Category: Daily Devotionals

If we are children, then heirs – heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.  Romans 8:17

 If I’m materialistic here, then I will think of heaven as one big indulgence of ‘stuff’.  Being an heir of God means that I inherit God Himself.  Can that mean so little to me? “I say to myself, ‘the Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.’”  Lamentations 3:24 God promised His chosen people in Exodus that they would enter the land of promise but that promise was eclipsed by other passages where God spoke of Himself as their inheritance.

There is no more moving moment in a romance than when one lover pledges their heart to another.  Watching it on the screen, I sometimes hold my breath to hear the words spoken.  What is unfathomable is that God would make Himself the Lover of my soul and give Himself to me without any reservation.  I was His enemy, and through no merit of my own, He made me His friend because of Jesus.  Today, I will do things that offend Him, yet His heart will still stay true. As if that’s not enough, He will give me other things as His heir.

1.)  A home.  He’s building one for me.  It will be perfectly crafted to my liking.  I won’t ever have to fear losing it.  Here on earth, homes are fleeting and fragile.  I can fail to pay the mortgage and lose it.  It can burn down or be destroyed in a tornado in a matter of a few seconds.  It can be broken into and precious things stolen.  Not so in heaven.  I’ll have a home I’ll never have to worry about.

2.)  A banquet.  There is a promise of abundance.  I’ll have an invitation to a dinner the likes of which I’ve never seen.  It is the stuff of fairy tales.  It will not be rushed and the joy of the fellowship across the table will have no trace of human drama.

3.)  An opportunity to rule.  Every time I am frustrated here by something I can’t change, I remember that God promises His children the right to rule one day.  I will share in the privilege of bringing about perfect justice and heavenly order.

4.)  A likeness to Christ.  I cannot imagine the gift of being like Jesus.  Frustration with myself will be a thing of the past.  Every habit here I can’t break, every fear that plagues me, every trigger that sends me down a path of bitter memories, these will all go away.

When I look at others today and envy, forgive me.  Amen

And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit himself intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.  Romans 8:27

There are many times I don’t know how to pray because I don’t know what God’s purposes are for a certain situation.  If I know I’m going to lose my job, do I bear down in prayer to keep it, or do I just assume God is using that loss to lead me somewhere else?  If I’m experiencing a tragedy, do I ask God to take it away or do I assume that, like Job, God has ordained this chain of events to further His glory in some way?

This is where a prayer life gets stuck.  I don’t know what to pray for because I don’t know the will of God.  Because I don’t know, it’s tempting to abandon prayer altogether.  That would be, and has been for me, a mistake.

That is the very time I need to rest with the Spirit of God in prayer and know that He is praying for my situation within the context of the will of God.  He knows what it is.  He knows how my present circumstances fit. There is comfort when I remember that though I am wordless, He is not.  Prayer to the Father never stops.  It is perfect prayer, and perfectly worded prayer.

For anyone today who might be tempted to think that lamenting over something God has ordained for His glory is wrong, let me assure you that lamenting is scriptural.  The Psalms are laments – well ordered.  If I take my very sick child to the hospital for a needed procedure and that procedure is painful but necessary for my child’s good, would I expect my child not to cry when he is hurting?  Never.

There is such a thing as a lament in the midst of trust.  While life hurts, I trust my Father’s plan and reach out for His hand to get me through it.  All the while, He is right there ‘in and around me,’ praying for me.

Never has ‘resting in You’ been more meaningful than this morning.  There are many places I fail to see resolution and I don’t know what Your plan is.  Give me grace to rest well in the waiting.  Amen

For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father!”  Romans 8:15

It’s really hard to say what might be the most important verse in Romans 8 but this one has to make the top five.

God does not withhold what we need as children. He is generous with words, and word pictures, to let us know where we stand with him.  Once we have accepted Jesus as our Savior, we don’t ever need to live in fear of not being good enough anymore or of being cast out of His presence. No more will a spirit of slavery spread insecurity like a cancer throughout our soul.  We can rest in our adoption.

“Adoption” is huiothesia in the Greek, which means, “to have an installation or placement as a son.”  Adoption means being taken from one family and placed in another.  It means receiving a whole new status that cannot be nullified, even if the children are difficult and dishonoring.

Satan, the father of all children (unless adopted by Christ,) is the worst of fathers.  He is not nurturing but cruel.  Though we all once belonged to him, there was never a warm sense of security.  Everything Satan isn’t, God is!  Whatever we experienced as children that left us wanting can be erased in the arms of our new Father.  It’s never too late to ask for what we need.  The healing we seek rests in the power of His words and the Spirit who breathes them into our needy hearts.

I never knew security until I found it in You.  There’s no peace like the peace I feel because I’m Yours.  Thank you.  Amen

If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you.  Romans 8:11

Harry Ironside, one of the first pastors of Moody Memorial Church in Chicago, said…“Christians are people whose past has been altered.”  The resurrection power of Jesus has forgiven their sins and forever stripped Satan of his right to damn them.  What power!  Without Christ’s death, my sins would have been enumerated and posted on my own cross.  I would have died the death of one condemned.  Hell would have been my end.

If my past has been altered, forgiven, then why does my past still affect me so much?  Is it possible that the same resurrection power that raised Jesus from the dead can also make me new, in every way, on the inside?

