Are you able to proclaim the same?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

I will say of the Lord, “He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.”
(Psalms 91:2 (NIV))

Sadly, it is human nature to say things that aren’t exactly true. Every single one of us has stretched the truth at least one time in the last twenty-four hours. Human nature makes us do things that are less than accurate. This easily comes out in the things that we say, after all, words flow far too easily. We say things we don’t mean to say. We sound sarcastic when saying something with sincerity, and we can sound honest when we are telling an outright lie. We may not intend to do these things, but we all do them. We are all guilty.

whose tongue utters no slander,
    who does no wrong to a neighbor,
    and casts no slur on others;
(Psalms 15:3 (NIV))

We must learn to be diligent with our words. We must not allow our mouths to utter things that are not true. We must strive to speak of only what is good.

My tongue will proclaim your righteousness, your praises all day long.
(Psalms 35:28 (NIV))

Even Jesus redirected goodness to the Father! Everything that He did was done to bring glory to the Father.

“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.
(Mark 10:18 (NIV))

Do your words bring glory to the Father? The psalmist claimed that he finds refuge in God. He claimed that God is his fortress. He claimed that he trusts in God. Since the Lord God sees the heart, I want these words to be my honest proclamation!

Are you able to proclaim the same?

Copyright 1998 – 2019 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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Have we been singing well enough?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living

Sing to the Lord, all the earth; proclaim his salvation day after day.
(1 Chronicles 16:23 (NIV))

Do you ever feel like you need to praise the Lord more than you do?

Sadly, if you are like me, the weight of the world closes in on us far too often and we quickly lose site of what is truly important in this world. We feel the pressures of our jobs and many other aspects of our daily lives. As a result, we soon forget to lift up praise to the Lord for all that He has done for us. It almost sounds like I am saying to give thanks for the pressures that we face. On the contrary! The pressures do not come from the Lord. They come from the enemy and he does all that he can to heap more and more on us in order to distract us from praising the Lord. When that happens, take heart and slow down. It is said that if you focus on your problems, you fail to recognize the blessings in your life. God designed His creation to remind us of Him. God’s creation praises His majesty through the beauty of what He has created. When we are too weak to praise the Lord, we just need to focus on the backing vocals that we have at our disposal. Shift your attention from your problems and allow God’s creation to remind you of just how great that He is!

When he came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives, the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen:
“Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!”
“Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”
Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!”
“I tell you,” he replied, “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”
(Luke 19:37-40 (NIV))

The enemy knows that the Lord is to be praised. He also knows that we are created to lift up the name of the Lord, so he does all that he can to prevent this. Thankfully, God’s creation will sing His praises when we don’t. We just need to make sure that we remember to pick back up in the next stanza of our lives and sing to the Lord for He is worthy of our praise!

Have we been singing well enough?

Copyright 1998 – 2018 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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How well do you follow these instructions?

Be Still . . .
Devotionals for Daily Living ^©

Give thanks to the LORD, call on his name; make known among the nations what he has done.
(1 Chronicles 16:8 (NIV))

Pretty straight forward instructions, but how well do we follow them?

Let’s run through a quick checklist.

How often do we give thanks to the Lord? Do we take things for granted when we should be thankful for what we have been given?

How often do we call upon His name? It is common to say things every once in a while such as “Lord, help me,” but do we really cry to out to God? Do we open up our hearts and tell Him our inner most desires?

How often do we make God known among the nations? This is probably the one where we fail the most. If you stop and think about these three points, giving thanks is probably the easiest. Calling upon His name is a little more difficult since we like to think that we can handle things ourselves, and proclaiming God to the nations is the most difficult. It is with this point where we must verbalize, where we must get outside of our comfort zone and loudly profess our faith in God and proclaim what He has done.

If you had to fill out a check list, or rate these three points on a scale of 1 to 10, how well would each of us do at the end of each day? Would we find that we have responded as we should or would we find that a majority of events during the day would go completely unrecorded? Do we miss opportunities in our daily lives to give thanks, to call upon God’s name, and to proclaim Him to the world?

Copyright 1998 – 2016 Dennis J. Smock
Daily Living Ministries, Inc.
http://www.dailylivingministries.org
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