August – Page 4 – The Path of Life Daily Devotions

Waiting

Do you know anyone who is good at waiting?
Waiting occupies the time between the moment a need is realized until it is met.

It could be a few seconds, like waiting for the thunder after the lightning struck nearby.
It may be a matter of minutes as in waiting for your food to arrive after the waiter has taken your order.
We wait for days for an order we placed online to arrive in the mail.
It certainly is a careful accounting of weeks and months until a new baby arrives.
Perhaps we wait (and work) faithfully for years building the credits to be awarded the degree.

We wait seconds, minutes, days, weeks, months, years—and sometimes, a lifetime.

It would be accurate to suppose that any moment in anyone’s life is a moment spent waiting on something.

A Skill Learned in Childhood
Just when a child is old enough to communicate what he/she wants, he/she has to learn how to wait. Even as adults, we are never quite happy about “waiting our turn” if what we are waiting for promises to be pleasurable.

On the Path of Life, waiting takes its place alongside the other essential skills required by the prospect of getting from here—life on earth—to there—life in the glories of heaven:

Learning skills: reading, writing, listening, speaking—and waiting;
Spiritual skills: believing, confessing, praying, praising, reading the Word—and waiting;
Interpersonal skills: loving, being lovable, supporting, being supported, honoring; receiving honor—and waiting;
Financial skills: giving, receiving, saving, investing, spending, selling, buying—and waiting.

I need not go on.

A Skill Demanded by Adulthood
I don’t mean a certain age, though sometimes age and adulthood arrive simultaneously. What I really mean is spiritual maturity. Waiting is an exercise in faith, a demonstration of confidence in God, a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving in advance of answered prayer.

Since waiting is something we all must do, let’s put a smile on our heart as we wait on God.

Parents of prodigals—God has heard your prayers and is at work in their rebellious, trouble hearts.
Pastors of troubled churches—keep preaching the Word, loving God and feeding the sheep. Jesus still brings down walls of hostility.
Worship Leaders and Lead Worshipers—keep praying and leading in prayer, praising and leading in praise. The Lord has promised to pour out His Spirit in the Last Days.
Students—keep on studying; salesmen keep on selling; managers keep on managing and workers keep on working.

Waiting is not passive inactivity. Waiting is the work life demands—the planting, watering and tending that brings the harvest.

Scriptures:
Psalm 130
Out of the depths have I called to you, O Lord; Lord, hear my voice; let your ears consider well the voice of my supplication. If you, Lord, were to note what is done amiss, O Lord, who could stand? For there is forgiveness with you; therefore you shall be feared. I wait for the Lord; my soul waits for him; in his word is my hope. My soul waits for the Lord, more than watchmen for the morning, more than watchmen for the morning. O Israel, wait for the Lord, for with the Lord there is mercy; With him there is plenteous redemption, and he shall redeem Israel from all their sins.
Hebrews 6:13-15 NIV
When God made his promise to Abraham, since there was no one greater for him to swear by, he swore by himself, saying, “I will surely bless you and give you many descendants.” And so after waiting patiently, Abraham received what was promised.
Psalm 27:13-14 NIV
I am still confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.
Psalm 37:1-7 NIV
Do not fret because of evil men or be envious of those who do wrong; for like the grass they will soon wither, like green plants they will soon die away. Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture. Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord; trust in him and he will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun. Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him; do not fret when men succeed in their ways when they carry out their wicked schemes.
Jude 20-21 NIV
But you, dear friends, build yourselves up in your most holy faith and pray in the Holy Spirit. Keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life.
Titus 2:11-14 NIV
For the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope — the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.
Romans 8:23-25 NIV
Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.

Prayer:
Lord Jesus, help me to wait in faith believing! When answers to prayers are delayed, I will wait in faith believing. When needs persist, I will trust in You and wait in faith believing. When it seems the enemy will win, I will wait for Your victory in battle. As I praise You, give me confidence. As I obey You today, going about my work as if everything is just fine, each completed task draws me closer to Your answer, Your provision, Your reward. I will wait upon You and You will renew my strength! Amen and Amen.

Song:
Waiting on the Lord
Words and Music: Charles F. Weigle

1. Waiting on the Lord, for the promise given;
Waiting on the Lord, to send from Heaven;
Waiting on the Lord, by our faith receiving,
Waiting in the Upper Room.

Refrain:
The Power! The Power!
Gives victory over sin and purity within;
The Power! The Power!
The power they had a Pentecost.

2. Waiting on the Lord, giving all to Jesus;
Waiting on the Lord, till from sin He frees us;
Waiting on the Lord, for the heavenly breezes
Waiting in the Upper Room!

Refrain

3. Waiting on the Lord, longing to mount higher;
Waiting on the Lord, having great desire;
Waiting on the Lord, for the Heavenly fire;
Waiting in the Upper Room.

