Category Archives: Devotions

GOD OWES NO ONE

FAITH CAPSULE: God does not owe, but all owe Him.

Numbers 14

Knowing that God has done it all for His creation, one who knows shall strive to know God and live for His glory.
God is worth being glorified.
Before God, there is no reasonable excuse for complaining before God.
Also, ignorance is not a legitimate excuse for complaining before God.
Engaging challenges are not a reasonable reason for complaining before God.
Challenges prompt complaints.
Challenges are continuous, but God delivers in it all. (Psalm 34:19)
Complaining in the place of complementing God for His grace over your life, to be alive this far is a great grace.
Concerning your challenges, what are you saying before God?
God that gives ear does have an ear to hear.
Take note, life can be affected by the words that come out of the mouth.
Proverbs 18:21 warns, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.”
Often, a positive confession yields positive answers, while a negative confession yields negative ones.
God hears all, at all times, to do what is said.
Imagine the Israelites were delivered from the bondage of slavery for over four hundred years, but they fell into complaining in the place of complimenting God.
On their journey of deliverance to the promise of God, the Red Sea could not deny their deliverance to advance for the promise of God, for their life.
The wall of Jericho failed to stop the Israelites from passing through on their way to God’s promise.
The complaint of the Israelites, their negative confession, denied their arrival at the promise of God.
God heard the complaint of the Israelites and responded, sending Moses saying, “Say to them, ‘As I live,’ says the Lord, ‘just as you have spoken in My hearing, so I will do to you: The carcasses of you who have complained against Me…” (Numbers 14:28-29)
Complaining against God shall experience an unfavorable response, not to claim the promise of God.
The Israelites could not arrive at the promise of God.
What is it prompting complaining about the delay of the expectation?
Is there doubt in waiting before God to gain from God?
Know to watch and pray in waiting on God instead of complaining before God.
Ask against the spirit of complaint not to have a place in your life.
Ask that, complaining consciously or unconsciously in the place of complementing the goodness of God shall become established in your life.
Ask that the spirit that focuses on the negative, prompting complaining against God, shall not have a way in your life.
Psalm 34:19 states, “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.”
Ask God for His word, which does not return to Him void, to visit every area of challenges you know and do not know.
Ask that the deliverance of God begin to establish itself in all that represents the challenges in your life.
Ask God to order your mind and mouth away from negative confession.
Pray that confessing negative instead of positive shall not have place in you, so that you do not miss out on the promises of God.

DO YOU HAVE IT!

FAITH CAPSULE: One having trust without hope is not complete.

Numbers 13

During the wilderness journey, the children of Israel could not trust and hope to see in the word of God to take them to the Promised Land. 
They trusted God to bring them out of the bondage of over four hundred years, but had no hope of arriving at the plans and promise of God by confessing negative in the place of positive.
The Israelites demonstrated doubt and a lack of hope.
At the entrance to Canaan, God asked Moses to send men to spy on Canaan. (Numbers 13)
Moses sent out spies to the land of Canaan. 
The spies returned with a report stating: “We went to the land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. Nevertheless, the people who dwell in the land are strong; the cities are fortified and very large; moreover, we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the South; the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the mountains; and the Canaanites dwell by the sea and along the banks of the Jordan.” (Numbers 13:27-29)
The spies reported with trust, mentioning the goodness of the land.
However, the report had no hope rooted in fear. 
Numbers 13:31-33 states, “But the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we.” And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants), and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.” 
Spy reported without trust and hope.
Through the Bible, learn, know to trust, and have hope in God for His deliverance.
Except for Joshua and Caleb, the Israelites complained and confessed negatively before God.
God responded to the negative confession of the Israelites: 
Numbers 14:28-30, “As I live,’ says the Lord, ‘just as you have spoken in My hearing, so I will do to you: The carcasses of you who have complained against Me shall fall in this wilderness, all of you who were numbered, according to your entire number, from twenty years old and above. Except for Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun, you shall by no means enter the land which I swore I would make you dwell in.”
Know and understand that God is not careless to deliver in His plans and promises.
Are you with trust and hope, waiting on God to gain from Him?
Give full attention to the word of God that provokes the blessing of God for those who trust in the Lord and whose hope is in the Lord. (Jeremiah 17:7)

Prayer for today: Ask to be trusting and to have hope in God.

POSSIBILITY OF GOD

FAITH CAPSULE: With God, no impossibility will stand against the possibility of God. 

