Daily Devotionals for October 2006

[Jerry]

Wow - September sure was one busy, hectic month for me! God was stirring up some things in my life and getting me to leave the nest I was in - so that I would be ready to move into the new sphere He wanted me to be a part of now. (See Deuteronomy 32:11-12) I am no longer working full-time at the hotel (though the door is still open for me to work shifts here and there), but am now working at the Gospel Mission where I have been preaching once (sometimes twice) a week for over 2 1/2 years, and have done several years of volunteer work on top of this.

I have been praying for ways to get more involved in the lives of the people there - and all of a sudden this job opportunity came up (the senior evening position in the Mission), and the job was basically dropped in my lap. Because of the work the Lord was doing in my heart prior to this point in time, I knew this was exactly where the Lord wanted me to be. A lot of things fell into place - including His peace like a blanket covering my heart and mind. I am finished with the full-time graveyards at the hotel, and am adapting to the days at the Mission now...

It will be 4 days on, and 4 days off (plus whatever odd shifts I might still get at the hotel - no set schedule there though). That will give me plenty of time to work on studies, my websites, my blogs, etc. and still work on my messages at the Mission. I was thinking that if I had to preach up to 4 days in a row that would mean I would have to shorten my messages and not have as much time as needed to develop them - but even will a full hectic week last week, the Lord still gave me two messages - the second one (this is the one below) actually went a little longer than planned, but it sure had everyone's attention! Praise the Lord for His grace - especially for this step into greater ministry opportunities, for a day job that will allow me more time to get involved in church soulwinning times (could not easily do that before with full-time graveyards), for being able to be around the people at the Mission throughout the week (not just on the day I was to preach), and for more opportunities to preach the Word of God (which gives me more experience in this area too - not just more opportunities to get the Word of God out to those in the Mission) - also, I am looking foward to being able to do more series and build upon prior messages (which I can easily do if I am preaching two to four days in a row).

My message today is what I preached on Sunday - the basic idea is not new to me, as someone has pointed out these four passages in a message I have read before (though theirs dealt with Satan trying to hinder us from being involved in our local church - attempting to hinder us from worshipping God in the manner and place He has designated - and using work as one of the main hindrances from assembling together with other believers). Using the same four passages as my springboard, I took it in another direction, aimed at presenting the Gospel to the lost at the Mission.

Daily Devotional for Sunday October 1st/06

Pharaoh's Four Proposals

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Monday October 2nd/06

Wanted: Faithful Men

There is an incredible famine of faithfulness in these days. Many churches could take Proverbs 20:6 as their theme verse: Most men will proclaim every man his own goodness: but a faithful man who can find? Thank God that the Apostle Paul found one in Timothy. To that young preacher Paul issued the following command from the Holy Ghost: And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also (2 Timothy 2:2).

Every God-called, Spirit-led pastor desires to commit the truth to faithful men. But, the sad fact is that there are few that qualify for the training! Many that profess Christ are unfaithful men - unfaithful to the Word, the work, the war, the worship of God, and some are even unfaithful to their wives. Here's a challenge, sir - BE A FAITHFUL MAN!

A faithful man is one who has first been REGENERATED. He has been born again of the Holy Spirit. What about you - was there a time when the Holy Ghost of God REPROVED you of your sinfulness, REBUKED you of your ungodliness, and you RESPONDED by REPENTING and RECEIVING the Lord Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour? Only the saved man can qualify for this holy designation of faithful men.

He is also one who RECEIVES the Word of God. Too many are REJECTING, REWRITING, REARRANGING, RECONSTRUCTING, and REINVENTING the Word of God. But, faithful men will not go that route! The faithful man doesn'??t get mad at the truth-telling preacher either. Like the Berean Christians of Acts 17:10,11 he RECEIVES the Word of God as it is preached, RESEARCHES the message with the Scriptures, and then REACHES a conclusion about what God's man has declared.

The faithful man allows his pastor to commit the truth to him! He is humble and takes time to be taught the Word and treasures it in his heart. He is not carried about by every wind of doctrine because he RETAINS the truth. In other words, he sticks with, stands for, and strives about the truth.

That last part of 2 Timothy 2:2 is where it really gets good. When a man is REGENERATED, RECEIVES the Word of God, and RETAINS it, he is at the place where he can be used of God to REPEAT it to others. He is able to teach others also. The work of God goes forward mightily as men develop into faithful men. Sinners are sought, the seed is sown, souls are saved, and saints are settled as faithful men continue the wonderful process of preaching the Word of God in the power of the Holy Ghost.

Sir, don't allow the famine of faithfulness to famish your family and assembly. Before God Almighty, and for His glory and honour, commit by His grace to be a faithful man from this day forward.

