Hannah - A Woman of Prayer

   ***Attention***  This month's devotional will be the last of the Refreshing Daily in God's Word. Starting in June this blog will have a new exciting format. Stay tuned for the official announcement. 

Bible Reading: I Samuel 1:1-11 and 27

Key Verse: Verse 27 – “For this child I prayed; and the LORD hath given me my petition which I asked of him:”

Key Words: For this child I prayed 

In his book, All the Women of the Bible, Herbert Lockyer says in regard to Hannah’s prayer that it was a prayer of a peculiar kind.  It was a supplication without external speech.  Her lips moved but there was no sound.  Her prayer was internal, and as she spoke thus to herself she created the impression that she was drunk with wine.  She had learned that prayer is the Christian’s native breath, “unuttered or expressed.”  While she never said a prayer, “she breathed a wish in her soul and sent it up unspoken right to the throne of God.  It is a unique experience for the age of the Judges; the piety of Hannah is a ripe flower in an almost sterile field.”

The power and awe of God to answer our prayers is beyond the explanation of words, and then for God to give us the peace and assurance of answered prayer (I Samuel 1:17) – God is indeed gracious!

While Josh McDowell was attending seminary in California, his father went home to be with the Lord.  His mother had died years earlier, but Josh was not sure of her salvation.  He became depressed, thinking that she might be lost.  Was she a Christian or not?  The thought obsessed him.  “Lord,” he prayed, “somehow give me the answer so I can get back to normal.  I’ve just got to know.”  It seemed like an impossible request.

Two days later, Josh drove out to the ocean.  He walked to the end of a pier to be alone.  There sat an old woman in a lawn chair, fishing.  “Where’s your home originally?” she asked.

“Michigan – Union City,” Josh replied.  “Nobody’s heard of it.  I tell people it’s a suburb of ....”  “Battle Creek,” interrupted the woman.  “I had a cousin from there.  Did you know the McDowell family?”

Stunned, Josh responded, “Yes, I’m Josh McDowell!”  “I can’t believe it,” said the woman.  “I’m a cousin to your mother.”  “Do you remember anything at all about my mother’s spiritual life?” asked Josh.  “Why sure – your mom and I were just girls – teenagers – when a tent revival came to town.  It was the fourth night.  We both went forward to accept Christ.”  “Praise God!” shouted Josh, startling the other fishermen. 

                                                                                         Dr. Mike Rouse                                            

What to do: 

            ✞ Fret about nothing, pray about everything.

Ruth - Something Worth Seeing

  ***Attention***  This month's devotional will be the last of the Refreshing Daily in God's Word. Starting in June this blog will have a new exciting format. Stay tuned for the official announcement.

Bible Reading: Ruth 2:1-17   

Key Verse: Verse  2 – “And Ruth the Moabitess said  unto Naomi, Let me now go to the field, and glean ears of corn after him in whose sight I shall find grace. And she said unto her, Go, my daughter.”

Key Words: And Ruth said...let me now go to the field 

The name Ruth means something worth seeing.  As you study the life of Ruth, you begin to understand why.  She was dedicated (she stayed with Naomi), she was obedient (she obeyed Naomi), she was humble (she gleaned in the field).  Indeed, Ruth was something worth seeing.

I have no doubt that Ruth was a beautiful woman to look upon.

Sam Janet wrote in Reader’s Digest, “My wife was grading a science test at home that she had given to her elementary school class and was reading some of the results to me.  The subject was ‘The Human Body,’ and the first question was: ‘Name one of the major functions of the skin.’  One child wrote: ‘To keep people who look at you from throwing up.’”  I doubt that Ruth would cause anyone to throw up.

She undoubtedly was an attractive woman, but even more than her outward beauty, Ruth would have been inwardly beautiful.  The renowned Quaker scholar, Rufus Jones, was speaking of the importance of having a radiant countenance.  After his address, a woman “with an almost unbelievably plain face” came up and asked him what he would do if he had a face like hers.  He replied, “While I have troubles of my own of that kind, I’ve discovered that if you light up from within, any old face you have is good enough.”  This I know, Ruth was lit up inwardly which caused her to glow outwardly.

My prayer today is that God not only would shine in me, but out of me as well.

                                                                                     Dr. Mike Rouse

What to do: 

            ✞ Be dedicated to God.

            ✞ Be obedient to God.

            ✞ Be humble before God.

            ✞ Be a believer worth seeing.

Naomi - A Place of Service

  ***Attention***  This month's devotional will be the last of the Refreshing Daily in God's Word. Starting in June this blog will have a new exciting format. Stay tuned for the official announcement.

Bible Reading: Ruth 1

Key Verse: Verse 20  - “And she said unto them, Call me not Naomi, call me Mara: for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me.”