Refrain

Semper Reformanda!
Stephen Phifer

Vines

June 1975.
I had just moved into my first pastoral office as Youth Pastor and Minister of Music at First Assembly of God in Camden, AR. The room was a converted Sunday School classroom in a creaky old wooden building. Across from my desk was a patio-type couch. I knelt there with my Bible open praying from John 15. The chapter begins with the good news that Jesus is the True Vine and we are the branches. This was the part that I wanted to claim.

Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you,
that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain…

We find Two Vines in the Scripture: Israel and Jesus.

Israel

The Nation of Israel is depicted as a vine planted by the Lord in the earth for two specific purposes—

to Worship the One True God in the midst of pagan cultures, and
to bring Messiah into the world to make salvation possible for all people.

The nation stands today, countless generations removed from Abraham, as a strong people group even after being conquered and scattered time again—a geographical and political miracle and a testimony to the God Who Keeps Covenant.

The Poet pens a lament at a season when it seemed God had abandoned the Vine He had planted. They were overrun:

Jerusalem besieged,

The Walls of Jerusalem broken down,
The Gates burned with fire,
The Temple violated and destroyed, and
The craftsmen, musicians, priests and Levites lead away to Babylon as captives

The psalm is a plea for God not to abandon His Vine forever.

Pagan, like the World
This terrible calamity blighted the Vine of Israel because they had themselves become as pagan as the world they lived in. They had violated their part of the Covenant with Jehovah in the most serious way possible—to worship other gods.

While it felt as if God had abandoned the Vine of Israel this proved not to be the case. There was a remnant of true worshipers left in Israel, both among the people left behind and those carried away to Babylon. The remnant prayed. God heard. The Vine was restored. Jesus came into the world.

Jesus

In the New Testament Jesus refers to Himself as the True Vine. He explained that we were the branches. What does that mean? It means God is still at work in the world!

When we turned to Him in repentance, faith, and confession of His Lordship, we become a branch in the True Vine—vitally and functionally connected to Him. We have the same two-fold mission as the nation of Israel—to worship God in spirit and truth and to go into all the world to tell others about Him. In addition to these two points of mission we have a third—to make disciples.

We are meant to bear much fruit and fruit that remains. How can we succeed in this?

With disciplined prayer in the Secret Place,
With dynamic worship in the Sanctuary and
With determined, holy, obedient, and productive lives of service to God and man.

We will be a well-tended branch in the Vine, “safe and secure from all alarms” and free to produce much fruit.

He is the Vine, we are the branches. Without Him we can do nothing. With Him we can do what He calls upon us to do.

Scriptures:
Psalm 80
Hear, O Shepherd of Israel, leading Joseph like a flock; shine forth, you that are enthroned upon the cherubim. … stir up your strength and come to help us. Restore us, O God of hosts; show the light of your countenance, and we shall be saved. O Lord God of hosts, how long will you be angered despite the prayers of your people? You have fed them with the bread of tears; you have given them bowls of tears to drink. You have made us the derision of our neighbors, and our enemies laugh us to scorn. Restore us, O God of hosts; show the light of your countenance, and we shall be saved. You have brought a vine out of Egypt; you cast out the nations and planted it. You prepared the ground for it; it took root and filled the land. The mountains were covered by its shadow and the towering cedar trees by its boughs. You stretched out its tendrils to the Sea and its branches to the River… Why have you broken down its wall, so that all who pass by pluck off its grapes? … Turn now, O God of hosts, look down from heaven; behold and tend this vine; preserve what your right hand has planted…And so will we never turn away from you; give us life, that we may call upon your Name. Restore us, O Lord God of hosts; show the light of your countenance, and we shall be saved.
John 15:1-17 NIV
“I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful. You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. “I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples. “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have obeyed my Father’s commands and remain in his love. I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete. My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit — fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. This is my command: Love each other.

Prayer:
Lord Jesus, True Vine of my life! Thank You for grafting me into Your heart! I look back over my life since that 25 year old man knelt at that patio couch in that office and prayed for a fruitful life and I see that You have answered that prayer abundantly. I want to keep bearing the fruit You and I produce! Keep my creativity flowing. Guard my days and nights so that I am healthy and productive. May those who know me but not You sense that the fruit of my life is You. There is no secret of success—You are the reason! You are the True Vine and I am a branch firmly connected to You! All for Your glory, Lord! Amen.

Song:
Freely, Freely
Words and Music: Jimmy and Carol Owens

1. God forgave my sin in Jesus’ name,
I’ve been born again in Jesu’s name.
And in Jesus’ name I come to you
To share His love as He told me to. He said

Refrain:
Freely, freely you have received;
Freely, freely give.
Go in my name and because you believe,
Others will know that I live.

2. All power is giv’n in Jesus’ name,
In heaven and earth in Jesus’ name.
And in Jesus’ name I come to you
To share His love as He told me to. He said

Refrain

Semper Reformanda!
Stephen Phifer

Category: August

August 2, 2017 “Waiting”

Waiting

August 1, 2017 “Vines”

Vines