Precept Austin

Daily Devotionals

REDEEM THE TIME - Youtube Recording on Redeeming the Time given by myself (Bruce Hurt) to men's ministry -- Slides that go with talk  Related article on Redeem the Time. 

Below are links to several devotionals to aid your Quiet Time with the Lord. 

"And I (JESUS) say to you, make friends (aorist imperative see need to depend on the Holy Spirit to obey) for yourselves by means of the wealth of unrighteousness (not that money is evil, but because it is often used for evil), so that (purpose or result) when (not "if") your earthly possessions are gone, you will be welcomed (dechomai = THEY WILL PUT THE "WELCOME MAT" OUT FOR YOU IN GLORY!) into the eternal homes." (Luke 16:9)

NLT Paraphrase - "I tell you, use your worldly resources to benefit others and make friends. In this way, your generosity stores up a reward for you in heaven".

Comment by John MacArthur - In relation to others, Jesus exhorted His hearers to make friends for themselves by means of the wealth of unrighteousness, so called because it belongs to this unrighteous, passing world. Unbelievers, like the unrighteous manager (Lk 16:1-8), often use money to buy earthly friends. Believers, on the other hand, are to use their money to evangelize and thus "purchase" heavenly friends. The wealth of unrighteousness, being an element of fallen society’s experience, cannot last past this present life (cf. Luke 12:20). When it fails, the friends believers have gained through investing in Gospel preaching will welcome them into the eternal dwellings of heaven. Those friends will be waiting to receive (ED: WITH "OPEN ARMS") them when they arrive in glory because through their financial sacrifice for reaching the unconverted they heard and believed the Gospel.The Lord calls for Christians to use their money for eternal purposes to produce a heavenly reward.

Why Should You Consider Interceding for the Hidden People Group Below? 

  1. Jesus taught us that "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few." (Mt 9:37) - Will you be a worker for the Lord of the harvest? Will you obey His command to "beseech (aorist imperative) the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.” (Mt 9:38)?
  2. You are in effect entering the mission field with your intercessory prayers. "With all prayer and petition pray at all times in the Spirit, and with this in view, be on the alert with all perseverance and petition for all the saints (including those of the hidden people groups who will become saints - see Rev 5:9 below) (Eph 6:18) 
  3. You are obeying Jesus' command to "Store up (thesaurizo in present imperative see need to depend on the Holy Spirit to obey) for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for (term of explanation) where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." (Mt 6:20-21) (Where is your [my] heart beloved?)
  4. You will rejoice with Paul for those precious souls in this hidden people group who accept Christ as their Savior for they will be your "hope or joy or crown of exultation...in the presence of our Lord Jesus at His coming. For you are our glory and joy." (1 Th 2:19, 20)
  5. You will shine like the stars for "those who lead the many to righteousness, like the stars forever and ever." (Da 12:3)
  6. You can be confident God will answer your prayer for Rev 5:9 says Jesus was "slain, and purchased for God with (His) blood men from EVERY tribe and tongue and people and nation."
  7. If these Biblical truths are not sufficient motivation to redeem the precious time then take a moment and Read the longer answer. 

RECOMMENDATION - HERE IS AN EXCELLENT PRAYER GUIDE FOR UNREACHED PEOPLES, RELATIVES, NEIGHBORS, FRIENDS, ENEMIES! -

"Prayer works! Prayer is work! Prayer leads to work! Prayer is the work!"

Scripture that you can pray for all the peoples of the world including the lost in your world, your sphere of influence! This is a wonderful Biblical tool. And the apostle John reminds us that our prayers in the present transcend time for he writes in Rev 8:3 that "the prayers of all the saints (ARE) on the golden altar which was before the throne!" Beloved, store up for yourself some treasure in Heaven! (Mt 6:20) The R.O.I. (Return On Investment) is "out of this world!" Below is a sample prayer from this guide...

Lord Most High, You are awesome. You are the great King over the ______. May the ______ sing praise to you for you are King of all the earth. You reign over the ______. You sit on Your holy throne. PSALM 47:2, 6-8

These devotionals are provided to encourage your daily devotional time reading the "pure milk  of the Word" (1 Peter 2:2 = a vital verse because intake of the pure word is an absolute essential for spiritual growth or progressive sanctification) and are not meant to replace your personal time reading God's "Word of Life" (Philippians 2:16) and "Word of Truth, the Gospel." (Colossians 1:5) Our prayer is that you would...

Let the word of Christ richly dwell (present imperative calling for dependence on the Holy Spirit to obey) within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God. (Colossians 3:16)

Remember that letting the Word of Christ richly dwell within you produces the same fruit as being continually filled with the Spirit (Eph 5:18 (See chart comparing effects). Be filled is also a present imperative command calling for reliance on the Holy Spirit to give you the desire and the power - Php 2:13NLT)

NOTE: For a short synopsis of the Hidden People Group of the day, click the picture to go to Joshua project entry for that group. 