Key Words: Call me not Naomi, call me Mara 

There are several things we know about Naomi.  First of all, we know her husband’s name was Elimelech.  We know she had two sons, Mahlon and Chilion.   We also know that they moved to Moab because of a famine in Bethlehem.  It was in Moab when her sons met and married wives.  Mahlon married Ruth and Chilion married Orpah.  After the death of her husband and sons, Naomi decided to return to her homeland of Bethlehem.  Ruth made the journey back with Naomi, Orpah decided to stay in her homeland of Moab.

The name Naomi means pleasantness, a delight; and as you read the story of Naomi, she was a delight to at least Ruth, and I am sure to others as well.  But it was not always that way.  We read in Ruth 1:20 where she said, “Call me not Naomi, call me Mara (bitterness).”

As you read Naomi’s story it seems that joy returned as she found a place of service for God through her ministry to Ruth.

Albert Schweitzer was a man willing to abandon a great career in order to serve his fellow man.  In 1913, he sailed for Africa, having turned his back on fame, money and prestige.  His first hospital was an old abandoned hen house and his first operating table an old camp board.  On a trip to the United States, a reporter asked, “Dr. Schweitzer, have you found happiness in Africa?”  “I have found a place of service,” he replied, “and that is enough for anyone.”

                                                                                    Dr. Mike Rouse

What to do: 

            ✞ Be a delight to others; find a place of service for   God.

Deborah - A Picture of Courage

 ***Attention***  This month's devotional will be the last of the Refreshing Daily in God's Word. Starting in June this blog will have a new exciting format. Stay tuned for the official announcement.

Bible Reading: Judges 4

Key Verse: Verse 4 - “And Deborah, a prophetess, the wife of Lapidoth, she judged Israel at that time.”

Key Words:  And Deborah 

Have you ever read the story of Deborah?  She was a prophetess, a wife, and a judge in Israel.  To say she was a leader would be an understatement.

In our text we see Deborah, the warrior.  Deborah led ten thousand warriors into battle against Jabin and the army of Canaan. 

As Deborah and her army arrives at the battlefield, they see Sisera with his nine hundred chariots of iron.  Though they had far inferior equipment, they rose as one when Deborah said, “Up; for this day is the day in which the Lord hath delivered Sisera into thine hand:...” (Judges 4:14), and so it was.  Deborah was indeed a picture of courage, as we all should be.

Now our courage may not be on foreign soil in the heat of battle, it may be on our job or in our community; but we still need to be courageous for God’s glory.

Peter Cartwright, a 19^th-century circuit-riding preacher, was an uncompromising man.  One Sunday morning when he was to preach, he was told that President Andrew Jackson was in the congregation and was warned not to say anything out of line.  When Cartwright stood to preach he said, “I understand that Andrew Jackson is here.  I have been requested to be guarded in my remarks.  Andrew Jackson will go to hell if he doesn’t repent.”  The congregation was shocked and wondered how the President would respond.  After the service, President Jackson shook hands with Peter Cartwright and said, “Sir, if I had a regiment of men like you, I could whip the world.”

Can God count on you to be courageous in the spiritual warfare of today?

                                                                            Dr. Mike Rouse 

What to do: 

            ✞ Ask God to give you the courage to stand daily for righteousness for God’s glory.

Rahab - A Picture of God's Grace

***Attention***  This month's devotional will be the last of the Refreshing Daily in God's Word. Starting in June this blog will have a new exciting format. Stay tuned for the official announcement.

Bible Reading: Joshua 2 and Hebrews 11:31

Key Verse: Verse Hebrews 11:31 - “By faith the harlot Rahab perished not with them that believed not, when she had received the spies with peace.”

Key Words: the harlot Rahab 

The story of Rahab is strange to many.  It presents many moral challenges and difficulties.  It’s really hard to imagine Rahab with her moral life and her life of religious paganism belonging in God’s Hall of Faith.  Commentators have tried to explain away the blot of prostitution from Christ’s lineage insisting that in those days a harlot was actually an innkeeper.  But the truth cannot be ignored, Rahab was a harlot.

Now the Lord’s ways are past finding out.  We are told in Isaiah 55:9, “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

In Matthew 1:5 we find that Rahab is right there in the Messianic lineage.

I believe this is a perfect picture of God’s grace, showing us that salvation is not dependent on human goodness but on God’s grace.

A beggar stopped a lawyer on the street in a large southern city and asked him for a quarter.  Taking a long, hard look into the man’s unshaven face, the attorney asked, “Don’t I know you from somewhere?”  “You should,” came the reply.  “I’m your former classmate.  Remember, second floor, old Main Hall?”  “Why Sam, of course I know you!”  Without further question the lawyer wrote a check for $100.  “Here, take this and get a new start.  I don’t care what’s happened in the past, it’s the future that counts.”  And with that he hurried on.

