Tag: joyful
Ask and Receive!
Scripture reading for August 10: Jeremiah 30-33
“The Lord appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness.” Jeremiah 31:3
“While Jeremiah was still confined in the courtyard of the guard, the Word of the Lord came to him a second time: “This is what the Lord says, He who made the earth, the Lord who formed it and established it–The Lord is His name: ‘Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.’ “ Jeremiah 33:2-3
God loves His people! He always has and always will love them! He draws His people to enter into a love relationship with Him by cords of loving-kindness. He knows that love must be freely given by His people and that they must be drawn back to Him from the world and it’s enticements. God’s love will ransom them from the hand of the enemy. (Jeremiah 31:11) He will cause them to take up the tambourine and dance with the joyful! (Jeremiah 31:4, 13)
God declared to Jeremiah a time that was coming when He would make a new covenant with Israel and Judah. This covenant would include God writing His law on the human heart and mind. God would personally be their God and each person would personally know God. His forgiveness of sin would be experienced by all and God Himself would remember it no more. (Jeremiah 31:31-34)
These visions of restoration came to Jeremiah at a most unlikely time in the history of the nation. The nation was surrounded by the Babylonians and Jeremiah was confined to the courtyard of the guard under house arrest. In the natural, it did not look good. But in the midst of the troubling time, God’s Word brought hope and encouragement to Jeremiah and His people. God would allow the destruction of the temple and send His people into captivity. He promised restoration and the coming of the New Covenant.
The amazing promises of great things given to Jeremiah included the promise of the righteous “Branch” that would sprout from David’s line. (Jeremiah 33:14-16) This “Branch” would bring salvation to Judah and peace and safety to Jerusalem. His Name would be “The Lord our Righteousness”. This “Branch” is none other than Jesus Christ! He brought the “New Covenant” in His own blood that would enable eternal forgiveness of sins and the law written on hearts. He was the embodiment of the everlasting love of God in human flesh and draws us with His loving-kindness! These are great and unsearchable things revealed to those who call on Him!
Clothed with Christ
Scripture reading for June 23rd: Colossians 3, Psalm 125, Proverbs 1
Colossians 3: 12-17 “Put on then, as God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. And above all these put on love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body. And be thankful. Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the Name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through Him.”
Paul had instructed the believers to put off certain worldly and destructive habits, attitudes and actions as one takes off dirty clothes. They were to put on, like a clean and beautiful outfit, Jesus Christ through repentance and faith. They were ‘beloved children’ of the Father, chosen by Him, to be filled with His Holy Spirit of adoption and bearing fruit of that Spirit. Holiness was not a pious term, but practices of obedience from a humble and now compassionate heart. Love, joy, peace, patience and forgiveness would flow from the new nature that they put on. God would change them from the inside out so that instead of worldly attitudes and division would flow songs and hymns and thanksgiving! Everything would be done thankfully in the Name of Jesus Christ!
Psalm 125: 2 “As the mountains surround Jerusalem, so the Lord surrounds His people, from this time forth and forevermore.”
Prayer: Father God, thank You for surrounding me and filling me with Your Holy Spirit and love. Help me today to continue to put on my new, clean, and joyful clothing! My changed heart flows with thanksgiving and joy at Your grace. I can forgive others as I have been forgiven. I am made truly rich as Your child, clothed in Your righteousness by grace! Thank You Jesus for Your great gift of salvation!
Proverbs 1: 8-9 “Hear, my son, your father’s instruction, and forsake not your mother’s teaching, for they are a graceful garland for your head and pendants for you neck.”