Devotional messages written by Peter for Seeds of the Kingdom from Ellel Ministries
“The people who do know their God will be strong and do exploits.”Daniel 11:32, NIVThere are three key phrases in our Scripture for today – ‘know their God’, ‘will be strong’ and ‘do exploits’. These are the action words which draw us into supernatural…
Daniel 11:32, NIV
“The people who do know their God will be strong and do exploits.”
There are three key phrases in our Scripture for today – ‘know their God’, ‘will be strong’ and ‘do exploits’. These are the action words which draw us into supernatural involvement with Father God. There is a divine logic about the sequence which teaches us a profound lesson about the protocol of God.
First we have to know Him – and that doesn’t just mean know who he is. It means to be in a close relationship with Him – to understand His heart, recognise His voice and be happy to walk in His ways. Unless we have come to that place in God we will not know what it is that God is calling us to be or to do.
But once we know Him like this, we know that what God calls us to do as we follow Him is what He will enable us to do also. So there is no need to fear or doubt. And when we have reached that place of confidence in Him, we will be strong – in fact so strong that nothing can stand in the way of His purposes being fulfilled.
And the result will be that we will do exploits – amazing things that only God could have prepared for us in advance, as Paul expressed it in his letter to the Philippians. I pray that as you seek to know Him better, you will get excited at the prospect of doing exploits for Him. Then one day you will look back at the journey you have been on and be amazed at what God has done.
Prayer: Thank You, Lord, that You are still in the business of calling people like Daniel to be strong and do exploits for the Kingdom of God. Help me to keep my eyes always open to see what You are doing and my ears always alert to listen to what You are saying, so that I will know what it is that You want me to do next for You. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
“Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil.”John 4:1, NIVLife is not always easy. Everything doesn’t always fall nicely into place and there are seasons in life when it seems as though God has withdrawn His presence. T…
John 4:1, NIV
“Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil.”
Life is not always easy. Everything doesn’t always fall nicely into place and there are seasons in life when it seems as though God has withdrawn His presence. Times when we have been walking on with God in obedience and fellowship with Him when, suddenly, it seems as though the Lord has led us into a desert place – a place where God has desert-ed us!
It must have seemed like that for Jesus when, just after the most extraordinary and supernatural manifestation of the Father’s presence and power, following His baptism by John the Baptist, He suddenly found Himself being led into a spiritually hostile place by the same Spirit who took Him down into those baptismal waters.
It’s easy to love and obey God when you are in the middle of a wonderful spiritual season of blessing, when you are so aware of the Lord’s presence. But how do we cope when the circumstances around us are very different and even hostile? Do we still choose to walk in obedience to God because we love Him or do we turn to other things to comfort ourselves in tough times – be it some form of self-indulgence, wrong relationships or whatever?
In His wilderness experience the devil offered Jesus bread from stones, followers through spiritual performances and, ultimately, the world without sacrifice. Jesus persevered for forty days, faced with constant temptation – but at no time did He indulge himself. He consistently chose to obey His Father God, even though there was no obvious evidence of His presence. This was Jesus’ test – and He came through it without succumbing to the devil’s temptations. The wonderful evidence of Scripture is that Jesus came back from this wilderness experience in the power of the Spirit and began His work.
God sometimes tests our hearts also – how will we respond when it seems as though we are in a desert? Will we still love and obey the Lord – and come out the other side even stronger than before!
Prayer: Help me, Jesus, to learn from the way You faced a season of testing. Give me, I pray, the courage to keep on loving and obeying you, even when I’m going through tough times. Freshly empower me with Your Spirit so that I will always want to walk in Your footsteps and not step out of the Way You have set before me. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Psalm 56:3,4, NIV
“When I am afraid I will trust in You. In God, whose word I praise, in God I trust, I will not be afraid.”
A new foot-bridge was recently opened in China – it spans a deep gorge and is hundreds of metres long. But it’s different from most bridges – its flooring is made of glass! There is a natural reticence to trust that a floor you can see through is safe to walk on. So, in an opening display designed to give people confidence that the foot-bridge was safe, they drove a car full of passengers across it. No need to be afraid, if it will take a car it will take you! The bridge is safe – you can trust it.
