“For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from him who has nothing, even what he has will be taken away.”

— Matthew 25:29

In the Greek text the words of Jesus have a certain forcefulness about them that often is lost in the translation. I read the words of Jesus after one of His judgment parables in Matthew, “Then He will say to those at the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angels’” (Matthew 25:41). I thought to myself, “What must it be like for a human being to actually hear those words intoned by the Judge of all of the earth upon himself?” It seemed to me that every single person on this earth ought to cast himself upon his knees and pray, “O God, may these ears never hear those words come from Your mouth.”

The great 19th century British preacher Charles Spurgeon said that there are two great principles of grace enunciated in the Bible. The first one is this: God gives grace to the empty…to the needy…to the poor…to the humble. Second: to those whom God has granted His grace, He is in the habit of granting more. This is the great truth of our text above, Matthew 25:29.

If you are in Christ, in one sense you are already a success. If you are not in Christ, no matter how well accomplished you may be, you are ultimately a failure. What does it profit you if you gain the whole world, but lose your soul? Serve the Lord with all your heart, and He will bless you with more opportunity and joy to serve Him.

Father God, Giver of all great gifts, thank You for Your grace in our lives and the abundance of Your blessings. Help us to be mindful of our responsibilities to share with others…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE
CAN SERVE HIM WITH JOY.

“If Christ has not risen, then our preaching is vain, and your faith is also vain.”

— 1 Corinthians 15:14

Some people begin with the assumption that miracles don’t happen; therefore, Christ could not have been raised from the dead. But this does not explain any of the facts. It is also circular logic. It’s merely a presupposition that disallows the possibility of the resurrection.

But the truth is that Christ rose from the dead. The greatest problem mankind has ever faced, generation after generation, century after century, millennia after millennia, has been solved by Jesus. Death has been with us since the fall of man, and always people have asked, “If a man dies, will he rise again?” Jesus Christ has given us irrefutable evidence that the answer is “Yes!”

The greatest efforts of the most brilliant, unbelieving skeptical minds of the last 2,000 years to disprove the resurrection have all come to naught. There is not one of them that could stay afloat in a debate for 15 minutes when the evidence is given a fair examination.

Notice even the transformation of the Sabbath from the Jewish Saturday to the Christian Sunday. The resurrection took place amidst Jews who were committed and zealous Sabbatarians. How is it that suddenly the Christian church changed from the seventh day Sabbath to the first day? Because the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead happened on the first day of the week.

When Jesus walked out of the tomb, He changed human history for all time. He put His seal on everything He said. We can believe in Him because He is truly alive forevermore.

Dear Lord, thank You that what we believe has been sealed for all time. Thank You that You have solved once and for all our greatest need and by successfully taking on death, You have solved life’s biggest problem…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN
PROCLAIM THAT DEATH IS DEAD.

“…to whom He presented Himself alive after His passion by many infallible proofs, appearing to them for forty days…”

— Acts 1:3

When Jesus walked out of His own tomb 2,000 years ago, He changed all of history. His appearances to His disciples are crucial. He appeared to one, then to another, then to two, then to three and then to eight and ten and eleven and 500 people at a time, over a period of about six weeks (1 Corinthians 15:4-9). They saw Him, they heard Him, they handled Him. He fixed breakfast for them. He ate fish with them (John 21:7-15; Luke 24:42-43).

Connected to the appearances was the transformation of the apostles. One day they were cringing in an upper room for fear of the temple authorities, and soon after they were boldly upbraiding the Sanhedrin and proclaiming the resurrection of Christ.

Consider also their martyrdom. They were crucified, crucified upside down, sawed in half, stoned to death, and killed in many other ways, all except John, who was exiled to the island of Patmos by Nero. Why would they give their lives for what they knew to be false?

One could argue that they were deceived in believing Jesus rose from the dead. However, the notion that they knew He wasn’t really raised from the dead, but they made it up anyway? Why? So they could face horrific deaths? That does not make sense. People do what is in their own best interest. The apostles spread the Word everywhere because they knew Jesus rose from the dead from firsthand experience. He is risen indeed!

Lord Jesus, give me strength for today to boldly transform my world around me by letting others know You are risen from the dead. Thank You for showing the world for all time that Your truth is based on the unshakable foundation of Your historical resurrection…

BY HIS STRENGTH, WE CAN TELL OTHERS
THAT DEATH HAS BEEN DESTROYED.

“The next day John [the Baptist] saw Jesus coming toward him and said, ‘Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.’”

— John 1:29

In the obdurate hardness of his heart, Pharaoh had defied the Almighty God. So God had sent onto the land of Egypt plague after plague with ever-increasing severity. The tenth was the most severe. It is this one that gave rise to the Feast of Passover.

At God’s instruction, the Hebrews were to take a bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood from an unblemished lamb, and strike the lintel and the door posts of their houses. They were not to go out the door of the house until the morning, because at midnight the LORD would send His angel to destroy the firstborn throughout all Egypt. But when He saw the blood upon the door post, and the lintels, He would pass over those homes.

