Trust in the Lord to care for you!

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.
(1 Peter 5:7 (NIV))

To me, this verse goes hand in hand with the following passage.

Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.
(Philippians 4:6 (NIV))

The basic concept in both passages indicate that we, as the Body of Christ, should not have anything to be worried or anxious about. There is one stipulation that most people have a tendency to miss when they think of not be anxious or worried and that is the simple fact that we are to turn our worries over to God. 1 Peter 5:7 tells us to cast our anxiety on him. When you cast, such as casting fishing nets or casting a fishing rod, it is an action where you physically throw things away from you in hopes of bringing back something better. Philippians 4:6 talks about bringing your worries to God through prayer and praise. This, too, requires an action on our part. In either case, we should not be timid when approaching our Father.

Consider the following scenario. You are walking and you lose your balance and fall. As a result of the fall, you are behind some bushes and in need of assistance to get back on your feet. Do you simply lie there and hope that someone will come along, see you and offer assistance or do you shout for help? It takes action to bring your needs before someone who can be of assistance. It takes a boldness to make the request and a confidence that your request will be answered. This is no different than being bold enough to approach God and “cast” your worries, anxieties and needs upon His strong shoulders.

Are you on speaking terms with God?

Do you trust God to fulfill His promises?

Are you willing to take the action that is needed to “cast” your troubles on God?

Are you to embarrassed to talk to God about your anxieties? Don’t you think that He already knows what they are? He has the answer. He is just waiting for you to leave whatever is troubling you at the foot of the cross!

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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Do you worship anything above your worship of God?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

I will pronounce my judgments on my people because of their wickedness in forsaking me, in burning incense to other gods and in worshiping what their hands have made.
(Jeremiah 1:16 (NIV))

Have you accepted Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior?

Have you stopped deliberately sinning?

We may not think that we worship other gods, but in all honesty, we still do.

Do you like your job? Do you want promotions and raises? Are you willing to sacrifice for your job? Do you like money and the things that money can buy? Do you like your things? Are you so addicted to your smart phone that it has become the center of every waking moment? Do you wait impatiently for the new model to come out and then run out and buy it? Do you like to watch sports? Have you ever missed out on something else, such as church, because of sports? Are you proud of your car? Would you go ballistic if something scratched the paint on your car?

Now, can you still tell me that you don’t worship other gods? We may not think that we do, but do our actions tell another story and is that story one that we would be proud of? Even more important, is that story one that God would approve of? Will He pronounce judgments on us for what we have placed before Him in our lives? Would He consider from our actions that we have forsaken Him?

Do you worship anything above your worship of God?

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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There is amazing power in God’s Word!

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
(John 1:1 (NIV))

Do you truly realize just what this passage is saying?

We all know that Jesus is the Word made flesh. From this passage we also know that Jesus existed from the beginning. We know that Jesus was with God from the beginning. We also know, based on logical deduction, that Jesus was and is God!

Still, there is one very important realization that each of us, as the Body of Christ, must fully embrace, and that is that for us to know God we must get to know Jesus. In addition, we come to the realization that in order to know Jesus, we must know the Word! This passage clearly tells us that what we call the Bible is how we get to know God, for it is a direct reflection of God’s character.

Now that we have established some fundamental principles, I want to ask a few questions.

Do you believe that God is all powerful?

Is He able to do things beyond your imagination, or have you put God into a box and limited Him to what you can understand?

Do you believe that the Bible is the Word of God?

Did you have to think about your answers or were you able to quickly affirm that God is all powerful and that the Bible if the Word of God? If you were able to do this, I want you to logically think about what this implies based on what John 1:1 says about the Word was God. This implies that the Bible is all powerful since it is the Word of God and that the Word is God!

Do you realize the amazing power that is God’s Word?

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Are your steps firm?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

The LORD makes firm the steps of the one who delights in him; though he may stumble, he will not fall, for the LORD upholds him with his hand.
(Psalms 37:23-24 (NIV))

I have two questions for you.

Do you delight in the Lord and lift up His name in joy and thanksgiving?

Have you ever faced a situation where you did not see any logical way for you to come through it unscathed? You just knew that the outcome was not going to be pretty!