 

 

Daily Light on the Daily Path

September 25

Morning

Let endurance have its perfect result, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing

NOW for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials that the proof of your faith, being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ --We also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope

It is good that he waits silently for the salvation of the LORD --You have for yourselves a better possession and an abiding one. Therefore, do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God, you may receive what was promised. For yet in a very little while, He Who is coming will come and will not delay --Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God our Father, Who has loved us and given us eternal comfort and good hope by grace, comfort and strengthen your hearts in every good work and word.

Jas 1.4. 1Pe 1.6, 7.--Ro. 5.3, 4.
La. 3.26.--Heb 10.34-36.--2Th. 2.16, 17.

Evening

God will judge the secrets of men through Christ Jesus

Do not go on passing judgment before the time, but wait until the Lord comes who will both bring to light the things hidden in the darkness and disclose the motives of men's hearts; and then each man's praise will come to him from God.--not even the Father judges anyone, but He has given all judgment to the Son… He gave Him authority to execute judgment --The Son of God… has eyes like a flame of fire

They say, How does God know? And is there knowledge with the Most High?--These things you have done, and I kept silence; You thought that I was just like you; I will reprove you, and state the case in order before your eyes --There is nothing covered up that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known.

Lord, all my desire is before Thee; And my sighing is not hidden from Thee --Examine me O LORD, and try me. Test my mind and my heart.

Ro 2.16. 1Co 4.5.--Jn 5.22, 27.--
Rev 2.18. Ps. 73.11.--Ps. 50.21.--
Lk. 12.2. Ps. 38.9.--Ps. 26.2.

Spurgeon's Morning and Evening

September 25

Morning

“Just, and the justifier of him which believeth.”

Romans 3:26

Being justified by faith, we have peace with God. Conscience accuses no longer. Judgment now decides for the sinner instead of against him. Memory looks back upon past sins, with deep sorrow for the sin, but yet with no dread of any penalty to come; for Christ has paid the debt of his people to the last jot and tittle, and received the divine receipt; and unless God can be so unjust as to demand double payment for one debt, no soul for whom Jesus died as a substitute can ever be cast into hell. It seems to be one of the very principles of our enlightened nature to believe that God is just; we feel that it must be so, and this gives us our terror at first; but is it not marvellous that this very same belief that God is just, becomes afterwards the pillar of our confidence and peace! If God be just, I, a sinner, alone and without a substitute, must be punished; but Jesus stands in my stead and is punished for me; and now, if God be just, I, a sinner, standing in Christ, can never be punished. God must change his nature before one soul, for whom Jesus was a substitute, can ever by any possibility suffer the lash of the law. Therefore, Jesus having taken the place of the believer—having rendered a full equivalent to divine wrath for all that his people ought to have suffered as the result of sin, the believer can shout with glorious triumph, “Who shall lay anything to the charge of God’s elect?” Not God, for he hath justified; not Christ, for he hath died, “yea rather hath risen again.” My hope lives not because I am not a sinner, but because I am a sinner for whom Christ died; my trust is not that I am holy, but that being unholy, he is my righteousness. My faith rests not upon what I am, or shall be, or feel, or know, but in what Christ is, in what he has done, and in what he is now doing for me. On the lion of justice the fair maid of hope rides like a queen.

Evening

“Who of God is made unto us wisdom.”

1 Corinthians 1:30

Man’s intellect seeks after rest, and by nature seeks it apart from the Lord Jesus Christ. Men of education are apt, even when converted, to look upon the simplicities of the cross of Christ with an eye too little reverent and loving. They are snared in the old net in which the Grecians were taken, and have a hankering to mix philosophy with revelation. The temptation with a man of refined thought and high education is to depart from the simple truth of Christ crucified, and to invent, as the term is, a more intellectual doctrine. This led the early Christian churches into Gnosticism, and bewitched them with all sorts of heresies. This is the root of Neology, and the other fine things which in days gone by were so fashionable in Germany, and are now so ensnaring to certain classes of divines. Whoever you are, good reader, and whatever your education may be, if you be the Lord's, be assured you will find no rest in philosophizing divinity. You may receive this dogma of one great thinker, or that dream of another profound reasoner, but what the chaff is to the wheat, that will these be to the pure word of God. All that reason, when best guided, can find out is but the A B C of truth, and even that lacks certainty, while in Christ Jesus there is treasured up all the fulness of wisdom and knowledge. All attempts on the part of Christians to be content with systems such as Unitarian and Broad-church thinkers would approve of, must fail; true heirs of heaven must come back to the grandly simple reality which makes the ploughboy’s eye flash with joy, and gladens the pious pauper’s heart—“Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.” Jesus satisfies the most elevated intellect when he is believingly received, but apart from him the mind of the regenerate discovers no rest. “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.” “A good understanding have all they that do his commandments.”

