Day 289
Pray (ACts) Read - Acts 1v6-11 Message - Scott Woodburn Our faith has many big words which are often difficult to say but are part of our vocabulary nevertheless. Crucifixion. Resurrection. Justification. Propitiation. We know all of these things and often preach them and speak of them. Yet there are many gaps in our speech. Something that we don't often speak about is the Ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ. What is the Ascension? Just as we ascend the stairs to bed in the evening, so Jesus ascended back up to heaven. He is there today at the Father's right hand, interceding for His own. Before His departure the disciples were keen to ask the Lord a question. He had risen from the dead and they wondered if this would be the time He would restore the kingdom to Israel (v6). Even at the end of the Lord's time on earth His disciples were still asking the wrong questions. Their focus was on ethnic, national Israel. Would Christ now usher in a new age of glory for the Jewish people? Would a new David-like King take the throne? Would this new King throw the Romans from the land? Perhaps Jesus Himself would lead them in victorious battle against their enemies. The purpose of the Lord was bigger than the borders of Israel. The time had come for the Gospel to be preached to the nations and for the Gentiles to be added to the Church of Christ. The Lord's response is gentle. He tells them that the times and seasons fixed by God are not their concern (v7). We too must be careful in this regard. Some might say "Surely Covid is a sign that the end is near?" Still others proclaim that they know exactly when Christ will return. Truth be told, we do not know and cannot know (Mark 13v32). Jesus directs His disciples' wrong question to the right answer. They would be His witnesses to the ends of the earth (v8). Empowered and equipped by the Holy Spirit they would preach the Gospel to the nations. The kingdom of God would know no borders and no limits and it would be ruled over by King Jesus. Just as this answer reached their ears, Christ ascended into the clouds (v9). The Ascension is not an irrelevant part of Scripture. It is a certain reminder that Christ is alive forevermore and He reigns today above the heavens. I heard a sermon recently on the Kingship of Christ, the preacher reminded us "He is reigning and we can rest." No matter what this year brings, nothing changes the fact that we trust the ascended Christ who is not troubled or threatened by the forces of this evil age. He is reigning, He is returning (v11) and we find our rest in Him. Pray (acTS) Sing WSC Q60 How is the Sabbath to be sanctified? The Sabbath is to be sanctified by a holy resting all that day, even from such worldly employments and recreations as are lawful on other days; and spending the whole time in the public and private exercises of God’s worship, except so much as is to be taken up in the works of necessity and mercy.
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Day 288
Pray (ACts) Read - Exodus 1:1-5 Message - Alan Burke I have a question for you, would you put your child or someone close to you in the path of danger? Likely you didn’t even give that question a second thought, you knew immediately that you wouldn’t or at least I hope that you didn’t give it a second thought. We want to protect those who we care about, we don’t want to see them placed in harms way, parents can even be guilty of being over protective of their children, wrapping them in cotton wool. That is what Moses’ mother attempted to do, it may not seem like that’s what she was doing but remember how Satan through Pharaoh was at work in opposition to the plans and purposes of God. Pharaoh had forced the people of God into slavery, had ordered infanticide, then resorted to genocide, decreeing that all newborn Hebrew boys should be thrown into the Nile (1:22). This child’s mother did all that she could to keep him from harm’s way. For three months she hid him, the screaming the crying, the dirty nappies, this wasn’t an easy job, yet she did all that she could to preserve the life of the child in spite of Pharaoh’s edict. Then when she was no longer able to conceal her growing baby son within her home she weaves and waterproofs a basket. After spending hours and hours on, doing all that she can so that this basket would be a place where she believed her son would be safe from the hands of the Egyptians. It may not sound that significant until you know the word that is translated basket isn’t basket but rather the Hebrew word that is used ‘Ark’. The placing of this child in reeds was effectively placing him harms way, far enough away from earshot so if he had screamed his head of that no one would have heard him. On one level this may seem barbaric but what was the option, let him be found or hide him away, placing his sister there to watch him, keeping an eye him and his mother coming later maybe under the cover of dark to feed him all so that this child could live. This isn’t the lovely little story that we have domesticated to be less barbaric this is an act of desperation by the parents of this