HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Vol 2 No 41 THEO'S DEVOS

PSALM 50:1 I don’t need the bulls you sacrifice;

I don’t need the blood of goats.

¹⁴ What I want instead is your true thanks to God;

I want you to fulfill your vows to the Most High.

This week millions of people will gather together for Thanksgiving. They may not know it but, when they do, they will be observing an activity that warms the heart of God. We do a lot of things and often believe that God is happy when we do them. You know like attend church services, sing hymns, pray and other well intended activities. Now don't get me wrong. There is nothing wrong with doing these things. In fact God is moved when we do. But we must understand that you can do those things and not have a heart that is aligned with God.

Our verse implies that Thanksgiving is a sacrifice but not like the sacrifices we normally think of. A sacrifice is something that costs. It takes effort. God puts a lot of emphasis on thanksgiving throughout the Bible. Have you ever wondered why? The answer to that question is that in order to be thankful you have to have received something. Someone has given you something and you are thanful for it. The fact is that, every day, you receive something from God. The fact that you are breathing right now is because God gave you breath.

This does not mean that you should go through life being thankful simply because you are told to. Have you ever met people who have a simple smile on their face and act thankful when, in your heart, it seems so insincere? Some people are just good actors. They can't paint a smile on ther face and pretend really well. Not does God expect you to be thankful for bad things. He doesn't expect you to say “Oh I am so thankful that my car was totalled last week. And thank God my son ran away from home.” No, that is not the things that God wants us to be thankful for. It isn't those kinds of things that are reasons for thankfulness. However, those kinds of things can reveal a God who cares for us and can strengthen us on the inside in spite of what is going on around us and we can be thankful for that. In the middle of the worst catastrophe there will always be something for which we can be thankful to God..

When we look for reasons to be thanful, no matter what the circumstance, we “ fulfill your vows to the Most High.” You see a vow is something you make freely of your own volition and when you are thankful to God it fulfills a vow to Him. If you have trusted God as your savior, you know in your heart that you are endebted to Him. How do you pay that debt? You can't. The closest you will get to paying Him back is to look for Him in your life and thank Him when you see His fingerprints. Where are they? Open your eyes, look around. He has given you life, friends, family. He loves you more than you can imagine. Thank Him for that love. This Thanksgiving be sure to let someone else know that you are thankful to God for what you have and where you are headed. Someday you will be glad you did. Do you have email? Then send an email to someone special and give them something to be extremely thankful for.

May God bless you and your family this Thanksgiving. I trust it will be an excellent day for you.

Theo

LOOK AROUND

Vol 2 No 47 THEO'S DEVOS

John 1:3 He created everything there is. Nothing exists that he didn’t make.

Where are you right now? At home? Work? Take a moment and look around you. What do you see? Does it strike you as rather mundane? Just the stuff of life? Or do you see the touch of God? If not, maybe you are not looking close enough. What will you be doing later today? Climbing a mountain? Sitting on a surfboard? Filing reports? Maybe watching football like I will be. In the middle of all this normal life we can easily miss some very important things. You know the old saying that we need to slow down and smell the roses? Well, when you do that, remember who made them. The same one who made all that there is: Jesus.

Our verse for the day, taken in its context, tells us that it was, and is, Jesus who makes everything. You were made by Him and so was the paper clip you will use at some point in your life. Oh, you say that some man made the perperclip. Sorry but that guy simply assembled that paper clip out of the materials that God made. I am told that the scientists all got together one day and decided that, if there was a god, they no longer needed Him. So they assigned one of their own to go to g/God and tell Him that man no longer required Him. The scientist bowed down and said. “God we no longer need you.” Startled he heard a reply: “Fine, if you can make a person out of dirt, I will go away.” The scientist agreed and went outside. When he knelt down to scoop up some dirt he heard the words: “Oh no, get your own dirt.”

That apocryphal tale illuminates the reality that when you swim, you swim in God's water. When you eat, you eat God's food. Not Bhuda's food, the almighty God's food. Not Allah's food, but Jehovah God's food. When you fly, you fly in a plane assembled with material that Jesus provided us. Now look up and see the sky, the clouds. If it is at night the moon and the stars. Jesus made them as well. Get a microscope and delve into the innerwokings of a plant. There is Jesus' handiwork. From the subatomic particle to the universe, Jesus gets the credit for its existence.

So, when you think about it, thank God for the breath you take. He gave the air to you to breathe. It is His way of saying, among many others, “I love you.” Three of the most powerful words in the English language and words that appear in one of the most important verses in, not only the Bible, but in any book ever written. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.” Yes eternal life. It appears that Jesus is capable of more then mere life. He can give eternal life.

Have you believed in Him? Do you trust that Jesus died on that cross for your sins and mine? If not, why not trust Him right now. Tell Him that you no longer trust in yourself to get you to heaven but that you believe that His death on that cross saved you from your sin and that, when He rose from the grave that He proved His power over death. Believe in your risen Lord and it will change your life and fill you with His presence. May God bless you all.

Theo

THE KING'S HEART

Vol 2 No 46 THEO'S DEVOS

Proverbs 21:1 The king’s heart is like a stream of water directed by the LORD; he turns it wherever he pleases.

Last week was certainly an historic one. This last presidential campaign was probably the most important one in the last several. The outcome has put Americans into two distinct groups that seem slightly different in makeup this time around.

