Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.
Whom are you looking up to? Man or God?
EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!
TUESDAY OCTOBER 14, 2025.
SUBJECT: LOVE GOD SUPREMELY!
Memory verse: "He who has My commandments and keeps them, it is he who loves Me. And he who loves Me will be loved of My Father, and I will love him and manifest Myself to him." (John 14 vs 21.)
READ: John 14 vs 23 - 24:
14:23: Jesus answered and said to him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My words: and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our home with him.
14:24: He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father's which sent Me.
INTIMATION:
Love is the characteristic word of Christianity. It describes the attitude of God toward His Son (John 17 vs 26), the human race (John 3 vs 16), and to such as believe in the Lord Jesus Christ (John 14 vs 21). Love also, expresses the essential nature of God (First John 4 vs 8), it conveys His Will to His children concerning their attitude one to another (John 13 vs 35), and toward all men (First Thessalonians 3 vs 12; Second Peter 1 vs 7). Christian love has God for its primary object, and expresses itself first of all in implicit obedience to His commandments. Therefore, self-will, that is, self-pleasing is the negation of love to God.
Jesus said that His followers show their love for Him by obeying Him. Keeping God's commandments is the true demonstration of your love for Him. When you love God, you keep His commandments, and Jesus reciprocates by manifesting Himself to you. An intimate relationship is what God desires from you and I. It's the most outstanding truth in the universe—that our Creator wants to fellowship with us in love.
God is love, and He made us to love us, hence He created us in His own image and after His likeness. He longs for us to love Him back. In Hosea 6 vs 6, God says, "For I desire mercy and not sacrifice, And the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings." God says, I don't want you rituals (sacrifice); I want your love. I don't want your offerings; I want you to know Me." God deeply loves us and desires our love in return. He longs for us to know Him and spend time with Him. This is why learning to love God and be loved by Him should be the greatest objective of our lives. Nothing else comes close in importance. Jesus called this the greatest commandment (Matthew 22 vs 37 - 38).
Loving God supremely puts you in an enviable position of being in partnership with Him; the Father and the Son making their home with you. I can envisage the triumphant life of such a person; who lives with Him whom nothing is difficult or impossible with, and the Owner of the whole universe and everything in it! Jesus said, “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light” (Matthew 11 vs 28 - 30).
Speaking figuratively, Jesus used a yoke, a heavy wooden harness that fits over the shoulders of an ox or oxen. It is attached to a piece of equipment the oxen are to pull. A person’s heavy burdens may be sin, oppression, persecution, unfavorable life’s circumstances, or even weariness in the search for God. Jesus frees people from all these burdens when you are in partnership with Him. The yoke is shared with Him, with weight falling on His bigger shoulders than yours. He has more pulling power, and is upfront helping. Consequently, you are participating in life’s responsibilities with a great Partner, and now that frown can turn into smile, and that gripe into a song.
Jesus doesn’t offer a life of luxurious ease—the yoke is still an oxen’s tool for working hard. But you are assured of His winning power and support at all times in your life’s travails. The rest that Jesus promises is love, healing, and peace with God, not the end of all labor. A relationship with God changes meaningless, wearisome toil into spiritual productivity and purpose.
Love is more than lovely words; it is commitment and conduct. If you love Christ, then prove it by obeying what he says in His Word. Jesus never promised that obeying Him would be easy. But the hard work and self-discipline of serving Christ is no burden to those who love Him. And if the load starts to feel heavy, we can always trust Christ to help us bear it.
Prayer: Abba Father, endue me with the excellent spirit of love and obedience to You, in all things, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed, Amen.
PRAISE THE LORD!
God Heals by Humbling
“I have seen his ways, but I will heal him; I will lead him and restore comfort to him and his mourners, creating the fruit of the lips. Peace, peace, to the far and to the near,” says the Lord, “and I will heal him.” (Isaiah 57:18–19)
In spite of the severity of man’s disease of rebellion and willfulness, God will heal. How will he heal? Isaiah 57:15 says that God dwells with the crushed and humble. Yet the people of Isaiah 57:17 are not humble. They are brazenly pursuing their own proud way. So, what will a healing be?
It can only be one thing. God will heal them by humbling them. He will cure the patient by crushing his pride. If only the crushed and humble enjoy God’s fellowship (Isaiah 57:15), and if Israel’s sickness is a proud and willful rebellion (Isaiah 57:17), and if God promises to heal them (Isaiah 57:18), then his healing must be humbling and his cure must be a crushed spirit.
