Are you a doer of the Word?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it–he will be blessed in what he does.

If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
(James 1:19-27 (NIV))

Perhaps the best way to say what these words say is simply the phrase “Be doers of the Word.”

We cannot honestly expect to “give lip service” to God and then go about our business ignoring Him! When you take wedding vows, do you expect to be able to say “I Do,” and then go about your life as if you were still single? When you accept a job from someone, can you do what you please and not show up when you agreed to? What is different with our promise to God and our acceptance of His only son, Jesus Christ, as our personal Lord and Savior? Is it because we do not see them that we “give lip service” and do not do what we should be doing?

Honesty and integrity of faith are what God seeks in us. When we accept Jesus, we also accept the rules of the gift of grace. Some people claim the gift, but deny the rules. God wishes for us to be faithful to Him, and to keep all other “gods” in there places. Anything can become a “god” if we place it above anything else. If money is so important that you would cheat to get more, then money has become your “god.”

Be doers of the Word. Remember, actions always speak louder than words. Do not let other “gods” keep you from God.

Are you a doer of the Word?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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Are you headed for destruction and a fall?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall.
(Proverbs 16:18 (NIV))

Have you been able to overcome these attitudes?

Human nature is such a strange thing. It is so easy to slip into a state of pride and arrogance. We do it so often that many of us probably don’t ever realize that we are doing it! If you find this difficult to believe, simply look at the last time you experienced something like one of the following at work and how you reacted.

You finish up a large project of which 90% of the project was your contribution, and then someone else gets the credit.

You now the business and the job so well that everyone comes to you for answer, yet, someone else gets the promotion or the raise.

Did you find yourself responding with an attitude like, “How dare they do that. This company wouldn’t even be able to do what we do if it weren’t for me!”

I could go on and on with examples and responses, but the overall idea is that all of us can easily slip into attitudes that are far less than what we know we should do. We slip into pride and arrogance!

We need to keep our eyes on Jesus and recognize our sinful nature when it raises its ugly head. We need to turn away from our sinful nature and turn toward Jesus so that we don’t find ourselves headed for destruction and a fall.

Are you headed for destruction and a fall?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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Are you truly free from sin and death?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life.

If we have been united with him like this in his death, we will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin– because anyone who has died has been freed from sin.
(Romans 6:4-7 (NIV))

What a glorious statement! We, as believers, are free from sin!

This does not mean that we do not sin. We are still human. What this means is that we are free from the punishment of sin. We have accepted Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior. He has paid the price for our sin. It has been washed away from us by His crucifixion. Through His resurrection, we have been granted the right to be born again, to be looked upon by God as righteous and spotless in His sight.

We will still sin. We are in the world. The world is controlled by Satan, the father of all lies and sin. But, we will not be condemned to suffer the consequences of sin, for we have a risen Savior in Jesus Christ! This does not mean that we can choose to sin all that we want. It means that when we do slip up, we can ask for forgiveness.

We can ask for and be shown grace and mercy in spite of our sins. This is the ultimate freedom!

Are you truly free from sin and death?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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How are you recognized?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.
(Matthew 7:20 (NIV))

Have you ever seen an apple tree bear peaches? Have you ever seen an orange tree bear bananas? In the physical world, if we ever saw anything like this, we would think that we have gone utterly insane. These types of things just don’t happen. We are so used to seeing things a certain way that we know that certain things will never happen. Matthew understood this. He even took this concept one step further and explained that good fruit does not come from plants that we know to be bad. He referenced plants that most people cut down, dig up or burn. How could anything good ever come from something like this?

By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit.
(Matthew 7:16-18 (NIV))

The very same concept is also true in the spiritual as well. It seems as if everyone knows one or two people who just can’t seem to do anything good. Their whole demeanor just ruminates with a foreboding sense that is not comfortable to be around. They display everything that is opposite of the fruit that we are told is good.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.
(Galatians 5:22-23a (NIV))

Fruit is the means of reproducing in kind the very thing that produced the fruit. It carries the seed that will grow another plant like the one that it came from. When we think of fruit in the physical world, we think of something that is sweet and succulent to eat. Think of this in terms of the fruit of the Spirit. When we partake of the fruit of the Spirit, we soon begin to grow and mature with that very fruit becoming evident in our lives. The more love, joy and peace that you partake of, the more love, joy and peace that you bear.

