Devotional Song: Go to this link - … Please take the time to see a video of the group 4Him singing The Basics of Life, reminding Christians that we need to get back to the terms of Jesus’ New Covenant agreement with mankind
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Highlight Passage: Luke 6: 37-38 … [NKJV] … Jesus teaching some of His basics - or his “terms of service” about kingdom values …
37 “Judge not, and you shall not be judged. Condemn not, and you shall not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven. 38 Give, and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom. For with the same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you.”
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Highlight Context - NKJV: Luke 6: 17-49 [NKJV] … GO TO THIS LINK … Jesus’ second great sermon where he spells out His “terms of service” - i.e., His New Covenant values …
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Reference Passage #1: Matthew, Chapter 5-7 [NKJV] … GO TO THIS LINK … Jesus lays out His covenant values in the Sermon on the Mount…
Reference Passage #2: Matthew 28: 19-20 … [NKJV] … … Jesus’ last TOS with His disciples - His Great Commission …
19 " ... Go, therefore, and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”
Reference Passage #3: Luke 9: 23 … [NKJV] … … Jesus summarizing His “TOS” - on discipleship …
23 Then He said to them all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me. ... "
My Journal for Today: Today’s Our Daily Bread devotional entry, authored by Julie Ackerman Link, used an interesting, modern-day, word picture to describe how Jesus was trying, with His New Covenant values, to get across God’s “terms of service” to His disciples.
Check out the attached photo; and any of you computer geeks reading here will immediately recognize a “terms of service” [TOS] agreement, which we have to establish online when we’re installing new software or buying something via computer. And sometimes these TOS agreements can be pages long with a lot of small-print legalese, which we don’t want to read. So, we rapidly scroll down to the “[ ] I agree” box and click on it to proceed with our installment or purchase. But we bypassed all the important details which establishes our agreement with the entity we’re dealing with about the transaction.
Jesus had quite a few “TOS” agreements which He tried to get across to His disciples; and I’ve laid out a few in the highlight and reference scripture texts above. The longest of these was in our Lord’s famous “Sermon on the Mount,” where Jesus laid out His “TOS” on God’s Kingdom values to those who were following Him. But unfortunately those folks, like us with a computer TOS, just didn’t get it from all the details in His long teachings [i.e., Jesus’ TOS].
The highlight Bible passage today was another sermon, which Luke recorded in His gospel, …very much like the Sermon on the Mount (some think it was Luke’s account of the latter); but in this account of Jesus’ teaching - I believe in another setting - He also laid out His terms of service, which the people very likely had trouble either believing or applying to their lives.
And then, of course, there was our Lord’s last major “TOS” on this earth as He was taken back into heaven after the resurrection, … when He laid out His “Great Commission,” charging His disciples to go out a make more disciples. And that is the charge of the song I chose to link readers toward today, which spells out the charge that we “get back to the basics” of life, which, for Christians, are those “TOS” agreements which Jesus tried to lay out in the passages to which I’ve linked or copied for you readers here today.
So, take in Jesus’ TOS agreement; … and then, if you can check the “[ ] I agree” box, on what Jesus taught, … well, we’ll see you in heaven per Christ’s agreement.
My Prayer for Today … Lord, help me to get back to Your basics, .. i.e., Your TOS with me; and let me honor those values in my living today. … Amen
Blogger Note: Everyday during this year, my daily devotional blogs are influenced by the reading and study of the online devotional blog entitled Our Daily Bread [TGIF], distributed online via email by RBC Ministries. If you GO TO THIS LINK on the date of my blog, you’ll find a link to read the Our Daily Bread blogs; or you can subscribe to the blog via email at that site.
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