child. What a time to live in, what fear these parents must have had that in order to save the life of this three month old baby Moses. This is a plan that has come out of desperation. This helpless three month old, in a papyrus ark, coated with tar and pitch, hidden in the reeds along the bank of the nile, as Miriam his sister watches on. But just as God in his divine deliverance saved Noah from the waters in the ark, God was going to divinely deliver Moses as part of his redemptive purposes. He is only one Israelite among many but God’s saving purposes are once more at work in the midst of it all. He had brought his people to this Land of Egypt and he was bringing forth a deliverer by his divine deliverance to save his people, to redeem and rescue them. All of that which took place was in accord with the wonderful purposes of God, in his providence he was ordering it all that he would bring salvation to his people, for from beginning to end, salvation belongs to our God. In all of this, God was at work, he has divinely delivered Moses, this didn’t take place by mere chance or luck, this wasn’t blind fate this was the hand of God at work. We will think more about this on Friday and Sunday but for now, remember that truth how God in his providence was at work, just as right here in this day God by his providence is at work (Heb 1:3, Ps 103:19, Matt 10:29-31). We have thought about this before but it’s a truth that we constantly need reminded of, for God by his providence is at work, that means in what you face, in the midst of Covid, in all of it, God is at work. Pray (acTS) Sing WSC Q59 Which day of the seven hath God appointed to be the weekly Sabbath? From the beginning of the world to the resurrection of Christ, God appointed the seventh day of the week to be the weekly Sabbath; and the first day of the week ever since, to continue to the end of the world, which is the Christian Sabbath. (Gen. 2:2–3, 1 Cor. 16:1–2, Acts 20:7) Day 287
Pray (ACts) Read - Acts 1v1-5 Message - Scott Woodburn As the book of Acts begins we very quickly realise that it is Luke part two. Luke speaks of his first book (v1) which is his Gospel account and he mentions his friend Theophilus once more (Luke 1v3). Luke has recorded "all that Jesus began to do and teach" until the day of His ascension (v2a). Acts will speak of the taking of the Gospel to the nations. But before Christ's Apostles begin their work, Jesus appeared to them alive and well (v3a). He gave them many proofs to show that His resurrection was no fraud (v3b) and for forty days He spoke to them about the kingdom of God (v3c). Where is the kingdom of God today? Perhaps Jerusalem? Perhaps the Vatican? No. Our Westminster Confession puts it this way "The visible Church, which is also catholic or universal under the gospel (not confined to one nation as before under the law) consists of all those, throughout the world, that profess the true religion, and of their children; and is the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ, the house and family of God, out of which there is no ordinary possibility of salvation." The kingdom of God on earth is His Bride the church. Soon the Apostles would leave Jerusalem and take the Gospel to every corner of the earth. The Gospel would advance and be opposed at every step of the way and yet it would still advance. The church of Christ would be built, no longer situated primarily in the middle-east but it would become a multi-national and multi-ethnic body. But the time for the Apostles' work had not yet come. Jesus told them that they needed to stay in Jerusalem to wait for the promise of the Father (v4). Christ had already spoken to them that it would be to their advantage that He would go away. Another was coming, called the Helper. The Apostles were to receive the Holy Spirit. John had baptised with water but they would be baptised with the Holy Spirit (v5). They would need the Spirit's help. These men would face unimaginable trouble for the rest of the their lives. They would be despised and rejected by men, their names would be slandered, they would have no safe place to call their own and most of them would be murdered for their refusal to deny Christ. Luke in his second book tells us their story, their acts. If the church exists outside the boundaries of Israel today, then it is because these men took it with them. Every mile they walked, every town they visited, every sermon they preached was used by Almighty God to call the nations to repentance and faith in Christ. The year at the top of the calendar may have changed but our message is still the same, Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. May the Lord continue to build His church in 2021. Pray (acTS) Sing WSC Q58 What is required in the fourth commandment? The fourth commandment requireth the keeping holy to God such set times as he hath appointed in his Word; expressly one whole day in seven, to be a holy Sabbath to himself. Day 286
