What Do You Value? (and other devotionals)

What Do You Value?

Psalm 119:72 says,

The law of Your mouth is better to me than thousands of coins of gold and silver.

We understand "the law of Your mouth" to be God's Word.  And what the psalmist is saying is, "Lord, Your word is better to me than a pile of silver or a pile of gold."

Let's say you are offered a position at a particular company—offered a great job, great increase of pay, and maybe the housing in that area is less.  It is your dream job!  But you investigate things, and you find out there is not a good spirit-filled Bible teaching church in that town where the job is.  But you can make a lot more money!  Do you go?  It depends on how much you value God's Word.

One gentleman who was very involved in my church came to me one day and announced that he was moving.  I asked him, "Did you find a church there?"  He replied, "No, no.  There's not a good church in the town at all.  But I'm going to be making a lot more money.  We can get a bigger house.  It's going to be great."

A year later his teenage daughter was pregnant, his boy was in juvenile hall, he and his wife were getting a divorce, and he was back on drugs.  But, hey!  He was making a lot more money.

In our society, it is so easy to make decisions based solely on money.  And sadly, it is the ruin of many a family and relationship.  Value first God's Word.  Value it more than anything our world can give you.

If you do, you will never be disappointed.

~Bayless Conley~

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Confident in God

Today's reading: 2 Kings 4:18-37

After receiving the miraculous gift of a child and enjoying him for a number of years, the Shunamite woman's son takes ill and dies quite suddenly and unexpectedly. What an awful situation. Yet what we see from this woman in the middle of heartbreak is a display of confidence and faith in God.

Reading this account served as a good reminder that life will bring times of extreme difficulty, including unexpected loss, and that it's during these incredibly hard times when we are given the opportunity for our faith to grow and to display our trust in God to others.

How have you seen your faith grow when you've gone through difficult circumstances? How have you been able to show confidence and trust in God to others through hardship? 

~Tami~

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2 Chronicles 25:9

And Amaziah said to the man of God, But what shall we do for the hundred talents which I have given to the army of Israel? And the man of God answered, The Lord is able to give thee much more than this.

A very important question this seemed to be to the king of Judah, and possibly it is of even more weight with the tried and tempted O Christian. To lose money is at no times pleasant, and when principle involves it, the flesh is not always ready to make the sacrifice. "Why lose that which may be so usefully employed? May not the truth itself be bought too dear? What shall we do without it? Remember the children, and our small income!" All these things and a thousand more would tempt the Christian to put forth his hand to unrighteous gain, or stay himself from carrying out his conscientious convictions, when they involve serious loss. All men cannot view these matters in the light of faith; and even with the followers of Jesus, the doctrine of "we must live" has quite sufficient weight. The Lord is able to give thee much more than this is a very satisfactory answer to the anxious question. Our Father holds the purse-strings, and what we lose for His sake He can repay a thousand-fold. It is ours to obey His will, and we may rest assured that He will provide for us. The Lord will be no man's debtor at the last. Saints know that a grain of heart's-ease is of more value than a ton of gold. He who wraps a threadbare coat about a good conscience has gained a spiritual wealth far more desirable than any he has lost. God's smile and a dungeon are enough for a true heart; His frown and a palace would be hell to a gracious spirit. Let the worst come to the worst, let all the talents go, we have not lost our treasure, for that is above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God. Meanwhile, even now, the Lord maketh the meek to inherit the earth, and no good thing doth He withhold from them that walk uprightly.

~Charles Spurgeon~

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Perfect through suffering (Heb. 2:10).

Steel is iron plus fire. Soil is rock, plus heat, or glacier crushing. Linen is flax plus the bath that cleans, the comb that separates, and the flail that pounds, and the shuttle that weaves. Human character must have a plus attached to it. The world does not forget great characters. But great characters are not made of luxuries, they are made by suffering.

I heard of a mother who brought into her home as a companion to her own son, a crippled boy who was also a hunchback. She had warned her boy to be very careful in his relations to him, and not to touch the sensitive part of his life but go right on playing with him as if he were an ordinary boy. She listened to her son as they were playing; and after a few minutes he said to his companion: "Do you know what you have got on your back?" The little hunchback was embarrassed, and he hesitated a moment. The boy said: "It is the box in which your wings are; and some day God is going to cut it open, and then you will fly away and be an angel."

Some day, God is going to reveal the fact to every Christian, that the very principles they now rebel against, have been the instruments which He used in perfecting their characters and moulding them into perfection, polished stones for His great building yonder.
--Cortland Myers

Suffering is a wonderful fertilizer to the roots of character. The great object of this life is character. This is the only thing we can carry with us into eternity... To gain the most of it and the best of it is the object of probation.
--Austin Phelps

"By the thorn road and no other is the mount of vision won."

~L. B. Cowman~

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When the Lord saw her, He had compassion on her, and said unto her, weep not - Luke 7:13

No widow stands by the bier of her only son, no mother by the empty cot of her babe, no lover beside the fading beauty of his beloved - but the Son of Man, unseen but glorious, is at hand, seeing, understanding, touched with compassion, and saying, in His tenderest tones, Weep not!

Weep not: Love is eternal. - Hast thou forgotten that there are three things which abide forevermore, the greatest of which is love? Is it likely that those blessed ties which have woven us to others can be snapped by death, which can only touch the body, but is not able to reach the soul? Is not love of God - and can God's love change, and pass away? No; though severed from your sight, the dear ones that are gone are thine to-day, and have not forgotten, but love thee still. Without us they cannot be made perfect.

Weep not: recognition of the beloved dead is certain. - Did not Mary and the women, Peter and five hundred more, recognize Jesus after His resurrection? Is He not the same Man? Are we not to be like Him? Recognition went so far, in His case, that the Magdalene recognized the very tones of His voice, when He said Mary, and she answered Rabboni. Yes, though refined and purified, the face thou hast loved shall smile, and the tones that have made thy heart-music shall speak again. Weep not!

Weep not: they shall rise again, nevermore to be separated. - The Lord raised this youth to life; but there had to be another parting, when his mother or he died. But when thy dear ones are reunited to thee, there will be no more partings. There shall be no more sea. Thy heart shall find its mate. Thou and he shall go no more out.

~F. B. Meyer~