Devotions for Dieters

Romans 14:17
For the kingdom of God is not meat and drink; but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.

Joan's doctor had told her to make a list of what was really important to her. Her husband and children headed the list. Her health was next, then her pets. She also wrote down her mother's ring and some furniture that her father had made when he was a young man. Her doctor asked her if she wanted to lose all that was on the list, and she told him 'Of course not!' He told her that she had to lose weight or she wouldn't be around long to enjoy the things she truly loved. If those things were really more important to her than food, then she was going to have to prove it. She asked God for help and then set her mind toward losing weight.

Today's thought: Compared to the truly important things in life, food is pretty pathetic!

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Is salvation the end of the Christian life? If it is, on earth it's the front end.

The Bible teaches us that the faith we begin with is to be a faith that is growing and maturing.

What Does God Say?

Read the two scripture passages below and write down (in column form) at least three characteristics of those who have not grown in their faith (immature) and three characteristics of those who have (mature).

"Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. Their responsibility is to equip God's people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God's Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ.

"Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won't be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church" (Ephesians 4:11-15, NLT).

"You have been believers so long now that you ought to be teaching others. Instead, you need someone to teach you again the basic things about God's word. You are like babies who need milk and cannot eat solid food. For someone who lives on milk is still an infant and doesn't know how to do what is right. Solid food is for those who are mature, who through training have the skill to recognize the difference between right and wrong" (Hebrews 5:12-6:1, NLT)

My Thoughts

What three characteristics are in your first column? How about your "mature" column? It's likely you want to be a growing, maturing follower of Christ. But how do you grow in your faith? Hebrews 12:1-2 gives this instruction:

"Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God's throne" (Hebrews 12:1-2, NLT).

Answer these questions when you've finished reading the scripture above:

How are you supposed to deal with sin?

What "race" are you running?

What does "run with endurance" mean to you?

Who should you stay focused on while you are running this race?

Now, look at Romans 10:17:

"So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ."

Where does faith come from?

What does staying in the Word have to do with your faith?

How many times a week do you read your Bible?

Would you like to read it more days? If so, make the commitment today to make that one small change in your life.

My Part

Faith is primarily a personal relationship with God that determines the priorities of one's life. As you stay focused on the Lord and stay in the Word, your faith grows. As your faith grows, you become more focused on Jesus and hunger more for His Word. Amazing how that works, isn't it?

Bible Study from Back to the Bible Copyright © 1996-2008 The Good News Broadcasting Association, Inc. All rights reserved. http://www.bibleminute.org/

The Following Devotionals are from: Back to the Bible Copyright © 1996-2008 The Good News Broadcasting Association, Inc. All rights reserved. http://www.backtothebible.org/

Loved

Hosea 1-4, Revelation 1
Key Verse: Revelation 1:5

The apostle John knew Jesus. He walked with Him, heard Him teach and joined with Him in ministry. When Jesus died on the cross, John was there and was given a special responsibility, that of caring for Mary, the mother of Jesus. He is remembered as the Apostle of Love-but he was not always known by that name.

In the list of disciples in Mark 3, John and his brother James are called the "Sons of Thunder" (v. 17). When the Samaritans would not receive Jesus, John and James were ready to command fire from heaven to destroy the place (Luke 9:54)! John not only was with Jesus, but he also was changed by Jesus. He went from one who would react with a call for judgment to being characterized as a man of love. John knew the reality of being loved and became one who loved.

In the opening chapter of the Revelation of Jesus Christ, John gave greetings and a doxology. Doxologies are words of praise. His praise of Jesus includes this phrase: "to him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood" (v. 5). John had experienced both the love of Jesus and the cleansing that can be received from Him.

John may not have been the most lovable of individuals. Typically, someone described as a "son of thunder" does not invoke images of relational warmth! Yet there is no more tender picture of closeness and purity in relationship as that of John at the table during the Last Supper, leaning on Jesus. He knew love and was changed by the love of Jesus.

We are loved and it should show. How do others see you? If you are more like a son of thunder than an apostle of love, ask Jesus to help change you like He changed John.

1 Kings 5:6

"Now therefore, command that they [the servants of Hiram] cut down cedars for me from Lebanon; and my servants will be with your servants, and I will pay you wages for your servants according to whatever you say. For you know there is none among us who has skill to cut timber like the Sidonians."

Teamwork

Don Bennett, a Seattle businessman, decided he wanted to climb Washington's Mount Rainier. It's a stiff climb to the peak of the 14,410-foot summit, but so many individuals have succeeded that it no longer merits much attention. But for Bennett, the climb was a remarkable achievement. He made the climb on one leg and two crutches. Asked to share the most important lesson he learned, Bennett gave credit to the team of individuals who helped him attain his dream. He observed, "You can't do it alone."

Solomon realized this same truth. When he became king, he inherited from his father not only the kingdom but also the task of building a temple worthy of the God of the universe. Such an awesome responsibility would have been overwhelming, but Solomon knew it could be done if he called on others to help. Accordingly, he contacted a friend of his father, King Hiram of Tyre, and requested his most skilled lumbermen. The king graciously agreed. And thanks to the benefit of teamwork, they built one of the most beautiful temples ever.

Christians are notorious for not working together as a team. Some try to worship God on their own. The writer of Hebrews had to admonish such people about "forsaking the assembling of ourselves together" (10:25). Others can be difficult to get along with (1 Cor. 1:11). But whatever we accomplish alone is not nearly what we could have accomplished with others.

Are you willing to be a team player? Can your pastor count on you to pitch in with others in your church when there is a job to be done? More will get done if we do it together. Learn from the wisdom of Solomon. Be a part of something greater than yourself. Be a part of a team.