I just love how if your answer to the first question is yes, it will lead to a successful outcome for the situations described in the second question.

When you delight in the Lord, He delights in you! Think about this from the viewpoint of an earthly father with multiple children. He loves all of his children, but the ones who seek to bring joy to their father are the ones who make the father the happiest. He loves them all, but if any are aloof, they don’t have the intimacy with the father and the father is saddened by this. How can he guide them if they will not come to him? Does this sound familiar? Does this help to paint a picture of how the Lord makes firm the steps of the one who delights in him? Could it be due to the desire to be close to the Lord? When you draw close, you begin to know the very heart of the Lord, and when you know the very heart of the Lord, you begin to walk where He leads.

When you were young, did you ever walk with your father and hold his hand? You relied on the guidance, the strength and the stability to help you make it to your destination. You followed where he led. You might have stumbled, but you never fell. You were firmly holding onto your father’s hand! Because you relied on the guidance, the strength and the stability of your father, you were confident in your steps. There was a firm and bold faith in your steps. Walking with the Lord should be just the same. Step out boldly and firmly in faith as you hold your Father’s hand!

Are your steps firm?

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Whose son or daughter are you?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Now you, brothers and sisters, like Isaac, are children of promise. At that time the son born according to the flesh persecuted the son born by the power of the Spirit. It is the same now. But what does Scripture say? “Get rid of the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with the free woman’s son.” Therefore, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.
(Galatians 4:28-31 (NIV))

Unlike our biological families, we have a choice to make!

We can choose to be a child of slavery to sin or we can choose to be a child born of the Spirit. It has been, and will forever be, our choice. But, it was a choice that we could not fulfill on our own merit if we chose to be a child born of the Spirit.

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.
(John 3:16 (NIV))

Did you pick up on the very simple adoption policy that God put in place so that we could abandon our sinful childhood and be welcomed into a childhood of freedom? All that we have to do is believe that Jesus is God’s one and only Son and accept the grace that is freely given through the ransom, through the adoption fee that Jesus paid to make each of us a part of the free woman’s family. We are no longer a part of the slave woman’s family.

I must do the responsible thing and remind everyone that becoming a child of grace does not mean that you will never face persecution from the enemy and those bound by slavery to sin. We have elected to leave our natural, sinful nature and those who are still bound to sin do not like that we have become children of God. They will do anything and everything to trip us up, to deceive us into turning away from God.

Once again, when this happens, we have a choice!

Each and every day we must consciously make that choice.

Whose son or daughter are you?

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Are you thankful?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is indeed at work in you who believe.
(1 Thessalonians 2:13 (NIV))

Would Paul be able to write these words about you and I today? Would he thank God that we received the word of God as the truth that it is? Would Paul find that the word of God is at work in us?

In other words, would Paul thank God that you and I believe?

I often wonder what courage and faith it must have taken to have been one of the early believers in Jesus. Even more so, I wonder what courage and faith it must have taken to preach the word of God as an early believer. Are we as faithful now as the early church was then? They faced persecution, condemnation and even death, yet they were faithful. Because of their faith, we can proclaim our faith.

But, will we be able to stand firm when we face the troubles that are coming?

We see hints of it every day. We see the persecution and the condemnation toward people who profess a faith in Jesus. Will we be able to make someone thankful that we held on to what we have received? Think about that for a moment. The people that Paul was thankful for were the people whom he had led to faith in Jesus. He saw them as his spiritual children. Who led you to faith in Jesus? Would they be thankful for what you have become? Will they be thankful for your faith when we face tribulations?

Let’s take this one step further.

Who are you thankful for?

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Stand firm on the Word of God

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. For the time will come when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths. But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.
(2 Timothy 4:2-5 (NIV))

People not putting up with sound doctrine. People doing things after their own desires. People listening only to what they want to hear. People turning away from truth.

Does this sound anything like what we are seeing in our society today?

