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May 23, 2011The Essential Ingredient

by Charles R. Swindoll

Read Exodus 11:1–10

The main point, the central ingredient of Exodus 11 and 12, is obedience. God spoke, some people heard and did what God said. As a result, God used them in His plan at that time in history.

God knew in advance what use that silver and gold would be put to when the new nation arrived at Mount Sinai out in the desert. God already had something in mind that no one had ever dreamed of yet—the Tabernacle, the Tent of Meeting where the Israelites would meet in close proximity with the awesome holy God who had delivered them.

At this point, God didn’t tell them why they would need those precious metals. He just said, “Ask for them,” and they did. It’s called obedience.

Isn’t that encouraging? Earlier, we read about Moses’ bad day. The ex-shepherd was under the gun, snarled at by the king and thoroughly hated by the Hebrew leadership. But now we read that he was “greatly esteemed” in Egypt by the Egyptians. From the court of Pharaoh on down to the man on the street, people were saying, “Now there’s a great man.”

Do you know why that was true? Because Moses stood all alone and trusted God (he obeyed), and the Lord gave him favor in their eyes. The Lord delights to do that. Remember Proverbs 16:7? “When a man’s ways are pleasing to the LORD, He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him.” We see that borne out yet again in this amazing development.

That may be the very word you need from the Lord today. Perhaps in your work you have come to an impasse; there’s an issue of integrity at stake, and you’ve determined not to compromise. Because of your stand for Christ, you find that you are resented. I want to assure you that if you handle your situation wisely and tactfully, God will see to it that in the eyes of those who are now your enemies, you will one day be esteemed. They will respect your stand because you are standing alone, doing what is right.

Excerpted from Charles R. Swindoll, Great Days with the Great Lives (Nashville: W Publishing Group, 2005). Copyright © 2005 by Charles R. Swindoll, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

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Chuck Swindoll’s Daily Devotional: Plagues That PreachChuck Swindoll’s Daily DevotionalReceive a daily devotional message written by Charles Swindoll that brings God’s Word to life.Left

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May 22, 2011Plagues That Preach

by Charles R. Swindoll

Read Exodus 6:28–10:29

I’m convinced this dreadful display of judgment in Egypt, this battle between a righteous, holy God and the stubborn heart of Pharaoh, has at least two major truths to teach us. First, when God judges, He does a thorough job of it. Second, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

Let’s make this painfully personal. You may be in the danger zone as you read these words. You have played fast and loose with your life, ignoring warning after warning. You have shoved aside essential truths for so long that your heart has become hardened. And the longer you harden it, the more difficult it is to allow God’s light to finally break through.

But there’s a bright side to this dark story. When God blesses, He holds nothing back. It’s called grace. God’s grace rescued the children of Israel in the land of Goshen. As dark as it became in Egypt, the Hebrews were flooded with light. They were a city on a hill, shining through the night, if only Pharaoh had eyes to
see it.

You may be one who has enjoyed God’s great grace and favor in your life—His protection, provision, daily blessings, and unmerited favor fill your days. You can thank God for a place in the land of Goshen. You enjoy God’s protection—a careful plan which distinguishes you from those who live under His wrath. Believe me, nothing in this life or the next is more serious and sobering than the wrath of God. Some are broken—blessedly broken—by that wrath. Others only harden.

Life’s plagues are tough to endure—painful to the core. But God has no desire to leave us alone in our pain and distress. Habakkuk once cried out to God, “In wrath, remember mercy.”

And the Lord has done just that. Jesus, who endured God’s wrath to the uttermost on the cross, now invites us to walk arm in arm with Him through the rest of our days. He is our faithful, ever-present Friend. No earthly catastrophe can ever separate us from the grip of His grace or the legacy of His love. Gratefully thank Him for both today.

Excerpted from Charles R. Swindoll, Great Days with the Great Lives (Nashville: W Publishing Group, 2005). Copyright © 2005 by Charles R. Swindoll, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

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It’s really strange, this thing that I often hear coming from atheist feminist as they try to explain their reasons for advocating for abortion.

