So yesterday concluded a chapter in my life that was an amazing experience. Yesterday was also the end of the devotional The Father’s Legacy. Today is a new day with a new topic to dig into The Heart Of The Father | Devotional Reading Plan | YouVersion Bible. My search for dad devotionals brought this one to the surface for our next study and I am looking forward to hearing and learning from God through this devotional. The introduction caught my attention too as it points to our hearts when things are challenging and what lies the devil to speak that we are vulnerable to accept as truth. We need to be the dads who trust God and persevere! We need to be the dads who know that God is for us and not against us! We need to be the dads who know that God’s plans for us are for good and not for evil, to give us hope and a future! We need to be the dads who know that God’s plans for us should give us life and life more abundantly whereas the devil’s plans are to rob, kill, and destroy us! So let’s grab hold of the author of our devotional’s prayer for each of us, that we will have a revelation of the Father’s heart for each of us!
Today’s devotional gets us started with the following verses:
‘For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. ‘
John 3:16-17
‘The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. ‘
John 10:10
‘There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. ‘
1 John 4:18
God’s Word is so amazing to me as it speaks to me each day right where I am at and what I need to receive the hope, the truth, the energy, and the life to go out and live out today to the full. Let’s be the dads who realize how much God loves us! Let’s be the dads who realize God loves us so much that He gave! God is so generous that He gave sacrificially because He loves us! Let’s be the dads who realize that God is looking to live in relationship with us and provide us a way through Jesus to be able to spend all of eternity with Him! Let’s be the dads who choose to start our relationship with Him through Jesus Christ on this side of eternity and live out our lives with Jesus not only as our savior but our Lord! Let’s be the dads who grab onto the reality of why Jesus came! Let’s be the dads who receive the truth that Jesus came to save us, not condemn us! Let’s be the dads who choose to live out our lives in a way that will bring God the praise, the honor, and the glory just like Jesus did to glorify the Father! Let’s be the dads who realize there is good and evil out there! Let’s be the dads who realize the devil has plans that will try to rob us, stealing what God has prepared, planned, and even given us! Let’s be the dads who realize that the devil has plans to kill us and tries to trip us up through lies and deception to walk away from God rather than moving closer to Him when things get tough! Let’s be the dads who realize that the devil has plans to destroy us through temptation and lies that will draw us away from God and cause us to live out lives that will lead us into the pits of hell rather than eternity in heaven with God! Let’s be the dads who choose to reject and resist the devil so that he will flee and grab hold of the truth of God that He desires for us to have life and life to the full! Let’s be the dads who choose life with Jesus in order that we can have life and live it out on this side and the other side of eternity in abundance, to the full, and till it overflows! Let’s be the dads who are filled with love! Let’s be the dads who spend time with God in order to get filled with love to overflowing! Let’s be the dads who spend and meditate on God and His Word to the point that we are filled up to overflowing with His love, His grace, and His mercy as we step into each day! Let’s be the dads who grab hold of the reality that there is no fear in love! Let’s be the dads who grab hold of the reality that perfect love casts out or drives out fear! Let’s be the dads who grab hold of the reality that fear has to do with punishment and we know why God sent Jesus and it was to seek and save the lost! So today, let’s be the dads who are filled with and live in love so that we don’t end up having fears that allow the devil to take hold and manipulate us and our lives!
Today’s devotional has been provided by Inspirations by Lisa(more details can be found here: https://www.amazon.com/author/lisasingh)
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)
Pastor Lisa Singh is the Senior Pastor at Heavenly Grace Ministries in Queens, New York.
For more information, please visit About The Publisher (amazon.com).
Takeaways from Today’s Devotional: “Do you know the Father’s heart toward you?“
- Let’s be the dads who are prepared!
- Let’s be the dads who when we get surprised are prepared to lean on and turn to God for wisdom and discernment!
- Let’s be the dads who when we get surprised are aware of God’s heart and so can respond accordingly!
- Today’s devotional gets started on a real application, a real experience we have all been through with COVID, and a real experience that many of us may have been through with the 9/11/2001 attacks. Consider this:
- Let’s be the dads who spend enough time with God and in His Word that we know God, we have a real relationship with Him through Jesus Christ!
