Reformed Doctrine Daily Devotions

 ²⁴  “Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap;  they have no storeroom nor barn, and yet God feeds them;  how much more valuable you are than the birds!

 ²⁵  “And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life’s span?

 ²⁶  “If then you cannot do even a very little thing, why do you worry about other matters?

 ²⁷  “Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin;  but I tell you, not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these.

 ²⁸  “But if God so clothes the grass in the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, how much more will He clothe you?  You men of little faith!

 ²⁹  “And do not seek what you will eat and what you will drink, and do not keep worrying.

 ³⁰  “For all these things the nations of the world eagerly seek;  but your Father knows that you need these things.

 ³¹  “But seek His kingdom, and these things will be added to you.

 ³²  “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has chosen gladly to give you the kingdom.”  Luke 12:22-32.  (Emphasis added.) 

God reminds us that His provisions are magnificent.  “Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin;  but I tell you, not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these.  “But if God so clothes the grass in the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, how much more will He clothe you?  You men of little faith!”  Luke 12:27-28.

In summary, “He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?”  Romans 8:32.

“¹  Bless the LORD, O my soul,
         And all that is within me, bless His holy name.
    ²  Bless the LORD, O my soul,
         And forget none of His benefits;
    ³  Who pardons all your iniquities,
         Who heals all your diseases;
    ⁴  Who redeems your life from the pit,
         Who crowns you with lovingkindness and compassion;
    ⁵  Who satisfies your years with good things,
         So that your youth is renewed like the eagle.”  Psalm 103:1-5.

 ¹⁶  And He told them a parable, saying, “The land of a rich man was very productive.

 ¹⁷  “And he began reasoning to himself, saying, ‘What shall I do, since I have no place to store my crops?’

 ¹⁸  “Then he said, ‘This is what I will do: I will tear down my barns and build larger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.

 ¹⁹  ‘And I will say to my soul, “Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years to come;  take your ease, eat, drink and be merry.”‘

 ²⁰  “But God said to him, ‘You fool!  This very night your soul is required of you;  and now who will own what you have prepared?’

 ²¹  “So is the man who stores up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.”   Luke 12:15-21.  (Emphasis added.)

How hard it is to not be greedy!

How hard it is to not store up treasures for ourselves!

But, we should be “rich toward God”.

It was interesting to read the following Scriptures which I pulled up with the words “rich” and “God”.  Each verse has its own clear lesson which needs no further explanation. 

Psalm 52:6-8:

“The righteous will see and fear,
         And will laugh at him, saying, 
    “Behold, the man who would not make God his refuge,
         But trusted in the abundance of his riches
         And was strong in his evil desire.” 
    But as for me, I am like a green olive tree in the house of God;
         I trust in the lovingkindness of God forever and ever.”

Ecclesiastes 5:19
“Furthermore, as for every man to whom God has given riches and wealth, He has also empowered him to eat from them and to receive his reward and rejoice in his labor;  this is the gift of God.”

Ecclesiastes 6:1-5:

“There is an evil which I have seen under the sun and it is prevalent among men–a man to whom God has given riches and wealth and honor so that his soul lacks nothing of all that he desires; yet God has not empowered him to eat from them, for a foreigner enjoys them. This is vanity and a severe affliction.  If a man fathers a hundred children and lives many years, however many they be, but his soul is not satisfied with good things and he does not even have a proper burial, then I say, “Better the miscarriage than he, for it comes in futility and goes into obscurity;  and its name is covered in obscurity.  “It never sees the sun and it never knows anything; it is better off than he.”  

 ⁶  “Are not five sparrows sold for two cents?  Yet not one of them is forgotten before God.

 ⁷  “Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered.  Do not fear; you are more valuable than many sparrows.”  Luke 12:4-7.  (Emphasis added.)

There is a natural fear in us of “those who kill the body”.  There also is a natural fear in us of lack of supplies necessary to survive.  Jesus tells us to not fear such things.

However, there is no natural fear of God in us prior to regeneration and God’s other work within us.  “THERE IS NO FEAR OF GOD BEFORE THEIR EYES.”  Romans 3:18.  Jesus tells us to fear God.

The Heidelberg Catechism also starts with comfort but then proceeds to warn us to fear God.

