Daily Devotion for June 26, 2015
Prayers
Scripture
Lord's Prayer
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.
Gordon Mote, who was born blind, gives thanks for his blessings. With Jason Crabb.
Puritan Prayer to be Free of Carnal Sin
O ever watchful Shepherd, lead, guide, and tend me this day; without Your restraining rod I err and stray. Hedge up my path lest I wander into unwholesome pleasure, and drink its poisonous streams; direct my feet that I be not entangled in Satan's secret snares, nor fall into his hidden traps.
Defend me from assailing foes, from evil circumstances, from myself. My adversaries are part and parcel of my own nature; they cling to me as my very skin; I cannot escape their contact. In my rising up and sitting down they cause me pain; they entice with constant baits; my enemy is within the citadel. Come with almighty power and cast him out, pierce him to death, and abolish in me every particle of carnal life this day.
Prayer on a Summer Day
Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers today;
And give us not to think so far away
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here
All simply in the springing of the year.
from A Prayer in Spring by Robert Frost
Meditation
[“Hedge up my path.”]
Benediction
The blessing of the Lord rest and remain upon all his people, in every land, of every tongue; the Lord meet in mercy all that seek him; the Lord comfort all who suffer and mourn; the Lord hasten his coming, and give us, his people, the blessing of peace, this day and always.
Think of the day ahead in terms of God with you, and visualize health, strength, guidance, purity, calm confidence, and victory as the gifts of His presence.
On Self
A rejection, or in Scripture’s strong language, a crucifixion of the natural self is the passport to everlasting life. Nothing that has not died will be resurrected.
~ C. S. Lewis, from The Weight of Glory
Galatians 5:19-21 (DP Bible)
Desires of the Flesh (Galatians #63)
19-21, 26 You know perfectly well what I mean when I speak of indulging the “desires of the flesh”: such things as sexual immorality, impurity of mind, sensuality, worship of false gods, witchcraft, hatred, quarrelling, jealousy, bad temper, rivalry, factionalism, carousing, envy, drunkenness, orgies and things like that. None of us should be ambitious for our own reputation, or seek our own glory, or indulge our vanity; such motives just make us jealous of one another. As I have told you before, those who indulge the desires of the flesh will never inherit God’s kingdom.
Verbatim Bible
19 Now, evident is the works of the flesh, which wGreek has a peculiar relative pronoun that infers a class; it is used in this phrase, so the literal form, “which is”, really means something closer to “which includes”. is fornication, uncleanness xOr impurity; the word used is a Semitic equivalent, i.e. the Jewish term for “unclean” in the legal sense., indecent conduct,
20 idolatry, making potions yOr sorcery. The literal word, close to “pharmaceutics”, might be cleverly used to mention drug addiction or dealing, although that is not what is meant. , hostilities, rivalry zOr strife., jealousy, angry outbursts, selfish ambition, factionalism, dogma,
21 envyings aaMany sources differentiate this word, translated “envy” or “coveting”, from the word in v. 20 translated “jealousy”, in that it includes or requires taking something away from someone else, rather than simply wanting to have a similar item, status, etc. Jealousy is more associated with pride., drunkeness, carousing, and similar things, which I forewarn bbExt. of the more literal foretell. to you just as I forewarned that those the such things practicing kingdom of god not will inherit.
Notes on the Scripture
Lest there be any mistake, Paul describes the kind of conduct that constitutes “desires of the flesh”. We have given the Verbatim Bible as the second translation today, because it emphasizes an important point (and, also, we can have some fun examining more closely exactly what each of these fleshly sins means, in Greek).
Paul does not mean any of these sins to be a commandment not to commit that specific sin. For those of us who have been out of high school more than a few years (haha), a “relative pronoun” is a word like which, who, what, etc., used to introduce a clause (a “relative clause”) that tells us something about a noun or pronoun preceding it. In the phrase, “desires of the flesh, which are sexual immorality, . . .” the word which is the relative pronoun.
reek has a peculiar relative pronoun that English does not have. Try to imagine “whichever” used as a relative pronoun: “the desires of the flesh, whichever are sexual immorality, . . . ” It signifies that Paul is not making a list of the desires of the flesh, but giving examples. If we have received the Holy Spirit and are attempting to follow it (or Him), we will not need to quibble about what is and is not sinful. We do not need to see it on a list. It does not have to be specifically prohibited in the Bible, New or Old Testament, for us to know it is contrary to the life in the Spirit and avoid it!
I have seen almost every concept in the Bible picked to pieces by commentators who want the Bible to say what they want it to say, not what it says. People naturally tend to read the Bible to confirm that their own ideas are correct, not to learn something new and especially not to learn that they are wrong about something. People do not want to hear that something they like, and have convinced themselves is right, is neither right nor even permissible.
I don't want to pick on homosexuality, but “discovering” that the Bible does not forbid homosexual activity is a growth industry right now. This has spawned a number of gay apologists, whose methodology is to go through the New Testament and show that, wherever homosexuality is mentioned as a sin, it can be translated to mean something else.
But there is a fatal flaw to their logic, which is that God doesn’t care about their arguments. One cannot believe he has solved a Rubik’s cube by becoming color blind.
A person genuinely living in the Spirit will understand and avoid desires of the flesh, which includes every manner of perverted sexual desire (not to mention, abuse of “normal” sexual desire). One does not get to heaven by blinding one’s own Spirit. We may close our eyes or wink at what we consider itty-bitty sins — eating that last slice of pizza when we have had enough, spending too much on a luxury consumer item just to satisfy our vanity, etc., but God is not blind and will not wink. He will forgive sin, but He will not wink at it.
