Daily devotion – resetting our focus on that which is important
Tit 3:9 But avoid foolish questions, and genealogies, and contentions, and strivings about the law; for they are unprofitable and vain.
Ministers can become ensnared in so many foolish questions, which quite often are not really asked with an honest desire for an answer. And there’s a difference between foolish questions and honest, serious questions. I have no time for foolish questions where a person is just wanting to cast doubt on the Scripture. Pastor Chuck Smith said of such questions like, “Where did Cain get his wife?” I’m always suspicious of a man who is interested in another man’s wife. “Avoid the foolish questions, and genealogies,”
As I grow older in years, both in age and in walking with the Lord, I find I have little time for meaningless discussion on frivolous matters.
It is best defined by the writer of Hebrews when he wrote, Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up. And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us. – Hebrews 12:1
We are on the verge of WW3 in Europe and in the next few days the people of Ukraine face horrific attack with a brutality that will bring massive death and destruction. Besides the terrible loss of life through the invasion of Russia into Ukraine, the enormous flood of refugees is a growing tragedy of which we as a Church, Lord willing will become involved in providing assistance.
In addition, we have whole towns on our east coast, where people have lost all their lives and homes, who now have nowhere to live due to the enormous flooding.
Life for those in Ukraine, Queensland and northern NSW has become very simple.
May we take stock of our own lives at this moment to offload any foolishness we are wasting our time with. Let us lay aside the frivolous matters that are weighing us down and drowning our walk with the Lord.
This Sunday we begin a new series teaching through the book of Philippians. A letter that Paul wrote about the joy of God in spite of him being locked in prison at the time. Paul will tell us that God can and does use times of great difficulty to bring about blessing even when things seem troubled.
We will gather around the Lord’s table this Sunday and celebrate communion. As we do this Jesus words remind us that we are to forget about all the cares (frivolous) of the world and “remember Him’ as we take the bread, symbolic of His body, and drink the cup, representing His blood.
War and floods certainly should help us recalibrate our thinking. We have much work to do in praying and helping those who are in desperate need of our love and prayers.