Take a serious look at your life. Do you produce love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, or do you produce something completely different? How do you think that others see what you produce?

How are you recognized?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Are we truly capable of loving God in this manner?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Jesus replied: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.”
(Matthew 22:37 (NIV))

Are you capable of giving of yourself so thoroughly and so completely as Jesus described in this passage?

Think about that for a moment!

Can you love the Lord with all of your heart? This implies that there is not room for any other love in your heart.

Can you love the Lord with all of your soul? This implies that you are completely devoted to the Lord.

Can you love the Lord with all of your mind? This implies that you think of nothing else.

I don’t know about you, but this sounds pretty tough. It sounds extremely difficult, and it sounds impossible.

Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”
(Matthew 19:26 (NIV))

Let’s take a look at these three aspects of how we are to love the Lord with a fresh persepctive, with God’s persective.

It is possible to love the Lord with all of your heart and still have room to love others. When you love the Lord with all of your heart, you begin to see the world through His eyes and with His heart. You then learn to love others with the same love that the Lord loves them.

It is possible to love the Lord with all of your soul with a devotion to the Lord that overflows to those who are around you. They will see the joy and you will see the love and devotion that the Lord has for them.

And, yes, it is possible to love the Lord with all of your mind. Because you focus on loving the Lord and His Word, you begin to live what you love.

Blessed is the one
who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
or sit in the company of mockers,
but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
(Psalms 1:1-2 (NIV))

You walk in His Word. You study. You sit quietly in His presence. As you learn to love the Lord with all of your mind, you learn to love His creation because He loves His creation. You learn to find solice in His word.

In all honesty, loving the Lord is an all consuming endeavor, but as you grow in your love for the Lord, your ability to reflect that love to others grows as well. We are told to love the Lord, but Jesus took this one step further and told us to love each other as we love ourselves.

And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’
(Matthew 22:39 (NIV))

Are we truly capable of loving God in this manner?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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Where do you hide?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

You are my hiding place; you will protect me from trouble and surround me with songs of deliverance.
(Psalms 32:7 (NIV))

Everyone encounters times in their lives when they need a safe and secure place to take refuge from the onslaught of the world. Sometimes the weight of the world just becomes too much and we need a place to escape to. If I’m not mistaken, each one of us can still remember the last time that you felt this way.

Where did you turn?

Where did you hide?

Hopefully, each of us turns to the same hiding place, the same source of comfort, that David turned to.

Have you ever stopped to think why David was called a man after God’s own heart? Perhaps it had something to do with the simple fact David didn’t only turn to God when he needed a place to hide. He turned to God in all things. David didn’t run from trouble. He had such a good relationship with God that he knew that God would be with him no matter what. Think about that from David’s perspective when he faced Goliath. David wasn’t running from Goliath. He confronted him head on with the security that God would deliver the victory.

Perhaps we should change our definition of the word hide. When we think of hiding, we think of escaping, of cowering in fear, and of avoiding trouble. Maybe we should think of hiding as a place of refuge, preparation and as a source of strength. Thankfully, we have a God who allows both, who provides both. We simply have to turn to Him in all things and not just in times of trouble.

Where do you hide?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Do you know where your heart is?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
(Matthew 6:21 (NIV))

When I was growing up, television stations didn’t stay on the air 24 hours a day. In fact, they would shut down right after the late news. They used to run a public service announcement a few hours before they shut off for the night. Typically, this announcement went something like, “It’s 9 PM. Do you know where your children are?” It was a simple reminder to keep what is important to you close so that no harm would befall them. If you truly stop to think about this, it is not a far stretch to adapt this question to apply to our lives in Christ.

Can you imagine if someone were to ask you, “It’s 10:00 AM on Sunday. Do you know where your heart is?” Perhaps it is asked like this. “You are an adult now. Do you know where your heart is?” The implications are the same. Quite often, we fail to recognize exactly what we place as a priority until we are asked pointblank where we are with respect to certain things. Consider the following questions as examples of this human trait.

Where is your marriage?

Where is your relationship with your children?

Where is your relationship with Jesus?