The Marvel of Life

The greatest evidence of God's power is human birth. When a baby is born, there is promise, potential and excitement. David considered babies to be miracles from the hand of God. Eugene Peterson has said, "In the presence of birth we don't calculate, we marvel." As we ponder these truths, what should be our response?

We worship God. The word fearfully means "I am shuddering with astonishment; I am trembling with awe" (v. 14). I fear that today people have taken sex, conception, birth and babies and turned the process into something functional instead of miraculous. Some people think of sex as animal excitement, but David thought of spiritual enrichment. No wonder we are aborting babies today; we don't see anything holy about sex, conception and birth.

We show confidence in God. What we are is God's gift to us. What we do with our lives is our gift to Him. He accepts us as we are. He's not going to judge us on the basis of what He has given someone else, but on the basis of what we have done with what He has given us. Never be discouraged by what you don't have. Having confidence in God about your life brings eager expectation.

We obey God. The more we glorify God, the more we enjoy Him. We can take the miracle of life He gave us and wreck it, or we can present our bodies to the Lord as a living sacrifice.

* * *

To leave God out of your life is simply to exist, not really to live. Jesus died that you might be saved from your sins and one day go to heaven. But while you're here on earth, God wants you to fulfill all that He has built into you. Are you responding to His power for your life? Worship Him, place your confidence in Him and obey Him.

Fullness Begins With Thirst

John 7:37-39

Along with obeying we must desire to be filled and then appropriate the filling. Our Lord said in John 7:37, "If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink."

Here are two prerequisites for the filling of the Holy Spirit: thirst and trust. Thirst suggests desire, and drinking suggests obedience and trust.

Included in this desire to be filled with the Holy Spirit must be our wanting God to judge and put away sin in our lives.

We must desire to be separated unto the Lord from the world and its evil system. We must reckon ourselves dead to sin and alive to God. This is true positionally, but it can be made true in our spiritual life only as we yield to the Holy Spirit's control.

We must also desire the fruit of the Spirit in our lives. Do we want love, joy, peace and these other evidences of the Spirit's life in us? Do we long to enthrone Christ as Lord?

Thirst should cause us to drink, and desire should cause us to trust. In the words of our Saviour, out of our innermost beings "shall flow rivers of living water" (v. 38).

We not only trust Christ to save us from sin, but we also trust Him to fill us with the Spirit.

This particular phase of believing, or trusting, in Christ should be a continuous attitude of trusting, of committing ourselves to the Lord in order to be controlled by the Holy Spirit.

"And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess; but be filled with the Spirit" (Eph. 5:18).

Jesus First

I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star.

Just as Genesis, the first book of the Bible, is a book of beginnings, Revelation, the last book of the Bible, is a book of new beginnings. Before these new beginnings can occur, however, a series of endings must transpire. Thus the book of Revelation represents numerous "finals" in the Word of God.

Genesis 3:9 is God's initial call to man: "And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou?" Revelation 22:17 is God's final call to man: "And the Spirit and the bride say, come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Somewhere between Genesis 3:9 and Revelation 22:17 everyone who would enjoy eternity in heaven with Christ must answer one of God's calls. Perhaps you have answered Jesus' call in Matthew 11:28, "Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." Or maybe it was the call of Christ in John 4:14, "But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." But if you have not responded to the call of Christ, if you have never received Jesus Christ as your Saviour, you must respond to His call in order to receive eternal life.

Once we have responded positively to the Lord's call to salvation, we have a whole new outlook on the future. Our destiny is brighter. Our lives are sunnier. The birds' songs are sweeter. We look forward to serving Jesus every day and anticipate the day we shall live with Him in glory.

Just before God's final call in Revelation 22:17, Jesus verifies that He is indeed the one to whom we are called in salvation. He says, "I am the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star" (Revelation 22:16). These titles are applied to Him elsewhere in Scripture (cf. Isaiah 11:1; Numbers 24:17), but nowhere do they take on more meaning than just prior to the final call in the Bible. When we come to God in salvation, we come to the offspring of David. When we leave the darkness of sin, we enter the light of the Bright and Morning Star. It is the shining face of Jesus, the one who died for us, that we will first want to see when we enter the brightness of heaven. After all, being with our Savior is what makes heaven heavenly.

When Fanny Crosby, the hymn writer who wrote more than 8,000 gospel songs even though she was blinded at the age of six weeks, was pitied by a friend because she could not see, Miss Crosby replied, "Do you know that if at birth I had been able to make one petition, it would have been that I would have been born blind?" The friend was puzzled by this answer and asked her for further explanation. "Because when I get to heaven, the first face that shall ever gladden my sight will be that of my Savior!" We too will want to see our Savior first of all.

There is a story about Cyrus, the founder of the Persian Empire, who once captured a prince and his entire family. When they came before the monarch, Cyrus asked the prisoner, "What will you give me if I release you?" The prince replied, "The half of my wealth." "And if I release your children?" The prince replied, "Everything I possess." Finally Cyrus said, "And what will you give me if I will release your wife?" The prince replied, "Your Majesty, I will give myself." So moved was Cyrus by the devotion of this young prince that he freed him and his entire family. As the prince, his wife and children returned to their home, the prince said to his wife, "Wasn't Cyrus a handsome man!" With a tender look of love in her eyes, the wife said to her husband, "I did not notice. I could only keep my eyes on you the one who was willing to give himself for me."

Morning by morning we arise to give praise to the one who saved us. Day by day we serve the one who saved us. Evening by evening we rejoice in the one who saved us. Let's concentrate today on loving the Lord Jesus and adoring no other face than the one who loved us so much that He died for us (John 3:16).

MORNING HYMN
All hail the pow'r of Jesus' name!
Let angels prostrate fall;
Bring forth the royal diadem,
And crown Him Lord of all.