and travelling with Him. What about you? Are you looking to the Lord? Are you learning from Him? Are you turning to the Lord? Are you travelling with Him? These are the questions that the Word of God puts to every one of us. Will we give the answer of faith and obedience? I cannot answer this question for you. You cannot answer it for me. Each one of us must answer for ourselves. What will your answer be?

Psalm 78:12-25 "He worked wonders" (Psalm 78:12), "He gave them drink as abundant as the depths" (Psalm 78:15), "He brought streams out of the stone and made water flow down like rivers" (Psalm 78:16), "They spoke against God - Is God able to provide food in the wilderness?" (Psalm 78:19), "waters gushed out, torrents overflowed" (Psalm 78:20), "He opened the doors of heaven" (Psalm 78:23), "He gave them grain from heaven" (Psalm 78:24), "the bread of angels, an abundant supply of food"(Psalm 78:25). This is about more than food. In Psalm 78:22, we read about "salvation." Whatever words we use to describe God's salvation, we can never say all that needs to be said. It's always more than we can put into words.

Psalm 118:1-29   ‘The Lord is my Strength and my Song. He is my Saviour’(Psalm 118:14). We thank You, Lord, that Jesus Christ is our Saviour. We thank You that He gives us a song to sing: ‘Blessed assurance, Jesus is mine... This is my story, this is my song, praising my Saviour all the day long’. Help us, Lord, to grow in our knowledge of Jesus Christ, our Saviour. May we sing His song with strength, committing ourselves to His service, earnestly seeking to win others for Him.

Psalm 119:1-24   Lord, You show us the way of blessing. It is the way of obedience (Psalm 119:1,9,11,17). Many will choose the way of disobedience - ‘influential people sit together and slander me’. Help us to choose the way of obedience - ‘Your servant will meditate on Your teachings’ (Psalm 119:23). We know, Lord, that following Jesus Christ will not be easy. We see many people turning back from following Him. We are tempted to join them. We feel the pull of the world. We must not return to the world’s way of living. Help us to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus.  Help us to remember all that Jesus has done for us - ‘He loved us and gave Himself for us’ (Galatians 2:20) - and recommit ourselves to following Him: ‘I have decided to follow Jesus... The world behind me, the Cross before me... Though none go with me, I still will follow... No turning back, no turning back’ ( Mission Praise , 272). 

"Much more then, being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him" (Romans 5:9). The forgiveness of our sins - this is just the beginning. God has so "much more" for us. He is leading us on to our full enjoyment of His salvation: eternal life. We look back to our personal "happy day" - "O happy day! that fixed my choice on Thee, my Saviour and my God!" We look forward to an even more wonderful day- the great Day when all God's people will be gathered together in his heavenly and eternal Kingdom. We think of that great Day, and our hearts are filled with this glorious hope: "When the roll is called up yonder, I'll be there." --- I have quoted from "O happ y day" and "When the trumpet of the Lord shall sound." Here are links to the words and tunes of these hymns -  Hymn: O happy day that fixed my choice  and  When the Roll Is Called Up Yonder | Hymnary.org .

"This is My blood of the   new  covenant,  which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins" (Matthew 26:28). Early on in my Christian life, I read James Denney's book, The Death of Christ.  Reading this book gave me a real sense of the importance of the death of Christ. This has stayed with me over the years. It helped me to understand why the Apostle Paul said, "we preach Christ crucified" (1 Corinthians 1:23),  " I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified" (1 Corinthians 2:2) and "God forbid that I should ever boast (or glory) except in the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Galatians 6:14). It helped me to understand what John the Baptist when he pointed to Jesus and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world" (John 1:29). Many year have come and gone since I read James Denney's book. It is still my great desire to join, with John the Baptist, i...