Question 1.  What is thy only comfort in life and death?

Answer.  That I with body and soul, both in life and death, I am not my own, but belong unto my faithful Savior Jesus Christ; who, with his precious blood, hath fully satisfied for all my sins, and delivered me from all the power of the devil; and so preserves me that without the will of my heavenly Father, not a hair can fall from my head; yea, that all things must be subservient to my salvation, and therefore, by his Holy Spirit, he also assures me of eternal life, and makes me sincerely willing and ready, henceforth, to live unto him.

Question 2.  How many things are necessary for thee to know, that thou, enjoying this comfort, mayest live and die happily?

Answer.  Three;  the first, how great my sins and miseries are; the second, how I may be delivered from all my sins and miseries; the third, how I shall express my gratitude to God for such deliverance.

Question 3.  Whence knowest thou thy misery?

Answer.  Out of the law of God.

Question 4.  What doth the law of God require of us?

Answer.  Christ teaches us that briefly, Matt. 22:37-40, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength. This is the first and the great commandment; and the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

Question 5.  Canst thou keep all these things perfectly?

Answer.  In no wise;  for I am prone by nature to hate God and my neighbor.

Question 6.  Did God then create man so wicked and perverse?

Answer.  By no means; but God created man good, and after his own image, in true righteousness and holiness, that he might rightly know God his Creator, heartily love him and live with him in eternal happiness to glorify and praise him.

Question 7.  Whence then proceeds this depravity of human nature?

Answer.  From the fall and disobedience of our first parents, Adam and Eve, in Paradise;  hence our nature is become so corrupt, that we are all conceived and born in sin.

Question 8.   Are we then so corrupt that we are wholly incapable of doing any good, and inclined to all wickedness?

Answer.  Indeed we are;  except that we are regenerated by the Spirit of God.

Question 9.  Doth not God then do injustice to man, by requiring from him in his low, that which he cannot perform?

Answer.  Not at all;  for God made man capable of performing it; but man, by the instigation of the devil, and his own willful disobedience, deprived himself and all his posterity of those divine gifts.

Question 10.  Will God suffer such disobedience and rebellion to go unpunished?

Answer.  By no means;  but is terribly displeased with our original was well as actual sins; and will punish them in his just judgment temporally and eternally, and he hath declared, “Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things, which are written in the book of the law, to do them.”

Question 11.  Is not God then also merciful?

Answer.  God is indeed merciful, but also just;  therefore his justice requires, that sin which is committed against the most high majesty of God, be also punished with extreme, that is, with everlasting punishment of body and soul. 

(Emphasis added.)

So, yes, fear God!  But, there is hope.  The next part of The Heidelberg Catechism teaches us about “Man’s Deliverance” by God starting with Question and Answer 12 – Click here: The Heidelberg Catechism

 ³  “Accordingly, whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered in the inner rooms will be proclaimed upon the housetops.”  Luke 12:1-3.  (Emphasis added.)

“Hypocrisy” is defined as “a feigning (pretending) to be what one is not or to believe what one does not” to give “an appearance of virtue or religion”.  Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary.  (Parenthetical synonym is Bill’s).

“Leaven” is defined by Scripture.  “Then they understood that He did not say to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”  Matthew 16:12

Thus, putting it together, the lesson for us today is to beware of teachings which the teacher really does not believe but which that teacher teaches to give an appearance of virtue or religion.

When we think about it, all or most of us have heard someone say something that we perceive that they really don’t believe but that they feel they have to say it in order to give an appearance of virtue or religion. 

When we compare the conclusion, climax, or summary of a sermon with minor points made through the sermon, we may be able to detect an inconsistency.  It seems as if the preacher or teacher is teaching that minor point to defend himself “as orthodox” in case he is later challenged.

The comfort of this Scripture is that they are not going to get away with the deception.  “But there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known.”  Luke 12:2.

These teachers think that they are more clever and more deceptive than they really are.  “But they will not make further progress;  for their folly will be obvious to all, just as Jannes’s and Jambres’s folly was also.”  2 Timothy 3:9.

