Devotions

“So it was always: the cloud covered it by day, and the appearance of fire by night” (Numbers 9:16).

In Numbers 9 we read of a cloud that came down and covered the tabernacle in the wilderness. This cloud represented God’s constant presence with his people, and for us today, the cloud serves as a type of the Holy Spirit’s work in our lives. At night, the cloud over the tabernacle became a pillar of fire, a warm glow in a dark place.

The children of Israel always followed this supernatural cloud, however it directed them. When it rose above the tabernacle, the people pulled up stakes and followed it. And wherever the cloud stopped, the people also stopped and pitched their tents (see 9:18-19).

Another cloud descended from heaven centuries later, at the Upper Room in Jerusalem. The Holy Spirit — the same Spirit who had hovered over the wilderness tabernacle — came down and hovered over some hundred and twenty worshipers who had gathered in the Upper Room after Jesus’ death. This cloud came down into the very room where people sat, and it dwelled upon the heads of the people as cloven tongues of fire (see Acts 2:3).

We who love Jesus today also have a cloud to follow. We may be filled with the Holy Spirit but we still have to commit to taking orders from him. If we don’t wait for his direction in all things, we simply aren’t walking in the Spirit. Paul’s instructions make this distinction clear: “If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit” (Galatians 5:25).

The meaning of Paul’s phrase regarding walking in the Spirit means: “Just say yes!” “For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us” (2 Corinthians 1:20). So, according to Paul, walking in the Spirit begins when we give a confident, intractable “divine yes” to all of God’s promises. It is saying, “Father, I have read your promises, and I say yes to all of them. I believe your word to me.”

God will lead you into all truth, guiding you where he wants you to go and showing you things he wants you to know. Just say yes to him today!

At the time Paul was still known as Saul, he was on his way to Damascus with a small army to take Christians captive, bring them back to Jerusalem, imprison and torture them. But on the way, Jesus appeared to him and he fell to the ground (see Acts 9:3). Trembling and astonished, this proud, misguided zealot asked, “Lord, what do You want me to do?” Jesus directed him to go to the city, where “he was three days without sight, and neither ate nor drank” (9:9).

In those three days’ time, Saul’s mind was renewed as he spent the entire time in intense prayer, reconsidering his past life and renouncing his evil ways. That’s when Saul became Paul. He “spent some days with the disciples at Damascus. Immediately he preached the Christ in the synagogues, that He is the Son of God” (9:19-20).

Paul was a man who could say, “I was a man of influence; all my peers, including my fellow Pharisees, looked up to me. I was a powerful teacher of the Law, considered a holy man, climbing the ladder. But when Christ apprehended me, everything changed. The striving, the competing, everything that I thought gave my life meaning, was surrendered. I saw that I had missed the Lord completely.”

Paul had once thought his religious ambitions, his works, his competitiveness, his busyness, were all righteousness. He had thought it was all for God’s glory. Now Christ revealed to him that it was all flesh, all for self. Therefore, Paul stated, “I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win the more” (1 Corinthians 9:19). He was saying, in essence, “I laid aside all desire for success and recognition and I determined to be a servant.”

Paul believed that the mind of Christ changes a person’s affections for all time. When Christ became his total satisfaction, he set his affection on heavenly things: “If then you were raised with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ is, sitting at the right hand of God. Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:1-3).

Our prayer should be, “Lord, I don’t want to focus only on myself in a world that’s spinning out of control. I know you hold my path in your hands. Please, Lord, give me your mind, your thinking, your concerns.”

“You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you” (John 15:16). 

I am convinced by Scripture there is only one core purpose for all believers. Our specific callings are gathered up in this single purpose, and every gift springs from it. If we miss this purpose, all our desires and pursuits will be in vain. This purpose is simply this: we are all called and chosen to bear fruit.

Bearing fruit means something much larger than even soul-winning. The fruit Jesus is talking about is Christlikeness, reflecting the likeness of Jesus. And the phrase “much fruit” means “the ever-increasing likeness of Christ.”

Growing more and more into Jesus’ likeness has to be central to all our activities, lifestyle and relationships. Indeed, all our gifts and callings — our work, ministry and witness — must flow out of this core purpose.

