| For Sunday, May 11 |
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| SCRIPTURE READING: Romans 6:19b-22 |
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| KEY VERSE: The benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life (Rom. 6:22b).
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| The Point of It All |
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Reminding ourselves that we are God's children frees us from thinking we have to earn God's love. Trusting our Heavenly Father frees us from "spiritual paranoia," constantly taking our spiritual temperature to see if we are still "alive to God." The freedom we find in true faith is actually a freedom from being preoccupied with ourselves. Now the attention we used to give ourselves can be given to God, and the end result of that is becoming more like Him.
We are either focused on ourselves or on God. Paul reminds us that we are either slaves to our sin or slaves to God's righteousness. The sinful preoccupation with ourselves means death, but a preoccupation with God means life, and not just any kind of life but the very life that God enjoys-eternal life.
So often, it seems, we focus so much on trying to be spiritual that even our religious life becomes one more way we focus on ourselves. We are like mirrors turning inward to focus on ourselves and so end up reflecting nothing at all. May God so captivate our imagination, may His grace flow so naturally in our lives, that we hardly give ourselves a second thought. |
| -Timothy J. Crutcher |
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| SING TO THE LORD |
All that thrills my soul is Jesus;
He is more than life to me.
And the fairest of ten thousand
In my precious Lord I see.*
*© 1931, renewed,1959 by Nazarene Publishing House. All rights reserved. Used by permission. |
| "All That Thrills My Soul" Words by Thoro Harris |
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| REACH OUT IN PRAYER |
| Many people in Myanmar will come to know Christ and receive the Holy Spirit. |
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| THOUGHT FOR THE DAY |
| So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God (1 Cor. 10:31). |
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| THROUGH THE BIBLE IN A YEAR |
| Psalms 91-93 |
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All Scripture quotations not otherwise designated are from the Holy Bible, New International Version® (NIV®). Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.
All hymn texts are taken from the hymnal Sing to the Lord. Copyright © 1993 by Lillenas Publishing Company.
Copyright © 2008 by WordAction Publishing Company. All rights reserved. Http://www.WordAction.com |