Faith's Checkbook by C. H. Spurgeon

September 25

The Sacrifice Has Been Accepted

If the Lord were pleased to kill us, he would not have received a burnt offering and a meat offering at our hands, neither would he have showed us all these thing. (Judges 13:23)

This is a sort of promise deduced by logic. It is an inference fairly drawn from ascertained facts. It was not likely that the Lord had revealed to Manoah and his wife that a son would be born to them and yet had it in His heart to destroy them. The wife reasoned well, and we shall do well if we follow her line of argument.

The Father has accepted the great sacrifice of Calvary and has declared Himself well pleased therewith; how can He now be pleased to kill us! Why a substitute if the sinner must still perish? The accepted sacrifice of Jesus puts an end to fear.

The Lord has shown us our election, our adoption, our union to Christ, our marriage to the Well-beloved: how can He now destroy us? The promises are loaded with blessings, which necessitate our being preserved unto eternal life. It is not possible for the Lord to cast us away and yet fulfill His covenant. The past assures us, and the future reassures us. We shall not die but live, for we have seen Jesus, and in Him we have seen the Father by the illumination of the Holy Ghost. Because of this life-giving sight we must live forever.

J.H. Jowett's Daily Meditation

September 25

THE SENSE OF GRACE

Psalm 107:21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32.

A VITAL part of all devotion is the remembrance of the goodness of God. Such a remembrance keeps my soul in the realm of grace. I am so inclined to proclaim my personal rights rather than glorify the favour of God, so inclined to exhibit my own prowess rather than God’s most gracious bounty. And whenever I lose the sense of grace I become a usurper and take the throne. Our salvation is “not of works, lest any man should boast.”

And such a remembrance would keep my soul in the mood of humility. “Nothing in my hands I bring.” I can no more claim the glory of salvation than a child, who has cut a shallow trench on the sands, can claim the glory of initiating the roll of the ocean-tide. I owe all my desires and all my hopes and all my present attainments to the boundless goodness of God.

And such a remembrance would keep my soul in the dispensation of love. I cannot quietly and steadily contemplate the goodness of the Lord without my soul being kindled into loving response. Without high contemplations love smoulders, and will eventually die out. But God’s goodness inflames the soul, and communicates its own most gracious heat. “We love because He first loved us!”

J.R. Miller's Year Book

September 25

"But you have now rejected your God, who saves you out of all your calamities and distresses." 1 Samuel 10:19

We are very quick to see ingratitude in those whom we have befriended, who forget our kindness and treat us unkindly. We like to quote in such connection, the fable of the serpent, frozen by the wayside, which the benevolent passer-by took up and put in his bosom to warm—but which returned his kindness, by striking its deadly fangs into his flesh!

Let us be honest toward God. Let us judge ourselves in relation to his mercies and favors to us, by the same rule which we so inexorably apply to our fellow-men. What has God done for us? What mercies and favors have we received from him? From what adversities and tribulations has he delivered us? Are we saved? Are we on the way now to heaven and glory? Who forgave us our sins? Who rescued us out of the hands of Satan? Who keeps us day by day?

There is only one answer. How, then, are we treating this Deliverer, Savior, and Friend? Do we recognize him as our King and Lord? Or are we rejecting him and demanding another? It is well that we sit down quietly, while this matter is before us, and see whether we are free from the sharp blame which the prophet here lays upon these ancient people. May it not be that we, too, are neglecting the God who has saved us?

Our Daily Walk by F. B. Meyer

September 25

THE FILE LEADER

"Behold, I have given him for a Witness to the people; a Leader and Commander to the people."-- Isa 55:4.

FOUR TIMES in the New Testament our Lord is called Leader or Prince.

Originally the word means the First of a file of men, and therefore their Captain or Commanding Officer (see Act 3:15; Act 5:31; Heb 2:10; Heb 12:2).

Christ leads from death into Life. Probably Joshua was the first to pass over the dried bed of the Jordan, as the priests stood by bearing the Ark of the Covenant; but this, at least is true, that our Saviour has preceded us through the waters of death, and will hold them back until each of the ransomed has passed "clean over" (Jos 3:17).

Christ leads His followers into victory. When our Lord was exalted to the right hand of power, He opened up a path to be trodden throughout the ages by a company which no man can number. As He overcame, we may overcome; as He reigns over all principality and power, so we believe that He will bruise Satan under our feet, and make us more than conquerors.

Christ leads those who suffer to perfection. Though He was the Son of God, He learned obedience by the things that He suffered, and transformed suffering, showing that it was an elembic, a purifying furnace, a means of discipline, strength, and ennoblement. If we are thrust into the fiery furnace we shall find the Son of God walking at our side, and shall emerge without our bonds, and with no smell of fire upon us. Jesus is the Leader of a long procession of martyrs and sufferers. He leads through no darker rooms than He went through before; He knows exactly how much we can bear, and will not test us beyond our strength. He is with us "all the days," and will help us to learn obedience, faith, and hope, as we follow in His footsteps.

PRAYER

O Lord, whose way is perfect, help us always to trust in Thy goodness: that walking with Thee and following Thee in all simplicity, we may possess quiet and contented minds; and may cast all our care on Thee, for Thou carest for us. AMEN.