Praise God for a great day of using us, His servants, all day to bless many, study, pray and shine His light. What an awesome God that allows sinners like us to draw near and to minster through us to others! We are His hands and feet and He blesses us and through us as we humble ourselves and invite Him to use us and others to experience His Love through us too. PTL! Worship! He also allows us to be His people called by His name to gather, abide, fellowship, feast, commune, pray and love well. Yes rejoice! Thanks Lord! Please continue Your good work in and through us! Be glorified. Bring revival and new life alive. Amen!
Good Morning Abiding in His Holiness, Visionaries! Amen! That comes from OD and TWFYT. (see below) How often have we prayed, "Hallowed be Your name. Your Kingdom come and will be done"? Often, a lot, daily maybe. Fearing the Lord is contemplating His holiness and awesomeness and emptying ourselves to abide and fellowship with Him and worship. Check Deut. 10:12-15 below and abide as you meditate and pray through it. What's God saying to you? How will you hallow His holy name as you respond and follow the dreams, visions and ideas He has given you? I pray for all of us to have those and plan and prepare together to follow His lead. Yes that's the answer to the prayer, Your Kingdom come and will be done and to send me. With obedience comes blessings is a valid statement and goal. Does God rule and reign in you and us, His gathered people? May it be so Lord! Start with meditating on this song. It often comes to mind after heavy rains. Ans then abide with the Deut. passage and then the devotionals. What visions and ideas has God given you? Who will you process, pray with and act? God has great plans for you and us that come alive as we humble ourselves, invite Him to inform our prayers and actions and then go live and love like Jesus! be still and know. Abide then thrive in Christ. I'm praying for you and us and God has heard. What's He saying to you ! Go thrive in Christ! Amen! Is. 33:6 says, (He is Jireh! May His Kingdom come and His will be done in, thru, and around you and us! Amen!)
In that day he will be your sure foundation,
providing a rich store of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge.
The fear of the Lord will be your treasure.
12 “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you? He requires only that you fear the Lord your God, and live in a way that pleases him, and love him and serve him with all your heart and soul. 13 And you must always obey the Lord’s commands and decrees that I am giving you for your own good.
14 “Look, the highest heavens and the earth and everything in it all belong to the Lord your God. 15 Yet the Lord chose your ancestors as the objects of his love. And he chose you, their descendants, above all other nations, as is evident .
“I killed people in the past,” Tanitan said, “but ever since I chose to believe in Jesus Christ, He will not allow me to commit such practices anymore.” Tanitan, a member of the Ilongot tribe from the Sierra Madre mountains in the Philippines, came from a culture of head-hunting—the practice of hunting humans and severing their heads. In comparing his life before he knew God to his life now, Tanitan said, “Before, I was afraid to die but not afraid to kill. Now, I am afraid to kill but not afraid to die.”
As I read Tanitan’s story in the book To the Headhunters of Sierra Madre by Florentino Santos, I thought of how his newfound fear of or reverence toward God developed his desire to obey Him. I remembered Moses’ words to the Israelites before they entered the land God promised them: “What does the Lord your God ask of you but to fear the Lord your God” (Deuteronomy 10:2). Reverence toward God was to be reflected in obedience to Him. God’s people were to “walk in obedience to Him, to love Him . . . and to observe the Lord’s commands and decrees” (vv. 12-13).
As believers in Jesus, our deep respect for God’s holiness compels us to hate evil and do what pleases Him (Proverbs 8:13). Let’s ask Him to help us make reverence toward God a way of life.
By Karen Huang
REFLECT & PRAY
From ’s Scripture, how would you describe the “fear [of] the Lord”? Where do you find obeying God difficult, and how can the command to fear Him help you?
Holy God, please help me to experience reverent fear in Your presence.
SCRIPTURE INSIGHT
“Moses summoned all Israel” (Deuteronomy 5:1), and he began to publicly review the covenant God had made with His people. They were about to cross the Jordan River (Joshua 3), and Moses would soon step across a “metaphorical” Jordan into eternity (Deuteronomy 34:7). Much of his speech recounts Israel’s rebellion during their meandering forty-year journey out of Egypt (9:7-24). Even as he assured them of their future success in inhabiting the promised land, Moses warned, “It is not because of your righteousness that the Lord your God is giving you this good land to possess” (v. 6). It was because God had chosen them, in spite of their failure: “They are your people, your inheritance that you brought out by your great power and your outstretched arm” (v. 29). Because God was their God, Israel was to follow Him. Although His holiness can’t tolerate sin, His Spirit enables believers in Jesus to “fear” Him, “[obey]” Him, and worship Him (10:12).
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