Tears welled up in the man’s eyes as he walked to a bank nearby.  Stopping at the door, he saw through the glass well-dressed tellers and the spotlessly clean interior.  Then he looked at his filthy rags.  “They won’t take this from me.  They’ll swear that I forged it,” he muttered as he turned away.

The next day the two men met again.  “Why Sam, what did you do with my check?  Gamble it away?  Drink it up?”  “No,” said the beggar as he pulled it out of his dirty shirt pocket and told why he hadn’t cashed it.  “Listen, friend,” said the lawyer.  “What makes that check good is not your clothes or appearance, but my signature.  Go on, cash it!”

The Bible says, “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.”  That promise is a “negotiable note” of infinite value.  And as sinners, all we need to do is “exchange” it by faith for eternal life.  Don’t let the “tattered clothes” of your past keep you from cashing God’s “check” of salvation.

                                                                                      Dr. Mike Rouse

What to do:

            ✞ Accept Christ as your Savior today! 

Miriam - Part 2

***Attention***  This month's devotional will be the last of the Refreshing Daily in God's Word. Starting in June this blog will have a new exciting format. Stay tuned for the official announcement.

Bible Reading: Numbers 12

Key Verse: Verse  8- “And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman  whom he had married: for he had married an Ethiopian woman.”

Key Words: And Miriam ... spake against Moses 

As I study the Word of God, I find it’s a dangerous thing to turn on your family.  For example, Cain turned on Abel and was cursed all the days of his life.  Joseph’s brothers turned on Joseph and went through a horrible famine.  Absalom turned on David and died hanging from an oak tree.  In our text Miriam turns on Moses and as a result, she is smitten with leprosy.

The same can be said for those who turn on their spiritual family as well.  Saul turned on David (as a result of sin) and battled with depression.  Demas turned on Paul and went back into the world.  No doubt he received the world’s reward.  Judas turned on Jesus (and no, I don’t believe Judas was saved) and he went out and hung himself.

It just appears as though to me that turning on your family is a dangerous thing.

The evidence is convincing that the better our relationships are at home, the more effective we are in our careers.  If we’re having difficulty with a loved one, that difficulty will be translated into reduced performance on the job.  In studying the millionaires in America (“U.S. News and World Report”), a picture of a “typical” millionaire is an individual who has worked eight to ten hours a day for thirty years and is still married to his or her high school or college sweetheart.  A New York executive search firm, in a study of 1,365 corporate vice-presidents, discovered that 87% were still married to their one and only spouse and that 92% were raised in two-parent families.  The evidence is overwhelming that the family is the strength and foundation of society.  Strengthen your family ties and you’ll enhance your opportunity to succeed. 

                                                                        Dr. Mike Rouse

What to do:

            ✞ Be a vessel to strengthen your family.  Turning on your family is not a wise or safe thing to do.

Miriam - Part 1 (The Fugitive)

***Attention***  This month's devotional will be the last of the Refreshing Daily in God's Word. Starting in June this blog will have a new exciting format. Stay tuned for the official announcement.

Bible Reading: Exodus 15:20-27

Key Verse: Verse 17 - “And Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand; and all the women went out after her with timbrels and with dances.”

Key Words: And Miriam 

The life of Miriam is a life of spiritual ups and downs.  In Exodus 2, as a young lady we find her obeying her mother and watching over her baby brother, Moses, as he is floating in a basket on the Nile River.

Here in Exodus 15 we find her as the sister of Aaron, singing praises to God for leading them over and through the Red Sea.

We then hear of Miriam in Numbers 12, when she is questioning Moses about his authority.  As a result of her actions, she was smitten with leprosy (Numbers 12:10).

We last read of Miriam in Numbers 20:1 where she dies in Kadesh as she wandered in the wilderness, evidently a fugitive from God, for the word Kadesh means a fugitive.

Some years ago there was a television series entitled “The Fugitive.”  The show was about a doctor who was charged with murdering his wife, and as a result he was fleeing from the law: he was a fugitive.  Each episode found the fugitive...

Ø  Constantly on the run,

Ø  Constantly living in fear of being found out,

Ø  Constantly in turmoil and never at peace.

Living the life as a fugitive from God will never lead to peace, only to turmoil.  Let me ask you today, are you a fugitive – are you running from God?  If so, you’ll never have peace until you say “enough!” and stop running from God and run to Him.

                                                                                    Dr. Mike Rouse

What to do: 

            ✞ Don’t run from God, but run to Him.