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Daily Devotional – We are All Babies I stood out by my car and looked at my old friend. Only moments before we sat in my room and talked about the old days. I won’t say we were remembering happier days because these are happy days too. I looked back on him, even though I knew it was him, I almost couldn’t recognize him. I wondered if he felt the same as he looked at me. No doubt he did. This is not a depressing article. It is about life – not life on earth but life wherever we are. If I don’t get around as well as I used to, it is to remind me that I am not made for here. I am made for there. If I prefer comfort to adventure, it is because I am in a different place in the same life. The truth is that we don’t get older, we only move to different places in our lives. I am not old. You are not old. If you are 50, you are not old. If you are 90 you are not old. You are exactly where God wanted you to be. I think it must be funny to a 4,000 year-old Abraham when any of us complains about being 50, or 40. A 2,000 year old Paul probably can’t wait to challenge us about old age. You may think it strange to speak of 4,000 year old Abraham or 2,000 year old Paul in the present tense, but that is approximately how old they are and they are still alive. I love the fact that there will never be another time when I will cease to be. When I was a child I thought of eternity as a distance place and a distant time that might be a million years from now. Jesus spoke of eternity as beginning when death happens on earth. (Luke 16:19-31) Paul said he wanted to leave and go be with Jesus. (Phil 1:21-24). You are not made for here. You are made for there. Any pleasures you might have here are nothing compared with what is yet to be. You are not growing old. In the number of our eternal years, we are all still babies. Lonnie Davis |
Begin with a Smile “Mothers are guinea pigs in a scientific experiment to prove that sleep is unnecessary for human existence.”
HeartWord – Psalm 56:3-4 Reflecting on Today’s Text: When we truly trust God, we know that in the end there is nothing man can do to us. Jesus said, “Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul” (Matt 20:28). Someday we will all understand that only eternity matters. Today’s Bible Chapter Psalm 56. To read it click H E R E. |
Today’s Bible Chapter
is Psalm 56. To read it click H E R E.
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A Place of Shelter and Rest
In Matthew 13, Jesus told us an often overlooked secret of the kingdom.
“He told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches.’” (13:31-32)
The “kingdom of heaven” in this parable is the church. Those early disciples could not havecompletely understood what Jesus was saying about the church, but you and I can. Those early disciples had the chance to hear the Master preach. They did not understand the amazing privilege they had, but you and I do see how blessed they were.
It is easy to see other people’s blessings, but there is a blessing in this parable that we must notoverlook. Jesus said that the kingdom (the church) becomes a tree, “so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches.”
The meaning of this last teaching is that the church becomes a place where shelter and rest can be found. Yes! That is what I want the church to be, a place where Christians can find shelter and rest.
The church is a shelter from the attacks from the world. It is a place where a Christian can go and find rest. It is not a place where we ought to fear what others are thinking, doing, or saying behind our back. It is a place of family and a place of safety.
There are two institutions where every person needs to be able to find shelter and rest, (1) the home and (2) the church.
The world may not understand this, but God’s people must!