As they waited, eventually they heard a shriek and then another…moaning and crying went up all over Egypt, as the angel of death passed over. They waited until they would hear some sound close to their own houses, but seeing the blood upon the door post and lintel, the Angel of God passed by.

The Passover celebration continued down through the centuries until Christ our Savior came. All of the lambs of God slain before, all the lambs of the Israelites were but types of that reality which should come. When John the Baptist saw Jesus, He said He was the Lamb of God. Our Passover Lamb has been slain for us. When God sees our sin, He passes over it, if we are in Christ.

Dear Lord, thank You for Your brilliant yet simple plan to show the world that only by being covered by the blood of the unblemished lamb are we to be spared from death. Thank You, Jesus, Lamb of God, for dying on the cross to pay the penalty for our sins…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE SEE THAT CHRIST
OUR PASSOVER LAMB HAS BEEN SLAIN.

“But our citizenship is in heaven, from where also we await for our Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ…”

— Philippians 3:20

I don’t know if I really ought to let you know this, but I think it’s time I told you. I am actually an extraterrestrial alien visiting this planet. That’s true. Now before you think we are talking about the body snatchers, Christ, who is an extraterrestrial, has come to live in my heart and creating a new and heavenly nature within me. So my citizenship is in heaven, and I am an alien here on this earth. A resident for a while. We need to always remember that.

You know it is interesting in all of the sci-fi pictures that I have ever seen where there were aliens on this earth, they always seem to remember that they were from somewhere else and that they were really aliens and they had an agenda, usually malignant, for themselves while they were here.

Now we are not really illegal aliens because Christ owns this planet. He made this planet, this is His world. But we have an agenda. It is not malignant. It is most beneficial to bring about the salvation of mankind. We now look for Jesus Christ our Savior who will come from heaven and who will change our corrupted bodies. As soon as we mature, we begin to die, until finally we are a cold corpse lying in a casket.

While in this body of flesh, let us do good to others on this earth, recognizing that our ultimate citizenship is in heaven. Not bad work for an alien.

Lord of heaven and earth, give me strength today to live in this world, with my eyes fixed on heaven. Help us to remember that this is not our true home. So help us to not get too attached to this world…

IN GOD’S STRENGTH, WE LIVE
AS PILGRIMS AND ALIENS HERE.

“But now is Christ risen from the dead and become the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.”

— 1 Corinthians 15:30

The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is the greatest historical fact of antiquity. Author and speaker Josh McDowell has studied, written on, and debated about this for decades now. He writes: “After more than 700 hours of studying this subject, and thoroughly investigating its foundation, I have come to the conclusion that the resurrection of Jesus Christ is one of the “most wicked, vicious, heartless hoaxes ever foisted upon the minds of men, or it is the most fantastic fact of history.”

He points out that the theories to try and explain away the resurrection make less historical sense than the resurrection itself.

When asked if the disciples stole the body of Christ, as some unbelievers assert, he says: “…here was a small band of men—most of them fishermen—just common people. They came out, fought off the Roman guard, some of the most disciplined soldiers in history, broke the Roman seal that anyone feared breaking because of the consequences of it, and then stole the body and spread abroad that Jesus had been raised from the dead.”

But what if He hadn’t really died, but swooned in the tomb? “Four professional executioners signed His death warrant; that was according to Roman customs. And then to try to believe that that damp tomb, instead of killing Him, healed Him, and I guess then He jumped up, hobbled over, pushed the stone out of the way, tied the guard unit up with His linen cloth and appeared to His disciples as the Lord of Life.” No, the only thing to explain the facts are that He is risen. He is risen indeed!

Lord of life, we praise You that You have conquered the grave. We praise You that You changed all history, Jesus, when You walked out of that tomb. Thank You for building Your kingdom on the solid foundation of Your historical resurrection…

BY HIS STRENGTH, WE KNOW THAT
WE WILL LIVE, EVEN AFTER WE DIE.

“…their glory is in their shame, their minds are set on earthly things.”

— Philippians 3:19

One of the sad things about our time is the fact that shame seems to have become almost extinct. When did you ever hear anyone say, “You should be ashamed”? We have so many people today that glory in their shame, that boast in their shame, that proclaim their shame publicly, and it is tragic that today people glory in the very things that they should be ashamed of.

And “their minds are set on earthly things.” That, I think, is sort of the bottom line of it all because their hearts and minds are not in heaven but simply upon this earth, and if we do not have that upward calling in mind we are going to mind earthly things. Paul says our citizenship is in heaven. The Greek word we translate as citizenship is the word from which we get politics or policy. We should remember that we are citizens of heaven.

This was particularly apropos to the Philippians because Philippi, though in Macedonia, was a Roman colony. It was attached to the Roman Empire, since they had been granted by Caesar Roman citizenship, which was to be devoutly desired. They were citizens of Rome. They were citizens of Rome, even as we are citizens of heaven and most particularly of the new Jerusalem, the heavenly city. That is where our true citizenship is.

