January 25, 2012
Today’s Text: Read Matthew 6:9-13
“Give us this day…bread”– Without refrigeration and without as many resources as we have today, a person in that time could not store food as we can today. Often they would only have enough money to get them food for that day. Of course there were exceptions, but this part of the prayer reflects the idea that we should be dependant for God’s provisions on a daily basis. For many of us this may not look like praying to God for our next meal because we don’t know where it will come from, but it does look like recognizing that what we have comes from Him and that He gives us what we have as a gracious gift. Dependence.
“forgive us our debts…debtors”- We must also recognize our status with God as being indebted to Him. We could never ‘pay Him back’ for what He has done for us. In fact, He has payed the sin-debt that we owe by dying on the cross. Even still, when we sin, we sin against God and should ask for His forgiveness so that we may stay clean and close to Him. In recognizing what God has done for us, we also must learn to forgive those who have sinned against us. In fact, Jesus says that God should forgive us “as” or in the same way that we forgive those who wrong us. Forgiveness.
“lead us not….amen”- The last part of this prayer requests of God that we should not be lead into temptation, and that we should be delivered from evil. He is able to ask that prayer to God because God is the one who can answer it! Why? Because “Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.” Ultimately everything will be to the glory and honor of God and not exclusively for our honor and glory. We should live for His glory first. Glory.
Application:
Dependence– As God observes your life, would He say that your attitude reflects that you depend on Him or on yourself?
Forgiveness– As we recognize the goodness and forgiveness that God has given to us, we should be motivated to do good and forgive even those who do us wrong. Is there someone you need to forgive today?
Glory– Ultimately it’s all about God’s glory and not ours. Are you concerned with God getting the glory in your life?
Study the Scriptures with Ben Jennings 
Dependence- I would say that i depend on god because depending on my self won’t get me anywhere and I depended on god in the beginning so it would make no sense if I stoped.
Forgiveness- I forgive people easily and there isnt anyone that I need to forgive because I already forgave her and I’m good now! 🙂
Glory- I used to be concerned about god getting the glory and making all the decisions in my life but then when I got saved and got alittle help it all became clear that god getting all the glory is a good thing and him making all the descions in my life is a good thing to because he knows everything and he knows me better then me!! 🙂 🙂
Mafalda- Thank you for your faithfulness on here. I’m so glad to see you on here everyday. Keep growing girl!
My daily life would not reflect total dependence on God. I sometimes depend on Him, and most of the time I forget to do that and i depend on my own strength. Forgiveness seems like an easy concept. We were given the most awesome gift when Jesus died on the cross for our sins. Our debt was forgiven. So why can forgiveness sometimes be easy and sometimes be difficult? I think it depends on the severity of the issue at hand. If a friend talks behind your back and you find out, but that person comes to you and sincerely apologizes its pretty easy to forgive. But lets say you are the mother of a child killed by a drunk driver who you knew. All of a sudden forgiveness becomes harder. I have had to forgive someone in my life fairly recently and it was difficult to do and didn’t happen overnight. It is important for my relationship with God to forgive and not have bitterness in my heart. However, forgiveness doesn’t always mean reconciliation. Using the above example, the mother of a child killed by someone she knew in a drunk driving accident can forgive, but it doesn’t mean she is planning on inviting the driver to dinner any time soon. If God can forgive me of all my sins: past, present and future, certainly I can forgive others who wrong me. Without God I would not even be here. So I should give Him the glory and honor for anything good that comes out of me in my life. What ever gifts He has given me are not of my own doing. I need to humble myself and recognize that God deserves all the credit for any thing good I may do. I think when we give proper credit to God for all we have and do, keeps us from getting too full of ourselves. If we ask God for help in these areas with sincerity, then He will honor that, and the above three questions should be easier to do.
Wow Laura- That was an incredible example. That would be such a difficult circumstance to try and forgive in. That being said, Jesus’ example of forgiveness and Him working in us is probably the only way that we could forgive in a situation like that.