Isn’t this Isaiah’s way of prophesying what Jeremiah called the new covenant and the gift of a new heart? He said, “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel. . . . I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people” (Jeremiah 31:31, 33).
Isaiah and Jeremiah both see a time coming when a sick, disobedient, hard-hearted people will be supernaturally changed. Isaiah speaks of healing. Jeremiah speaks of writing the law on their hearts. And Ezekiel puts it like this: “I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh” (Ezekiel 36:26)
So the healing of Isaiah 57:18 is a major heart transplant — the old hardened, proud, willful heart of stone is taken out, and a new soft, tender heart is put in, which is easily humbled and crushed by the memory of sin and the sin that remains.
This is a heart that the lofty One whose name is Holy will dwell with forever.
EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!
MONDAY OCTOBER 13, 2025.
SUBJECT : RELY NOT ON YOUR OWN STRENGTH!
Memory verse: “It is God who arms me with strength, and makes my way perfect." (Psalm 18 vs 32.)
READ: : Isaiah 40 vs 29 - 31:
40:29: He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength.
40:30: Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall,
40:31: But those who wait on the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run, and not be weary, and they shall walk and not faint.
INTIMATION:
Strength is the capacity for endurance or exertion; it is the power of a person or of God, measured variously in terms of wealth, wisdom, military might, physical prowess. However, we are not called to rely on our own strength. Even the strongest people get tired at times, but God’s power and strength never diminish. He is never too tired or too busy to help and listen. His strength is our source of strength. When you feel all of life crushing you and you cannot go another step, remember that you can call upon God to renew your strength.
Those who are strong, attractive, or talented often find it easier to trust themselves than in God who gave them their gifts. Self-sufficiency is a handicap when it causes us to believe we can do what needs to be done in our own strength. We must recognize the danger of fighting in our own strength. One’s accomplishments are limited to working things out according to the abilities of men. However, we can be confident of victory against life’s challenges and temptations only if we put our confidence in God and not ourselves.
It is easy to trust God when we see His mighty acts, but after a while, in the routine of our daily lives, His strength may appear to diminish. God doesn’t change, but our view of Him often does. The monotony of day to day living lulls us into forgetting how powerful God is and can be, and His strength is always available. God has unlimited power and control of all the world’s events. We cannot see all that God is, and we cannot see all that God will do. But we can be assured that He is God and will do what is right. Knowing this can give us confidence and hope in a confusing world.
No matter how big an obstacle in front of us may seem, if we rely on God's power, we can overcome it. In addition, God's strength acts as a shield from feelings of anxiety we may experience. When we fully put our trust in Him, He walks alongside us. God doesn’t promise to eliminate challenges, instead, He promises to give us strength to meet those challenges. If He gave us no rough roads to walk, no mountains to climb, and no battles to fight, we would not grow. He does not leave us alone with our challenges, however, He stands beside us, teaches us, and strengthens us to face them.
When we feel as though we cannot handle what is to come, we can turn to God. We are not called to rely on our own strength. No matter how big an obstacle in front of us may seem, if we rely on God’s power, we can overcome it. In addition, God’s strength acts as a shield from feelings of anxiety we may experience.
When we fully put our trust in Him, He walks alongside us. Psalm 55 vs 22 says, “Cast your cares on the Lord and He will sustain you; He will never let the righteous be shaken.” Whatever trials we may be going through, we can take them to the Lord, and He will give us the strength to walk through them. When we fully put our trust in Him rather than ourselves, we will not be shaken.
When it comes to feelings of doubt, we can turn to Hebrews 4:16, which says, “Therefore let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” Even when we feel incompetent, we can find confidence in knowing that when we call upon the Lord, He will help us. Rather than being confident in our own abilities, we can be confident in God’s abilities.
Though men may grow weak, God’s sustenance always abounds. Those who will wait on God to work in their lives will not be disappointed. They will be able to accomplish things beyond their dreams, for God is able to work in the lives of those who walk in faith. God is a shield and defense only to those who put their faith in Him to protect them.
Prayer: Abba Father, my trust is in You, my shield and buckler, my very present help in trouble. Yours I am and Yours I want to be. By my strength I can do little, but by Your strength I can do all things. O Lord, daily load with Your strength to maneuver the difficult terrains of this world, in Jesus’ Name I Have prayed. Amen.
