Thursday Devotional - Faithful God versus Pot of Death (2/2/23)

Have you ever made a big mistake by forging ahead without asking appropriate questions or following the directions?

With one of our kids, we keep hounding the importance of reading school assignments carefully! He jumps ahead with working a problem or writing an answer without reading the instructions. He ends up making big mistakes over and over. I get quite frustrated (especially since it is so opposite my personality). I keep praying for guidance and help and direction, but I still worry. The following passage reminded me that I can trust our Faithful God with the purposes He has for our son. We can rely on God (without worry) as we continue to diligently train.

God doesn’t always spare us from the consequences of our foolish ignorance, but he did with one prophet’s cooking mistake!!!

II Kings 4:38-41  Elisha returned to Gilgal and there was a famine in that region. While the company of the prophets was meeting with him, he said to his servant, “Put on the large pot and cook some stew for these prophets.”

³⁹ One of them went out into the fields to gather herbs and found a wild vine and picked as many of its gourds as his garment could hold. When he returned, he cut them up into the pot of stew, though no one knew what they were. ⁴⁰ The stew was poured out for the men, but as they began to eat it, they cried out, “Man of God, there is death in the pot!” And they could not eat it.

⁴¹ Elisha said, “Get some flour.” He put it into the pot and said, “Serve it to the people to eat.” And there was nothing harmful in the pot.

God graciously intervened! He miraculously used the flour to negate the poison from the wild gourds. He spared this group of prophets!

When has God graciously spared you from the consequences of a foolish mistake?

He doesn’t always step in to save us from our foolishness. He is faithful, though, to work His purposes through any situation.

Alice

Thursday Devotional - Faithful God versus Foolish Rehoboam 10/20/22

What do you think it would have been like to grow up with the wisest and wealthiest parent on earth?

Solomon’s son Rehoboam had the wisest and wealthiest father ever, but he didn’t seem to use that to his advantage. Soon after becoming king, he lost most of the kingdom (10 tribes) by heeding poor advice.

I Kings 12:12-15     ¹² Three days later Jeroboam and all the people returned to Rehoboam, as the king had said, “Come back to me in three days.” ¹³ The king answered the people harshly. Rejecting the advice given him by the elders, ¹⁴ he followed the advice of the young men and said, “My father made your yoke heavy; I will make it even heavier. My father scourged you with whips; I will scourge you with scorpions.” ¹⁵ So the king did not listen to the people, for this turn of events was from the Lord, to fulfill the word the Lord had spoken to Jeroboam son of Nebat through Ahijah the Shilonite.

Rehoboam foolishly listened to his peers. Israel was divided into two kingdoms after this. God was faithful to David, though, by keeping a descendent on the throne of Judah. God was also faithful to his promise to Solomon to tear the kingdom away from him and his descendants because of his sins. God is faithful, whether it’s a lavish blessing promised or a forewarned consequence.

Where might you and I be foolishly listening to peers instead of seeking and heeding God’s wisdom? We have the wisest and wealthiest Heavenly Father!

Thursday Devotional - Faithful God versus Foolish Solomon 10/6/22

By God’s gift, Solomon was one of the wisest people to ever live! Yet, in his later years, he wasted the wisdom God gave him and foolishly turned to other influences.

I Kings 11:9-13        ⁹ The Lord became angry with Solomon because his heart had turned away from the Lord, the God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. ¹⁰ Although he had forbidden Solomon to follow other gods, Solomon did not keep the Lord’s command. ¹¹ So the Lord said to Solomon, “Since this is your attitude and you have not kept my covenant and my decrees, which I commanded you, I will most certainly tear the kingdom away from you and give it to one of your subordinates. ¹² Nevertheless, for the sake of David your father, I will not do it during your lifetime. I will tear it out of the hand of your son. ¹³ Yet I will not tear the whole kingdom from him, but will give him one tribe for the sake of David my servant and for the sake of Jerusalem, which I have chosen.”

Although Solomon wasted his wisdom, God was still faithful to His promises to David and to Solomon. God gave Solomon an opportunity to repent, too. It isn’t recorded that Solomon ever repented and turned back to God. If he had, God would have faithfully forgiven him and helped him use wisdom again.

When have you and I foolishly wasted something God gave to us? Money, education, family relationships, time? How might our Faithful God help you and me to wisely use His gifts going forward?

Alice

Thursday Devotional - What is Truth?

If you had a private one-on-one meeting with Jesus what would you ask Him? What would you want explained or defined? I have several things I would want to know and understand.

Pilate had a private one-on-one meeting with Jesus and even asked Jesus an important theological question.

John 18:37-38         ³⁷ “You are a king, then!” said Pilate.

Jesus answered, “You say that I am a king. In fact, the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.”

³⁸ “What is truth?” retorted Pilate. With this he went out again to the Jews gathered there and said, “I find no basis for a charge against him.

It appears Pilate was a relativist. Maybe it was because he constantly heard different people’s perspectives on all sorts of issues. However, he had an opportunity to hear straight from Jesus what truth is and passed it up! How sad and foolish.

What about you and me? We get inundated with news, people’s opinions, all kinds of statistics, and “new” research. What information is really true? Only God’s Word is 100% trustworthy. Are you like Pilate? Do you pass up the opportunity to hear truth directly from God? Do you spend more time watching and reading news articles than reading truth from God’s Word? If so, we’re just as foolish as Pilate.

Many of us chart our daily steps and hours of sleep. What if we charted the amount of time reading, studying and applying the Bible, versus time spent taking in information from the world? Truth is available to us! Let’s not foolishly pass it up.   

Alice