SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 12/1/2016 10:10 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-2 “The Pursuit of Peace”
Bible Reading &
Meditation Reference: John 14:27d
Message of the verses: “Do not let you heart be troubled, nor lit it
be fearful.”
We continue
in this SD to look at how we as believers pursue peace as we have a
responsibility to do this as we look at in our last SD.
I want to
begin with a quote from John MacArthur “When we trust in His goodness,
faithfulness, and provision, God fills us ‘with all joy and peace in believing’
(Rom. 15:13). To live in anguish over
the past, anxiety concerning the present, or apprehension about the future is
to fail to appropriate that peace. As
noted earlier, believers are to be ‘anxious for nothing, but in everything by
prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let [their] requests be made known to
God. And the peace of God, which
surpasses all comprehension, will guard [their] hearts and [their] minds in
Christ Jesus’ (Phil. 4:6-7).”
Now we will
look at what Jesus said about the sinful folly of allowing fear and worry to
corrode the believer’s experience of having divine peace: “25 "For this reason I say to you, do
not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink;
nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and
the body more than clothing? 26 “Look at the birds of the air, that they do not
sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them.
Are you not worth much more than they? 27 “And who of you by being worried can
add a single hour to his life? 28 “And why are you worried about clothing?
Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin, 29
yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like
one of these. 30 "But if God so
clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown
into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith! 31 “Do
not worry then, saying, ’What will we eat?’ or ’What will we drink?’ or ’What
will we wear for clothing?’ 32 “For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things;
for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things. 33 “But seek first His kingdom
and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you. 34 “So do not worry about tomorrow;
for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own
Matthew 6:25-34).”
As
believers we are assured that God has forgiven the past, provided for the
present and He has also guaranteed the future, and we know that our future home
in heaven will be much better than our home here on earth so we can rejoice in
that, along with His provision for our salvation in which he forgave all of our
sins, past present and future even though we do not deserve that. Knowing this there is nothing to legitimately
disrupt our peace. Paul wrote about this
in 2 Corinthians 4:8-9 and 17-18 “8 we are afflicted in every way, but not
crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; 9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck
down, but not destroyed; 17 For momentary, light affliction
is producing for us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison, 18 while
we look not at the things
which are seen, but
at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the
things which are not seen are
eternal.” Now when we look at
what Paul called momentary light afflictions we may not think that they were
either momentary nor light afflictions as we wrote later on in 2 Corinthians “24
Five times I received from the Jews thirty-nine lashes. 25 Three times I was
beaten with rods, once I was stoned, three times I was shipwrecked, a night and
a day I have spent in the deep. 26 I have been on frequent journeys, in dangers
from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the
Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea,
dangers among false brethren; 27 I have been in labor and hardship, through
many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and
exposure. 28 Apart from such external things, there is the daily pressure on me
of concern for all the churches. 29 Who is weak without my being weak? Who is
led into sin without my intense concern? 30 If I have to boast, I will boast of
what pertains to my weakness. 31 The God and Father of the Lord Jesus, He who
is blessed forever, knows that I am not lying. 32 In Damascus the ethnarch
under Aretas the king was guarding the city of the Damascenes in order to seize
me, 33 and I was let down in a basket through a window in the wall, and so
escaped his hands (2 Corinthians 11:24-33).”
Now when you read of all these things that Paul went through you first
of all must realize that Jesus said that he would have to greatly suffer of
God, and second of all you have to realize that in all of these difficulties
that Paul had the peace that passes all understanding that was guarding his
hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”
We will
stop here and make every effort to finish this section so we can move onto the
last section in the 14th chapter of John.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: As I was thinking about the times that I have
not experienced the kind of peace that Paul experienced I began to think about
my expeditions and perhaps the reason that I don’t always experience God’s
peace is because my expeditions are different than what God wants to do in my
life.
My Steps of Faith for
Today: Just trust the Lord for He
knows best.
Memory verse for the week:
(Romans 6:5-7) “5 For if we have become united with Him in the likeness
of His death, certainly we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection, 6
know this, that our old self was crucified with Him, in order that our body of
sin might be done away with, so that we would no longer be slaves to sin; 7 for
he who has died is freed from sin.”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible question: “As a thief in the night” (1 Thessalonians
5:2).
Today’s Bible question:
“What name is given to what is recorded in Matthew 5:3-12?”
Answer in our next SD. 12/1/2016 11:02 AM
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