PRAISE THE LORD!
The Master Servant
. . . so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. (Ephesians 2:7)
To me, the Bible’s most astonishing image of Christ’s second coming is in Luke 12:35–37, which pictures the return of a master from a marriage feast like this:
“Stay dressed for action and keep your lamps burning, and be like men who are waiting for their master to come home from the wedding feast, so that they may open the door to him at once when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those servants whom the master finds awake when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will dress himself for service and have them recline at table, and he will come and serve them.”
To be sure, we are called servants — and that no doubt means we are to do exactly as we are told. But the wonder of this picture is that the “master” insists on serving. We may have expected this during Jesus’s ministry on earth, since he said, “The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mark 10:45). But Luke 12:35–37 is a picture of the second coming, when the Son of Man comes in the blinding glory of his Father “with his mighty angels in flaming fire” as 2 Thessalonians 1:7–8 says. Why would Jesus be portrayed as a table waiter at the second coming?
Because the very heart of his glory is the fullness of grace that overflows in kindness to needy people. This is why Ephesians 2:7 says he aims “in the coming ages [to] show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.”
What is the greatness of our God? What is his uniqueness in the world? Isaiah answers: “From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides thee, who works for those who wait for him” (Isaiah 64:4 RSV). There is no other god like this. He never relinquishes the role of inexhaustible benefactor of his ever-dependent, happy people.
EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!
SUNDAY OCTOBER 12, 2025.
SUBJECT: THE WORTH OF BELIEVERS TO GOD!
Memory verse: "They shall be Mine, says the Lord of Hosts, On the day that I make them My jewels. And I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him." (Malachi 3 vs 17.)
READ: First Peter 2 vs 9 - 10:
2:9: But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.
2:10: Who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.
INTIMATION:
The love of the Father marked all belivers out for the position of sons and daughters way back before the morning stars sang their first anthem, and they are made unto the praise of His glory. He planned that believers should be holy without blemish before Him. He marked them out for the position of sons and daughters through Jesus Christ unto Himself; and they are the marked ones. Believers have been chosen by God as His very own, and His jewels, a special treasure to Him above all people, and they are to Him a kingdom of priests, as Christ has made them kings and priests to God that they shall reign on the earth.
He has blessed the believers with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ (Ephesians 1 vs 3). They are blessed, rich in Him, and have His fullness. The believers are sufficient in His sufficiency. All that He is, they have. They are what He says they are. God the Father sees the belivers as His own righteousness in Christ Jesus, and they are in the Beloved. The believers are complete in Him, and this completeness is over and above all that they can ask or think or desire.
The believers have been called to represent Him to others. They are united with Christ as members of His body, and they join in His priestly work of reconciling God and people. God has given them eternal life in Christ. Their eternal life with Christ is certain because they are united in His powerful victory. God’s incomparable great power is available to help all believers.
Now, look at the conclusion of the whole matter as the apostle Paul says: “....We are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor power, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8 vs 37 - 39.)
These verses contain one of the most comforting promises in all Scriptures. Believers have always had to face hardships in many forms: hardship, persecution, illness, imprisonment, and even death. These sometimes cause them to fear that they have been abandoned by Christ. But the apostle Paul exclaims that it is impossible to be separated from Christ. His death for us is proof of His unconquerable love. Nothing can separate us from Christ’s presence. God tells us how great His love is so that we will feel totally secure in Him. If we believe these overwhelming assurances, we will not be afraid.
Now you know your worth to God in Christ as a believer. You see your vast responsibility. You can pray appropriately for you now know how. Take your place in Christ. Dare to act your part. Dare to let God use you. Dare to let love reign in your life. Dare to be in your daily life what He says you are. Dare to do what He says you can do. Dare to confess that you are what He says you are. All is yours. Use them. As you act on the Word, the Word reacts in you; it builds up in you, and so you grow in Christ. Believersare partakers of His Nature, of His very substance and Being.
Prayer: Abba Father, You are awesome, merciful, and compassionate. In all the world there’s none like You. Your love for me is unparalleled and unfathomable. You have blessed me with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places, and made me partaker of Your divine nature. Forever You are my God and Father. I am persuaded that nothing will ever take away Your love for me, in the mighty Name of Jesus’ I have prayed, Amen.
PRAISE THE LORD!
