Devotional Song: … GO TO THIS LINK … Please take the time to take in a YouTube video with an unidentified group singing… Here I Am Lord … poignantly singing of how we should respond to God’s call to service and action.
=============
Highlight Verse[s]: 1 Samuel 20:13 [NKJV] … 13 … But if it pleases my father to do you evil, then I will report it to you and send you away, that you may go in safety. And the Lord be with you as He has been with my father.
… Jonathan’s commitment to David, giving up his right to succeed to the throne of Saul and risking his very life for David.
==============
Highlight Passage [context]: 1 Samuel 20 [NKJV] … USE THIS LINK …
… Jonathan came into a covenant friendship with David at exactly the right time because of the jealousy of Saul for David.
=============
Reference Passage : … Isaiah 6:8 [NKJV] … 8 Also I heard the voice of the Lord, saying: “Whom shall I send, and who will go for Us?” … Then I said, “Here am I! Send me.”
… Isaiah responded to God’s call with surrender and commitment exactly at the time of God’s calling. But do we bloom where God plants us.
Reference Passage : … Acts 1:8 [NKJV] … 8 But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
… Any born-again Christian is always at the right place, at the right time, to witness Christ’s love and grace to others.
My Devotional Journal: Today's ODB author, Tim Gustafson, uses a botanical word picture to show that we Christians should bloom where God plants us. The ODB author wrote: “A weed is any plant that grows where you don’t want it,” [see photo] my father said, handing me the hoe. I wanted to leave the corn plant that had “volunteered” among the peas. But Dad, who had grown up on a farm, instructed me to pull it out. That lone cornstalk would do nothing but choke the peas and rob them of nutrients.
Then, in the “Insight” addendum to the ODB entry today, Mart DeHaan, another ODB author, wrote, giving insight into the highlight passage about David and Jonathan: Do you ever wonder whether you are in the place God wants you to be? David and Jonathan help us ask a different question. When combined with the story of Jonathan’s father, Saul, they give us reason to ask not about our place in life but about the condition of our hearts.
And I’m somewhat convicted - or at least challenged - by these images and questions from God’s word today. I’m asking myself: “Am I responding as did Isaiah when he was called by God to go and share His message with the world?” [see Is. 6:8] … Even more I’m asking myself: “Am I blooming where I’m planted as Jesus called Christians to be as His witnesses wherever they happened to be?” [See Acts 1:8]
I’ll let you wrestle with those thoughts after you listen to the linked song and meditate on the Scriptures above. Personally, in conviction, God has me pinned to the mat here this morning as I’ve been with Him.
=============
My THANKFULNESS: … Oh Lord, Jesus, thank You for Your Spirit and the charge to be Your witness wherever You have me today.
=============
My Prayer Today: Abba Father, … King Jesus, … Precious Spirit … Help me to go forth in Your Name - even today - for Your glory. … 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.
No comments:
Post a Comment