FBC Daily Devotional – February 8, 2022

Well, a good Tuesday morning to you. I hope your week got off to a good start yesterday. Mondays are always an interesting day, aren't they?

A lot of people look at Monday with depression because you've got to get back to work. But I encourage you to charge into Monday and let

Monday set the pace, set the tone for the rest of the week. And if you do that, then you can end the day

Monday and get up Tuesday feeling pretty good about the direction the week is going.

Well, anyway, so today I want to make a connection between the two passages that were in our

Bible reading plan for our reading today, 2 Chronicles chapters 4 through 6, and then two verses in Proverbs chapter 19.

And I just want to zero in on one verse in 2 Chronicles 5 and one of the verses in Proverbs 19.

And the verse I want to zero in on in 2 Chronicles 5 is verse 13. So there's this dedication of the temple,

Solomon's temple grand affair. And at this dedication ceremony, one of the things that happened, it says in verse 13, it came to pass when the trumpeters and singers were as one to make one sound to be heard in praising and thanking the

Lord. And when they lifted up their voice with the trumpets and cymbals and instruments of music, all right, you're getting a, you're getting a vision of this, what this must've looked like, or all these, this, this vast choir of, uh, of singers.

And there were trumpets blow, uh, blasting, uh, blaring, making this great noise and cymbals crashing and other instruments of music all playing.

So there's this grand orchestra accompanying this grand choir and they praise the

Lord. And it's like there was this chorus that they just repeated.

And I'm sure there were other words to their singing, uh, poems of the

Psalms, for example, but this is the refrain that kept being repeated over and over and over again for, uh, praising the

Lord saying for he is good for his mercy endures forever.

Praising the Lord for he is good for his mercy endures forever. All right. Now, word of explanation about that word mercy.

It's a word that's translated variously in the English language. It's a Hebrew word has said, and it, it, it doesn't, it doesn't mean mercy.

Like we think of the, the center, uh, the, the, the center who was in the public and in center story who was standing there in the temple and standing far off.

And he wouldn't even look up to heaven and pray. He just bowed his head and smote upon his breasts and said, God be merciful to me, a center.

So that, that is the kind of mercy where you don't receive what you deserve for the wrong that you've done.

Well, that's not the word that is used here. Speaking of his, of God's mercy that endures forever.

The word has said has more to do with, uh, loving loyalty to the covenant that he has made.

So in other translations, it's, uh, it's translated. I think of the ESV consistently translates that word steadfast love, steadfast love.

And I think that's a better way of translating it because it, it doesn't add the confusion of mercy with the word mercy.

Um, sometimes in the King James, uh, it's translated, uh, loving kindness and sometimes just kindness.

In fact, I'm using a new King James today, reading from that. And when we look at Proverbs 19, we're going to see that word show up again, but translated kindness.

And that's misleading as well. I mean, cause people can be kind without necessarily loving the object of the kindness and without there being any covenant, uh, behind that, behind that kindness.

So steadfast love, loving loyalty to one's covenant that he has made.

This is the idea of that word. And this is what God is like. All right. So I often,

I often encourage us at Faith Baptist to, to approach a worship service, a church service where the word of God is opened and preached and taught with the attitude that says,

I want to find out what God is like and what God likes so that I may love him more effectively and appropriately and live for him accordingly.

All right. So what is God like? He is good and he is steadfastly loyal.

He is, he is lovingly, steadfastly loyal to his covenant that he has made.

All right. Now that, that verse tells us what God is like, and he's praised for, for, uh, his character that he's good, that his steadfast love endures forever.

All right. Now jumping to Proverbs 19 verse, uh, verse 22 says this, and I'll read the new

King James and then give clarification. It says, what is, what is desired in a man is kindness and a poor man is better than a liar.

All right. Now here's the clarification. That word kindness isn't simply the, you know, you're just being nice to people.

That's not what that's talking about. It's that same word hesed that we read, uh, back in second

Chronicles about God, that God is to for his hesed, his steadfast love, his loving loyalty to the covenant that he has made.

And Proverbs tells us that what is desired in man is that he's like that, that he is also lovingly loyal to the covenant that he has made.

And it goes on to say, and a poor man is better than a liar. And what's the sense there?

What's the idea there? It's better to be poor and marked by steadfast love marked by hesed than to be materially comfortable or wealthy, but a liar, a deceiver, a crook that is betraying, uh, betraying, uh, a deficiency in hesed.

It's better to be poor and marked by steadfast loyalty than it is to be rich and to be deficient in that loyalty.

So when it comes to a practical application of this, this is what it's better for me to have this steadfast love.

Then I can ask myself some questions. How do I express steadfast love in my marriage to my spouse?

How do I express that steadfast loyalty to my church family?

And what about to my, uh, the rest of my family, to my children or to my parents as the case may be?

How do I express steadfast love in my business dealings? How do

I express steadfast love as an employee in the workplace? How do

I express steadfast love in my friendships, my friendships?

And how about in my relationship with God, God, the father,

God, the son, God, the Holy spirit. Am I a person who is marked by steadfast, faithful, loving loyalty to the covenants that I have made?

Good question to ponder to the extent that I am more, more faithful and loyal.

I am more like God I become and may that mark us, our father and our

God, we thank you for your steadfast love that we can count on you to be ever faithful to the covenants that you have made with your people.

Now, Lord, may our lives be likewise so marked and this we pray in Jesus name and for his sake.

Amen. Well, all right, have a good rest of your Tuesday and I trust