Today’s devotional is Killing Sin. It’s interesting as the order changed from what I had looked at yesterday when I was finishing our last devotion on the 10 Challenges Every Dad Must Conquer. It’s a shorter devotional in that it is only 4 days long. This devotional was provided by Moody Publishers which has a great number of reading resources. Checking out the description of the devotional it shares the following: “If you feel like you’re on the losing end of sin, and shame has you hiding out in the basement of life, God has a plan for you to win and the power to pull it off. It’s time to put to death those sins that have been killing you. In this four-day study, you’ll learn about God’s strategy for dealing with sin and living in freedom.” Are you ready to jump in and grab hold of this freedom? Are you ready to jump in and hear God’s strategy to help us be the dads God created and purposed for us to be? Are you ready to journey with me through these 4 days? Let’s get started!
Today’s devotional gets us digging into the following scriptures:
‘If your hand or your foot causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell. ‘
Matthew 18:8-9
‘My son, keep my words and store up my commands within you. Keep my commands and you will live; guard my teachings as the apple of your eye. Bind them on your fingers; write them on the tablet of your heart. Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,” and to insight, “You are my relative.” They will keep you from the adulterous woman, from the wayward woman with her seductive words. At the window of my house I looked down through the lattice. I saw among the simple, I noticed among the young men, a youth who had no sense. He was going down the street near her corner, walking along in the direction of her house at twilight, as the day was fading, as the dark of night set in. Then out came a woman to meet him, dressed like a prostitute and with crafty intent. (She is unruly and defiant, her feet never stay at home; now in the street, now in the squares, at every corner she lurks.) She took hold of him and kissed him and with a brazen face she said: “Today I fulfilled my vows, and I have food from my fellowship offering at home. So I came out to meet you; I looked for you and have found you! I have covered my bed with colored linens from Egypt. I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes and cinnamon. Come, let’s drink deeply of love till morning; let’s enjoy ourselves with love! My husband is not at home; he has gone on a long journey. He took his purse filled with money and will not be home till full moon.” With persuasive words she led him astray; she seduced him with her smooth talk. All at once he followed her like an ox going to the slaughter, like a deer stepping into a noose till an arrow pierces his liver, like a bird darting into a snare, little knowing it will cost him his life. Now then, my sons, listen to me; pay attention to what I say. Do not let your heart turn to her ways or stray into her paths. Many are the victims she has brought down; her slain are a mighty throng. Her house is a highway to the grave, leading down to the chambers of death.’
Proverbs 7:1-27
It always amazes me how God’s Word is so alive and can speak right into me today. Today’s devotional not only gives us a couple of verses but includes all of Proverbs 7. Today’s devotional gets us to start in God’s Word considering what are the things that are causing us to get stuck, get tripped up, get off track. God speaks through His Word to the importance of eternity versus this temporary time we get to spend on earth. So we get to choose if we want to do things during our temporary time on earth that will help us get to heaven or prevent us from getting to heaven. So how does today’s verse from Matthew help you to evaluate your decisions in how you will choose to live your today? How does today’s verse help you consider what you can do to be the dads God wants us all to be? What things come to mind that you can consider removing or pruning in order to become a better dad and be the dad your wife, your kids, and your world needs you to be? As you consider changes, removing, and pruning, consider what things will help you continue on your path to heaven versus the things that would disqualify you and stop you from begin able to get to heaven and end up in the fiery pits of hell. We are faced with choices every day! We are faced with challenges every day! We are faced with opportunities every day! We get to make the choice! We get to make the decision! So let’s choose life! Let’s choose love! Let’s choose relationships!