“Therefore, say to the Israelites: ‘I am the Lord , and I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. I will free you from being slaves to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with mighty acts of judgment.   I will take you as my own people, and I will be your God. Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians. And I will bring you to the land I swore with uplifted hand to give to Abraham, to Isaac and to Jacob. I will give it to you as a possession. I am the Lord’” (Exodus 6:6-8). The people of Israel seemed to be overwhelmed. They felt that their situation was hopeless. They were living in dark times. It seemed like nothing but trouble lay ahead of them. Their courage was low. Their hope was almost gone. How did God see this situation? How did he feel about it? He saw what was happening, but he also saw something else - "the promised land." Things seemed hopeless to man, bu...

At the heart of the Old Testament, there's a remarkable prophecy concerning Jesus Christ, our Saviour. It's found in Isaiah 53. When we read these words of Isaiah, it almost seems to us that these words were written  after  the death and resurrection of Christ. The remarkable thing about Isaiah's words is this: they were written many years before the birth of Christ. Some people will tell us that we're reading into Isaiah's words more than is really there. I invite you to read the words of Isaiah 53, and ask yourself the question, "Is this God speaking to us, through Isaiah, concerning Jesus Christ?" "Who has believed our message      and to whom has the arm of the  Lord  been revealed? 2  He grew up before him like a tender shoot,      and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,      nothing in his appearance that we should desire...

Psalm 110:1-7   ‘The Lord says to my Lord: ‘Sit at My right hand...’(Psalm 110:1). Lord, we read these words, and we think of our Lord Jesus Christ: When ‘He was taken up into heaven, He sat at the right hand of God’(Mark 16:19). When Jesus ascended to Your Father’s right hand, the Holy Spirit was sent down from heaven to fill our lives with Your blessing (John 7:37-39). Through the power of the Holy Spirit, our lives are changed: ‘In the Day of Your power, Your people will come to You willingly...’. We come to You, Lord, in our weakness, and You ‘renew our strength’. We come to You in our weariness, and we are ‘refreshed’ by Your ‘streams of living water’(Psalm 110,7). ‘Come, Thou Fount of every blessing, tune my heart to sing Thy grace. Streams of mercy never ceasing call for songs of loudest praise.’

God is calling us to love Jesus. In His Word, He tells us about people who learned to love Jesus. Little by little, they learned to live the Jesus life - less living for self and more living for Jesus. We can learn so much from the life of Peter. at the heart of his life, there is the life-changing experience when, three times over, Jesus asked him, "Peter, do you love Me?" Three times, Peter said, "Yes, Lord, You know that I love You." The story of Peter is a story of growing love for Jesus. At first, Peter had a lot of love for himself, and not quite so much love for Jesus. Peter's love for Jesus was so changeable. Sometimes, it was strong. Sometimes, it was weak. In one way or another, Peter learned to make it less of self and more of Jesus. There are three parts in the story of Peter. * (a) the Gospels - Little by little, Peter is learning to love Jesus. * (b) the first half of Acts - Peter's love for Jesus has grown stro...

We give thanks for what God has done, but we can't remain in the past. The past has gone. We must put it behind us. We must press on into God's future Let us pray for what God will do. Looking back to the past will help us - only if it inspires us to move on with God and for God into His future. Let us rejoice in what the Lord has done for us - and let us be renewed for what he is planning to do in us and through us.

In the New Testament, we read much about Peter, We read about him in the Gospels. We read about him in the Acts of the Apostles. His name speaks of both failure and triumph. Peter was a man who denied his Lord. He was a man who won thousands of people for his Lord. In the story of Peter, walking on water (Matthew 14:22-33), we see both faith and unbelief.  * In Peter, we see faith - real faith. While the other disciples hung back, wondering what to make of this mysterious figure, walking on the water, Peter launched out in faith - "Lord, if it is you, bid me come to you on the water" (Matthew 14:28). This was an act of faith - real faith.  * Peter's faith was not perfect. His faith was weak. Nevertheless, it was real faith. His faith was mixed with unbelief. Yet, there was faith in Peter's heart - faith that would grow strong as Peter learned to look to Christ, faith which would overcome the unbelief in Peter's heart, faith which would win the victory. This...