Good Morning Dwelling in His Presence, Peace-Filled, Joy Bringers! Please Lord! May that be me and us today. May we sit at Your feet and dwell in Your Love and Peace. May Joy overflow from us as we grow in trust and go live and love like You with You. May Your shalom overwhelm us as we abide in you. Come! Amen!
Do you know His peace and love intimately? You can as you still yourself, dwell in His loving presence and receive His shalom. Try it! Turn off the noise. Be still and choose to abide as you sit at His feet in conversation and quietness. You can hear His still small voice that comforts and speaks love over you. You are His! He chose you and wants to bless you as you spend time with Him and walk with Him through each day. He does have plans to prosper and not harm you, even when He allows some hard things to come your way. Choose worship first always. He is Love and always with you and working all things together for good and your growth. PTL! Choose joy as you grow in trust of the only One who knows you intimately. Abide as you prepare for this day. What's He saying to you this morning? Maybe write it down, pray through it and allow that to direct your steps today. Maybe process that with some others too. He really does have some great plans custom made just for you. And He is always good and near, Amen! Draw close and He will draw close to you. He's knocking on the doors of your heart. Open them and invite Him in.
Spend some time in His presence this morning as you spend some time prayerfully engaging with our devos for the day. Charles Stanley reminds us to let Him in. We can be real good at shutting Him out or drowning out His whispers with all kinds of noise. Turn off the noise. Still yourself. Invite Him in with an open heart and mind to receive what He's revealing. Our Daily Bread reminds us that we are made new in Christ and can choose to shed our old nature and walk in the new. You are His masterpiece and He is molding you into your newness in Christ and for the good plans He has for you. Rejoice and let go of your expectations and allow Him to work. The Upper Room reminds us of the fresh mana we can have daily as we still ourselves and feast on His Living Word. Prayerfully open your Bibles and talk to Him. Maybe read the verses attached to our devos or read Ephesians 6 that Sarah will reach on tomorrow. (Pray for God to prepare and use her well) Put on His armor and don't allow the enemy to steel you away or fill your mind with lies. God is Truth. Dwell in His Truth today. Harvest Prayer speaks into this today. Spend some time in using their prayers and prayer starters as you dwell in His presence and Word this morning and know His peace and grow in His love and joy. He has some great things in store for you. Yes, prepare your heart and focus for this day He has made. Amen! Rejoice! be still and know. Prepare and go in His strength and love today. Put on that easy yoke of Jesus and walk with Him today. What joy we can know as we do! Shalom!
CS:
ODB:
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Applause rang out as a school’s top students received certificates of excellence for academic achievement. But the program wasn’t over. The next award celebrated students who weren’t the school’s “best,” but instead were most improved. They’d worked hard to raise a failing grade, correct disruptive behavior, or commit to better attendance. Their parents beamed and applauded, acknowledging their children’s turn to a higher path—seeing not their former shortcomings but their walk in a new way.
The heart-lifting scene offers a small picture of how our heavenly Father sees us—not in our old life but now, in Christ, as His children. “Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God,” wrote John (John 1:12).
What a loving perspective! So Paul reminded new believers that once “you were dead in your transgressions and sins” (Ephesians 2:1). But in fact, “we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (v. 10).
In this way, Peter wrote, we are “a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light,” and we are now “the people of God” (1 Peter 2:9-10). Through God’s eyes, our old path has no claim on us. Let’s see ourselves as God does—and walk anew.
By Patricia Raybon
REFLECT & PRAY
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How does God see you? In Him, how should you walk?
On this new day, dear Father, please inspire me with Your view of me.