We can be asked questions like these and we typically brush them off because we don’t really want to acknowledge that we may be far less than what we desire in these areas. We may not want to answer them because something else has our attention and our heart.

I honestly believe that it is a good thing to evaluate ourselves to determine exactly what we treasure and then turn to God, repent and ask for the strength to return to what we truly should treasure. With this in mind, I want to ask one simple question and hopefully you have a simple and righteous answer.

Do you know where your heart is?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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Are you alert to the prowling of the enemy?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.
(1 Peter 5:8 (NIV))

Do you find that you are the focus of more attacks from the enemy since you professed a faith in Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior?

There is a very good chance that this question is answerable in the affirmative. The enemy couldn’t care less about people who don’t profess a faith in Jesus, since, in his mind, they already belong to him. But, if you profess a faith in Jesus, he becomes the roaring lion with the intent to devour the person he just lost!

We, as members of the Body of Christ, must be ever vigilant to keep our eyes focused on Jesus and open to the instruction of the Holy Spirit so that we can recognize the devil in all of his prowlings. We must also hold fast to the faith that we possess and hold fast to the promises that we have been given.

So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.
(Isaiah 41:10 (NIV))

Are you able to recognize physical danger when it draws near? Most people are capable of this, yet, far too many fail to recognize spiritual danger when it draws near. The enemy is a sly trickster. He is the father of all lies. We must be ever on our guard and ever diligent of our spiritual well being just as much, if not more so that with our physical well being. We have so much more to lose than just our physical life!

But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear him who, after your body has been killed, has authority to throw you into hell. Yes, I tell you, fear him.
(Luke 12:5 (NIV))

The enemy will use anything and everything at his disposal to trick you, ensnare you and devour you. Never forget that by professing a faith in Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior, you have declared yourself an enemy combatant of the devil. Each of us are in a war against the devil. He will use do all in his limited power to devour you.

Are you alert to the prowling of the enemy?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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Are you planted and prosperous?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither— whatever they do prospers.
(Psalms 1:3 (NIV))

Prosperity does not always mean money!

If a tree is planted by streams of water and yields its fruit in season, that tree is fruitful. It can be considered prosperous. It does exceedingly well exactly what it was created to do!

Do you judge others by financial prosperity? Do you judge yourself by financial prosperity?

Sadly, we have a tendency to judge prosperity by worldly benchmarks where financial gain is the easiest one to measure. We do this regardless of what calling God has placed on the individuals being measured. Please don’t misunderstand me and think that financial prosperity is not from God. It is very possible to be called by God to something where financial prosperity is needed. It is not exactly easy to have the gift of generosity and not have the means to fulfill that gift.

We must realize that not everyone is gifted the same.

So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.
(Ephesians 11-13 (NIV))

Each person has been gifted differently in order to equip us for His service. If we are obedient and serve as we are called, we will prosper. We will have an impact utilizing the gifts that we have been given. Just as the tree planted by streams of water yields it fruit, if we are obedient and stay planted in our calling, we will produce a yield. We will prosper in what we have been called to do.

Are you planted and prosperous?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
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It is impossible for God to fail!

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

For no word from God will ever fail.
(Luke 1:37 (NIV))

You can look at this passage from several different perspectives.

God’s word is truth.

God never lies!

Anything that God decides to do will come to fruition.

God does not simply attempt to do something. He does it!

God’s word does not return empty.

I could go on an on, but I think that you understand the concept of the power of God’s word as truth.

If we can agree upon this, why do so many people find the following passages so difficult to believe?

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

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.
(John 1:14 (NIV))

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. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son.
(John 3:16-18 (NIV))

Jesus is God’s word made flesh! He was sent to redeem those who believe.

Think about that in context to the passage from Luke.

For no word from God (Jesus is God’s word made flesh) will ever fail. Jesus came into this world to redeem those who simply believe. He is calling people to God through a redeeming grace bought by His blood on Calvary. This act of redemption will not fail. God is calling His children to Himself through Jesus. God is washing away the sins of those He calls through the cleansing power of the blood of Jesus! I love the way that Paul conveyed this truth.

For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
(Romans 8:38-39 (NIV))

It is impossible for God to fail!

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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