By Pastor Bobby Mitchell
Mid-Coast Baptist Church
Brunswick, Maine
(Used With Permission)

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Tuesday October 3rd/06

This is the outline of the message I preached on Tuesday at the Gospel Mission:

The Lord Uses Clean Vessels

2 Timothy 2:19-22 Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity. But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some to honour, and some to dishonour. If a man therefore purge himself from these, he shall be a vessel unto honour, sanctified, and meet for the master's use, and prepared unto every good work. Flee also youthful lusts: but follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

Do you want to be a vessel that the Lord can use? He uses vessels of gold and silver - vessels of honour - for His glory, they are set apart (sanctified) for special use. If you want to be used by the Lord, you need to be a clean vessel.

John 17:17 Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.

I used to deal with severe depression, and in the worst of the battles I turned to drinking (which never helped); then when I wanted to be used by God, He could not use me until I became a clean vessel!

How do we become clean vessels, according to the Word of God?

1) Salvation cleanses us from our sinful past:

Ezekiel 36:25-27 Then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from all your idols, will I cleanse you. A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh. And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.

2 Corinthians 5:17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.

For the believer:

2) How to cleanse your heart (be clean on the inside).

Confess that you have sinned against the Lord, and forsake (repent of) that sin.

Psalms 51:2-4 Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgressions: and my sin is ever before me. Against thee, thee only, have I sinned, and done this evil in thy sight: that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest, and be clear when thou judgest.

Psalms 51:10 Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me.

1 John 1:9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Confess here means to agree with God about what He said regarding my sin. When I truly repent and acknowledge my sin to the Lord, He will forgive me and cleanse me from it.

Proverbs 28:13 He that covereth his sins shall not prosper: but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy.

3) How to cleanse your conduct (be clean on the outside).

Study and apply the Word of God, memorize it, meditate on it.

Psalms 119:9 Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? by taking heed thereto according to thy word.

Psalms 119:11 Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.

Regardless of your past, cleansing is available. The Lord will only use clean vessels for His honour.

Are you a clean vessel?

Written/Preached October 3rd/06
Jerry Bouey

Here is a follow up: After I preached, one of the men from the Mission's recovery program went to the head of the program and told him that he wanted to be the kind of vessel that the Lord could use! That is awesome!

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Wednesday October 4th/06

My webpartner, Kate Plourde, on EarnestlyContending has started a new series of devotionals - this time on the theme of:

Nuggets From Proverbs

Please check them out if you love Biblical food for thought.

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Thursday October 5th/06

Here is an excellent article on the Biblical teaching of Creation:

Fossils And Dinosaurs ...Or, Can I Be A Christian And Still Believe In Evolution?

If you are blessed and strengthened in your faith by reading this article, by all means read the other ones on this website. From what I have read, this author is solid.

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Friday October 6th/06

New Translations and the Authorised Version

I suppose that the most popular of all the proposals at the present moment is to have a new translation of the Bible... The argument is that people are not reading the Bible any longer because they do not understand its language - particularly the archaic terms - what does your modern man... know about justification, sanctification, and all the Biblical terms? And so we are told the one thing that is necessary is to have a translation that Tom, Dick, and Harry will understand. I began to feel about six months ago that we had almost reached the stage in which the Authorised Version was being dismissed, to be thrown into the limbo of things forgotten, no longer of any value. Need I apologise for saying a word in favour of the Authorised Version in this gathering?...

It is a basic proposition laid down by the Protestant Reformers, that we must have a Bible "understanded by the people." That is common sense... We must never be obscurantists. We must never approach the Bible in a mere antiquarian spirit... but it does seem to me that there is a very grave danger incipient in so much of the argument that is being presented today for these new translations. There is a danger, I say, of our surrendering something that is vital and essential...

Take this argument that the modern man does not understand such terms as justification, sanctification, and so on. I want to ask you a question. When did an ordinary man ever understand those terms?... Did the colliers to whom John Wesley and George Whitfield preached in the 18th century understand? They had not even been to day school... they could not read, they could not write. Yet these were the terms that were used. This was the version that was used - the Authorised Version. The common people have never understood these terms... We are concerned here with something that is spiritual; something that does not belong to this world at all; which, as the apostle Paul reminds us, the princes of this world do not know. Human wisdom is of no value here - it is a spiritual truth. This is truth about God primarily, and because of that it is a mystery.

Yet we are told - it must be put in such simple terms and language that anybody taking it up and reading it is going to understand all about it. My friends, this is sheer nonsense. What we must do is to educate the masses of the people up to the Bible, not bring the Bible down to their level. One of the greatest troubles today is that everything is being brought down to the same level; everything is cheapened. The common man is made the standard of authority; he decides everything, and everything has to be brought down to him...

