Saturday, July 30, 2016

July 30, 2016: God’s Promise for the Faithful

Daily Berry Patch Devotions in 2016 - Day 212

Devotional Song:  … GO TO THIS LINK …  Please take the time to take in a You Tube video of Steve Green singing … Find Us Faithful, poignantly declaring the heritage of faithfulness in all those who paved the way to Christ by their faith; … and may the faithful of today pave the way for others to receive Christ’s promise.


Highlight Passage:  Hebrews 11:6, 39  [NKJV] … USE THIS LINK … 
 
… Faith is no magical formula to wealth and happiness … 
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Highlight Context – Hebrews 10:32-11:39 [NKJV] … USE THIS LINK 
… Those who lived by faith lived for the promise of God, never having received it.
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Reference Passage #1 … Lamentations 3:22-23 [ NKJV] … USE THIS LINK 
… Forever God is Faithful

Reference Passage #2 … Hebrews 13:5 [NKJV] …
5 Let your conduct be without covetousness; be content with such things as you have. For He Himself has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” [Deut. 31:6,8] 
… God will NEVER, NEVER, NEVER forsake His beloved remnant of believers.

My Journal for Today:  … Our Daily Bread author, Philip Yancey, pointed to a troubling religious trend in our world today as he wrote: It’s tempting to think of faith as a kind of magic formula. If you muster up enough of it, you’ll get rich, stay healthy, and live a contented life with automatic answers to all your prayers. But life does not work according to such neat formulas. As proof, the author of Hebrews presents a stirring reminder of what constitutes “true faith” by reviewing the lives of some Old Testament giants of faith (Hebrews, Chapter 11). 

There are many false teachers/preachers out there these days, many of whom claim to be “christian” and teach that the words we speak// have the power of faith to produce health, wealth, and happiness. This so-called “word of faith” teaching lulls people into thinking that we produce the power of faith by claiming our world by some magical formula of faith.

But Philip Yancey, in today’s ODB entry, repudiates these teachings, pointing out that none of the “giants of faith,” listed in the “Hall of the Faithful” in Chapter 11 of Hebrews, no matter how great their faith, received the promise of God [see verse 39]. Yes, they will one day; and their faith will be rewarded by their Messiah in Heaven; but none of them, even a giant of faith like Abraham, ever achieved God’s ultimate promise in their lifetime.

And none of God’s faithful will achieve health, wealth, and happiness by claiming to be God’s faithful in their lifetime on earth now. Our faith does produce justification, just as it did for Abraham and the other giants of faith in Hebrews 11; but faith does not come from our mouths by claiming to be faithful. It only comes by faith in the one Who died to give us His promise of glory … and that is Jesus!

My Prayer Today:  O, Heavenly Father, … Lord, You are the promise for the faithful.  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, distributed online via email by RBC Ministries.  If you GO TO THIS LINK on the date of my blog, you can read/study the ODB blogs; or you can subscribe to the blog via email at that site.

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