Woodpeckers and flickers....
The woodpeckers and flickers are back again..every spring they come and try to peck a hole into the siding of my home...inevitably giving up after several days of futile pecking...the siding looks like wood but it is a composition that is really hard. Their constant pecking doesn't even leave a dent....so off they go to the trees nearby....they still come for the food in the feeders even though they have failed in the house pecking pursuit...
The Bible speaks of hardened hearts in many places..just as the siding of my house doesn't let the birds penetrate its surface....these hearts are not penetrated by His Word..or the rebelliousness hardens their hearts, lives....
Everyday the birds pecked away, I asked myself, "am I hardening my heart towards anything that God is trying teach me?", "am I listening", "am I softening?"... Those examination questions....I don't want to be hardened toward God...I want my face to shine as in Ecclesiastics...
Thank YOU again for speaking even through a bird's futile pecking...You are wisdom, You choose the hardening and softening...help me listen to your directions, words...not seeking a rebellious nature....
Exodus
7:13 Yet Pharaoh’s heart became hard and he would not listen to them, just as the Lord had said.
Daniel
5:20 But when his heart became arrogant and hardened with pride, he was deposed from his royal throne and stripped of his glory.
Romans
9:18 Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden.
Hebrews
3:13, 15 But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.
As has just been said:“Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion.”
1 Kings 10:3, 6, 9 Solomon answered all her questions; nothing was too hard for the king to explain to her.
She said to the king, “The report I heard in my own country about your achievements and your wisdom is true.
Praise be to the Lord your God, who has delighted in you and placed you on the throne of Israel. Because of the Lord’s eternal love for Israel, he has made you king to maintain justice and righteousness.”
Ecclesiastes 7:29-8:1New International Version (NIV)
29 This only have I found:
God created mankind upright,
but they have gone in search of many schemes.”
8 Who is like the wise?
Who knows the explanation of things?
A person’s wisdom brightens their face
and changes its hard appearance..
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| The Benefits Of Wisdom |
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| A daily devotion for February 17th |
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| From your friends at RayStedman.org |
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| Who is like the wise man? Who knows the explanation of things? Wisdom brightens a man's face and changes its hard appearance (Ecclesiastes 8:1). |
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There is a marvelous, fourfold description of what happens to one who discovers the true wisdom of righteousness as a gift from God, one who walks with God in the fear of God.
First, it will make that person a unique human being. Who is like the wise man? One of the follies of life is to try to imitate somebody else. The media constantly bombards us with subtle invitations to look like, dress, or talk like some popular idol. If you succeed in that, of course, you will be nothing but a cheap imitation of another person. The glory of the good news is that when you become a new creature in Jesus Christ, you will be unique. You will become more and more like Christ, but unlike everyone else in personality. You will not be a copy, a cheap imitation, but an original from the Spirit of God.
Secondly, the Searcher says, godly wisdom will give you a secret knowledge: Who knows the explanation of things ? The implication of that question is that the wise person knows. This is what Paul declares in 1 Corinthians 2: The spiritual man makes judgments about all things (1 Corinthians 2:15a). Spiritual people are in a position to pass moral judgment on the value of everything, not because they are so smart, but because the God who teaches them is wise.
Thirdly, such a person will experience a visible joy: Wisdom brightens a man's face. Grace—not grease—is what makes the face shine. Manufacturers put grease in cosmetics to make the face shine artificially, but it is grace that does it from within. Grace and the joy that results from it visibly expressed make a face shine.
Finally, it changes the inner disposition of a person: [Wisdom] changes its hard appearance. Have you ever watched somebody whose life was under the impact of the Spirit of God soften, mellow, and grow easier to live with? That is the work of the Spirit of God.
All of us have sung the hymns of John Newton. One in particular is a favorite of many: Amazing grace! How sweet the sound—that saved a wretch like me! That is John Newton's story. He was raised by a godly mother who prayed for him all his life. As soon as he came of age, he joined the slave trade, running slaves from Africa to England. He fell into wild, riotous living, involving himself in drunken brawls. He ended up at last, as he himself confesses, a slave of slaves, actually serving some of the escaped slaves on the African coast, wretched, miserable, and hardly even alive. Then he found voyage on a ship back to England. In the midst of a terrible storm in the Atlantic, when he feared for his life, he was converted; he remembered his mother's prayers, and he came to Christ. He became one of the great Christians of England, author of many hymns that set forth the joy, the radiance, the gladness of his life as he found it in Jesus Christ.
Here the Searcher has clearly declared what he emphasizes throughout the whole book of Ecclesiastes: that it is the man or woman who finds the living God who discovers the answer to the riddles of life.
Father, thank You that when You came into my life, You granted me wisdom from above. Teach me to listen and live by the wisdom You give through Your Word.
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| Life Application |
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| Media bombardment encourages us to always imitate and copy somebody else, but God made us individually unique. Have we discovered the benefits of godly wisdom? |
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| Related Message |
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| For more on this portion of Scripture read the message: |
| Whoever said Life was Fair? |
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| Copyright © 2014 Ray Stedman Ministries — This daily devotion is from the book The Power of His Presence: a year of devotions from the writings of Ray Stedman, compiled by Mark Mitchell. It may be copied for personal non-commercial use only in its entirety free of charge. All copies must contain this copyright notice and a hyperlink to RayStedman.org if the copy is posted on the Internet. |
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