• If an angry mother raised me and I still tremble in the presence of anger, Christ’s resurrection power can deliver me from fear and make me bold.  I can be calm and prayerful though others rage.
• If I was raised to be someone’s puppet and never had a thought or dream of my own, Christ’s resurrection power can deliver me from the control of others.  I can be free to follow Christ and follow His plans for me.
• If I was criticized relentlessly for most everything I did and still feel a crippling fear of doing something wrong, Christ’s resurrection power can deliver me from playing it safe.  I can become a Joshua who goes forward in the God’s confidence to conquer spiritual mountains.

How does this happen?  Not by a simple prayer and one-time event.  While Jesus washed away my sins through one event, His own death, the process of being made new on the inside is progressive.  It’s something God does, but with my full cooperation and involvement.

Wouldn’t it be tragic to get to heaven and see a picture of who I could have been if I had trusted Jesus, and His Word, to really change me?  If I am a radical disciple, a woman who has great faith in the transforming power of Christ and every Word He speaks, I will cease to resemble the person I was in my past.  Jesus calls each of His children out of the grave, offers to unwrap the grave clothes so that we can be free to live in resurrection power.  To what extent am I allowing that?

I just realized, Lord.  It’s called sanctification.  Peeling away the grave clothes.  May it be!  Amen

But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.  Romans 8:10

If Christ lives in me, I have full access to Him; everything that He is and everything that He has promised to give to me. He withholds none of it. He plays no games. I am not used for sport. He is not emotionally unavailable. He does not make me earn His approval. As my Savior, He opens His heart and lets me in without restrictions. This level of intimacy is to extend in both directions. I have been given full access to Him and He wants full access to me.

You’re familiar with the term, “He’s dead to me.” It is usually spoken by one family member regarding a relationship he has with another member of the family. One, or both, has declared the relationship over. Access is denied. The time for reaching out has passed. The heart is closed. This, unfortunately, can describe some of the dynamics that are in place between us and God. Oh, this should not be.

• If I am alive to God, His voice quickens a response inside of me.
• If I am alive to God, His feelings about me matter.
• If I am alive to God, His promises are lifelines and His warnings are heeded.
• If I am alive to God, His words are a rudder for how I approach everything.
• If I am alive to God, every obstacle that would cause me to be suspicious and distrustful of Him is addressed immediately.
• If I am alive to God, I won’t hide in corners.
• If I am alive to God, I won’t withhold expressions of love and worship.

There are times I have felt estranged from God, not because He went away from me but because my own heart was in a bad place and I pulled back from Him.  Even though God was near, I made myself numb to His impact.  Ah, but when I am alive to Him, how differently it feels. The contrast is exhilarating as I relax in perfect holiness.

This is what comprises progressive sanctification.  As I am open and yielded, I am changed by every Word He speaks and every move His Spirit makes. I am caught up into the rhythms of the Trinity and know what it is to feel eternity in my heart.

  Lord, I will stay alert so that no one, and nothing, can try to shut down my heart, or even to numb it.  I will keep it with all vigilance. Amen

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit.  Romans 8:5

Bear with me.  There is no way to interact with Romans and not engage with the deeper things of the faith.  Today’s scripture is a prime example.  Many days, I track the number of people who open these devotionals and read them.  The days the numbers are high tend to be connected to catchy emotional titles; ones that deal with fear, anger, abandonment, etc.  The days the numbers are low are usually ones where a title is more intellectual than heart-oriented.  I contend that we need both.  Material that causes us to think will lead to an emotional response if we ask God to let it penetrate our heart.

This section of Romans 8 is controversial.  Many believe that there are three categories of people; the unsaved, the carnal Christian, and the committed follower of Christ.

I have always believed that but I am searching the scriptures and asking God to show me whether or not there are only two kinds of people; believers and unbelievers.  Are those who live according to the flesh unbelievers?  And, are those who live according to the Spirit believers?  I’m beginning to wonder if that is the case.

Would you ask the question with me and would you prayerfully consider that the issue might be quite simple.  We either follow Christ or we don’t.  The notion of a church half full of ‘carnal Christians’ might mean that we will all be surprised one day to see ‘too whom’ Jesus says, “Depart from me.  I never knew you.”  Perhaps we are either ardent followers of Jesus (and have our minds set on the things of the Spirit) or we are hostile to Christ (and have our minds set on the things of the flesh.)  In a few more verses, Paul will say that those who have their minds set on the flesh are hostile to God.

I am not saying that if I sin today, I am not God’s child.  I will sin – and I have already sinned even though it’s 8:30 in the morning.  The questions I must ask myself are, “Where is my mind set?  Did I sin with no regard whatsoever to the heart of God?  Did I sin without a conscience?  Will a line of sins follow today for which I will feel no tinge of remorse?”  If the answers to these are ‘yes’, I am probably not a true disciple.

If I am a disciple, I am consistently conscious of the “One” whom I’m following.  If He never crosses my mind, then how, by definition, can I consider myself a follower?  Perhaps the church makes the issue too difficult.  Children may understand these things better than we do.  So, I continue to ask God to make things clear; clear enough to change me, challenge me, and equip me to teach the women God brings to my sphere of influence.

Lord, is it possible for a person to be backslidden and still have their minds set on you?  I know many who thought of you constantly, but sinned, and were miserable.  Oh, perhaps the test is this ~ Is the one sinning thinking of you at all?  Bring me understanding as I continue in Romans, Lord.  Amen