They tell me that it’s not a baby, which it clearly is. Or that they don’t believe it’s a baby until it is born. Technically it is a fetus until the moment of birth but they use the term fetus to mean “less than” a baby, which it is not. Fetus is simply a medical term to describe an unborn baby. Then there is the whole, it’s not a person until it is born argument, which it clearly is. By nature of it being human it is a person. It’s a simple equation. Human equals person and person equals human.

Those arguments among others vary from being odd to downright silly. But, the one that makes me scratch my head and wonder if we have all gone down the rabbit hole with Alice to visit the mad hatter is, “It’s o.k. To kill the unborn because God is an abortionist Himself.” I have heard that one many times in various forms. This argument, as you can imagine, is ripe with problems. The most glaring one being that they don’t believe in Him by nature of the fact that they are atheist but they use Him to try to argue their points. No!

To get to the bottom of the ridiculousness of this argument we have to look at what God says about the unborn….

Read article in full here.

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Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you —Matthew 6:33

When we look at these words of Jesus, we immediately find them to be the most revolutionary that human ears have ever heard. “. . . seek first the kingdom of God . . . .” Even the most spiritually-minded of us argue the exact opposite, saying, “But I must live; I must make a certain amount of money; I must be clothed; I must be fed.” The great concern of our lives is not the kingdom of God but how we are going to take care of ourselves to live. Jesus reversed the order by telling us to get the right relationship with God first, maintaining it as the primary concern of our lives, and never to place our concern on taking care of the other things of life.

“. . . do not worry about your life. . .” (Matthew 6:25). Our Lord pointed out that from His standpoint it is absolutely unreasonable for us to be anxious, worrying about how we will live. Jesus did not say that the person who takes no thought for anything in his life is blessed— no, that person is a fool. But Jesus did teach that His disciple must make his relationship with God the dominating focus of his life, and to be cautiously carefree about everything else in comparison to that. In essence, Jesus was saying, “Don’t make food and drink the controlling factor of your life, but be focused absolutely on God.” Some people are careless about what they eat and drink, and they suffer for it; they are careless about what they wear, having no business looking the way they do; they are careless with their earthly matters, and God holds them responsible. Jesus is saying that the greatest concern of life is to place our relationship with God first, and everything else second.

It is one of the most difficult, yet critical, disciplines of the Christian life to allow the Holy Spirit to bring us into absolute harmony with the teaching of Jesus in these verses.

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It may be that, like the apostle John, you know Jesus Christ intimately. Yet when He suddenly appears to you with totally unfamiliar characteristics, the only thing you can do is fall “at His feet as dead.” There are times when God cannot reveal Himself in any other way than in His majesty, and it is the awesomeness of the vision which brings you to the delight of despair. You experience this joy in hopelessness, realizing that if you are ever to be raised up it must be by the hand of God.

“He laid His right hand on me . . .” (Revelation 1:17). In the midst of the awesomeness, a touch comes, and you know it is the right hand of Jesus Christ. You know it is not the hand of restraint, correction, nor chastisement, but the right hand of the Everlasting Father. Whenever His hand is laid upon you, it gives inexpressible peace and comfort, and the sense that “underneath are the everlasting arms” (Deuteronomy 33:27), full of support, provision, comfort, and strength. And once His touch comes, nothing at all can throw you into fear again. In the midst of all His ascended glory, the Lord Jesus comes to speak to an insignificant disciple, saying, “Do not be afraid” (Revelation 1:17). His tenderness is inexpressibly sweet. Do I know Him like that?

Take a look at some of the things that cause despair. There is despair which has no delight, no limits whatsoever, and no hope of anything brighter. But the delight of despair comes when “I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells . . .” (Romans 7:18). I delight in knowing that there is something in me which must fall prostrate before God when He reveals Himself to me, and also in knowing that if I am ever to be raised up it must be by the hand of God. God can do nothing for me until I recognize the limits of what is humanly possible, allowing Him to do the impossible.

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