Be Yourself

Today's Daily Soap {Scripture | Observation | Application | Prayer} FOR TODAY'S FULL READING, CLICK THE TITLE LINK ABOVE.

• S: He went on to tell a story to the guests around the table. Noticing how each had tried to elbow into the place of honor, he said, "When someone invites you to dinner, don't take the place of honor. Somebody more important than you might have been invited by the host. Then he'll come and call out in front of everybody, 'You're in the wrong place. The place of honor belongs to this man.' Red-faced, you'll have to make your way to the very last table, the only place left. "When you're invited to dinner, go and sit at the last place. Then when the host comes he may very well say, 'Friend, come up to the front.' That will give the dinner guests something to talk about! What I'm saying is, If you walk around with your nose in the air, you're going to end up flat on your face. But if you're content to be simply yourself, you will become more than yourself." Luke 14:7-11 [MSG]
• O: We reap greater rewards from just being ourselves than from trying to please everyone else.
• A: The world today is full of pretense. So many people are so busy trying to be someone else -- to please everyone and be something they really aren't -- that we often know people (or know of people) long before we actually really know them. Often this can actually be true in the closest of relationships, like marriage. Imagine not knowing some of your spouse's deepest secrets because he/she has always tried to please you and make you happy, even to the extent of never letting you really get to know them. Wouldn't it be so much better to really get to know someone -- the good and the bad -- than to be misled by their pretense? Whether it be family, friends, casual work acquaintances, or the politicians we elect to serve and represent us -- give me the real thing. We are so much more likely to pleased with ourselves and with others if we can all just be ourselves.
• P: Father, help me to be the me that You want me to be -- to rise above pretense and let the real me shine through.

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Living Right

Today's Daily Soap {Scripture | Observation | Application | Prayer}

• S: First off, you need to know that in the last days, mockers are going to have a heyday. Reducing everything to the level of their puny feelings, they'll mock, "So what's happened to the promise of his Coming? Our ancestors are dead and buried, and everything's going on just as it has from the first day of creation. Nothing's changed." They conveniently forget that long ago all the galaxies and this very planet were brought into existence out of watery chaos by God's word. Then God's word brought the chaos back in a flood that destroyed the world. The current galaxies and earth are fuel for the final fire. God is poised, ready to speak his word again, ready to give the signal for the judgment and destruction of the desecrating skeptics. Don't overlook the obvious here, friends. With God, one day is as good as a thousand years, a thousand years as a day. God isn't late with his promise as some measure lateness. He is restraining himself on account of you, holding back the End because he doesn't want anyone lost. He's giving everyone space and time to change. But when the Day of God's Judgment does come, it will be unannounced, like a thief. The sky will collapse with a thunderous bang, everything disintegrating in a huge conflagration, earth and all its works exposed to the scrutiny of Judgment. Since everything here today might well be gone tomorrow, do you see how essential it is to live a holy life? Daily expect the Day of God, eager for its arrival. 2 Peter 3:3-12 [MSG] They're busy, busy, busy at worship, and love studying all about me. To all appearances they're a nation of right-living people— law-abiding, God-honoring. They ask me, 'What's the right thing to do?' and love having me on their side. But they also complain, 'Why do we fast and you don't look our way? Why do we humble ourselves and you don't even notice?' "Well, here's why: "The bottom line on your 'fast days' is profit. You drive your employees much too hard. You fast, but at the same time you bicker and fight. You fast, but you swing a mean fist. The kind of fasting you do won't get your prayers off the ground. Do you think this is the kind of fast day I'm after: a day to show off humility? To put on a pious long face and parade around solemnly in black? Do you call that fasting, a fast day that I, God, would like? "This is the kind of fast day I'm after: to break the chains of injustice, get rid of exploitation in the workplace, free the oppressed, cancel debts. What I'm interested in seeing you do is: sharing your food with the hungry, inviting the homeless poor into your homes, putting clothes on the shivering ill-clad, being available to your own families. Do this and the lights will turn on, and your lives will turn around at once. Isaiah 58:2-8 [MSG]
• O: How critically important it is not just to appear to live right, but to actually do so.
• A: Christ will return for his followers. Of that there can be no doubt. But how will those followers be identified? Will they be the openly "humble" who take public pride in their humility? The leaders of the mega-churches we see every Sunday on TV? Just how will God identify those whom He calls Home at the time of the Second Coming? It really isn't hard to appear to live a holy life. Anyone can play a role in public. But God sees our heart. He knows our thoughts -- even before we form them. To live right by God means to live right before God -- in our hearts and in our minds as well as in our actions. There is no fooling the Father.
• P: Father, help me to resist the enemy and to live according to Your will, on the inside as well as the outside.

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To Do or To Be

Today's Daily Soap {Scripture | Observation | Application | Prayer}

• S: Galatians 5:16-26
• O: Those who live by the sinful ways of the world and refuse to accept Christ will not enter the kingdom of God,
• A: It's a pretty basic premise, really: what we do is nothing compared to what we are. There have been many people of great accomplishments in the world. Do you remember who invented the microwave? Or the person who developed the first cell phone? Or who came up with the first electronic calculator? These are all things that most of us couldn't make it through the day without, yet most of us couldn't name the inventors if our life depended on it. But if I asked you to tell me about the lives of Billy Graham, Bill Gates, George Washington, or Martin Luther King, Jr., you could probably tell me some very wonderful things about their personalities, not just their accomplishments. Because in addition to doing great things, they were all great people. They were all men who realized that what matters in life is not just what you do with it, but what you become with it. Those same questions will be asked of us at the time of Judgement. It won't matter if we had a great job, made lots of money, and achieved great fame. All that will matter is what we became. And we can only become what it takes to get into Heaven because of what Christ is: the Son of God who takes away the sins of the world. What will you answer when the Judgement Day comes? Did you do great things? Or were you a great person in the eyes of God (aka, a Christian). If you don't know the answer, then it's the wrong answer.
• P: Lord, Thank You for teaching me to become the most important thing I can be, a part of the family of God. I know that you still have plans for me and things you want me to do here in this life. Help me to make myself open to your bidding, and to not allow myself to get so caught up in what I'm doing to jeopardize what I'm being.

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