Guidelines For Living Devotional

How much is enough?  To be very candid with you, that is a question that I have struggled with personally for several years.  Oh, it isn't that I have so much or think I need so much that I have drawn a line and said to myself, "When I get there, I'll give the rest away."  The issue with me involves a lifestyle.  It is part of the fabric of my faith forced by my coming to grips with the needs of the world.

Have you ever heard it said that three moves are as good as a fire?  What that means is that every time you move, you throw out things, good things too, which you would like to keep but there is no room to keep them.  Why didn't you toss it out a long time ago?  You kept it because you were sure it was too good to throw away, so you put it in the closet or stored it in your garage.  Eventually, you have to reckon with it.  If you want to label the disorder, call it, "CLUTTER!"  It isn't only our closets which eventually suffer from clutter.  Clutter is a disease of the brain, even of the heart, as well as the closet.

Scientists have clearly defined laws that govern our physical world‑‑laws that have been in operation since creation. Those laws are subject neither to the ideas or philosophies of humankind.  For example, Sir Isaac Newton articulated the law of gravitation, showing that the gravitational pull of something is inversely proportioned to the mass of the attracting object. The law of gravity has nothing to do with how I feel, or what I think, or whether or not governments should pass laws disallowing the force of gravity. It's there and its force cannot be legislated or countermanded. 

Have you ever asked yourself what prompts a mom who leads her three grade school kids to the school bus to become a leader in a cultural battle?  Or an unremarkable seamstress in the back of the bus to defy the law of the land?  Quiet and unassuming people who become passionate for a cause, and to the great surprise of even themselves, often lead the fight for right.  How does that happen?  What makes some strong enough to lead the fight while others, far better equipped and prepared, are marginalized or give up?

You can afford to be ignorant of many things—you can hire an attorney to handle your legal stuff, an accountant to do your books, and a doctor to keep you healthy—but the individual who is ignorant of the Bible has an ignorance he can ill afford.

Cultural battles are far more extensive than whether or not your child's teacher embraces gender fluidity or if parents should be notified when a teenager requests contraceptives from a clinic.

Never has a generation wanted more from its culture that only Jesus Christ could provide than our present one.  Like what?  The comforts of prosperity including a home and car, happiness, and money in the bank.  When that is the driving force of a society, vast numbers of people buy into the God-will-deliver-the-goods mentality, expecting Him to be the great provider of our expectations.  This also explains why there are so many broken homes in the Christian community, why vast numbers of people own Bibles but never read them, go to church periodically and consider it to be pretty good entertainment but are unaffected by what they experience.  They face the same problems with their kids – drugs, sexual activity and its consequences – as those who make no pretense to having any relationship with God.

Any traveler to Rome today, making his way through the ruins of what was once the greatest city in the world, would have to admit, whatever they were short on, it was not temples.  Outdone only by the Athenians, the Romans had temples to the stars and to the gods, to the muses and to the politicians who thought they were gods.  There were plenty of them!

Your brain may rule your head, but it is your heart which rules your emotions, and emotions are to life what pigment is to paint.  When your heart is committed, your world is together; but when it is divided, you are headed for trouble. 

When Moses knew that time for him was running out, he gave a charge to Joshua, saying, "Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach" (Deuteronomy 30:11).  As a man who knew his days--possibly even his hours—were numbered, he gave it to him straight.  He said that obedience is a choice, a decision which you make.  And with obedience comes blessing; with disobedience comes difficulty.