Daily Devotion for September 12, 2017
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.
I told Jesus be alright if you changed, changed my name.
I told Jesus be alright be alright be alright,
I told Jesus be alright if you change my name,
If you change my name.
Then he told me, he said the world will turn away from you child,
if I change your name.
Yes he told me, said the world will turn away from you child,
if I change your name.
I told Jesus be alright be alright be alright,
I told Jesus be alright if you change my name.
Then he told me, he said your father won't know you child,
if I change your name.
Yes he told me, said your mother won't know you child,
child if I change your name.
But I told Jesus, I said it would be alright, be alright, be alright,
If my father turns away now, and my mother turn away now,
Yes my brother, my baby sister, turn away, turn away.
I told Jesus be alright, if you change my name.
Prayer for the Morning
Father, as I face this new day, let me be aware of the work you have done for me as I slept. I praise you that your loving care never slumbers, but has been with me while I was least aware of it; and that you renew me and the whole world, fresh every day, preparing your plans for me.
I pray that I may seek your will this day, your plan for my life, and carry out your plan in my every action. I lay my hopes and fears on an altar before you, that your Holy Spirit may guide my hopes toward the light of your holiness, and may quiet my fears with the knowledge of your infinite peace, in total confidence that your grace will save me from the evils of this world. In Jesus' name I pray,
For Forgiveness Among Fellow Christians
Teach me, O Lord, to act so that all my deeds will glorify your holy name and your wonderful creation. Take pity, O Lord, on all Christians. Hear the desires of all who cry out to you, and deliver them from evil. Send them comfort in distress, consolation in sorrows, and your holy mercy to forgive their misdeeds.
I especially pray for those who have in any way insulted, abused or aggrieved me. Do not punish them for the sake of me, a sinner; but pour your mercy upon them. I also pray to you for all those whom I, a sinner, have insulted or tempted in word, deed, thought, whether knowingly or without intending or realizing I had done so. O Lord God, forgive us our sins and offenses and insults against each other. Dispel from our hearts all indignation, suspicion, anger, remembrance of evil, quarrels, and all that might hinder and lessen brotherly love. Replace resentment with forgiveness, I pray, in the name of Christ.
Benediction
If you are with me, O God, who can be against me? For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate me from the love of God in Christ Jesus my Lord.
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.
Today’s “Remember the Bible” Question
What Bible verse tells us to boast in our weakness, so the power of Christ may rest upon us?
Proverbs 17:5 (NKJV)
he who is glad at calamity will not go unpunished.
Genesis 46:8-26 (abridged)(ESV)
Joseph Brings His Family to Egypt
Now these are the names of the descendants of Israel, who came into Egypt, Jacob and his sons. Reuben, Jacob’s firstborn, and the sons of Reuben: Hanoch, Pallu, Hezron, and Carmi. [Names of Jacob’s other eleven sons and their children.]
All the persons belonging to Jacob who came into Egypt, who were his own descendants, not including Jacob’s sons’ wives, were sixty-six persons in all. And the sons of Joseph, who were born to him in Egypt, were two. All the persons of the house of Jacob who came into Egypt were seventy.
Notes on the Scripture
These verses of Genesis 46 comprise a detailed roster of all the male (and some of the female) Israelites who entered Egypt. These were truly the “Israelites” now, that is, the bloodline descendants of Israel (Jacob), and so they have been called ever since.
he need for this detailed genealogy is to establish — for a period of over 3000 years — one’s legitimate claim to the birthright of Abraham’s descendants. Judaism is racial as well as religious, and one’s right to participate in the old covenant with God was (and, according to Judaism, still is) determined by one’s ability to trace one’s lineage to one of the twelve sons of Jacob. (The Jews make the lineage of the kings and queens of England look recent, and the Mayflower Society like utter arrivistes!)
The date when the Jews entered Egypt is difficult to place. Neither Potiphar nor Joseph appear in Egyptian records (or anywhere else outside the Bible). On the Jewish calendar, Joseph was purchased in the year 2216, which is 1544 BC. The difficulties in establishing the time frame drives scholars to distraction, and gives rise to periodic claims that none of it even happened.
But of every hard fact in the Old Testament, this might be the most credible, even to a person who is not a believer, due to the extraordinary detail of the record. It is, in fact, one of the most extraordinary ancient historical documents in existence; there really is nothing else like this part of Genesis, for it records the detailed events of a group of people who were, at the time, simply and completely inconsequential.
They were a small band of nomads and herders of cattle and sheep, an occupation contemptible in the eyes of the Egyptians. The Pharaoh’s granting them the right to graze a bit of land would have been a minor two-minute formality in the boring routine of the court. It was one of a million moments in ancient history, of no more importance to the great world than a drop of water flowing into the Mediterranean.
