GOD’S WORD FOR  MAY 11

We are reading from a daily devotional  called “Running To Win” written by Erwin Lutzer  and the late, great D.L. Moody.   Erwin Lutzer is a light in our day as D.L. Moody was in his.  Besides his many ministries, and many books, Pastor Lutzer was Senior Pastor at Moody Church in Chicago for 36 years and now serves as Pastor Emeritus there.  He is Chancelor and a former professor at Moody Bible Institute, where he taught Theology and Ministry, and now has numerous radio teachings.

MORE THAN CONQUERORS

Joshua 23:10 ~ ~ “One man of you puts to flight a thousand.”

D.L. MOODY

When in Glasgow, a friend was telling me about a man who was preaching one Sabbath morning on Shamgar.  He said, “I can imagine that when he was ploughing in the field, a man came running over the hill all out of breath and shouted:  ‘Shamgar!  Shamgar!  There are six hundred Philistines coming toward you.’  Shamgar quietly said:  ‘You pass on;  I can take care of them, they are four hundred short.’  So he took an ox goad and slew the whole of them.  He routed them hip and thigh.” 

“One shall chase a thousand.”  Nowadays it takes about a thousand to chase one, because we do not realize that we are weak in ourselves and that our strength is in God.

ERWIN LUTZER

Scripture reveals only this much of Shamgar, “After him was Shamgar the son of Anath, who killed 600 of the Philistines with an oxgoad, and he saved Israel”  (Judges 3:31).  In the time of the Judges, God gave His rebellious people Spirit-filled leadership to lead them out of their woes.  All the odds were against Shamgar, but his strength was in God.

Sometimes faith changes our circumstances.  God can intervene to deliver us as Shamgar experienced.  But sometimes faith doesn’t change our circumstances.  As Hebrews 11:37-38 says of the heroes of the faith, “(some were) destitute, afflicted, mistreated – of whom the world was not worthy.”  God, in His good purposes, doesn’t deliver everyone from their enemies.  But both groups – those who are delivered and those who die as martyrs – are all heroes of faith.

Faith is the ability to accept whatever God gives us.  In fact, faith always leads to ultimate victory, because it will always be the will of God for us.   We must keep believing, trusting, and accepting, whatever the outcome will be.

PRAYER

Father, please help me to remember that my faith is perfected in weakness.  Let me never judge You by the size of  my circumstance, but to judge my circumstance by your vast power.

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Romans 1:17

    For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “The just shall live by faith.”

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    2 Corinthians 5:7

    For we walk by faith, not by sight.

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    James 2:17

    Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

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    James 1:3

    Knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.

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1 Corinthians 16:13

    Watch, stand fast in the faith, be brave, be strong.

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Romans 10:17

    So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

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Hebrews 11:1

    Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

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Romans 5:1

    Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

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    1 John 5:4

    For whatever is born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.

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