Pray (ACts) Read - Exodus 1:1-11 and Hebrews 11:23 Message - Alan Burke Today as we look to the book of Exodus once more, but as we do so we begin by looking to Hebrews, for there the parents of Moses are listed among the great people of faith (Heb 11:23). But why are they listed there? Well in Exodus 2 we learn of these two parents who had a son and “…when she (Moses’ Mother) saw that he was a fine child, she hid him three months.” It doesn’t seem that remarkable, but when you remember that chapter 1 closed with Pharaoh commanded all his people, that every son that is born to the Hebrews should be cast into the Nile we understand that these were not normal circumstances and that these two parents were risking everything so that their son would live. It is because the parents of Moses lived with the certainty of receiving what God had promised but they had not yet received though Jesus Christ. The faith they had was not a vague hope that is grounded in imaginary or wishful thinking. Instead it is the hope that believers have in faith is based on assurance and that assurance is based on God’s character, it is not an unknowable leap in the dark but it is confident trust in the eternal God. These godly parents had confidence to go against the most powerful man in the world and in who God is, in His character, that He is who He says He is. The parents of Moses through their faith they recognised that God’s hand was on Moses and that he was a fine child (Ex 2:2). Moses’ parents disobeyed the king by faith, not being afraid of what the king might do to them if he discovered that they had been hiding their child for three months. God used these parents’ courageous act to place their son, the Hebrew of his choice, in the house of Pharaoh. In it all God was at work and he used the faith of these parents to raise up Moses to lead his people out of Egypt to deliver them from their bondage, just as Moses was drawn out of the water, he would later draw God’s people out of Egypt through the sea, all of it by God’s work, for God who has the power to work in human history to accomplish salvation. Moses would be a saviour of God’s people, but he was not the Saviour, for there was still another saviour to be born, one of whom God though Moses spoke of, “one greater than I from among the people” (Acts 3:22, Deut 18:15-22). This Saviour was worthy of greater honour than Moses (Heb 3:3), he was no ordinary child, he was the Son of God, God incarnate, his name is Jesus because he would save his people from their sins (Matt 1:21). This saviour has now come, he is the one that we must turn to and have faith in, he is the hope that believers have. In faith we have assurance and that assurance is based on God’s character, it is not an unknowable leap in the dark but it is confident trust in the eternal God who is all powerful the God who has revealed himself though his word and the word incarnate our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ whose promises have been proven, the God who will never leave us or forsake us. Even in the midst of these strange days we are to have faith for God is working out his purposes in the midst of it all. Pray (acTS) Sing WSC Q57 Which is the fourth commandment? The fourth commandment is, Remember the Sabbath-day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy man-servant, nor thy maid-servant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath-day, and hallowed it. (Exod. 20:8–11) Day 284
Pray (ACts) Read - Hebrews 11 Message - Scott Woodburn In a recent devotion I made the claim that Adam and Eve were the first members of the church of Jesus Christ. Their son Abel was also a man of faith and even though he died at his brother's hand, he will one day stand again upon this earth. The covenant of grace did not begin with the coming of Christ just as the church did not begin at pentecost. As we read Hebrews 11 two words constantly jump out as the apostle discusses Old Testament believers.."by faith". From Abel (v4) to the unnamed saints of the final verses the passage is clear, that all of them found their commendation (the favour of God) by faith (v39). Certainly Christ had not yet taken on flesh but He was on His way and the saved in the Old Testament looked forward to His arrival. In the Old Testament, the covenant of grace was active and effective, yet it was administered differently than today. Back then it was administered by promises, prophecies, sacrifices, circumcision, the passover lamb, and other types and ordinances. All of these pointed forward to the Christ who was to come. Paul speaks of the baptism of those who followed Moses and the fact that such men and women drank from the spiritual Rock who was Christ (1 Corinthians 10v1-4). There is a unity among God's people. We are not divided between Old and New Testament, instead we are united by the covenant of grace. As the Gospel was proclaimed to the nations and Jew and Gentile alike came to know Christ as their Saviour, there was great tension within the church. Even Peter was dragged into the controversy and would refuse to eat with Gentile Christians when Jewish Christians were present (Galatians 2v11-12). Should Christians follow the practices of the Old Testament? Paul's answer was no. Such conduct would not be in step with the Gospel (Galatians 