Devotional Song: … GO TO THIS LINK …Please take the time to take in a YouTube video of song and lyrics from Zach Williams singing his song … Fear Is A Liar … poignantly singing of how our fears are the lies of Satan, … who is the father of all lies.
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Highlight Verse[s]: John 8:44 [NLT] … [see photo] 44 For you are the children of your father the devil, and you love to do the evil things he does. He was a murderer from the beginning. He has always hated the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, it is consistent with his character; for he is a liar and the father of lies.
… Many following Jesus rejected walking into freedom by following the father of all lies, … Satan.
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Highlight Passage [context]: John 8:31-47 [NLT] … USE THIS LINK …
… Jesus challenges the Pharisees and the people to reject Satan, the father of lies, and to believe in Him, the Author of all truth.
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Reference Passage : … Proverbs 3:5-6 [NIV] … 5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding. 6 Seek his will in all you do, and He will show you which path to take.
… Following the ways of the Lord, thru His word, is the only path to take in life.
Reference Passage : … John 14:5-6 [NIV] … 5 “No, we don’t know, Lord,” Thomas said. “We have no idea where you are going, so how can we know the way?” … 6 Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me. …”
… Jesus, showing Thomas (and us), that following Him is the only way in life.
Reference Passage : … 1Peter 5:7 [NIV] … 7 Give all your worries and cares to God, for He cares about you.
… Satan wants us to worry about everything, lying to us that we can control things thru him; but he is a liar and our fears are his lies.
Reference Passage : … 1 John 4:4 [NIV] … 4 But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won a victory over those people, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world.
… God’s truth - thru John - about the reality that the God, living in us, is far greater than the agent of lies, living in this world.
My Devotional Journal: Today's ODB author, Amy Boucher Pye, uses a story of a young man’s turning from the father of lies to the Author of Truth. . And the ODB author wrote: When Aaron (not his real name) was 15, he began praying to Satan: “I felt like he and I had a partnership.” Aaron started to lie, steal, and manipulate his family and friends. He also experienced nightmares: “I woke up one morning and saw the devil at the end of the bed. He told me that I was going to pass my exams and then die.” Yet when he finished his exams, he lived. Aaron reflected, “It was clear to me that he was a liar.”
Hoping to meet girls, Aaron went to a Christian festival, where a man offered to pray for him. … Aaron turned to Christ from Satanism and now belongs to God. He ministers in an urban community, sharing the difference following Jesus makes. He’s a living testament of God’s saving power: “I can say with confidence that God saved my life.”
When I went off to college, like the young man in the ODB story, I was vulnerable to the lies Satan put forth thru many around me in the world who wanted me to believe my fears, which, as Zach Williams powerfully sings, are the lies of the devil. And as long as I believed that I was in control, those fears led me to wayward, sinful, ways of living.
But like Aaron in the ODB story, the Lord came after me with His truth; and when I realized that He, my Lord, was the Author of all truth (as Jesus taught the people in the highlight passage), I came to follow Him as Lord; and I was led from being a captive of my own fears to the freedom Christ offers by following Him (see the reference passages above).
And today, I pray that all reading here recognize that Jesus is the only voice to follow - thru His word, rejecting the lies of the father of lies, … Satan.
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My THANKFULNESS: … Oh Abba Father, … thank You, Lord, … for leading us to freedom from our fears and worries to the safety of Your truth.
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My Prayer Today: Oh Abba Father, … King Jesus, … I pray, Lord, that all reading here can, and will, join me to reject the fears and lies of the enemy and find the freedom which comes from the Author of Truth. … 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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