We may be involved, rightly so, and concerned about the politics and citizenship of this world, but we need to remember ultimately we are citizens of heaven; thus, we naturally are repulsed at people glorying in their shame.

Heavenly Father, You are pure and holy, and we live among a twisted and perverse generation. Help us to be more grieved when we see people flagrantly breaking Your commandments and are proud of it. Give us the strength to choose the hard right over the easy wrong…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN LIVE
IN THIS WORLD AS CITIZENS OF HEAVEN.

“For Christ also has once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, so that He might bring us to God…”

— 1 Peter 3:18

Before my conversion, I hadn’t realized what spiritual danger I was in. But how well I remember that day when I first discovered the truth about myself, when the Holy Spirit opened my eyes to see myself as I really was. I was arraigned before the bar of God’s judgment. Justice accused me, and the scales tipped precipitously against me.

The Judge looked me sternly in the face and said, “I pronounce that you shall die. Do you have anything to say for yourself before the sentence of eternal death is pronounced upon you?” For the first time in all my self-righteous life, I was speechless. The Judge brought down His gavel, and the sentence was pronounced.

Eternal death descended upon me, and I stood on the scaffold of God’s judgment. I felt hopeless as I felt the black cap of eternal death placed upon my head and about to be pulled down over my eyes. Suddenly, I heard a cry, a voice that said, “Stay. Let not that man descend into the pit.”

I looked and there came at a great run one whose face was flecked with blood, whose hands were pierced, who said, “Surely he deserves to die but the spear pierced My side instead. Surely he deserves to descend into the pit, but there in the blackness of midday at Calvary, I descended into the pit for him. All that he deserves I have properly taken. Now let him go free.” I praise God for His gift of eternal life in Christ Jesus my Lord.

Lord Jesus, thank You that You are our advocate before the Father, pleading our cause. Thank You for rescuing us from eternal peril at the cost of Your own shed blood…

IN HIS STRENGTH,
WE STAND FORGIVEN.

“For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from him who has nothing, even what he has will be taken away.”

— Matthew 25:29

There are certain sayings Jesus repeated over and over, such as “the last will be first, and the first last…” (Matthew 20:16). “…a servant is not greater than his master”… (John 13:16). “For many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14).

Matthew 25:29 is one of these. It is a text that is often overlooked. It is a text which is filled with meaning and pregnant with significance for our lives. On five separate occasions, Christ repeated this text in varied forms. It deals three times with the initial state of our Christian life, telling us to beware of what we hear.

We are warned early in the ministry of Christ that we are to be careful what we hear. Today it seems that people have very little care for what they hear. As long as the preacher has some eloquence and appeal or some sort of zeal, they will listen to anything. Nonetheless, false doctrine, however appealing it may appear, is always poisonous. Perhaps there has never been a time when people needed to listen more carefully to the Word of Jesus in that regard. “Take heed what you hear” (Mark 4:24). Few people would seem to suppose that hearing anything could be dangerous to their spiritual life. And Jesus also said, “take heed therefore how you hear” (Luke 8:18).

Are we not often careless hearers? May God give us the grace to listen carefully to Christ through the pages of Scripture with open ears and open hearts.

God of truth, help us to know Your voice amidst all the voices that scream out for our attention. Give us the strength to hear You correctly and to live by Your Word…

BY GOD’S STRENGTH, WE CAN DISCERN
TRUTH FROM FALSEHOOD.

“The fool has said in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, they do abominable deeds, there is none who does good.”

— Psalms 14:1

There are many atheists today. They write bestselling books. They go on national talk shows. They seem to be all over the place. Are they beyond God’s touch?

Well, over my lifetime, the best known atheist was Madalyn Murray O’Hair. Interestingly, she was the first guest on the Phil Donohue Show. He was a pioneer talk host, who liked to promote unbelief.

One of the defining moments in her life, when her atheism became solidified, was when she ran outside during a thunderstorm and defied God—if there was one—to strike her dead right then and there. He chose not to. “You see, you see.” she exclaimed, “I’ve proved irrefutably that God does not exist.” Note that she was pregnant at the time, and inside her was William J. Murray.

William J. Murray was actually a future servant of the Lord. After being exposed to a virulent form of atheism all his life, Murray came to a realization: “There has to be a God because there certainly is a devil. I have met him, talked to him, and touched him. He is the personification of evil.” Soon after this insight, Murray found the Christ his mother hated so much by reading the Gospel of Luke. Today he is a powerful evangelist and also an advocate of allowing God back into the public schools. This is the very man, who as a boy, had been at the center of Murray vs. Curlett (1963), one of the key Supreme Court anti-school prayer decisions. God can reach anyone.

Lord, give me strength for today to let others know about You, even those who have bought the lie of atheism. Thank You that no one is beyond Your reach, Jesus …

IN HIS STRENGTH, WE SEE GOD’S
HANDIWORK ALL AROUND US.