Jeremiah 52

The hand of God is never short to lift.
One living for God cannot be held down and not be lifted by the hand of God.
To live for God is bound to be near to the hand of God for deliverance and preservation.
Jehoiachin was in captivity for thirty-seven years when the hand of God, which is not short, raised his head and brought him out of captivity. 
Jeremiah 52:31 records, Now it came to pass in the thirty-seventh year of the captivity of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the twelfth month, on the twenty-fifth day of the month, that Evil-Merodach king of Babylon, in the first year of his reign, lifted up the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah and brought him out of prison.” 
God used Evil-Merodach of Babylon, the son of Nebuchadnezzar, to lift the head of Jehoiachin.
God alone will change the position of the persecuted to presiding as persecutors. 
God alone rescues.
Believe in Him that your position of pain will change to receiving gain from God.
Evil-Merodach was in the hand of God to lift the head of Jehoiachin. 
By the hand of God, through Evil-Merodach, Jehoiachin was rescued.
Jehoiachin had a chance as a prisoner to become one eating before the King of Babylon, all the days of his life. 
God will use an evil king to turn pain to gain.
Proverbs 21:1 records,“The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, like the rivers of water; He turns it wherever He wishes.”
Believe that God is true to perform and to perfect His word.
God changes impossibility to possibility; He makes a way where there is no way.
God is the same God yesterday, today, and tomorrow. 
Believe God, do not believe man for your deliverance and preservation.
God alone sought out Daniel in the den of hungry lions. 
With God, the hungry lions could not feast on fresh meat in Daniel.
Prayerfully, are you waiting on God concerning your challenge that seems unmovable? 
Concerning your challenge, persist, insist, and resist in your prayer. 
Your challenge today is not the time to stop waiting on God in prayer. Daniel slept overnight in the den of lions with no scratch.
Daniel 6:19-22 records, “Then the king arose very early in the morning and went in haste to the den of lions. And when he came to the den, he cried out with a lamenting voice to Daniel. The king spoke, saying to Daniel, “Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God, whom you serve continually, been able to deliver you from the lions?” Then Daniel said to the king, “O king, live forever! My God sent His angel and shut the lions’ mouths so that they have not hurt me…”  
God is still in the business of possibility regardless of impossibility.
The thirty-seven years of the captivity of Jehoiachin of Judah could not deny the hand of God; Lions in the den could not terminate the life of Daniel.
Trust and hope in the God of possibility.

Prayer for today: Ask for the hand of God to turn all your impossibilities into possibilities.

LIVE FOR GOD 

FAITH CAPSULE: The way for all is to live for God in His way.

Job 1, 2:1-10

Is your life of integrity before God?  
Does your way of life or your actions count before God?
1 Samuel 2:3 states, “For the Lord is the God of knowledge; And by Him actions are weighed.”
The walk of all before God testifies about one before God.
One who answers with integrity before God must be with action that is rooted in the word of God.
Also, a walk that does not count before God is with no integrity. 
God identified Job as one full of the word of God by his walk, before God as a believer. 
Satan attempted Job, and his assault on Job was not enough to derail Job from walking in the Lord. 
Is your life of integrity before God? 
What is it that is against your walk before God?
From the first assault to the second, and throughout the whole life of Job, it was clear that Job was a man who did not deter from his stand in the Lord. 
In all challenges for the life of Job, the consistency with no compromising was consistent, serving God.
Serving God consistently is the evidence of integrity before God. 
The Bible describes Job as no other character, stating: “There was a man in the land of Uz, whose name was Job; and that man was blameless and upright, and one who feared God and shunned evil.” (Job 1:1) 
At a time of bad news, Job did not complain to God.  
Job 1:20 records the response of Job, “Then Job arose, tore his robe, and shaved his head; and he fell to the ground and worshiped.” 
As if the first assault was not enough, Satan attacked the second time with boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.
After the first assault, God had testified about Job as a man who holds fast to his integrity (Job1:3). 
The wife of Job knew that he was a man of integrity as she attempted to destabilize Job, stating,“…Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die!” (Job 1:9)
Job refused his wife in an attempt to discourage him from his integrity before God.
Living life before God with integrity is the way to continually gain and maintain the presence of God, regardless of the world’s wickedness.
The documentation of Job was recorded in Job 42:12-17: “Now the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than his beginning…In all the land were found no women so beautiful as the daughters of Job… After this, Job lived one hundred and forty years and saw his children and grandchildren for four generations. So Job died, old and full of days.”
God is faithful to one who is faithful to His name.
Are you living for God?
To live for God is the will of God for all creation.
God creates all and wants all to live for Him.

Prayer for God: With desire, ask to live the life of integrity before God.

WHAT DO YOU WANT?

FAITH CAPSULE:

Matthew 4

What do you want to become before God?
Make it your desire, what you seek to become. 
One who desires to seek God diligently will live to find God.
Jesus declares it,“But seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you.” (Matthew 6:33)
One who seeks God first has to be driven by the fear of God.
The whole matter that counts and works perfectly in life is to fear God by keeping His commandments. God will bring every work into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil. (Ecclesiastes 12:13-14)
To fear God and to keep His commandments is with the desire to seek God. 
Listen to the word of God; let it settle in your heart to fear God. 
1 Samuel 12:24 buttresses, “Only fear the Lord, and serve Him in truth with all your heart; for consider what great things He has done for you.” 
Does your heart sincerely desire to seek God?
God has done, He is doing, and will do greater things.
There is reason to have a desire for Him.
God only sees and moves by the action rooted in the heart of all. God saw Samuel with his attempt to make the brother of David the king and spoke to him: “Do not look at his appearance or at his physical stature, because I have refused him. For the Lord does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” (1 Samuel 16:7) 
What do you desire? 
Jesus made fishermen follow Him. 
Matthew 4:19 records, “Then He said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” 
Serving God is following Him. 
Following Him is a sacrifice to give up all for Him. 
To follow Him is not to be a spectator but to learn, to become a fisher of men. 
The request of Jesus to man to follow Him does not identify Him as a slave master but as a saving master. 
Matthew 19:28 states the reward for all that follows Him, “…Assuredly I say to you, that in the regeneration, when the Son of Man sits on the throne of His glory, you who have followed Me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”  
With fear for God, serve Him fully to experience the fullness of the reward for following God.
Your work before God is rooted in your fear of God. 
Ecclesiastes 12:14 warns, “For God will bring every work into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil.” 
The works of God call us to live by the word of God, to fear Him.
Jesus was questioned about the work for God in John 6:28-29, “Then they said to Him, “What shall we do, that we may work the works of God?” Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He sent.”
Desire to live life before God, seek, serve unswervingly with fear for Him, He treasures.

Prayer for today: Tell God your desire to live life before Him.