The Greatest Command

Good morning and welcome to Our Daily Walk.

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Muhammad Ali declared that he was “the greatest.” Tom Brokaw wrote a book about The Greatest Generation. Guinness publishes a book each year of world records, including those who lift the greatest weights, live the longest, and do this or that the most.

We become fascinated with what is the greatest. And that’s not a bad thing. It should help to inspire us to even greater heights of service, work and accomplishment.

In the Old Testament book of Deuteronomy, Moses is retelling the Law to the people. In chapter 5 he lists the Ten Commandments again for the people and then reminds them of how they used to fear God.

Then in chapter 6 he sums up the commandments and statutes that God has commanded. Notice what he says,

“Now this is the commandment, and these are the statutes and judgments which the Lord your God has commanded to teach you, that you may observe them in the land which you are crossing over to possess, that you may fear the Lord your God, to keep all His statutes and His commandments which I command you, you and your son and your grandson, all the days of your life, and that your days may be prolonged. Therefore hear, O Israel, and be careful to observe it, that it may be well with you, and that you may multiply greatly as the Lord God of your fathers has promised you—a land flowing with milk and honey.” Deut. 6:1-3.

Notice those actions involved. God commanded us to teach statutes. Observe them. Fear the Lord. Keep all His statutes and commandments. Be careful to observe it. Reap longer days and multiply greatly.

Of course, with so many rules and regulations it may become difficult to keep them all in order. Which ones are the most important? Moses provides the key to keeping all of the commandments when he specifies the following:

“Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. And these words which I command you today shall be in your heart. You shall teach them to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” Deut. 6:4-9.

If we are to be found acceptable to God, we must keep His commandments as our guides in life. They need to be with us throughout the day—when we rise and when we retire for the evening.

In Matthew 22:34-40, Jesus is asked a question by a lawyer. He said, “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?” Jesus replies that it is to “love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”

Jesus said that all of the law hangs on these two commandments.

Friends, if we are to love God with all of our heart, all of our soul and all of our mind, then we will certainly desire to do all that God commands us.

Serving God faithfully is not about selfish service or fair-weather faithfulness.

Rather, it is to serve Him with loving loyalty and determined devotion.

If we fail to capture the concept of the greatest command in our minds, then we will have difficulty in following any of the other commands. Get the greatest command right in our heart and the rest will come very easily.

On Our Daily Walk today, may we realize that God wants our obedience and devotion in everything we do. May we determine to demonstrate our love to God by giving that love to our neighbors as well.

Our thought for the day: “You give but little when you give of your possessions. It is when you give of yourself that you truly give.” Kahlil Gibran

May God bless you on your daily walk.

How Is Your Aim?

Good morning and welcome to Our Daily Walk.

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I remember receiving my first BB gun as a young boy. I couldn’t wait to go out and set something up to shoot. Unfortunately, my aim wasn’t really all that good. I’m sure I expected too much out of myself at that age. After all, I had watched gun battles on TV for years. You know the kind. One shot to shoot the gun out of the bad guy’s hand.

But I wasn’t a very good shot. My main problem was in my aim. I just couldn’t steady that gun enough to keep it on the target when I pulled the trigger. Over time and with much practice I was able to do much better. But at first it was very discouraging to keep missing the target.

Two elements are needed to consistently and successfully hit the target. One is that we have an actual target in mind. The other is that we practice and refine our process so that we know and have confidence that we can reach or hit our target.

As for having a target in mind, a story is told of a boy in the country who had received a bow and arrow set for his birthday. A man was driving down the road and noticed that there were bull’s eye arrow shots all over that farm—on the barn, on trees and even on the outhouse. Each arrow was precisely in the middle of the target drawn on these places. The man stopped to ask who was such a tremendous shot. The boy proudly identified himself as the one who shot the arrows. “How did you get to be so accurate?” asked the man. “Well,” said the boy, “I just shoot the arrow and then draw the target around it.” That’s one way of doing it.

Of course the other way is to know the target and practice and refine your abilities so as to hit that target whenever needed. Determined effort and the ability to learn from our missed targets will lead to success. Michael Jordan once said, “I have missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I have lost almost 300 games. On 26 occasions I have been entrusted to take the game’s winning shot…and missed. And I have failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why…I succeed.”

Two of the problems that many Christians face fall into these two areas. One: they don’t always have a good idea of what the target is. Two: they are too easily discouraged when they sometimes fail to hit that target.

Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 5:9-11, “Therefore we make it our aim, whether present or absent, to be well pleasing to Him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad. Knowing, therefore, the terror of the Lord, we persuade men; but we are well known to God, and I also trust are well known in your consciences.”

We make it our aim, our target, to please God. That is, and should be, our goal. When we succeed in pleasing God we know that we are righteous in His sight. When we sometimes fail in pleasing Him, then we know that we must further refine our process and continue to look toward that target of pleasing God.

Friends, may we never forget that God is on our side, rooting for us to be obedient, faithful and successful in all that we do. Peter says that God is “longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” 2 Pet. 3:9.

So when we sometimes fall short of our target, or sometimes lose our aim, let us remember that God is still there waiting for us to come around to Him. After all, as Paul said in Romans 8:31, “If God is for us, who can be against us?”

Friends, I am convinced that when we aim for God’s targets we will accomplish more than we could ever imagine. How’s your aim today?

On Our Daily Walk today, may we make it our aim this very hour to be well pleasing to God. May we reflect on our speech, our actions and our reputation and make an effort today to refine these and aim them toward the target of what God wants us to be.

Our thought for the day: “Reach high, for stars lie hidden in your soul. Dream deep, for every dream precedes the goal.” Pamela Vaull Starr.

May God bless you on your daily walk.

But They Were Going To Do It Anyway

Good morning and welcome to Our Daily Walk.

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Being a parent is a difficult job. And yes, it is a job. As infants, our children are totally helpless and depend on us for their very survival. We feed them, comfort them, change them and train them. Being a parent is hard work.

But then our children become more independent. They dress themselves, read for themselves, play with other children and have their own circles of friends. But even though they are influenced by a wider circle of people, the parents’ responsibilities to the child still remain in place.

Solomon wrote in Proverbs 22:6, “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.” Many parents are aware of this important truth and they take their responsibilities seriously.

Unfortunately some parents do not properly understand how important it is to stand for what is right. Some will allow their children to become involved in many dangerous things and simply say, “But they were going to do it anyway.” This is not what God expects of parents.

I knew of a family years ago that fell into some bad thinking about their children. Since it seemed that other teenagers were smoking, they assumed that their boys would as well. Since they were going to do it anyway, the parents actually purchased cigarettes for their young teenage boys. Their thinking was that if they were going to do it, at least they could be supervised.

Later they reasoned the same way about drinking. Unbelievably the parents purchased beer and introduced their sons to alcohol. After all, everyone else is going to be doing it. So these parents thought their responsibility was to train their boys how to drink. Unbelievable.

Not surprisingly those boys became entangled in many episodes of trouble including jail and addiction. Perhaps they would have eventually began to smoke and drink, but I can’t help but think that if their parents had been stronger these boys may have avoided a lifetime of trouble. The parents failed to be responsible. They actually helped these troubles to occur.

An episode in the Old Testament also shows the failure of someone who was charged with keeping things going on the right path. In Genesis 39 we find the famous story of the Golden Calf. Moses had been on the mountain with God for some time. And the people became impatient. They went to Aaron, who was in charge while Moses was away, and said to Aaron, “Come, make us gods that shall go before us; for as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.” Gen. 39:1.

Now this is a critical decision point for Aaron. He knows what everyone else knows about God. God has been very good to these people. He has helped them to escape the bondage of Pharaoh and has given them the hope of the Promised Land. Aaron and the people witnessed the ten plagues and the parting of the Red Sea. Is there any other god than the real God who has delivered this people?

One would hope that Aaron, being the one in charge, would make a stand for what was right and rebuke the people. Just a reminder of what God had done should have been enough for the people to reconsider their request. But these people were impatient. They had forgotten the glory of God. They had become self-centered, demanding a man-made god to worship. Instead of stopping the people, Aaron actually takes charge of the process for creating the idol for worship.

Moses states in verse 9 that these people were “stiff-necked” or stubborn. Perhaps someone might make the case that they would have eventually found a way to have an idol to worship. That may be true.

But the real disappointment here was with Aaron, the one in charge. He was wrong to allow this to happen. And he was more wrong to help them in their sin. He failed to be responsible when he was placed in a position of responsibility. He failed to correct when the initial plan to sin was unveiled. And he failed by actually helping the sin to occur.

In Our Daily Walk today may we say a prayer right now to ask God to help keep us on the right path. May we never avoid or shirk our responsibilities as parents or as Christians to help others make the right choices and follow God. May we never endorse, encourage or enable sin to occur.

Our thought for the day: “Live so that your son, when people tell him that he reminds them of you, will stick out his chest—not his tongue!”

May God bless you on your daily walk.

Would You Be Missed?

Good morning and welcome to Our Daily Walk.

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A man on Long Island, NY, was found dead in his apartment recently. Lots of people die at home. But what made this situation special was that he had been dead for more than a year. Yes, that’s right—more than a year.

They found him sitting in front of the television set partially mummified. The TV was still on after all that time. Apparently the 70 year old man died of natural causes. Due to the low humidity of the apartment, amazingly his body was preserved.

His neighbors knew about this man, but hadn’t seen him in a long time. They had assumed that he had gone to a hospital or a long term care facility.

This story raises obvious and simple questions. Why didn’t someone miss this man? Didn’t he have family members or friends who would have communicated with him or looked in on him from time to time?

With direct deposit and many bills being paid automatically by the bank, it is reasonable to assume that the TV was still playing because the bill was paid automatically. But still the question remains, why didn’t someone miss this man? What a shame to die and have no one to miss you.

A contrast to the story of the man in NY is a story of a farmer in the Midwest. Years ago this widowed farmer was working a field when his tractor overturned and trapped the man. He was unable to free himself or call for help. But he didn’t lie there for much more than a few hours. You see, this accident happened on a Wednesday afternoon. And this man was known for always being at the services of the local church.

When the services began that Wednesday this man was not in his place. He was missed. Immediately some of the members tried to phone him but did not receive an answer. So they left and drove to his farm where they found him patiently waiting to be found.

Luke 19:10 says that Jesus came to “seek and save the lost.” For that we are eternally grateful. He died for each and every one of us, and God doesn’t want any of us to be lost. When we are away from Him spiritually, God is patiently waiting for us to come back to him. 2 Pet. 3:9.

Jesus, as the good shepherd, wants all of His sheep to be safe. In the parable of the lost sheep in Luke 15:3-7, Jesus illustrates this by saying that the joy of finding one lost sheep is more than knowing that you had 99 sheep that were never lost.

Of course, in order to be found, you first have to be missed. It is one thing to not be seen at worship services. It is another thing to be missed.

To be missed in that sense means that someone didn’t have the opportunity to be edified by you. Someone didn’t receive a smile, a compliment, a word of encouragement. Someone didn’t sing out as loud without the harmony of your voice. Someone didn’t have the opportunity for you to teach them. You left a void by not being in place. You were missed.

On Our Daily Walk today, may we make every effort to uplift, encourage and bless the lives of others around us. May we always live so as to make a difference and lead others toward God.

Our thought for the day: “What kind of church would my church be, if everyone in it were just like me?”

May God bless you on your daily walk.

No One Will Ever Know

Good morning and welcome to Our Daily Walk.

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“It will just be our little secret. No one will have to know.”

How many people have been tempted by such lines in their lives? How many honest and intelligent people have fallen for this great lie that no one will ever find out about sin?

Moses records in Numbers 32:23 that “your sin will find you out.” How true that is. God always knows what we are doing and even what we are thinking. But sometimes we forget these basic truths.

I love to play with babies and toddlers. I especially love to play peek-a-boo with them. Sometimes when they cover their eyes to play back, they may say, “You can’t see me!” Since their eyes are closed they mistakenly believe that others can not see them. That is innocent at their age, but dangerous as we grow older.

Perhaps you remember the television show a few years ago that featured dumb criminals. People caught up in sin don’t use common sense.

Like the two country boys in Kentucky who were attempting to pull an ATM machine out of the wall of a bank. They attached a cable to their truck bumper and pulled with all their horsepower. Of course, the ATM machine stayed put but it pulled off the bumper of the truck. They boys were arrested shortly thereafter and didn’t know how the police found them so soon. They didn’t stop to realize that the bumper they left behind also had their license plate on it. “Come on Billy. No one will ever know.” But beware. Your sin will find you out.

Or how about the guys who robbed a store at night? They were very careful to wipe down their fingerprints and even went so far as to steal the security cameras. They were also soon arrested. How did the police know who to arrest? They simply watched the video tapes that the security cameras were recording to. “Come on Frank. I know how to rob that store and no one will ever know!” Better beware. Your sin will find you out.

Temptation is always around us, but it has its greatest effect when we are alone. Almost anyone can stand up to temptation when the crowd around us thinks the same as we think. But when we are alone that common lie of the devil comes out of the darkness. “No one will ever know.”

Joe was once put in a situation that almost got the better of him. In fact, he paid a hefty price for not giving in to temptation. Joe was a young, very handsome, single man and he was really moving up in his career.

But before long a married woman began to make passes at him. At first it wasn’t very hard to ignore and turn away. But she was persistent. She kept on tempting Joe day after day. What made matters worse was that she was the boss’s wife.

All alone in the house I’m sure that the common lie came into play. Who would ever know if he gave in to her advances? Surely she wouldn’t tell since she was the aggressor. Maybe no one would ever find out.

But Joe didn’t give in to her seduction. Instead, when she, the boss’s wife, Potiphar’s wife, grabbed him by his clothing and said “Lie with me,” Joseph left his garment there are ran away. You can read all about that story in Genesis 39.

Can you picture yourself in Joseph’s place? No one else around except for you and this woman who really wants to be with you. “No one else needs to know. It will just be our little secret.” How many people have fallen for that great lie of the devil?

Joseph paid a heavy price for not giving in to temptation. Potiphar’s wife lied and caused him to go to prison for a long time. But Joseph did the right thing despite the price he had to pay. Be careful! Your sins will find you out!

In Our Daily Walk today may we seek to surround ourselves with likeminded people who can help us to overcome temptation. And may we always remember that even though we do something in secret, God always knows what we do.

Our thought for the day: “When you flee temptation, be sure you don’t leave a forwarding address.”

May God bless you on your daily walk.

And You Think You Had A Bad Day

Good morning and welcome to Our Daily Walk.

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Have you ever just had “one of those days?” Everything that possibly could go wrong does go wrong. Some times we refer to it as Murphy’s Law.

Maybe you are running late for an appointment, the low fuel light comes on in the car, every traffic light seems to turn red just for you, and then a train decides to cross just before you reach the tracks.

Frustrations are commonplace in our busy lives. Sometimes we think we are really suffering stresses and difficulties when in reality we really aren’t having that bad of a day.

Judith Viorst is the author of a very insightful children’s book, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day. Alexander’s day is so bad that he decides he will just leave and go to Australia to get away from it all. Can you imagine a day as a child where you wake up with gum in your hair, no prize in your cereal box, no dessert in the lunch your mom packed, and to top it all off the dentist found another cavity?

What more can a young boy endure? It was in fact a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day.

Stories are told often of the misfortunes of people. Some have great tragedies thrust upon them. I’m always curious to view how people react to these bad days. It says much about their character….about their faith.

Job was a man of outstanding character. In fact, God testified of Job saying that he was “a blameless and upright man, one who fears God and shuns evil.” Job 1:8.

Job was not perfect, but by our standards he was very close. Yet despite his faithfulness to God, Job suffered a really, really bad day. In the short span of one day, Job was visited by four messengers, each with very bad news. As one would barely finish with his bad news, the next one would appear with more bad news.

“Now there was a day when his sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house, and a messenger came to Job and said, ‘The oxen were plowing and the donkeys feeding beside them, when the Sabeans raided them and took them away—indeed they have killed the servants with the edge of the sword; and I alone have escaped to tell you!’ While he was still speaking, another also came and said, ‘The fire of God fell from heaven and burned up the sheep and the servants, and consumed them; and I alone have escaped to tell you!’ While he was still speaking, another also came and said, ‘The Chaldeans formed three bands, raided the camels and took them away, yes, and killed the servants with the edge of the sword; and I alone have escaped to tell you!’ While he was still speaking, another also came and said, ‘Your sons and daughters were eating and drinking wine in their oldest brother’s house, and suddenly a great wind came from across the wilderness and struck the four corners of the house, and it fell on the young people, and they are dead; and I alone have escaped to tell you!” Job 1:13-19.

I can’t imagine any one of those things happening. Yet all of this devastating news is delivered to Job in succession, one messenger after another. What would you do with such a bad day? Here’s what Job did.

“Then Job arose, tore his robe, and shaved his head; and he fell to the ground and worshiped. And he said, ‘Naked I came from my mother’s womb and naked I shall return there. The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; Blessed be the name of the Lord.’ In all this Job did not sin nor charge God with wrong.” Job 1:20-22.

Difficult days will come to everyone. What happens to us is not nearly as important as how we react to it.

In Our Daily Walk today may we be reminded to praise God in the bad times as well as in the good times. May we remember the fundamental points that helped Job to remain righteous—1) fear God, and 2) shun evil.

Our thought for the day: “The game of life is not so much in holding a good hand as playing a poor hand well.” H. T. Leslie.

May God bless you on your daily walk.