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SCRIPTURE INSIGHT
When Peter uses the language of “a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation” (1 Peter 2:9), he’s encouraging his readers by drawing from the story of Scripture in which God first chose Abraham and then the nation of Israel to reveal His ways to the world (Genesis 12:1-3; 18:19; Isaiah 41:8). The audience of 1 Peter was primarily gentile (non-Jewish), but Peter was assuring them that because of Jesus the story of God’s redemption had expanded to include gentiles: “Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God” (1 Peter 2:10). Through Christ, they were now part of the continuing story of God’s redemption of the world. They were part of His family, chosen to reveal who He was to the world. This gave them a new identity that could transform how they lived (vv. 11-12) as they experienced suffering (vv. 21-25).
Monica La Rose |
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UR: Fresh Mana
Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own. - Matthew 6:34 (NIV)
Sometimes I feel overwhelmed with problems. There is only so much time in a day and so many days in a week, and I ask myself how and when I can possibly do one more thing.
God intends to give us all the help we need, but only one day at a time. This has been God’s message all along, even in the days of Moses, with the daily manna that fell from heaven. I can easily get stuck in a mindset of trying to solve tomorrow’s problem today rather than slowing down my anxious thoughts and just asking for help today. It’s hard for someone like me to do this, but the guidance Jesus gives is to take one day at a time — to ask God for our daily bread. I have learned to take only this day’s concerns and bring them to God, asking for help just for today. Then I do the same thing tomorrow — and each tomorrow to come.
Each new day we can bring all our cares to God. Because God loves us and cares for us, God desires to meet us with fresh manna each day to lift our burdens. As we learn to trust that God will provide what we need today, we can release our grip on tomorrow, laying all our anxieties on God one day at a time.
Today's Prayer
Dear God, we surrender the worries of today to you, and we trust you to take charge of all that burdens us. We know you will do the same for us tomorrow. Amen.Harvest Blogs:
August 24 - The Combination
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A great man I know has adopted the regular practice of taking his Bible, a lawn chair, and a bottle of water into nature. He enjoys everything he sees along the way, and then he sits in a beautiful spot in God’s creation and reads whole books of the Bible God wrote.
You may think you could not have this luxury, but this man is a very busy and highly regarded medical doctor—probably far busier than you. But he makes a conscious, intentional choice, and his testimony is that this regular practice centers his life.
He will tell you that the combination of the Word of God, and the Spirit of God, in the Creation of God magnifies God’s voice exponentially. It never ceases to correct his perspective, calm his soul, renew his mind, tenderize his will. This triple-antidote works on his wounded soul and brings healing.
But the greatest result of this exercise? Worship. In such times, he cannot help but burst into praise. It is my suspicion that this doctor is not the only one who is pleased.
Consider getting your calendar out and plan a day or a half-day for time away with God. Don’t make excuses. Consider fasting on this day. Take your Bible and a notebook and record what God is saying to you. There is nothing more valuable than time with Him!
Lord Jesus, forgive me for thinking my life is so busy that I can’t take extended times to be with You in Your word and in Your creation. Teach me to yield to Your Spirit as You draw me closer to Your heart. Remind me that nothing I can do today is as important as the time spent in Your presence.
---Adapted from Prayer with No Intermission by Bill Elliff. This book is available at prayershop.org.
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- Praise God that he is your stronghold in time of trouble (Ps. 9:9).
- Give thanks for God’s promise that when you call on him in the day of trouble, he will deliver you (Ps. 50:15).
- Confess your failure to glorify and honor God when he does give you deliverance.
- Commit yourself to keeping the vows you make when you are in trouble (Ps. 66:13-16).
- Ask God to bring you to your knees in every situation, not just when special trouble surrounds you (Psalm 116).
- Pray that all Christians will see God’s hand in trouble and trials knowing that “God . . . will pay back trouble to those who trouble you” (2 Thess. 1:6).
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Prayer Points taken from Patterns for Prayer by Alvin VanderGriend. This book is available at prayershop.org. Use the code CONPSP3 at checkout to receive an additional 10% discount.
Connection (Devotions for Everyday Life) © 2024 is a free devotional published daily by Harvest Prayer Ministries. Subscribe here. |
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