David, the psalmist, had learned in many situations that God could be trusted. If God could enable him to kill Goliath with a stone from his sling, then what reason did he have to be afraid of his enemies? God could surely be trusted in all situations. We can look at hundreds of stories in the Scriptures in which God has acted on behalf of his people and been with them in difficult or lonely situations. We can therefore say with confidence that this God, the God whom I love and serve, has demonstrated his faithfulness to others and, therefore, I CAN trust Him and will NOT be afraid.
I was once faced with a dreadful situation in which a man motivated by evil was threatening my life. I will never forget the miraculous way in which God protected me. I know I can trust Him to be my deliverer. I will never forget the miraculous way in which God provided the money with which we were able to purchase Ellel Grange back in 1986. I know I can trust Him to be my provider. And I cannot forget the hundreds, no thousands, of times when in ministry situations God has set captives free and healed the broken-hearted. I know that God hears and answers prayer.
So if, today, you are struggling with personal fears, then take courage from the many times in the Scriptures when God delivered His people. Think back to the times when God has been your personal, help, healer or deliverer. Instead of letting the enemy grip your heart with fear, allow the Lord to surround your heart with love and the assurance of His presence in and through the journey of life which you are now on. He is utterly faithful and totally trustworthy.
Prayer: Thank You, Lord, that there is no situation in our lives that you are unaware of. Whatever bridge you are asking us to cross, we know it is safe if You are with us. Help me, Lord, to overcome fear hand in hand with You, by walking forward in confidence that You are my deliverer, my provider and my healer. In Jesus’s name, Amen.
“Each of you is to take up a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites, to serve as a sign among you in the future. When your children ask you, “What do these stones mean?”, tell them that the flow of the Jordan was…
Joshua 4:5-7, NIV
“Each of you is to take up a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites, to serve as a sign among you in the future. When your children ask you, “What do these stones mean?”, tell them that the flow of the Jordan was cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it crossed the Jordan the waters of the Jordan were cut off. These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever.”
When God does something special it needs to be recorded and remembered. For the testimony of what God has done in the past is a reminder to the generations yet to come of the reality of who God is and of His faithfulness to one generation after another. In recent weeks I have been re-reading the book “Charles E. Cowman – Missionary Warrior”. It is the extraordinary story of how one young man determined to trust God – and God alone – for his provision and supply when establishing missions in Japan in the very earliest years of the last century.
The book is written by his wife, Lettie Cowman, who faithfully recorded miracle after miracle that God did in response to their daily obedience to the vision they had been given. Every chapter is filled with ‘piles of memorial stones’ as she not only shares personal testimony to God’s provision but expresses herself with amazing gems of Christian truth that could only have been learned on the sharp end of trust and obedience to God.
As a result of all their experiences of God’s faithfulness, Mrs Cowman wrote “Streams in the Desert”, which for nearly a hundred years now has been one of the most loved, valued and blessed books of daily devotional readings. What she wrote was not just the clever words of a good writer, but the living expression of what had been burnt into her heart.
I will always be grateful for my own parents who regularly told us with enthusiasm and excitement of the things that God had done in their lives. As I grew up I had no reason to doubt the reality of who God is, because I was soaked in the living testimony of day to day Christian reality. Mum and Dad were regularly adding ‘stones’ to the pile of memories that would stand me in good stead throughout my life – and even today freshly impact and challenge my own faith and walk with the Lord.
So may I encourage you to write down the things that God has done in your life and regularly look at this ‘pile of precious stones’, reminding yourself of the goodness of God and His faithfulness – and don’t hesitate to tell the next generation what God has done.
Prayer: Thank You, Lord, for all the evidences of your faithfulness there have been in my life. Help me to take time to remember what You have done and let these things be an encouragement and a challenge to keep being faithful to You for the rest of my days. In Jesus’s Name, Amen.
“This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says, “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.”Isaiah 30:15, NIVGod’s desire is for each one of us to enjoy the inner pe…
Isaiah 30:15, NIV
“This is what the Sovereign Lord, the Holy One of Israel, says, “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it.”
God’s desire is for each one of us to enjoy the inner peace and joy that comes from being at one with Him. And it is the deepest desire and need of man’s heart as well. Without this we are like goldfish trying to survive in a pool full of sharks! Or, as Peter puts it,
“Those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs.”Jonah 2:8,NIVAn idol is anything that we are attached to, devoted to or addicted to that becomes a substitute for a true relationship with the living God. The story of Jonah is…