The second scripture today’s devotional shares with us is Proverbs 7 – that’s right a full chapter from Proverbs. For today’s devotional that must mean we need to grasp the full thing rather than a verse or two. It’s the story of getting to choose between a temporary thrill versus long-term satisfaction. It’s the story of getting to choose the path we will walk today and its impact on eternity. It’s the story of getting to choose the path that will tempt you and see if it is more than you can handle and hence breaks you. Remember how we are to resist the devil and he will flee? Remember how we are to flee from sexual immorality as it says in 1 Corinthians 6 where it says: “‘“I have the right to do anything,” you say—but not everything is beneficial. “I have the right to do anything”—but I will not be mastered by anything. You say, “Food for the stomach and the stomach for food, and God will destroy them both.” The body, however, is not meant for sexual immorality but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. By his power God raised the Lord from the dead, and he will raise us also. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ himself? Shall I then take the members of Christ and unite them with a prostitute? Never! Do you not know that he who unites himself with a prostitute is one with her in body? For it is said, “The two will become one flesh.”But whoever is united with the Lord is one with him in spirit. Flee from sexual immorality. All other sins a person commits are outside the body, but whoever sins sexually, sins against their own body. Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies.’ — 1 Corinthians 6:12-20“. Sexual sin is the one sin that impacts your body and is an internal thing rather than an external thing. Sexual sin attacks the temple of the Holy Spirit that is your body. So we need to honor God with how we treat our bodies! So let’s be the dads who stay off the troubled path as described in Proverbs 7. Let’s be the dads who take the warning and flee from sexual immorality! Let’s be the dads who choose to honor God with our bodies!
Today’s devotional has been provided by Moody Publishers (more details can be found https://www.moodypublishers.com/)
Reading through today’s devotional, here are some takeaways for me:
(check out the devotional on your own too to see if you pick up other nuggets, and please share your findings in the comments)
For more information, please visit Moody Publishers: https://www.moodypublishers.com/.
“Attack It“
- Are you ready to be the dads who take a stand?
- Are you ready to be the dads who resist the devil in order that he will flee?
- Are you ready to be the dads who flee sexual immorality as Joseph did when Potiphar’s wife tried to temp and seduce him?
- To do this we need to attack the sin and put it to death rather than allowing it to kill us!
- To do this we need to pour the blood of Jesus over it because blood needs to be spilled to defeat sin!
- To do this we need to be prepared! Today’s devotional shares some advice on how to prepare for this battle:
- “Until you believe that life is war—that the stakes are your soul—you will probably just play at Christianity with no blood-earnestness and no vigilance and no passion and no wartime mindset” – John Piper
- We are in the midst of a spiritual war! Some may think they are sitting at the beach, on the beach of Normandy, oblivious to the war taking place around them, but we need to be the dads who know there is a way taking place and grab hold of this reality and take hold of how significant it is, just as Jesus spoke to it in today’s verse from Matth 18.
- Jesus wasn’t being literal but chose to use hyperbole to make this critical and crucial point to us:
- Today’s devotional next speaks to our reading from Proverbs 7 and speaks to things we need to consider in order to be the dads God needs for us to be:
- “the story of a young man who got involved with a married woman—reaping all the short-lived moments of satisfaction.”
- “Early in the story, we see that he took the path toward her home.“
- “That’s where the battle was lost.“
- “He should never have gone down that path.“
- “It was too much pressure.“
- “Cutting off the path to sin usually prevents us from walking into sin“
- “preemptive strikes work.“
- So let’s be the dads who take preemptive strikes against things that are trying to kill us.
- Let’s be the dads who know where temptations are and are preemptive in making sure we don’t go down that road.
- Let’s be the dads who know our weaknesses and are preemptive in making choices that keep us from falling into them.
- Let’s be the dads who know our weaknesses and keep those things far away from us so that we won’t get tripped up in them.
- Let’s be the dads who know our weaknesses and destroy them, making sure not to carry them around with us so that we won’t get snagged by them and get caught in or by it.
- Let’s be the dads who know our weaknesses and setup safe boundaries to keep us from getting caught up and destroyed.
- Today’s devotional gives us some practical examples of things to do/avoid:
- “If you have a credit card weakness, leave it home, cut it in half, or melt it, but don’t have it handy. Ever!“
- “If wine, beer, the stiff stuff, or other drugs are owning you, get them out of easy reach, and find those trigger points or trigger people and remove them as much as possible.“
- “If social media is devouring your time, put limits on your electronics for this as well.“
- Today’s devotional closes with this powerful point:
- Today’s devotional provides us with the strategy for battle:
