(We are beginning another round of 30 devotionals from the ministry of my father, Bertram J. Youde. A brief biography can be found in the blog for September 26, 2014. Each post includes various occasions when he preached the sermon from which the post was taken.)
(#53, Hinkley, 1944; Radio 1951, 1959; Imperial, 1955)
Read Psalm 84:11; 34:9-10; Prov. 28:10..
God is the giver of every good and perfect gift (James
1:17). And should you ask what good
things He gives, one answer comes in Acts 14:15-17: rain from heaven, fruitful
seasons, the filling of our hearts with food and gladness.
Some will deny this truth, saying that they do not receive
these good things from God. But the
Bible makes it clear that it is not because God has failed but because we fail
God (Jeremiah 5:24-25).
If God is withholding His good things from us there are
two questions to ask:
1. Are
the things we long for really good? A
father might choose to give his 12-year-old son a pellet gun as a gift while
withholding it from his 4-year-old son.
Both the giving and withholding are "good gifts".
2. Are
we forfeiting God's good gifts because of our wrongdoings. This is Jeremiah's issue.
Thus we ask, in the language of Psalm 84:11, what does it
mean to walk uprightly? Ephesians keys
on the term "walk" as a picture of the believer's life. The Holy Spirit thus says that the
"upright walk" is a...
w Walk
in obedience, Eph. 2:1-2. In the Bible
Naaman wasn't cured until he obeyed.
w Worthy
walk, Eph. 4:1. Our walk must fit that
we are children of a perfect heavenly Father.
w Walk
unlike those around us, Eph. 4:17. The
children of God are, by definition, distinct from the children of Satan.
w Walk
in love, Eph. 5:2.
w Walk
in the light, Eph. 5:8. Again, the walk
is simply consistent with our God. God
is Light (1 John 5:5) so His children are Children of Light!
w Walk
in wisdom, Eph. 5:15.
For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord bestows favor
and honor; no good thing does He withhold from those whose walk is blameless.
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