Depending on God for everything can be a little scary because I like to be in control, but that is where faith comes in.
Forgiving people can be extremely hard because the natural reaction is that we want to get even and return the favor. That is not what we are called to do, We are the ultimate offenders and God still loves us enough that know matter how many times we mess up He is still willing to forgive us. That is an amazing example He has set.
So many times when we do something we can kind of get full of ourselves and we can put ourselves on a pedistal. The one that we should be giving the praise to is God, I think Tim Tebow is a great example because win or lose he still gives praise and glory to God.
With my brother I learned the natural inclination to hit back when I am hit. We prefer to get back over forgiving. You’re right though about God’s example. Good stuff Ryan.
Go TEBOW!
This is just an awesome devotion today it’s saying that we need to give all the glory to God because every thing I have is a gift from God the clothes my home my family everything that’s just awesome to think about. And my attitude does not always depend on God and it really should so that’s something i’m gonna work on. And at the momment I don’t really need to forgive any body no one has really done any thing to me but if some one does hurt me in any way the first thing that will come to my mind is to forgive them.
Good stuff Blake!
I do depend on God a lot, but reading this I realize that even though I depend on Him a lot, I still don’t depend on Him on a daily basis. It’s easy to forget to include this in my prayers because I already have everything I need, but all of it came from God and He could literally take it all away at any moment. Another word for depend is rely. When I think about it this way, I rely on myself way more than God! And that’s a bad thing. Everything comes from God and I need to be depending on Him more!
C.S. Lewis once said “To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.” I totally agree with this! I’ve always had a hard time letting go when someone has hurt me, and an even harder time forgiving them! I’ll always think “what they did is unforgivable.” but really, how many times have I done something unforgivable?! I’ve done it many times. God sent His only Son to die on the cross just to pay for all of the sins I’ve committed. But on top of that each and every time I sin, God forgives me. No matter how big or little the sin is, because He loves me that much. I know if I was in God’s place, I don’t think I would be able to do that! But if you think about it, God did soo much for me when I didn’t deserve one bit of it, and even if someone doesn’t deserve to be forgiven we should forgive them anyways because it’s what God would do. (more like what He’s already done.) My sins are just as bad as the person I think “doesn’t deserve forgiveness.” It’s taken me a long time to get to this, I’ve made so many mistakes because of not forgiving people, and I still don’t like forgiving people. But if God can forgive me, than I can forgive others too!
I’ll be honest.. When I do something good, I like to get credit for it. It’s always nice to be appreciated. But ultimately God needs to have all the glory. Not just half, like He gets some and I get some, He gets all of it! I used to think that was okay, as long as God got a little glory He’d be happy right?! Not really, because then I’m thinking about myself more than God and not giving Him what He asked me to give Him, ALL the glory. God is the creator of everything and He deserves all the glory!
Dependence- i deff depend on God rather than myself.i really wouldn’t get anywhere if i depended on myself.im with alexis.i depend on God,but not always on a daily basis.i also like what she said,everything comes from God and i really need to be depending on him more.
Forgiveness- i don’t think i need to forgive anybody right now.there has been people in the past even some from church but not right now.except for today cause i forgave this girl so now im better 🙂 hehe
Glory- right now im kinda between God’s glory and my glory.but most of the time its God’s glory.because i know he makes the decisions and he knows WAY WAY better than me.but sometimes,its like i want to control everything and make the decisions and know better than any one else.its DEFF not good to do that.i really need to stop doing that.i need to let GOD’S glory be in me.not mine.
sorry i wasn’t on the past few days.been pretty busy.btw,i have a few prayer requests….
1: im kinda sick so i won’t be there tonite 😦
2: my mom has been sick for a while so pray her and i will feel better soon!! love ya guys thanks! 🙂
Missed you tonight! Hope you and your mom feel better 🙂