Hebrews 4:12 – For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.
The Daily Nugget is a weekday devotional written by Pastor Jim Sole. We hope you find encouragement, guidance, and conviction unto holiness through the scriptures and commentary.
In today’s scripture, we see the deity of Jesus doing a miraculous work of feeding thousands of people with about enough for maybe a family of four, if they are not starving. But don’t allow the miraculous physically cause us to miss an important lesson spiritually. Jesus displays His power and the people displayed action to His power; they ate. The food would have meant nothing if they didn’t do their part in the miracle.
It might seem a bit odd to have an unsaved king be an example of living out the Christian life. I have not discovered a book titled, “The Christian Life” written by King Herod. Yet, in today’s scripture, we find this wicked ruler illustrating the reality of the Christian life. He does so, not by his personal experience of walking with Christ for he lacked faith in Him. He does so by showing us what occurs in the inner life of a Christian – conflict.
It may seem like a “no brainer” question – “Why walk with God?”, but the only people who would see this question as obvious are those in the minority who do strive to walk with Him. Look around the world, even our own little worlds. Most people don’t walk with Him. In fact, most people don’t even think about God. Now before we are tempted to think the answers are so obvious as to why walk with God, let’s allow a little humility to settle into our hearts and minds.
As one reads today’s scripture and enters the scene between Jesus and His disciples, it isn’t difficult to determine why the disciples asked Jesus, “Lord, teach us to pray.” It isn’t that they had never prayed. But look when their request occurred. It was right after they heard Jesus pray. It makes perfect sense to ask, “Lord, teach us to pray” after hearing Him pray.
The Christian life is filled with many spiritual dangers. Not a day goes by we are not confronted with spiritual foes seeking our destruction. It is an unwise and ill-prepared Christian who simply rushes into each day oblivious to this reality. And the evil tactics of our foes are many, subtle, well-crafted, and easily trip us up.
I like going through cemeteries. My calling as a pastor takes me into them often but I go there regardless. It is an interesting and helpful place for me to visit for two reasons. First, it reminds me of the brevity of life. Unless Christ returns, I, too, will soon occupy a place in the ground in a cemetery. Walking through one awakens me to reality that I am going to die and such awareness should move me to live each day to its fullest as if it were my last. It could be.