A light on the path

God has also appointed leaders in the church to help us develop spiritual discernment. They do this by teaching sound doctrine and refuting any ideas that contradict Scripture. Under the instruction of these mature believers, we can grow in righteousness by learning biblical truths and then applying them.

Commentary from the In Touch devotional by Charles Stanley, January 5, 2021.

Wait Actively

Mother to teen: “I’ll be back in an hour and then we’ll go shopping for your shoes.  While I’m gone I’d like you to clean your room, put your dirty clothes in the wash, and take Ruff outside for his walk.  Okay?”  Between the lines of those instructions is this:  “Don’t sit around and watch T.V. while you’re waiting for me.”  There is a difference between passive and active waiting.

And that applies to life as a follower of Jesus as well.  We are people waiting-waiting for “the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13).  But Titus didn’t just write about the return of Christ, he also wrote about what we are to do while we wait:  “Denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in the present age” (Titus 2:12). 

In other words, we are to wait actively, not passively.  Instead of being passive about loving Christ’s return and active about loving the world, we are to be passive about loving the world and active about loving Christ’s return.  What does active waiting look like?  Love, service, witness, worship, good works, and obedience.  

Portions of commentary from David Jeremiah’s Turning Points Devotional, November 23, 2017.

Hope

Let us hold on to the confession of our hope without wavering,

for He who promised is faithful.

Hebrews 10:23

He is the image of the invisible God,

the firstborn over all creation;

because by Him everything was created,

in heaven and on earth,

the visible and the invisible,

whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities-

all things have been created

through Him and for Him.

He is before all things, and by Him all things hold together.

He is also the head of the body,

the church;

He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,

so that He might come to have 

first place in everything.

For God was pleased [to have]

all His fullness dwell in Him,

and through Him to reconcile everything to Himself

by making peace through the blood of His cross-

whether things on earth or things in heaven.

And you were once alienated and hostile in mind because of your evil actions.  

But now He has reconciled you by His physical body

through His death, 

to present you holy, faultless, and blameless before Him-

if indeed you remain grounded and steadfast

in the faith,

and are not shifted away from the hope of the gospel that you heard.

[This gospel] has been proclaimed in all creation under heaven,

and I, Paul, have become a minister of it.

Colossians 1:15-23

Urgent

In a self-serve/customer service/choices galore culture, we may have an inclination to self ( I wonder why!).  We don’t have to focus on self though.  Other options (more options!!) are:

• serve God
• serve others

We can allow God to supply what we need, and He will, while we focus on Him and on others.  The degree of surrender determines the degree of God’s ‘footprint’ in your life.  Less of you makes room for more of Him (John 3:30).

Photo credit: T. Vickrey

 

Rifts

For we too were once foolish, disobedient, deceived, captives of various passions and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, detesting one another.

Titus 3:3

The same gospel that saves mankind from sin transforms man morally and ethically.