- Let’s be the dads who go beyond rituals and routines and right into a relationship with Jesus Christ!
- Ever reflect back on those two years or even the start and what we were being told and put through?
- Today’s devotional brings up some very powerful points for us to ponder and so I pause to allow us all to read and reflect on them:
- Let’s be the dads who when we aren’t sure what to do turn to our Heavenly Father!
- Let’s be the dads who when we aren’t sure what to do cry out to Jesus and invite Him into our situation!
- Let’s be the dads who are so connected to God that we won’t be stuck or tricked into only viewing God as judge and jury!
- Let’s be the dads who see God as the God of love rather than a god who is mean, angry, and upset at us all the time!
- Let’s be the dads who see God as the God of love who has good plans for us rather than allowing the devil to trick or manipulate us into thinking or believing that God is looking for ways of catching us doing wrong!
- Let’s be the dads who see God as the God of love who has good plans for us rather than allowing the devil to trick or manipulate us into thinking or believing that God is looking for ways to keep pouring out judgment on us!
- Let’s be the dads who know who God is as our scripture for today has told us so that we can live our lives in the joy of the Lord and with the joy of the Lord as our strength!
- Let’s be the dads who know who God is as our scripture for today has told us so that we can live our lives in a way that brings God the praise, the honor, and the glory!
- Let’s be the dads who live our lives with joy, the joy of the Lord, rather than in fear and worry based on the lies and deception of the devil!
- Let’s be the dads who take this head knowledge and apply it in the lives of our marriages and kids!
- Let’s be the dads who pass on these truths to our kids by not threatening them with God’s judgement when they mess up!
- Let’s be the dads who pass on these truths to our kids and wives by reflecting the light, the love, and the truth of God!
- Let’s pause and reflect on how the author of our devotional speaks to all of these things:
- “Before I came to the revelation about God being my heavenly Father, I only knew Him as a judge. I had the picture of Him being mean, angry, and upset at me all the time. I believed His only agenda was to catch me doing wrong so He could then continue to pour out judgment upon me. Because of this view and belief, I also lived with an expectation of things always turning out bad or going wrong. I had very brief moments of happiness. After all, when I did something right, God was happy. This belief of God as a judge instilled a lot of fear in me, and I did not enjoy my walk with God. In the past, I would have also asked the questions and made statements like those above. How about you? “
- “After I had my children, I finally began to get a glimpse of the Father’s heart for me. I was able to relate my love for my children to the love God, the Father, has for us. Yet, our capabilities of loving are so inferior compared to His. Today, when I look at this plague ravishing humanity, I know it is not the Father’s heart for His creation. You see, God made man in His image and likeness, and God gave man the earth as his inheritance to have dominion over. Satan stole that inheritance from man-kind and introduced sin and death. God then sent His Son to reconcile man back to God and reinstate dominion once again to his children. “
- Let’s be the dads who choose to covenant with Jesus!
- Let’s be the dads who cast the old ways of the world and sin for the new ways of Jesus and love and life!
- Let’s be the dads who receive Jesus into our hearts as Lord and Savior breaking the power and the chains of the devil!
- Let’s be the dads who receive Jesus into our lives as Lord and Savior so that we no longer have to live “under the law of sin and death, thereby giving the enemy the legal right to oppress, persecute, steal, kill and destroy.“
- Let’s be the dads who realize that the consequences of sin and of the actions of man are what open the door to allow the devil to attack us “through sickness, disease, famine, and natural disasters.“
- Let’s be the dads who are leaning in and pressing for a revival in this land!
- Let’s be the dads who are leaning in and pressing for an awakening in this land!
- Let’s be the dads whose hearts are stirred by the love of God and looking to pass it on wherever we go!
- Let’s be the dads whose hearts are so connected to God that we are looking for ways to share the love with the world around us!
- Let’s be the dads whose hearts are so connected to God that we look to be the husbands our wives need us to be!
- Let’s be the dads whose hearts are so connected to God that we look to be the dad that our kids need us to be!
- Let’s be the dads whose hearts are so connected to God that we look to be the people this world needs us to be!
- Today’s devotional closed with this truth about God:
