Wednesday, 2019-10-02

Bible Reference: John 3:15-17
Translation: The Voice (VOICE)

Bible Text: ¹⁵ then all those who believe in Him will experience everlasting life. ¹⁶ For God expressed His love for the world in this way: He gave His only Son so that whoever believes in Him will not face everlasting destruction, but will have everlasting life. ¹⁷ Here’s the point. God didn’t send His Son into the world to judge it; instead, He is here to rescue a world headed toward certain destruction.

OBSERVATION: In spite of our avoidance of those that tend to judge us, God assures us in His Word that He didn’t come to judge us, but to rescue us from a life of sin. Let’s meditate on the matter of who God came to rescue, and from what He will rescue us.

APPLICATION: In growing older, our daughter would always say to us ‘Now don’t judge me mom/dad’! This was not said in a disrespectful way but rather, asking us to see her as her own individual, with her own ideas and plans. Otherwise we tend to judge based on our ideals. So why is this different with God? Well, to start with, He knows our innermost thoughts and intentions, and because of this He knows why we do the things that we do, and what our intentions are when we make our decisions. So when we say that we didn’t have time to attend a church service, He knows that we truly had no intentions of doing that! When we say that we just can’t find a minute in our busy day to read God’s Word, He knows that we are truly saying that among our list of priorities for the day, reading God’s Word was not one of them. Others tend to judge us when we make these bad decisions and display a lack of priority in the things that we do. However, our Lord – the One who answered the call of His Father to surrender everything in sacrifice on the cross, said that He will not judge our reasons why we choose to do the things we do, or not do, but instead He will touch our hearts and call us unto Himself, or rescue us from our sin. On earth we tend to say that it takes a BIG person to do something wonderful and amazing like that. Can I suggest that for our Heavenly Father, who loves us unconditionally, and enough that He would bypass judging, and go straight to rescuing us, that we might shout about the great BIG God that we serve! Friends He loved us first, and He continues to love us in spite of our evil thoughts and ways. But let me draw to your attention the piece that I underlined in the above verses: ‘Whoever believes in Him’. That means that there is an action that you must be deliberate about. My whole objective in writing these devotionals, is to remind you of Jesus, and that His love is greater than anything we could ever experience here on earth. As we learned from today’s Scripture, God made His Son available for us – even while we were still sinners. He has prepared a place for us in Heaven, knowing that some will accept His rescue plan. The alternative to accepting God’s gift of His Son, is to drown in our sin. This results in eternal death in Hell with Satan. I pray that not one of you reading this devotional today will knowingly choose to reject the offer from God that I mentioned. I pray that the ‘unconditional love’ that I spoke of will receive a very positive and appreciative response from you dear one.

PRAYER: Thank You for loving every reader of this blog, and myself, with more love than we could ever imagine. My humble prayer is that each of us will accept that love and the precious gift given at Calvary. May we live like Jesus each and every day of our lives, in full expectation of joining you in glory someday. What a day that will be, when my Jesus I shall see, when I look upon His face, the One who saved me by His grace, what a day, glorious day that will be! In anticipation of that day, I long to see You loving Father! AMEN!