As I think about the state of the world, I can’t help but stop and say a prayer for the people who are caught up in the lies of the enemy. They have been blinded to the truth by the enemy to the point where they now hate the truth. They have refused to believe the truth, so it is only logical that they would believe the lie.

and all the ways that wickedness deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.
(2 Thessalonians 2:10-12 (NIV))

What is it about human nature that makes some people refuse to accept the truth? There are some people who would argue with you if you tell them that the sky is blue. That is simply a combative spirit, but what about the people who will yell obscenities at you for telling them that God loves them?

It is so easy to become overwhelmed with all that is going on in the world.

I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.
(John 16:33 (NIV))

Don’t allow the world to keep you from doing what you know to be right in the eyes of God. Preach the Word. Endure hardship and do the work that God has called you to do! Stand firm!

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Focus on what unites us in Christ!

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought.
(1 Corinthians 1:10 (NIV))

Can you imagine such a thing! What would the world think of the church if we could agree on all things as Jesus would direct us? What could the church do within this world if we all had the same mind and no divisions among us?

It is so nice to be able to think of these things. If we, as the body of believers, could put aside all of our petty differences that are so divisive and agree upon the things that unite us, we would be able to show the world that following Jesus is all that we claim it to be. In fact, it is much more.

Unfortunately, the church is made up of imperfect people who are still prone to sin. We want to do what is right, but we often get our own desires in the way. When that happens, someone else’s desires get in their way, and soon we have divisions. We cannot allow the enemy to take control of us because we have these divisions. We must constantly remind ourselves of what unites us – the atoning blood of Jesus – versus he who divides us while we are in this world.

This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.
(1 John 5:3-5 (NIV))

When it all comes down to what unites us, it is simple. It is our faith in Jesus Christ as the only begotten son of God and God’s plan to give us unmerited grace and mercy through Jesus.

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.
(John 3:16 (NIV))

What is divisive within your heart that needs to be set aside so that you can focus in what unites us?

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Do you allow God’s deep call to sweep over you?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me.
(Psalms 42:7 (NIV))

Do you like to play it safe and stay in the shallow end of the pool? When you go to the beach, do you stay in the shallow waters? Are you afraid of letting yourself be totally immersed?

Do you ever allow anything to totally sweep over you?

Too many people are afraid. Just like the feeling you get when you jump off of a diving board into a pool, allowing yourself to be totally immersed goes through phases. When you first stand there, you feel the fear trying to keep you from taking that first step. When you finally do take that step, your first reaction is what have I done. As you dive further in, your heart begins to race as you realize you are still going in deeper. You open your eyes and look around as you realize that it is peaceful. Soon, you find yourself beginning to surface and when you do you feel exhilarated and refreshed as a result of what has just washed over you.

Answering God’s call to go deep with Him is the same way. You go through the same fear, questions and realizations. When you come through your deep calling with God you emerge exhilarated, refreshed and empowered. Sadly, too may people are afraid to go beyond the shallow, to go beyond the first step. They are content with just a little bit of God, after all, they have to keep Him in the box that they have designed. It is so wonderful to experience the fullness of God as He sweeps over you!

Do you allow God’s deep call to sweep over you?

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Could you pass this test of temptation?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry.

The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.”

Jesus answered, “It is written: `Man does not live on bread alone.’ ”

The devil led him up to a high place and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And he said to him, “I will give you all their authority and splendor, for it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to. So if you worship me, it will all be yours.”

Jesus answered, “It is written: `Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.’ ”

The devil led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down from here. For it is written:

” `He will command his angels concerning you
to guard you carefully; they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’ ”

Jesus answered, “It says: `Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’ ”

When the devil had finished all this tempting, he left him until an opportune time.
(Luke 4:1-13 (NIV))

Satan tried everything that he could do to tempt Jesus!

Fortunately, Jesus did not fall prey to any of the temptations.

How did He face these temptations and walk away from them? How can we face them and walk away from them? Jesus was able to rebuke Satan and his temptations by knowing and using the Word of God to provide support during the temptations.

We can do the same!

True, Jesus was the Son of God, yet, He gave us an example that we can use to avoid temptation in our lives. We must rely on God. We must rely on the grace and mercy that God gave us through Jesus. We must turn to Jesus in honesty and sincerity.

Could you pass this test of temptation?

Copyright 1998 – 2017 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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