Longing For GOD

[WalterandDebbie]

Tuesday 7-13-21 AV 2nd., 5781 3rd. day of the weekly cycle, 23rd. Summer Day

OUR DAILY BREAD DEVOTIONAL
Our Daily Bread 13th July 2021 Today Devotional – Longing for God

Our Daily Bread 13th July 2021 Today Devotional, Tuesday Message By Tim Gustafson (Our Daily Bread Ministries)

1 Our Daily Bread 13th July 2021 Today Devotional, Tuesday Message By Tim Gustafson (Our Daily Bread Ministries)

Our Daily Bread 13th July 2021 Today Devotional Message

Reflect & Pray
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Topic: Longing for God

Today’s Scripture: Nehemiah 1:5–11

Key Verse: Even if your exiled people are at the farthest horizon, I will gather them from there and bring them to the place I have chosen. – Nehemiah 1:9

Bible in a Year: Psalms 7–9; Acts 18

INSIGHT:
The prayer of Nehemiah about the state of affairs of the Israelites who’d returned to their homeland (Nehemiah 1:5–11) rehearses the circumstances that both led to Israel’s exile and their return to the promised land (vv. 8–11). God’s faithfulness to His promises were the key to both events—He promised exile if Israel broke faithfulness with Him and return to the land if they repented and came back to Him. The Israelites had returned to their homeland, but the city gates and walls were still in ruins. After rehearsal of these events, Nehemiah asks God to grant him favor as he presents his case to the king (v. 11).


Our Daily Bread 13th July 2021 Today Devotional Message
When Conner and Sarah Smith moved five miles up the road, their cat S’mores expressed his displeasure by running away. One day Sarah saw a current photo of their old farmhouse on social media. There was S’mores in the picture!

Happily, the Smiths went to retrieve him. S’mores ran away again. Guess where he went? This time, the family that had purchased their house agreed to keep S’mores too. The Smiths couldn’t stop the inevitable; S’mores would always return “home.”

Nehemiah served in a prestigious position in the king’s court in Susa, but his heart was elsewhere. He had just heard news of the sad condition of “the city where my ancestors are buried” (Nehemiah 2:3). And so he prayed, “Remember the instruction you gave your servant Moses, . . . ‘if you return to me and obey my commands, then even if your exiled people are at the farthest horizon, I will gather them from there and bring them to the place I have chosen as a dwelling for my Name’ ” (1:8–9).

Home is where the heart is, they say. In Nehemiah’s case, longing for home was more than being tied to the land. It was communion with God that he most desired. Jerusalem was “the place I have chosen as a dwelling for my Name.”

The dissatisfaction we sense deep down is actually a longing for God. We’re yearning to be home with Him.

Reflect & Pray
What’s your idea of home and why? In what ways do you sense yourself longing for God?

Father, help me understand that only You can satisfy my longings. Help me be at home with You, no matter where I am.

Our Daily Bread 13th July 2021 Today Devotional Message. Our Daily Bread Ministries (ODB) is a Christian organization founded by Dr. Martin De Haan in 1938. It is based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, with over 600 employees. It produces several devotional publications, including Our Daily Bread.

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Love always, Walter and Debbie

 

[Pearl]

This passage touched me profoundly this morning, and it's been on my mind all day. At the start of the year God laid it on my heart to pray for the Church and as I read this portion of scripture which I have read many times before, I could see parallels between the Israelite situation and today’s church.

There must be so many Christians living in ‘exile’, no longer being part of church fellowships because the churches are letting people down. The enemy has done so much damage to its ‘walls’ and it has been ‘invaded’ by the world, and worldly views have diminished the power of God’s word.

Much of today's church is held in 'captivity' to world views, man-made traditions, religion, legalism, false doctrines and falling moral standards even within the Church. It needs modern day Joshuas to lead it into the 'Promised Land' and modern day 'Nehemiahs' to rebuild its 'walls'.

I pray for modern day ‘Nehemiahs’ and 'Joshuas' to be raised up to rebuild the Church and to stand against those who seek to destroy it. To stand against those who mock and ridicule so that the power of God may once again move within His Church.

 

[WalterandDebbie]

This passage touched me profoundly this morning, and it's been on my mind all day. At the start of the year God laid it on my heart to pray for the Church and as I read this portion of scripture which I have read many times before, I could see parallels between the Israelite situation and today’s church.

There must be so many Christians living in ‘exile’, no longer being part of church fellowships because the churches are letting people down. The enemy has done so much damage to its ‘walls’ and it has been ‘invaded’ by the world, and worldly views have diminished the power of God’s word.

Much of today's church is held in 'captivity' to world views, man-made traditions, religion, legalism, false doctrines and falling moral standards even within the Church. It needs modern day Joshuas to lead it into the 'Promised Land' and modern day 'Nehemiahs' to rebuild its 'walls'.

I pray for modern day ‘Nehemiahs’ and 'Joshuas' to be raised up to rebuild the Church and to stand against those who seek to destroy it. To stand against those who mock and ridicule so that the power of God may once again move within His Church.

Amen! It is so many areas to Do Longing For GOD.

Love, Walter

 

[WalterandDebbie]

Amen! It is so many areas to Do Longing For GOD.

Love, Walter

↑
This passage touched me profoundly this morning, and it's been on my mind all day. At the start of the year God laid it on my heart to pray for the Church and as I read this portion of scripture which I have read many times before, I could see parallels between the Israelite situation and today’s church.

There must be so many Christians living in ‘exile’, no longer being part of church fellowships because the churches are letting people down. The enemy has done so much damage to its ‘walls’ and it has been ‘invaded’ by the world, and worldly views have diminished the power of God’s word.

Much of today's church is held in 'captivity' to world views, man-made traditions, religion, legalism, false doctrines and falling moral standards even within the Church. It needs modern day Joshuas to lead it into the 'Promised Land' and modern day 'Nehemiahs' to rebuild its 'walls'.

I pray for modern day ‘Nehemiahs’ and 'Joshuas' to be raised up to rebuild the Church and to stand against those who seek to destroy it. To stand against those who mock and ridicule so that the power of God may once again move within His Church.


Walter: Amen! It is so many areas to Do Longing For GOD.

Love, Walter

Hi All, I thought that the below statement could be shared:

In His Own Words: Longing for God
February 24, 2017


Categories: Billy Graham, Devotional, In His Own Words

What does it mean to “long” for someone? It means that a person is unsatisfied or unfulfilled because there is someone he or she very much wants to be near, to hear that certain voice, to experience that special presence.

Usually, particularly when the object is someone very much loved by the person who is longing for another, there is hardly a waking moment when that person is not on the mind of the one who is “longing for.”

Have you ever been under water for a period of time that is longer than you had expected? You know, as the time ticks away, how desperate you become to reach the surface and breathe the air. The greater the time you are under water, the more you long for a breath of air until that desire overwhelms you, and you rush to get to the surface as rapidly as possible. You have no other thoughts but quenching your need for air.

That is what it means to “long for God.” In another context, it is what it means to “hunger and thirst” after righteousness with the same desires that lead us to quench our physical need for food and water.

How many of us are content to give God only a brief moment of our time, a hasty prayer before a meal, a few coins in the offering plate on Sunday, and forget about Him the rest of the time?

God wants us to long for Him because it is in that longing that we are fulfilled and overwhelmed by God and the reflection of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, in our lives.

We are never more fulfilled than when our longing for God is met by His presence in our lives.


Love, Walter