Food for Daily Living (Part 5)

Editor's Note: I apologize for the delay in publishing this. There were "technical difficulties" that surfaced as Blogger changed its interface. I am so sorry! ~Ana Renee

By Amanda T. (read her blog here)

Memorize

 “I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, Thy law is within my heart.” (Psalm 40:8)

God promised that if we memorize His Word, He will use it to help us in times of struggling.

 “The law of his God is in his heart; none of his steps shall slide.” (Psalm 37:31)

“Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against Thee.” (Psalm 119:11)

By hiding God’s Word in our hearts, we are providing help for future struggles.

Hiding God’s Word also goes hand-in-hand with meditating on God’s Word. If we memorize a verse, we can often quote it during the day and think upon it.  

Having verses memorized also helps when teaching, witnessing, and sharing with others.  “And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up.” (Deuteronomy 6:6-7)

Food for Daily Living (Part 4)

By Amanda T. (read her blog here)

Study

 “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.” (2 Timothy 2:15)

Lack of study is prevalent in the church today. Many Christians take what they hear and do not go to God’s Word to “rightly divide the word of truth” or to “see whether these things be so” as the Bereans did (Acts 17:10-11). Because of their neglect to study, Christians often believe lies that satan slips into the church.

When confronted with a question about the resurrection, Jesus answered, “Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God.” (Matthew 22:29) Because of the Sadducees’ accepted belief and lack of studying God’s Word for themselves, they fell into the trap of believing a lie. We can do the same thing today if we take the teachings of man and just assume that they are truth. The result will be erring like the Sadducees. We must study for ourselves to see what truth it.

Food for Daily Living (Part 3)

By Amanda T. (read her blog here)

Meditate

 “But his delight is in the law of the LORD; and in His law doth he meditate day and night.” (Psalm 1:2)

Meditation is a popular religious word today. However, the verse above clearly explains that the key is not simple meditation, but meditation on God’s Law (or the Bible). The original word for meditate is “hagah” or “siyach” which both mean to ponder.

I am sure that you have noticed that there are two ways of reading. One can read by skimming through, possibly losing most of the information they just read, or by reading slowly and pondering what they have just read. The difference is vital when we are considering God’s Word. We can skim through our Bible and put it away without gleaning anything from it or we can meditate on what we read and learn.

Meditating on God’s Word also goes beyond reading time. Many verses mention meditating, “Day and night” or “at night.” As we go through our day, we can think about the words we read and meditate on them.

 “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth; but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein: for then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success.” (Joshua 1:8)

Food for Daily Living (Part 2)

By Amanda T. (read her blog here)

Read

“Seek ye out of the book of the LORD, and read:” (Isaiah 34:16a)

We have the greatest privilege to hold in our hands the actual Word of God! In America, we are currently allowed to own a copy of the Bible without fear of someone taking it away from us. Many of us probably have duplicate copies. However, the Bible will do us little good if we leave it on our shelves to pull out only on Sunday (dusting it off). We need to dip into this treasure chest of wealth and relish the riches God has in store for us!

The simplest step to begin with is daily reading God’s Word. A man from Ethiopia started reading Isaiah. The Lord saw his heart and honored his reading by sending Philip to preach to him. The result was that the man accepted Christ as his Savior (see Acts 8:27-39).

When we set aside time to look through God’s Word, God will begin to work in our hearts.  “For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” (Hebrews 4:12)

Food for Daily Living (Part 1)

By Amanda T. (view her blog here)

Why Do We Need Daily Food?

How many times do you forget to eat? Once or twice a day? Three days in a row? That seems like an absurd question. Who would forget to eat?!? Most people eat three meals a day, seven days a week.

 Maybe I should re-word the question: How many times do you forget to feed your spiritual body? Do you “eat” daily or do you “eat” only once or twice a week? That should seem like an absurd question for Christians, but sadly it is not. What happens to our physical body if we go too long without eating? We will starve. The same will happen to our spiritual body if we neglect to give it daily nourishment.