The whole Chapter of 2 Timothy 3 provides a fitting summary and conclusion to warn us and to protect us and to equip us and to comfort us.  We are reminded of the importance of Scripture to help us detect such hypocrites and to give us “the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus” and to equip us “for every good work”.     

^“1  But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come.

 ²  For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy,

 ³  unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good,

 ⁴  treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God,

 ⁵  holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power;  Avoid such men as these.

 ⁶  For among them are those who enter into households and captivate weak women weighed down with sins, led on by various impulses,

 ⁷  always learning and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.

 ⁸  Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men of depraved mind, rejected in regard to the faith.

 ⁹  But they will not make further progress; for their folly will be obvious to all, just as Jannes’s and Jambres’s folly was also.

 ¹⁰  Now you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, perseverance,

 ¹¹  persecutions, and sufferings, such as happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium and at Lystra;  what persecutions I endured, and out of them all the Lord rescued me!

 ¹²  Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.

 ¹³  But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.

 ¹⁴  You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them,

 ¹⁵  and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.

 ¹⁶  All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness;

 ¹⁷  so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.”  2 Timothy 3:1-17 (the whole chapter).

 ⁴⁶  But He said, “Woe to you lawyers as well!  For you weigh men down with burdens hard to bear, while you yourselves will not even touch the burdens with one of your fingers.”  Luke 11:45-46. 

Jesus said: “Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.  Take My yoke upon you, and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart; and YOU SHALL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS.  For My yoke is easy, and My load is light”. Matthew 11:28-29.

What is a yoke?  According to Oxford American Dictionary, published in 1980 by Oxford University Press, a yoke is a “wooden crosspiece”.  It is a foundation for pulling or work.

After reading this definition of yoke, I thought of the cross.  The cross is a wooden crosspiece that was fastened to Christ as a foundation for His work of carrying away our sins.  The yoke that Christ endured was the cross, but the yoke that Christ give us is His Spirit.

The lawyers lay legal burdens upon legal burdens upon the people, weighing men down with burdens hard to bear, while they themselves were not even willing to touch the burdens with one of their fingers.

In sharp contrast, Christ tied up the heavy loads of the law and laid them on His own shoulders and gave us His Spirit as a yoke: “in order that the requirement of the Law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit”.  Romans 8:4.

Isaiah 58:6:
“Is this not the fast which I choose, To loosen the bonds of wickedness, To undo the bands of the yoke, And to let the oppressed go free And break every yoke?”

 ³⁹  But the Lord said to him, “Now you Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and of the platter;  but inside of you, you are full of robbery and wickedness.

 ⁴⁰  “You foolish ones, did not He who made the outside make the inside also?

 ⁴¹  “But give that which is within as charity, and then all things are clean for you.”  Luke 11:37-41.  Emphasis added.

The Pharisees were primarily concerned with appearances (the outside), and so are many of us today.  We think we can hide the wickedness inside us if we just look good on the outside.  But, Jesus was very direct about the inside condition of the Pharisees:  “you are full of robbery and wickedness”. 

Jesus commands us to focus on the inside of us and do good (charity), and He will take care of the cleaning of us, inside and outside.  

God made the inside of us.  God made the outside of us.  God can and does clean the inside of us.  God can and does clean the outside of us.

I quoted Ephesians 5:1-17 last week.  Part of the reason why I quoted this Scripture was to remind me of what was included in verse 4:  “and there must be no filthiness and silly talk, or coarse jesting, which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks.”  I had felt immediately guilty after something that I had said, and I wanted to remind myself of these words.  In a sense, I felt dirty on the outside, and I wanted to make sure that I did not talk like that again.  

The Scripture for today came to me as a cleansing and refreshing shower.   “You foolish ones, did not He who made the outside make the inside also?  God can and does clean the inside of us.  God can and does clean the outside of us.  Hallelujah!  Praise God!!!

Christ gave Himself to us, His bride, His church:  “so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word,”  Ephesians 5:26

P.S.  Before I forget, this morning, I came across Isaiah 45:11 which I had not remembered and about which I want to write this Postscript:  “Thus says the LORD, the Holy One of Israel, and his Maker:  “Ask Me about the things to come concerning My sons, And you shall commit to Me the work of My hands.”  Isaiah 45:11.  We need to talk more and write more about God’s grace to us, His sons.