April 21

" But the Lord said, `You have been concerned about this vine, though you did not tend it or make it grow...But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left...Should I not be concerned about that great city?'" Jonah 4:10,11.

Jonah is one of the more interesting people in the Bible. He was that most human mixture of strength and weakness; Godly yet bigoted, selfish and mean spirited.

And yet God seems to say to Jonah, "Come, let us reason together, Jonah. You are concerned about this measly vine which I have destroyed with a worm, and you are so angry about it you could die. And yet I want to save this nation, people and animals, and you seem so unconcerned about them. I want no more controversy with you, Jonah, for I am both sovereign and merciful. You are merciful to this gourd which is as nothing to the people in Niveneh, and yet you are angry that I want to overlook their sins and accept their repentance."

Yesterday we talked about aloneness. This passage from Jonah tells us of God's concern for the population. The great city is as much His distress as the sparrow. God is a God of peoples as well as persons. His Son wept over Jerusalem, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem...how often I have longed to gather your children together,...but you were not willing." Matthew 23:37. Here Nineveh is willing to repent, and God is willing to forgive. The Book of Jonah is filled with lessons and warnings. One warning is for us to beware of expectations interfering with our present obligations. Jonah expected God to destroy Nineveh, not realizing that God's plans are flexible. Another lesson is to let God lead rather than give in to our own inclinations. Jonah ran the other way and God still caught up with him, for God does know best. Our direction in duty is God's direction. All benefit when all obey. Nineveh did, and probably so did Jonah, after God reasoned with him.

Pat Nordman ©


April 22

"...The fire will test the quality of each man's work." 1 Corinthians 3:13c.

"The Lord has given to every man his work. It is his business to do it, and the devil's business to hinder him if he can. So sure as God has given you a work to do, Satan will try to hinder you. He may throw you from it, he may present other things more promising. He may allure you by worldly prospects, he may assault you with slander, torment you with false accusations, set you at work defending your character, employ pious persons to lie about you, and excellent men to slander you. You may have Pilate and Herod, Annas and Caiaphas all combined against you, and Judas standing by you ready to sell you, all for thirty pieces of silver, and you may wonder why all these things come upon you. Can you not see that the whole thing is brought about through the craft of the devil? To draw you off from you work and hinder your obedience to God?

"Keep about your work. Do not flinch because the lion roars; do not stop to stone the devil's dogs; do not fool away your time chasing the devil's rabbits. Do your work. Let the liars lie, let sectarians quarrel, let corporations resolve, let editors publish, let the devil do his worst; but see to it that nothing hinders you from fulfilling the work God has given you.

"He has not sent you to make money. He has not commanded you to get rich. He has never bidden you defend your character. He has never set you at work to contradict falsehood which Satan and his servants may start to peddle. If you do these things, you will do nothing else; you will be at work for yourself and not for the Lord.

"Keep about your work. Let your aim be as steady as a star. Let the world brawl and bubble. You may be assaulted, wronged, insulted, slandered, wounded, and rejected; you may be abused by foes, forsaken by friends, and despised and rejected of men, but see to it with steadfast determination, with unfaltering zeal, that you pursue the great purpose of your life and object of your being until at last you can say, `I have finished the work which Thou gavest me to do.'" Source Unknown.

Pat Nordman ©

Today's Bible Question ?

What are the four rivers in the Garden of Eden?

Previous question and Answer: What grief stricken woman turned away from her diseased husband because his breath was so offensive? Job's wife (Job 19:17)

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T H I N K A B O U T I T

The Weaver My life is but a weaving, between my God and me. I do not choose the colors, He worketh steadily. Offtimes He weaveth sorrow, and I in foolish pride, Forget He sees the upper, and I the underside. Not 'til the loom is silent and the shuttles cease to fly Will God unroll the canvas and explain the reason why. The dark threads are as needful in the weaver's skillful hand As the threads of gold and silver in the pattern He has planned. Author Unknown

 

Today's  Devotion

Slow Down! by Pat Nordman   "He directed the people to sit down...He told the crowd to sit down." Matthew 14:19; 15:35

In the ignited atmosphere preceding the two miraculous feedings, Jesus makes one consistent requirement of the people: have them sit down. It wasn't a question of anointing being present, the crowd had to be in a posture to receive, and this meant sitting. While God offers to feed us miraculously from His treasures of wisdom, will we sit? Will we wait and take a moment to submit to His presence? Can we, or must we rush onto the next thing? Perhaps this is the calamity of our souls in this time. One of the most influential theologians of this half of the century, German Jurgen Moltmann, accurately explains our plight: "Although the world offers us unlimited possibilities, our own life spans are short. Hence, many people panic because they think they might miss something, and thus they accelerate the tempo of their lives. The difference between lifespan and world possibilities seduces us into a 'race with time.' We want to gain more from time so we can get more from life and, precisely, in so doing we miss life. We believe that only the person who lives faster gets more out of this short life.... "The experience of the presence of the eternal God brings our own temporal life as if into an ocean that surrounds and supports us when we swim in it...We become calm and composed, and we begin to live slowly and with enjoyment. Only the person who lives slowly gets more from life! Only the person who eats and drinks slowly eats and drinks with enjoyment. Slow food; slow life. Only the person who is extremely rich can waste time. A person who is certain of eternal life has a great deal of time."   Send a note to © Pat Nordman , the writer of this devotion

While God offers to feed us miraculously from His treasures of wisdom, will we sit? Will we wait and take a moment to submit to His presence? Can we, or must we rush onto the next thing?

 More Walking Through the Darkness

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