God’s purpose for us cannot be fulfilled by what we do for Christ, it can only be fulfilled by what we are becoming in him. We are becoming transformed into his likeness each day as we seek him.

“We know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose” (Romans 8:28). Paul’s message here is simple: “All things ought to be working out for good in the lives of those who love God and walk in his ways.”

The most useful people in the church of Jesus Christ are those who have eyes to see and ears to hear. Yes, some people are doing great things that are seen and heard by many, but some of those same people don’t have eyes to see the needs of hurting people. They are project-oriented rather than need-oriented.

Jesus sees all the needs and hurts around us and we need his eyes to see the same things. This is the love of Christ: to have “eyes to see and ears to hear.”

May you have ears to hear what God is saying to you and may you love others in deed and in truth.

“When [Jesus] saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd. Then He said to His disciples, ‘The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest’” (Matthew 9:36-38).

Do Jesus’ words about a ripe harvest apply today? Where do we see evidence that fields are white and ready to be harvested? Is there a cry for holiness in this generation? With few exceptions, these things aren’t happening. Yet, none of these things moved Jesus in his time. Rather, he was moved by the sad conditions he saw on every side. Everywhere he looked, people were overwhelmed with distress. In fact, when he gazed out over Jerusalem, he wept over the hardness and spiritual blindness he saw (see Luke 19:41). Here were people headed for judgment, with no peace, only fear and depression.

Jesus actually gives us a picture of what the last days will look like. “There will be signs in the sun, in the moon, and in the stars; and on the earth distress of nations, with perplexity … men’s hearts failing them from fear and the expectation of those things which are coming on the earth” (Luke 21:25-26). In short, Jesus is describing here the most anxious, depressed, stressed-out generation of all time.

Are his prophecies happening even now, before our eyes? This generation is full of anxiety and worry. I hear Jesus’s words: “The fields are white. The harvest is plentiful.” He is telling his church, “People are ready to hear. This is the time to believe for a harvest, a time for you to start reaping!”

Christ is the Lord of the harvest and he is saying to us, “Stop focusing on the difficulties around you and, instead, raise your eyes and see that the harvest is ready.” As laborers, we are the instruments of harvest in the Lord’s hand. God is looking for those who will stand before the world and proclaim, “God is with me! Satan can’t stop me. Just look at my life. I am more than a conqueror through Christ, who lives in me!”  

Everyone knows about the biblical concept of a promised land; the arrival place for people who seek freedom, relief from bondage, and the joy of a blessed life. The original Promised Land was a gift that God gave to ancient Israel — a literal place called Canaan, a fertile land bursting with oversized fruit and flowing rivers. It was the stuff of dreams for the Israelites, a people who had been beaten down and exiled for generations.

When the children of Israel arrived at Canaan’s border, God made an unusual statement to Moses: “Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you … for you are a stiff-necked people” (Exodus 33:3).

This may sound harsh, but in context, it is anything but harsh. God had freed Israel from four hundred years of slavery in Egypt. Now, on the cusp of their entry into the Promised Land, God made the surprising declaration that he would not go with them. Even after all the miraculous things God did for the Israelites, they complained every time they faced a new hardship — the miracles God performed for them never translated into faith. Every time Moses turned around the people were threatening to reject God and abandon his leading.

But Moses’ faith was different. He knew the goodness of God, as demonstrated in all his supernatural works for Israel. In fact, the Lord’s favor toward his people seemed bottomless, never ending, unlimited. No matter what obstacle they faced or how impossible it seemed, God brought them through every time. Moses marveled at the character of God who mercifully performed all these things on their behalf and he said, “If your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here” (Exodus 33:15).

Moses had discovered a valuable truth; he knew that even though God had provided manna from heaven and water from a rock, these vital blessings were not the point of these experiences. Rather, trusting God’s compassionate love — knowing him intimately — was what really mattered.

“Please show me now your ways, that I may know you in order to find favor in your sight” (33:13).

What does your heart long for? Is your main dream for material things? Or is it the hope of God’s glory? Don’t let anything — even good things — blind you to the glory of his presence.