May 2008 Devotionals
May 24, 2008
How God Feels About Our Asking
A Conversation with Elizabeth Rice Handford
Ever taken a child to Toys-R-Us and bought him a toy only to have him ask for another, and then another? I used to mutter through gritted teeth, “Let’s have more gratitude and less asking.”
But, thank God, He doesn’t feel that way! King David said, in Psalm 116:1: “I love the LORD, because he hath heard my voice and my supplications.”
What an incredible picture this gives us of God “inclining His ear,” stooping down from Heaven just so He won’t miss a thing we say!
But it gets even better. David then tells himself, in verse 2, “Because he hath inclined his ear unto me, therefore will I call upon him as long as I live.” Because God heard my prayer, and answered me, he says, then I will keep calling on Him!
Does God get tired of our calling on Him? Never! Does He ever run out of resources? Never! How can we most thank God for all He keeps doing for us?
Take what He offers.
Thank Him.
Then honor Him by asking again!
God delights in sharing His inexhaustible resources with us. So we can say, with King David, “I love the Lord, because He has heard my supplications!”
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May 19, 2008
Imagine! Created in the Image of God
A Conversation with Elizabeth Rice Handford
One of the wonderful ministries God has given Walt and me in our old age is to act as chaplains for Interim HealthCare in upstate South Carolina. I’ve been thinking a lot about the Scriptural admonition in James not to respect the wealth nor disrespect the poor, and an illustration comes to mind.
Recently I visited a patient who lived in a dilapidated mobile home crouched in the darkest corner of a ravine in a dangerous community of drug addicts. Newspapers covering the holes in the floor stopped the cold drafts, but made walking precarious. Our patient could not speak because of his tracheotomy, he was fed by a tube in his stomach, and he lay in a fetal position. Most of the time he was lucid, but occasionally he saw things I couldn’t see, and reached for things that weren’t there.
In one of those lucid moments, I bent over his bed. “Can I tell you how much God loves you?”
He blinked his eyes, and nodded. I took several minutes to tell him Jesus had died in his place, to take away his sins, so he could go to Heaven to be with God forever. He seemed to acknowledge that he understood by blinking his eyes. “Do you want Jesus to forgive you and make you His child?” Again he nodded. So I prayed, and asked Jesus to rescue him, and he seemed comforted.
Several weeks later his wife phoned to tell me of his death, and asked me to come to see her again. She was comforted when I reminded her of that day we prayed together. He was in Heaven with Jesus, not because he had gone to church or lived a good life or given to the poor. Those were all beyond him. He was in Heaven because Jesus promised, “Him that comes to me I will in no wise cast out” (John 6:37).
That dear man, handicapped and damaged as he was, was created by a loving God in His very own image. He was so precious to God that He suffered the agony of His Son’s death to redeem him. His value had nothing to do with where he lived, what he’d accomplished, how much money he’d accumulated.
Why would such a holy, omnipotent God pay attention to the likes of us human beings? The Psalmist David wondered the same thing. “What are people that you should think about them?” he asked, “mere mortals that you should care for them? Yet you made them only a little lower than the angels, and crowned them with glory and honor” (Psalm 8:4,5)
Every person you run into today–whether friend, employer, bag boy, or child, bears that indescribable imprint of God. They are precious to God. May we treasure their uniqueness, no matter who they are, and share the fragrance of Christ with them today.
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May 12, 2008
God’s Antidote for Worry
A Conversation with Elizabeth Rice Handford
God seems to want to solve our problems in an odd way. “Have a really huge problem?” He seems to ask. “Don’t worry about it,” He says. “Instead, thank Me for it and you will be surprised at what happens!”
Thank God when we are worried? Be grateful for the uncertainties in our lives? Praise God when the future looks really bleak? Yes, God says! Philippians 4:6,7 says it this way:
Be careful for nothing;
but in every thing
by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving
let your requests be made known unto God.
And the peace of God, which passes all understanding,
shall keep your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ.”
How often I am not even consciously aware that I’m stewing about a problem. It lurks down in my subconscious mind, and I’m nervous and fretful, and I don’t even realize it. I’m “careful,” “anxious,” about a whole lot of things! But the Lord Jesus tells me not to worry about anything. Instead, He tells me to pray, while I’m thanking Him, and tell Him everything that is on my heart!
Our God is so gracious, so loving, so generous. He wants us to ask, and He wants to give us everything (yes, that’s what the Scripture says!) we need. And when we’ve prayed, even before we get the answer to our prayers, even before we can see how it is going to work out, He’ll give us His peace. He’ll guard our hearts so that we are no longer anxious.
What a wonderful antidote! Fearful? Anxious? Perplexed about a problem? Let’s thank God for all the wonderful things He has already done for us. Then, as we rest in His promises, we will be astonished at the peace, mysterious but real peace, that guards our hearts and minds!
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May 5, 2008
How God Really Feels About His Clumsy Children
A Conversation with Elizabeth Rice Handford
One Sunday I asked my Sunday School class to write down how they felt God thought of them. One dear woman wrote, “I know God loves me but I think He’s tired of me and wishes I’d hurry and straighten up!”
Sure, we know the Bible says God loves us. We know it teaches that we can be forgiven for our sins because Jesus died for us. But sometimes we feel so unworthy of His love, so helpless to change what we are, that we decide He’s probably pretty fed up of us!
And when we get to feeling that way, we need to remember again what Psalm 103:10-14 says:
He has not dealt with us after our sins;
nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.
For as the heaven is high above the earth,
so great is His mercy toward them that fear Him.
As far as the east is from the west,
so far has He removed our transgressions from us.
Like as a father pities his children,
so the LORD pities them that fear him.
For He knows our frame;
He remembers that we are dust.
A father doesn’t get irritated when his little girl falls down. After all, she’s just a little child. He gathers her in his arms, kisses her tears away, and puts a Band-aid on the scratch.
And that’s exactly how God feels about our failures. He remembers He made us out of dirt. He picks us up, wipes our tears away, and sets us on our feet again. What mercy! What grace!
No, God doesn’t get tired of you and wish you’d hurry and straighten up. Indeed, He has promised to help you stand up.