Are we to do that with the Word of God? I say No! What has happened in the past has been this. Ignorant, illiterate people, in this country and in foreign countries, coming into salvation have been educated up to the Book and have begun to understand it, to glory in it, and to praise God for it, and I say that we need to do the same in this present time. What we need is therefore, not to replace the Authorised Version... we need rather to reach and train people up to the standard and the language, the dignity and the glory of the old Authorised Version.

Dr. Martyn Lloyd Jones - 1961

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Saturday October 7th/06

Through The Fire

"So the Lord blessed the latter end of Job more than his beginning" (Job 42:12).

Through his griefs Job came to his heritage. He was tried that his godliness might be confirmed. Are not my troubles intended to deepen my character and to robe me in graces I had little of before? I come to my glory through eclipses, tears, death. My ripest fruit grows against the roughest wall. Job's afflictions left him with higher conceptions of God and lowlier thoughts of himself. "Now," he cried, "mine eye seeth thee.

And if, through pain and loss, I feel God so near in His majesty that I bend low before Him and pray, "Thy will be done," I gain very much. God gave Job glimpses of the future glory. In those wearisome days and nights, he penetrated within the veil, and could say, "I know that my Redeemer liveth." Surely the latter end of Job was more blessed than the beginning. --In the Hour of Silence

"Trouble never comes to a man unless she brings a nugget of gold in her hand."

Apparent adversity will finally turn out to be the advantage of the right if we are only willing to keep on working and to wait patiently. How steadfastly the great victor souls have kept at their work, dauntless and unafraid! There are blessings which we cannot obtain if we cannot accept and endure suffering. There are joys that can come to us only through sorrow. There are revealings of Divine truth which we can get only when earth's lights have gone out. There are harvests which can grow only after the plowshare has done its work. --Selected

Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seamed with scars; martyrs have put on their coronation robes glittering with fire, and through their tears have the sorrowful first seen the gates of Heaven. --Chapin

I shall know by the gleam and glitter
Of the golden chain you wear,
By your heart's calm strength in loving,
Of the fire you have had to bear.
Beat on, true heart, forever;
Shine bright, strong golden chain;
And bless the cleansing fire
And the furnace of living pain!
--Adelaide Proctor

(Taken from Streams In The Desert devotional)

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Sunday October 8th/06

Here is a good article on:

The Will Of God

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Monday October 9th/06

Here is a new commentary we are posting:

To My Son - An Epositional Study of 2 Timothy - Guy H. King

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Tuesday October 10th/06

Passing on a new biography that has been posted now. It is about Ira Sankey, the songleader that travelled around the world with D.L. Moody in his evangelistic campaigns.

My Life: Sankey's Story of His Own Life

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Wednesday October 11th/06

Here is a book that is bound to be an encouragement and answer many questions we have may on this subject:

Night Of Weeping - Why God's Children Suffer - by Horatius Bonar

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Thursday October 12th/06

THE CURE FOR A TROUBLED HEART - Sermon by George W. Truett

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Friday October 13th/06

Unshakable Things - Devotional from ICR.

I thought the following list of "Documents" was neat:

"The Bible is my Strong Box filled with my valuable documents:

First Document: My Great Gift (John 3:16).

Second Document: My Present Possession (John 5:24).

Third Document: My Life Insurance (John 11:25-26).

Fourth Document: My Accident Policy (Romans 8:28).

Fifth Document: My Fire Insurance (2 Peter 3:10-13).

Sixth Document: My Identification Papers (1 John 3:1-2).

Riches of inestimable worth!"

(Taken from Am I A True Believer?)

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Saturday October 14th/06

If I Do Not, Who Will? - by Bill Brinkworth

[Jerry]

Daily Devotional for Sunday October 15th/06

How Many Days? - Devotional from ICR

The following excerpt was taken from chapter 15 (Enough and to Spare - Philippians 4:10-20) of JOY WAY - Exposition of Philippians - by Guy H. King:

In the Christian sphere this is so often fraught with eternal significance. An opportunity of testimony presents itself­ you are brought into touch with some person quite unarranged, and in your heart you feel the meeting is of GOD: say the intro­ductory word at once, ere the chance quickly is out of reach.

What would have happened, I wonder, if Philip had lost the opportunity of hailing the Ethiopian chariot, that GOD had arranged to meet with the evangelist at that desert spot, Acts 8:29.

By some turn in the conversation among fellows, a chance occurs to put in a word for the Saviour - with love, with humility, and with tact grasp that chance. Eternal issues may hang on it. GOD does thus provide opportunities of service for His children, unless we habitually neglect them.

I think it is not our respon­sibility to make them, but to take them. In trying to make opportunities, we so often only make blunders. If, at the opening of each day, we place ourselves at His disposal, He will so delightfully, as in Philip's case, make the Place, the Time, the Person to coincide - and will then give the Word to preach unto him JESUS.

With what joy will you thus watch GOD working out His purposes through you.