FBC Daily Devotional – March 1, 2021

Faith Baptist Church

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:06

Well, good morning and a good first day of a new week and the first day of a new month.

00:14

I'm pretty excited about the fact that March has arrived and you know what that means.

00:21

That means, let's see, in a couple of weeks we get that extra hour of daylight every day, supposedly.

00:28

At least we experience a little differently in the evening. And, you know, we should see some gradual warming of weather and temperatures and before long some crocuses will pop up from the ground.

00:44

There is hope, isn't there? There is hope. Well, I hope you're having a good day and I hope you had a good weekend and we're able to meet together with God's people.

00:54

Well, we are in our Bible reading and this week, or today, we're in Matthew chapter 20 and sandwiched between,

01:03

I'll just point this out right away and then look at what it's sandwiched between.

01:08

But sandwiched between a couple of examples of how we struggle with grace in the lives of others.

01:16

Jesus tells his disciples, he pulls them aside from whatever else they're doing and whoever else is around.

01:22

He pulls the disciples, the twelve aside and he gets them together. He says, listen guys, I just want you to know, listen.

01:28

We're going to go up to Jerusalem and this is what's going to happen. We're going to get there and the chief priests are going to, they're going to have me arrested.

01:38

I'm going to be crucified and three days later I'm going to rise from the dead.

01:44

Okay? I just want you to know that. Now, we don't have any, we don't have any indication of how they responded at this point.

01:51

What we do know is they didn't get it because when the crucifixion came, they were utterly demoralized and when the resurrection occurred, they were totally surprised.

02:04

So they clearly didn't get this message. By the way, how difficult we do have, we have at hearing sometimes, don't we?

02:15

The Lord's word is pretty clear often and yet we don't hear.

02:24

We don't hear. Not until after the fact and sometimes there's some challenges that go along with that fact.

02:34

The other thing that struck me here is I wonder how many times we get demoralized in our culture, in our society, with what's going on in the world and some of the challenges that are approaching believers and other believers face and so forth.

02:55

How often we get demoralized and forget the promises that Christ has given to us that he is not going to leave us, that he's not going to allow the gates of hell to prevail against his church and that he's coming again.

03:12

So let's be sure our ears are wide open. Now that little interplay takes place sandwiched between a couple of other things.

03:22

One is this parable that the Lord gives regarding the servants, the various servants.

03:29

They go out at different times of the day. This is the beginning of chapter 20, verse 16 verses.

03:34

They go out at different times of the day and the master hires these servants and each group they go and they do their thing, working in the fields and so forth.

03:44

At the end of the day, they come to get paid and that was the norm. You didn't have bi -weekly paychecks or anything like that.

03:51

It was at the end of every day you got paid and that's how you survived day to day incidentally. So the servants come and the ones hired last only worked an hour or so.

04:03

They are first to receive their wages and they end up getting the same amount of pay as the guys who've been working all day.

04:12

And they start to begrudge that. They start to murmur against the master, say, man, this isn't fair.

04:19

How come we're only getting the same as they got when we've been working all day and they haven't been?

04:25

And the master replies and says, hey, it's mine, right? Don't I have the right to give my stuff as I see fit?

04:33

And of course the point of that lesson, that message, that parable is that God's grace is poured out abundantly and he doesn't discriminate on the time of one's coming to Christ or entering into the kingdom.

04:53

So someone comes to Christ late in life, they don't get less of the kingdom, they don't get less of heaven than the person who comes to faith in Christ as a five -year -old.

05:03

So we've got to be careful about begrudging grace is the point of that parable.

05:12

And then you see this same theme recur later after Jesus tells about his coming crucifixion and so forth.

05:20

When the mother of Zebedee's children come to Jesus and say,

05:26

I want you to do something for my sons, for my boys, what's that? I want you to have them sit one on the right hand, one on the left in your kingdom.

05:36

And well, that's a pretty bold request when you think about it. I mean, you think about the, what about the other disciples?

05:43

Is there any thought to them and where they're going to, their place in the kingdom? Any concept of preferring one before the other?

05:50

Not really there. And of course, James and John, they seem to think that that's their place too, to have that right at the right hand and the left hand of the father.

06:01

And Jesus asks, can you drink the cup that I'm going to drink? Can you be baptized with what

06:07

I'm going to be baptized? Oh yeah, we can do that, we can do that and so forth. And he says, oh, you will, you will.

06:15

And yet he says, I'm not going to give you this. I'm not going to give you what you're asking for.

06:20

This isn't mine to give. It's the father's and it's going to be given to those for whom it's reserved, which tells you something about God's sovereign grace and purposes right there.

06:33

But anyhow, what I wanted to point out is that after this little interchange, the other disciples, they got a little ticked at this request for special privileges and special place.

06:51

Why? Why do you think they were so upset? Well, because they thought, why should they have it rather than me?

06:58

I'm just as entitled to it as they are. And they can start talking about how long they've been following Jesus and how good of a disciple they are, how good of a follower and how loyal and all the rest of that kind of stuff.

07:11

Why should they get it and not me? So it's the same kind of stuff coming up just between those 12 that Jesus addressed earlier with the grumbling servants.

07:26

And the point of it all, I think, is that followers of Christ need to be less concerned about the grace that's given to others and to be exceedingly grateful for the grace that I receive.

07:41

We need to be more concerned about faithfully serving Christ wherever he would have us to serve, however he would have us to serve, and just be faithful at that.

07:53

And let God deal with the outcome of it all, and let him exalt who he wants to exalt, and let him abase whom he wants to abase.

08:02

And as far as my attitude is toward others, in honor,

08:08

I need to be preferring them before myself. So, a couple of little exhortations there for us today, aren't there?

08:15

Encouragement to keep our ears open, to listen carefully to what Christ promises us for the coming age, the coming kingdom.

08:25

But then also to be careful how we're living now and our attitudes toward ourselves and what we think we deserve, our attitudes toward others, and have a spirit of servanthood and a spirit of grace toward our brothers and sisters in Christ.

08:46

All right, well, let's have a word of prayer and ask God to give us the grace to live just like that. So, our

08:52

Father and our God, we are grateful today for these challenges from your word, because they help us to see ourselves and our relationship to others a little better and a little more clearly how we ought to.

09:05

I pray that you'd give us grace to live in just this way. And, Father, I also pray that you would help us to not become demoralized in this day and age in which we live, but to keep in mind the promises that you have made through our

09:23

Savior for the coming end of the age and for life in this age.

09:31

Help us to be faith -filled believers, we pray, in Jesus' name and for his sake.

09:38

Amen. All right, well, hope your week gets off to a good start, and may the