Thankful or Confused

Interesting passage for the day: Yes, they knew about him all right, but they wouldn’t admit it or worship him or even thank him for all his daily care. And after awhile they began to think up silly ideas of what God was like and what he wanted them to do. The result was that their foolish minds became dark and confused. – Romans 1:21, The Living Bible

Thought: One of the most important responses to knowing that God’s alive and well is not just to say so, but to thank Him for His daily care. God created each one of us. He saw us through the nine months in our mothers’ wombs, He helped us out the birth canal, He provided us with fathers and mothers, with protection and care and nourishment. God has given us every breath we’ve breathed. He’s seen us through sickness. He’s helped us grow in every way.

Thankfulness is so important. From Romans, you can see that when people refuse to thank God for His blessings they begin to pretend they know how to go through the paths of life on their own, and their lives become muddled, senseless and confusing.

Question: How long has it been since you have thanked God for anything? Especially for His “normal” daily blessings? Would it be hard to thank Him because it’s been so long? Would it help if you sat down and decided to write out a list of at least ten, fifteen, or twenty-five blessings, and then spent time thanking Him? Share a few snippets of how God has blessed you.

To review the Bible reading plan options, please visit http://tinyurl.com/yj2o7jz.

When Satan Wins

ALL – Psalm 69:19-36
ALL – Proverbs 12:2-3
OT – Deuteronomy 9:1-10:22
NT – Luke 8:4-21

Which people can Satan keep out of heaven?

Yikes! That’s not a fun question, for sure. But in one of Jesus’ parables, it seems like it’s a reality for some people that Satan can actually take Jesus’ words out of certain people’s hearts. What’s this mean? How does this work?

Well, as Jesus was explaining his parable, this is what He said:

The hard path where some seed fell represents the hard hearts of those who hear the words of God, but then the devil comes and steals the words away and prevents people from believing and being saved. – Luke 8:12, The Living Bible

Satan’s ability to steal God’s words away from people’s hearts is related to their hearts’ condition. And the kind of hearts that Satan can steal God’s words from are hardened hearts.

The next question is whether we have hardened hearts or not. And to be honest, some who are reading this may have hardened hearts. It’s a real spiritual heart condition, so the chances are that some of us really have this condition. But who? Who has a hardened heart? Who is vulnerable to Satan’s thievery of God’s Word?

Well, Hebrews 3:13 gives us a clue. It says, “But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness” (NIV). Hardening comes from sin. Specifically, it comes from the deceitfulness of sin. Sin is deceptive. Even as we sin, we convince ourselves that we’re ok. Initially, sin deceives us by saying, “It was just a little sin. I’m not really such a bad person. At least I didn’t do what so-and-so did the other day.” And because we’re listening to our sins rather than God’s words, our hearts are hardened against hearing God’s words. And the sins get worse. And the deception gets worse. And eventually it no longer matters to us whether we’re listening to God or not, or even whether we’re good or not.

A hard heart won’t even consider God’s words. They don’t sink in at all. And Satan doesn’t have a hard time quickly snatching God’s words away from a heart that isn’t trying to listen to God.

Have you been ignoring God, believing sin, believing its lies, following its enticements? Your heart is all the more vulnerable to Satan’s work of snatching God’s words of life away from you. Salvation’s chances of taking root are lowered.

Find believers. Listen to their encouragements. Do what they encourage. Follow God and His commands. Be willing to be good. And then listen. Listen to God. Soak His words deeply into your life. God’s words will produce life in you.

To review the Bible reading plan options, please visit http://tinyurl.com/yj2o7jz.