2v14). Christ has come and everything has changed. The types, signs and shadows have found their substance in Jesus (Colossians 2v17). Gentiles may have at one time been separated from Christ (Ephesians 2v12) but that is no longer the case. Christ is the peace of His people (Ephesians 2v14) and has reconciled both Jew and Gentile to God by His cross (Ephesians 2v16). If anyone has ever been saved, it is by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. The covenant of grace stretches from Eden to this present day, from Adam and Eve to the last person who will ever be saved. One church for whom Christ died. Men and women from every corner of this world and all of them, every single one, a recipient of the unrivalled and unparalleled grace of God. Pray (acTS) Sing WSC Q56 What is the reason annexed to the third commandment? The reason annexed to the third commandment is, that however the breakers of this commandment may escape punishment from men, yet the Lord our God will not suffer them to escape his righteous judgment. Day 283
Pray (ACts) Read - Exodus 1:15-21 - James 1:2-4 Message - Alan Burke God in his providence had led his people to Egypt and he had allowed a new king to rule in Egypt. This king, pharaoh was the tool of Satan, he enslaved the people of God, made their lives bitter, filled with hard service, treating them ruthlessly didn’t have its desired effect, they continued to multiply and now pharaoh told the Hebrew midwives that if a Hebrew woman gave brith to a boy that he should be killed (14). These were days of darkness that none of us can comprehend and all of this was part of a spiritual battle that was first displayed in the garden of Eden, when Satan in the form of a serpent appeared and tempted Adam and Eve to disobey God and fall into sin. Yet in the midst of all the hardships and the opposition that the people faced, we learn of two of the many midwives that there would have been, these two are singled out as the representative leaders of the rest. They are singled out because although they were instructed to carry out the plan of Pharoah, to dispatch the sons of the Hebrews they did not. For the simple reason that they feared God (17). Shiphrah and Puah made a stand against the most powerful man in the world, a man who had the power to kill them where they stood and they did so to defend the rights of the children then helped to deliver. For Shiphrah and Puah knew that by what ever way that they tried to justify it, what ever name they would call it, if they did what pharaoh commanded them to do they would have murdered an image bearer of God. These midwives show that fearing God means obeying him even when it means suffering and danger. That may be not something you really want to hear today but it is the cost of being a child of God through Christ Jesus. Sooner or later, we will be forced to make a stand, whether we fear God of man. We will all face choices and we choose either one way or the other to fear God or fear man. Here (22) Pharaoh in his anger he decreed that the to all his people: “Every boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live.” His attempts were futile, for God was at work in the midst of it all. God was faithful to his people in what they were facing, although they were oppressed and suffering God had promised that they would become a mighty nation. That is why the Lord God told Jacob not to be afraid to go to Egypt (Gen 46:3). God by his power had led hid people into Egypt, and he would lead them out, it was only in the years that followed would his people understand what God had done in spite of their suffering, for he had made them a people in their own right (Ps 105:23-38), Exodus begins with the stark reality of the suffering of God’s people, they are a people who as the opening verse reminds us are a people that are chosen by God, they are known by name and individually numbered, God knew and knows each one of his people, we also know that they were there by God’s divine plan, purposes and promise. God had not sent his people to Egypt as a punishment that was a result of their sin, rather God was using it to begin glory to himself, it was to glorify himself, to increase their faith, so that he would gain glory over pharaoh and his army, so that they would know that he is the Lord and greatly to be feared above all gods (Ex 14:10-15, 31). Why God allows us to face trials and temptations, well we need to turn to the book of James, for James as he writes to God’s people, the twelve tribes of the dispersion, identifying the church of Jesus Christ as the true Israel. And what does he say… 2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, 3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. 4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. (Ja 1:2-4). Pray (acTS) Sing WSC Q54 What is required in the third commandment?The third commandment requireth the holy and reverent use of God’ s names, (Matt. 6:9, Deut. 28:58) titles, (Ps. 68:4) attributes, (Rev. 15:3–4) ordinances, (Mal. 1:11,14) Word, (Ps. 138:1–2) and works. (Job 36:24) |
Alan
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