Fear and Hope in God’s Jealousy

 Fear and Hope in God’s Jealousy

“The Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God.” (Exodus 34:14)

God is infinitely jealous for the honor of his name, and responds with terrible wrath against those whose hearts should belong to him but go after other things, like a spouse running after another lover. 

For example, in Ezekiel 16:38–40 he says to faithless Israel,

“I will judge you as women who commit adultery and shed blood are judged, and bring upon you the blood of wrath and jealousy. And I will give you into their hands, and they shall throw down your vaulted chamber. . . . They shall strip you of your clothes and take your beautiful jewels and leave you naked and bare. They shall bring up a crowd against you, and they shall stone you and cut you to pieces with their swords.”

I urge you to listen to this warning. The jealousy of God for your undivided love and devotion will always have the last say. Whatever lures your affections away from God with deceptive attraction will come back to strip you bare and cut you in pieces. 

It is a horrifying thing to use your God-given life to commit adultery against the Almighty.

But for those of you who have been truly united to Christ and who keep your vows to forsake all others and cleave only to him and live for his honor — for you the jealousy of God is a great comfort and a great hope. 

Since God is infinitely jealous for the honor of his name, anything and anybody who threatens the good of his faithful wife will be opposed with divine omnipotence. That’s good news for the faithful wife — the faithful people of God.

God’s jealousy is a great threat to those who play the harlot and sell their heart to the world and make a cuckold out of God (James 4:3–4). But his jealousy is a great comfort to those who keep their covenant vows and become strangers and exiles in the world.

Every day in the God's Word

 EVERYDAY IN THE WORD!

WEDNESDAY OCTOBER 15, 2025.

SUBJECT: OUR SPIRITUAL BLESSINGS IN CHRIST! 

Memory verse: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ." (Ephesians 1 vs 3.)

READ: Ephesians 2 vs 4 - 7:

2:4: But God, who is rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us,

2:5: even when we were dead in trespasses, made us live together with Christ (by grace you have been saved),

2:6: and raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus,

2:7: that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

INTIMATION:

The metaphor “in Christ” refers to a spiritual relationship one has with Christ as a result of what He has done for us. In this relationship with Christ, all the blessings that relate to one’s salvation are for those who are in Christ. All that God did in order to reconcile man to Himself through the cross is granted to those who are in Christ. We are baptized into Christ (Romans 6 vs 3 and Galatians 3 vs 26 - 27). Therefore, in order to come into contact with all spiritual blessings that originate from the heavenly realm, one must act on his faith by obedience to the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus. 

He has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in Christ (Ephesians 1 vs 3). It means that in Christ we have all the benefits of knowing God—being chosen for salvation, being adopted as His children, forgiveness of sins, insight, the gifts of the Spirit, power to do God’s will, the hope of living forever with Christ. Because we have an intimate relationship with Christ, we can enjoy these blessings now. The heavenly places means that these blessings are eternal, not temporal. The blessings come from Christ’s spiritual realm, not the earthly realm. 

We are blessed. We are rich in Him. We have His fullness. We are sufficient in His sufficiency. All that He is, we have. We are what He says we are. And the Father has told us that we are in the Beloved. The grace (unmerited favor) gives us the gifts of His love life, wisdom, His very being, and substance. We are the branch of the vine; we are partakers of the Divine Nature. His fullness here means His ability, His love, His righteousness, His utter completeness, and we have received them all. All the gifts and favors are now piled on us one after another, and all by His grace.

The responsibility of the believers is to know God better. How do you get to know someone? By reading biographical information or historical data about him? That will help you know a lot about that person, but it won’t enable you to actually know the person. If you want to get to know someone, you have to spend time with that person; there is no shortcut. 

The same holds true with God. Reading the Bible, great works of theology, and devotional materials are wonderful, but there is no substitute for knowing God personally. Do you really know Christ, or do you just know about Him? The difference is spending time with Him. Study Jesus’ life in the Gospels to see what He was like on earth more than two thousand years ago, and get to know Him in prayer now. Personal knowledge of Christ will change your life.

Prayer: Abba Father, thank You so much for the spiritual blessings bestowed on us in Christ. Give me the grace to achieve my utmost heart desire of having an intimate relationship, and constant fellowship with You, in Jesus’ Name I have prayed. Amen.

PRAISE THE LORD!

Plan for Prayer

 Plan for Prayer

“If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit and so prove to be my disciples. . . . These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” (John 15:7–8, 11) 

Prayer pursues joy in fruitful fellowship with Jesus, knowing that God is glorified when we bear fruit in answer to prayer. Why do God’s children so often fail to have consistent habits of happy, fruitful prayer?

Unless I’m badly mistaken, one of the reasons is not so much that we don’t want to, but that we don’t plan to.

If you want to take a four-week vacation, you don’t just get up one summer morning and say, “Hey, let’s go today!” You won’t have anything ready. You won’t know where to go. Nothing has been planned.

But that is how many of us treat prayer. We get up day after day and realize that significant times of prayer should be a part of our life, but nothing is ready.

We don’t know where to go. Nothing has been planned. No time. No place. No procedure. And we all know that the opposite of planning is not a wonderful flow of deep, spontaneous experiences in prayer. The opposite of planning is the same old rut.

If you don’t plan a vacation, you will probably stay home and watch TV. The natural, unplanned flow of spiritual life sinks to the lowest ebb of vitality. There is a race to be run and a fight to be fought. If you want renewal in your life of prayer, you must plan to see it.

Therefore, my simple exhortation is this: Let us take time this very day to rethink our priorities and how prayer fits in. Make some new resolve. Try some new venture with God. Set a time. Set a place. Choose a portion of Scripture to guide you.

Don’t be tyrannized by the press of busy days. We all need midcourse corrections. Make this a day of turning to prayer — for the glory of God and for the fullness of your joy.

God, I look up to You by Whitney Houston

 Hebrews 12:1-2

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?

Every day in the God's Word

 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

 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 God's Word

 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!