Devotional Time with God

Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

James 4:10

Humility is the key to success while learning God’s word and doing what He says. Humility is the way God wants me to conduct myself.  He wants to bless me richly and I must do it without a selfish intention.

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.

James 1:22–25

I try to read my bible every day. I sometimes listen to it through the audio version, or from the pastors at church. Sometimes, I convinced myself that it’s all I need. If I listened or read it, that’s all there is to it.

But all this time, I’ve been fooling myself. I have to apply what I know!  It’s not enough that I read the word – I have to do what it says!  I can imagine seeing blemishes on my face, or dirt on my clothes, but I do nothing to clean it.  Same thing for my life. I need to clean the sin. I need to stop doing things that do not glorify God. I need to obey God’s laws, because He wants to protect me. He wants to bless me.

In Mark 14:3-9, Jesus defended a woman, against criticism from the people, for pouring expensive perfume on Him.

This is my sin, also: I judge people too harshly.  Either by how they look, their actions, or their beliefs (or lack of it).

Jesus always look at the heart and the intention of a person. That’s the truth. He knew what’s going to happen, so He knows what’s right.  I don’t know how, and I do make mistakes in determining people’s intentions.

Jesus commands that I put Him first, that means giving my best – not scraps, or seconds. I keep His promise that He will give me more for what I’ve given Him.  I must put Jesus on the highest regard. I must not take my focus from Him.

Each day, I pray that I can give Jesus the best that I have. God’s blessings are more important than worldly ones. I praise Him every day for that!

I’ve always known the name of Jesus, my God, has power.  It  has a power to heal. It has a power to change lives.

Yet there are those today who abuses this powerful name for a mere insult.  They just throw it around when they’re angry or frustrated.  This world has so much contempt over the one true God.

It makes me sad that anyone would use God’s name in vain.  God strictly prohibits it (Exodus 20:7).  Maybe the mere fact that I’m offended by the misuse, it’s the very reason they abuse it.  They want to use God’s name as a mean to anger and stir up emotions.

I rather use God’s name to bless and to save people.  That’s what He promised will happen:

For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile—the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, for, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

Romans 10:12-13

Honor the LORD with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops; then your barns will be filled to overflowing, and your vats will brim over with new wine.

Proverbs 3:9-10

This is God’s promise: He will overflow me with blessing if I give my first offering to Him. This is the concept of Tithe. It’s one of the most difficult concept in the bible because it requires a giant leap of faith to give 10% of my gross income to the Church. It’s a subject of controversy because people have concerns about giving that much money to a church that might abuse it. Of course, not all church will misuse it. I know for certain that Saddleback Church will not because Pastor Rick just offered the congregation a challenge: tithe for the next 3 months – if I’m not blessed, closer to God, and my life enriched, Rick will refund the money out of his own pocket! He strongly believe tithing works, and I do too. It happened in my life and I learned God’s blessing thru tithing.

Another important note is that tithing is for God. That means it’s an act of worship, in a house of worship. Tithing is for the church, not a third party charity or organization.

Tithing is a test of my trust in God. I trust my future in God with my faith in Him.