Proverbs 27:7 says: “The full soul loatheth an honeycomb; but to the hungry soul every bitter thing is sweet.” A starving body will take anything – even something that is “bitter.” Likewise a starving Christian will grasp anything they can to keep them going – whether it is Biblical or not. We see the result of this by Christians taking any and everything that they hear. They are “tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness.” (Ephesians 4:14)  Because the Christian is not searching the Scriptures, he does not know what is right or what is wrong. He will find “every bitter thing is sweet.” (Proverbs 27:7b)

On the contrary to starving their spiritual body, we see the Bereans praised for their daily attention to the Word of God. “These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11) They did not just take what they heard and run with it. They searched for themselves to see “whether those things were so.”

Other Verses about Daily Food:

As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby: 1 Pet 2:2

I opened my mouth, and panted: for I longed for thy commandments. Ps 119:131

Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and forsook not the ordinance of their God: they ask of me the ordinances of justice; they take delight in approaching to God. Isa 58:2

A Little Sister Follows Me

Shared by Bethany D. (read her blog here)

Author Unknown

Photography by Amanda T.

A careful girl I want to be;

A little sister follows me.

I do not dare to go astray

For fear she’ll go the selfsame way.

I cannot once escape her eyes;

Whate’er she sees me do, she tries;

Like me she says she’s going to be—

That little sister following me.

She thinks that I am good and fine;

Believes in every word of mine.

The bad in me she must not see—

That little sister following me.

I must remember as I go,

Through summer’s sun and winter’s snow,

I’m building for the years to be

That little sister following me.

The Devil is In the Details

By Gail Purath

“The devil is in the details” is a distortion of an earlier adage: “God is in the details.” 

Overlooked details can result in huge problems. Careful attention to details can lead to success. God's interest in details is evident everywhere...in creation...in Old Testament descriptions of the tabernacle, sacrifices and laws...and in the New Testament:

“He that is faithful in that which is least is faithful also in much: and he that is unjust in the least is unjust also in much.” (Luke 16:10, KJV)

It matters to God when we: 

• compromise on the little things
• tell little lies
• misuse small amounts of money
• fail to follow through on small commitments
• refuse to repent of small sins 

I'm praying for attention to detail, praying that God will find me worthy of greater things. How about you?

Remember: GOD IS IN THE DETAILS! 

About Gail:
Gail Purath has been married to her best friend for 41 years, has two married children and seven grandchildren. Her blog Bible Love Notes features one-minute devotions each weekday.

You may read more about her here.

Off the Prayer List

By Erika T. (read her blog here)

Matthew 14:31 – O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?

Isaiah 49:15-16 – Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me.

Photography by Amanda T.

Several weeks ago I took Miss K and Miss N off my prayer list. I’d begun praying for them several years ago when my friend asked me to pray for their spiritual recovery and well-being; they were not doing well spiritually. The girls and my friend live in a city that’s far away from my home, so all I could do was pray without seeing any results. The only thing I heard about them was that they eventually stopped coming to any meetings or Bible studies at all. They no longer participated in church events and they simply didn’t seem to care. So, at the beginning of the year, when I was adding several new people to my list, my heart sighed, shook its head and decided that I could use my time better praying for others. Sorrowfully, I replaced their names. Not that I’d never pray for them again, I just wouldn’t include them in my daily prayer time anymore. However, as it happens, God had other things in store, including a gentle rebuke for me.

 

Yesterday I got a deliciously long email from my friend. It had been a while since we’d had a good chat. The most surprising news she gave me was that Miss N has decided she needs to focus more on pleasing God and gathering with the local church again. The first verse that came to mind was, “O, thou of little faith…” I had given up on her, just before God brought to fruition all the prayers and efforts of people all over the country who were praying for her.

God didn’t give up on her.

I was ashamed to think I had.

And joyful to think He’ll never give up on me either.

Matthew 14:31 – O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?

Isaiah 49:15-16 – Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. Behold, I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands; thy walls are continually before me.