Daily Devotional For Tuesday, March 25, 2025
Good morning to everyone. We are well on into our week. When I think of the church and Christians, most of my thoughts are pleasant, positive and praiseworthy. Yet, I do have some thoughts that are not. Those thoughts center around when the church and/or Christians are part of an attack on a group of people. It was churches and Christians in the South that advocated and endorsed slavery, racism and prejudice. It was the church and some Christians in Germany during WWII that rounded up Jews and sent them off to be exterminated by the Nazis and Germany in an ethnic holocaust.
But what if the church and Christians in each of these horrible historical situations did just the opposite. What do you think would have been the outcome? Many who thought of themselves as Christians actively participated in the Holocaust; many others remained silent as their Jewish friends and neighbors were driven out of their homes and sent to extermination camps. The Christians of our generation may not have participated in an ethnic cleansing like that, but we have turned a blind eye to a great deal of evil and injustice, such as the abortion of over 63 million babies since 1973 alone.
God’s people really do matter in this world. When we stand up and tell the truth about what God says, evil is held at bay. When we capitulate to the culture, evil flourishes. James didn’t mince words when he wrote this passage in James 1:22, “But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves” (NASB).
James says “Don’t just read your Bible, then close it and walk away,” he said. “Don’t just sit there and hear God’s Word taught and act like it doesn’t apply to you. If you really believe it, you need to act like it. You need to do what it says.” And this applies in so many ways. I see so many people who claim to be Christians living lives that are no different from non-Christians and they do so quite proudly and arrogantly. How do I know this? I see in their social media posts and in their lives. They have no fear of God, no holiness, no godliness, no righteousness (except self-righteousness), and no discipleship. There is no difference and no visible change. To me, their God is dead and so are they spiritually. Take this study below as a mirror of this:
“A medical study reveals just how difficult change is for people. Roughly 600,000 people have heart bypasses a year in America. These people are told after their bypasses that they must change their lifestyle. The heart bypass is a temporary fix. They must change their diet. They must quit smoking and drinking. They must exercise and reduce stress.
In essence, the doctors say, "Change or die." You would think that a near-death experience would forever grab the attention of the patients. You would think they would vote for change. You would think the argument for change is so compelling that the patients would make the appropriate lifestyle alterations. Sadly that is not the case.
Ninety percent of the heart patients do not change. They remain the same, living the status quo. Study after study indicates that two years after heart surgery, the patients have not altered their behavior. Instead of making changes for life, they choose death. Change is that difficult. The majority of the heart patients choose not to change. They act as if they would rather die” (Source: Thom S. Rainer and Eric Geiger, Simple Church , p. 229).
If our old natural hearts do not die to self and for Christ, we are the walking dead spiritually. All these 600,000 people went through a medical procedure to in essence get a new heart. 90% of these heart patients refused to change and in essence chose death. Jesus said this to us in Luke 9:23-25:
“And He was saying to them all, ‘If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me. (24) For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it. (25) For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself?’” (NASB).
The Bible has a lot to say about our heart:
- Proverbs 4:23, “Watch over your heart with all diligence, For from it flow the springs of life” (NASB).
- Proverbs 4:23, “Guard your heart above all else, for it determines the course of your life” (NLT).
- Proverbs 27:19, “As a face is reflected in water, so the heart reflects the real person” (NLT).
- Luke 6:45, Jesus said, “A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say flows from what is in your heart” (NLT).
- Matthew 15:18-19, Jesus said, “But the words you speak come from the heart—that’s what defiles you. (19) For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, slanders” (NLT).
- Mark 7:21-22, Jesus said, “For from within, out of a person’s heart, come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, (22) adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, lustful desires, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness” (NLT).
- Jeremiah 17:9, “The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?” (NLT).
- Luke 21:34, Jesus said, “Watch out! Don’t let your hearts be dulled by carousing and drunkenness, and by the worries of this life. Don’t let that day catch you unaware” (NLT).
I think you get the point here. Our spiritual heart reflects who we really are, not who we say we are or wish people to see who we want them to see. Our hearts are deceitful and determine the course of our lives. We can’t live for Christ until we have been made alive by Christ. What the church needs today are doers of the Word, not just hearers or heretics of the Word.
If we are no different than the rest of the world, how can we convince them that Jesus is the only way, truth and life? How can we convince them that obedience is better than sacrificing our soul and reputation on the altar of peer pressure and conformity? When Christians refuse to believe in biblical values, and when we’re not willing to stand up for them in our homes or the public square, we reject obedience to the authority of Scripture and our assignment to be salt and light.
Questions To Consider:
- As a Christian, have you ever turned “blind eye” to some sin or horrible act? Why?
- Are you a conformist or a transformist agent in this world? Why?
- Are you any different from the 90% of heart patients who do not change their lifestyles? Why?
- When you read all the Scriptures above, which one hits you the hardest and why?
- If you were to die right now and stand before the Judgment Seat of God, in His courtroom, would you be found guilty of being a conformist to our culture or acquitted as a transformist to the Lord Jesus Christ? Why?
Scripture To Meditate On: Romans 12:1-2, “My Christian friends, God has been very kind to us. Because of that, I really want you to serve God with your whole life. Offer your bodies to him like a sacrifice that continues to live. Serve him with everything that you have and that will please him. That is the true way to worship God. (2) Do not become like the people who belong to this world. But let God completely change the way that you think, so that you live differently. Then you will understand what God wants you to do. You will know what is good. You will know what pleases God. You will know what is completely right” (EEB).
Prayer to Pray: “Heavenly Father, forgive me for when I have unresponsively read Your Word. From this day, I choose to honor You by not just reading Your Word but carefully listening to obey its counsel. I want to cooperate with You in such a way that You can trust me to be an effective salt and light for Your purposes. I do not want to be conforming to this world, but a transforming force in it for this world to receive You. In Jesus’ name, Amen!”
I love you Southside!--Pastor Kelly