Devotional Song: … GO TO THIS LINK … Please take the time to take in YouTube from Clay Crosse, BeBe Winans, and Bob Carlisle singing … I Will Follow Christ … poignantly singing of how we, as Christians, must be willing to follow the Lord no matter where He may lead us.
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Highlight Verse[s]: Numbers 9:17 [NLT] … 17 Whenever the cloud lifted from over the sacred tent, the people of Israel would break camp and follow it. And wherever the cloud settled, the people of Israel would set up camp.
… Even tho God’s people were reluctant at times, when the Lord led them with the cloud of His Spirit they would pack up on move on to follow Him.
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Highlight Passage [context]: Numbers 9:15-23 [NLT] … USE THIS LINK …
… When God’s chosen wandered in the wilderness, God led them with a cloud and a pillar of fire.
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Reference Passage : … Psalms 106:24-25 [NLT] … USE THIS LINK …
… The Psalmist sings of the times when God led Moses and His people in the wilderness and they grumbled with discontent even tho the Lord provided for their needs over and over and led them with a cloud and pillar of fire.
Reference Passage : … Proverbs 3:5-6 [NLT] … USE THIS LINK …
… There are times in our lives when we may find it difficult to follow the Lord; but we must trust Him to lead us where we need to go.
Reference Passage : … Luke 9:23 [NLT] … 23 Then He said to the crowd, “If any of you wants to be My follower, you must give up your own way, take up your cross daily, and follow Me. …”
… Under the New Covenant (i.e. Testament), it is Jesus who commands us to follow Him.
Reference Passage : … Acts 1:8 [NLT] … 8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you. And you will be My witnesses, telling people about Me everywhere—in Jerusalem, throughout Judea, in Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
… God’s pillar of fire is now His Spirit who will lead us to be the Lord’s witnesses wherever He might lead us in the world.
My Devotional Journal: Today's ODB author, Mart DeHaan, uses a sociological picture of our mobile, on-the-move, culture to show that we are often led by life’s circumstances to move from place-to-place. The ODB author writes … According to the US Census Bureau, Americans move from one address to another an average of eleven to twelve times during the course of a lifetime. In a recent year, 28 million people packed up, moved, and unpacked under a new roof. [See photo]
We have become a very mobile culture, haven’t we; and tho sometimes a move for individuals, families, or businesses can be seen as a positive, exciting venture, … for the most part, we don’t enjoy change or the stress of a move; and we might often grumble as God’s people did when the Lord was leading them thru the wilderness on the way to the promised land (see highlight passage and Ps. 106:24-25).
The question posed by today’s ODB entry is whether, being led to move to-and-fro in life, we’re always looking to do what is sung in the linked song … to follow Christ. Because when God became a man, … our Messiah, … God’s people no longer would have a pillar of fire to lead them (us). No, that Spirit of the fire of God, thru our faith in Christ, now resides in our hearts and we are called (nay, commanded) to let God’s Spirit, which resides in the hearts of true believers, - God’s Spirit - to lead us to be Christ’s witnesses in the world [see Acts 1:8].
Jesus commands us to trust that He will lead us as we travel thru life (see Prov. 3:5-6 and Luke 9:23), and today, I pray that we avoid grumbling and be willing to seek His will and His ways thru His word, which He gave us as His “GPS” for our moving thru live.
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My THANKFULNESS: … Oh Abba Father, … thank You, Lord, … for showing us the way to move forward in Your Name and for Your glory.
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My Prayer Today: Oh Abba Father, … King Jesus, … I pray, Lord, that all reading here can, and will, join me today to do all we can to follow our Lord’s lead by His Spirit and His word as we keep moving onward in life. … 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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