 

On the one hand you have a large group of people who act as though the Messiah has arrived. Did you see the Obama supporter who said she was so happy because Barack was going to pay for her mortgage and car. Hollywood got what they thought they wanted and I saw a letter from Michael Moore stating that "...today we celebrate this triumph of decency over personal attack, of peace over war, of intelligence over a belief that Adam and Eve rode around on dinosaurs just 6,000 years ago. What will it be like to have a smart president? Science, banished for eight years, will return. Imagine supporting our country's greatest minds as they seek to cure illness, discover new forms of energy, and work to save the planet. I know, pinch me."

 

On the other hand you have a group of people who believe that we are on the verge of socialism, if not Marxism. That Obama will surround himself with the most liberal of the Washington elite and take this country down the road to financial ruin. They see Russia putting missils in Eastern Europe as a test of the new presidency and fear that we will embolden our enemies because they see us as having gotten weaker militarily overnight.

 

So what are we to believe and what are we to do? Do you find yourself in one of these camps? If so what does that say about the placement of your faith? We know from the scriptures that when God wants to punish a country, He gives them bad leaders. Is that what just happened? Or has He given us a new perspective on govering and that what was termed 'redistibution of wealth' is really an opportunity for those who have to help those who do not. Are higher taxes patriotism and if you don't like higher taxes, is that selfishness?

 

I don't know the answer to those questions and that is one of the many reasons I have never thought to enter politics. There was enough of that in the churches that I served. I am happy to not be a part of the political scene. What I do know is stated in our verses for this week. We are not called to put our faith in guns and swords. We must never think that, as wonderful as this country is, it is the final solution to our problems. Do you know what the best form of government is? The Bible tells us that the best form of government is a dictatorship. That's right. Now don't start sending requests to unsubsbribe just yet. When God sets up the Milennial kingdom, assuming you belirve that He will, do you know what kind of government that will be? It will be a dictatorship with God as the benevolent dictator. Christianity is not a democracy. Democracies are crucial whenever you have humen beings in control Checks and balances are required to stop our depravity from becoming a terminal operating system.

 

Listen, no matter what you think of the election, God is still in control. Only time will tell whether Barack Hussein Obamam was a good choice or a bad one. God is blessing those who love Him in the worst places on earth and He will continue to bless and guide those who trust Him here. I hope and pray that Mr Obama turns out to be a great president. But, one way or another, I know that God will keep us in the center of His will. So don't put your faith in a government. Keep your faith in God and understand that there is no need to worry and no cause to gloat.

 

Our God reagns. He reigns in my heart and yours. May He bless you and keep you and may you follow Him no matter what the cost.

 

Theo

Honesty Before God

Vol 2 No 45 THEO'S DEVOS 110608

1 John 1:8-10 If we say we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and refusing to accept the truth. ⁹But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from every wrong. ¹⁰If we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that his word has no place in our hearts.

Sin is a difficult concept is a few ways. Someone has said that sin is simply stupid. If we sin it is almost always to get what we want without God. To do that is to act in a way that is just plain stupid. God wants what is best for us and is in position to give it to us but we, like many characters in the Bible, try to take shortcuts to the goal and often end up short. We may then start to justify our actions by stating that what we did was really not a sin at all. It just didn't work and we have learned from it. However to try and dodge the obvious, John tells us, is to fool ourselves. Confessing our sin brings about cleansing and that heals a broken relationship with God. It frees Him to open blessings to us.

Note that verse nine says that He can cleanse us “from every wrong.” This cannot mean that we become sinless because right after saying those words he goes on to say that claiming to have not sinned calls God a liar. So what are we to do? It is clear that we are not supposed to sin. And yet it is apparent that we cannot avoid it. This is the great dilemma of human existence that can only be rectified by the entrance into heaven at the end of life. Until then we struggle with the sin problem and must be sure to heed the guidance of 1:9. We must be quick to confess our sin, or sins, to God so that he can cleanse us. The forgiveness has already occurred. “To forgive” is an aorist verb and indicates that upon confession of sin, they are forgiven; once for all. We do not confess to get forgiven over and over again. We confess because the words “to cleanse” is a present perfect and indicates that we must confess over and over in order to keep up to date and so the cleansing continues.

Note that, in these verses we are not told to confess to some person granted the power to forgive. We confess directly to God. None of the gifts of the spirit are given to grant forgiveness of sin. That lies in the hands of God. Asking forgiveness of a person when you have harmed them may be necessary and, in that case, it is in the hands of the person wronged to forgive but that is so human relationships can be healed. In those circumstances it is best if we offer forgiveness whether or not it is asked. To not forgive someone is to allow the lack of forgiveness to dwell in our hearts and minds like a social cancer, eating away at us and causing us to harbor sin in our hearts.

To try and justify what is sin is to call God a liar and that, my friend, is a dangerous thing to do. It certainly does not endear us to Him nor does it make the thing done anything less than sin. It falls into the 'lipstick and pigs' realm. Listen, God knows your actions and your thoughts. There is no advantage to pretend that something you have done was not a sin when you know that it was. Live your life open before your God. Talk to Him and confess those things that you know are sin. The fact is that you will do things that are sin and you may not even realize that you have done them. In those cases the Holy Spirit will talk to God on your behalf. Jesus will defend your case and you will stand 'in Christ.'

Sin is an important thing to avoid but since it cannot be totally avoided, be sure to keep in touch with God and confess those things that you know He wants you to. You may not be perfect but you can be heading in that direction. Please remember something we noted a while ago and will mention again. God loves you just the way you are but He loves you too much to let you stay that way. Confessing your sins to Him allows Him to help you progress along the path of Christian growth.

I am praying for you and asking God to fulfill your hopes and dreams. May you place a blessing in your life today.

Theo