Apr 30

“…Hast thou considered my servant Job…a perfect and an upright man...” Job 2:3

Twice, God held up as a shining example of righteousness and godly perfection, the very man that Satan had determined to make his conquest and trophy. The Lord knows the heart of a man and He recognises and upholds the integrity found within us, as a result of being in close relationship with Him. Like the false comforters of his day, Job still finds many critics today, who would malign him, his motives, his speeches, and his responses to the difficulties he faced. It is from God Himself that we can safely take our position on the kind of man Job was. God calls Him a perfect and upright man, one that feared God and avoided sin and evil! He is given a good character reference by the Lord, and we find him being praised and rewarded as a faithful servant of God, at the end of his ordeal. We understand that this does not make Job a perfect man in the absolute sense, but like many of the men who faithfully obeyed and stood for God, he did so with the kind of perfect heart and righteous spirit, that God honours. How desirable that we also should live the kind of life of which God can be proud enough, to present it as exemplary! Jesus instructed that the quality of our service to the Lord should be such that men who see how we conduct ourselves, might be brought to give God praise! Clearly we have a high calling to live up to, and should walk worthy of our vocation. God wants us to bring forth a witness which glorifies Him. We are His people, His children and He has invested in us His Spirit, His righteousness and His holiness. When we walk faithfully and obediently with the Lord, the world gets a taste of godliness and a glimpse of God through us! We must remember however that when do not walk right with God, we still give forth a ‘witness’. In this case a poor and damaging testimony. This could contribute to the destruction of someone’s chances to believe and accept Christ as their Saviour! This is a daunting thought and it should motivate us to make certain that we align with Job in the quality of our service and faithfulness to God, by being people who walk uprightly, and in purity of mind and heart before the Lord!  

http://www.pentecostalfamilychurch.com.au/devotion

Feb 20

“…Solomon clave unto these in love” 1 Kings 11:2

Though many have emphasised the number of Solomon’s wives, as being the cause of his heart becoming less than perfect in his old age, this does not appear to be the emphasis of scripture. The stress of the text highlights the fact that the women he ‘loved’ were ‘strange’ women. In context with the listing of the various nations from which God warned Israelites regarding intermarriage, this must be taken to mean ‘foreign’ women, but more importantly, foreign women which had not become proselytes to the Hebrew faith! God does not rebuke Solomon for the many wives and concubines he loved, but for loving and cleaving to them, to the detriment and loss of his love for God! Evidence would show that this is just as possible with one wife as with many, or with one sole possession as easily as with much wealth! Should Solomon not have had as many wives? As a king, this man was indeed ‘excessive’ in many ways; with his wealth, his horses and with his wives, yet nowhere do we find God reprimanding him for any of those things. Should Solomon not have loved his wives? Clearly both loving and cleaving to one’s wife, or as in this case, wives, is not against God, but rather encouraged and even commanded by the Lord! The simple fact and truth we are presented with in these verses, is that Solomon failed when it came to the comparative love he gave his wives, as against the quality of love He had and lost for his God! He failed to ensure the conversion of his foreign wives; then tolerated his foreign wives’ idols; then facilitated their idolatry by building temples and shrines to them; and lastly ended up himself influenced by them to enter into their idolatry! This was the cause of the deterioration of his relationship with God. It was descent by degree, born from the misplaced consent of his heart. The prime reason this happened, appears to be because he loved and clave to unconverted women, more so than he loved and clave to God! Could not this have happened just as easily with loving and cleaving to just one unconverted wife, and displacing the love he had for God, if a man’s heart was so inclined? The lesson we learn from his life, in the context of these verses, is that we must be extremely careful not to yield the love and passion we owe to God, to anything or anyone else, at any time! Interestingly, this was the very righteous and godly example, Solomon had seen from his father David, a man who also had been much blessed of God, allowed a great deal of wealth, position, influence and a large family with multiple wives. David was the standard of upright and ‘perfect’ heart by whom, the Lord compared and judged Solomon’s heart! Seeking God and His will, loving and pleasing Him, must take priority, remain first, and be in importance, above all other people, pursuits or purposes in our lives! 

http://www.pentecostalfamilychurch.com.au/devotion