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Christian Devotional – February 4, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 34 God fulfills His plan, in His time. Read 2 Samuel chapter 3. When we read through this chapter, we see continued ways in which God is moving and working and setting things up so that David would be king. But, it doesn’t happen overnight. It takes several years and lots of time before David realizes the fulfillment of the promise that God made to him person. Often, when God makes a promise to us, we expect immediate action and immediate results. We have grown up in a society and a culture where we are frustrated by waiting. Waiting seems bad. When in actuality, waiting…
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Christian Devotional – February 3, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 33 David’s continued respect for Saul. Read 2 Samuel chapter 2. David continues to demonstrate what it means to respect what the Lord has annointed. He shows kindness to those who have been kind to Saul, the annointed of the Lord. How do we treat others? How do we treat those who have been mean to us? We can respect all that God does through people and be showing respect to God, even if the people have been mean to us. David gives us the example.
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Christian Devotional – February 2, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 32 When your adversary is defeated, how do you respond? Read 2 Samuel chapter 1. David receives word that Saul has been killed. There has been a major battle and Israel has been defeated. During the course of this battle, Saul and his sons are all killed. David receives word of this and responds in a way that is different than most of us would probably respond if we learned of the death of our adversary. David laments and mourns Saul. I wonder whether David actually ever considered Saul and adversary? Certainly, there are plenty of reasons to think that since Saul was constantly trying…
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Christian Devotional – February 1, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 31 Fulfillment of God’s Word. Read 1 Samuel chapter 31. Saul had continued to deny God and God had shared through prophets that he was going to lose everything. Well, God’s word came true and Saul died, along with his sons. While this chapter is tragic, it’s tragic because of the disobedience and rebellion that Saul showed. It’s tragic because of his lack of repentance. It’s always tragic to see sin ruin the lives of those around us. Sin, and our failure to repent from it, is a main reason why we experience a lot of the struggles that we do. Are we repenting to…
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Christian Devotional – January 31, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 30 Ever have anyone talk badly about you? Yea, so has David. Read 1 Samuel chapter 30. David and his men are told to go home, so they do. But when they get there, they find out that the place they have been living has been raided, destroyed, and their families captured. No one is very happy with David at this point. If we’ve ever been in a position where we made desicions, then we have, at some point, made a decision that others didn’t like. There will always be people who don’t like us and who are angry with us. However, David found his…
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Christian Devotional – January 30, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 29 God gets David out of a tight spot. Read 1 Samuel chapter 29. David was living in enemy territory and pretending to be on the same side as his enemies. However, he had been secretly fighting against them. However, the time has come that these Philistines are going to fight against Israel and David has to come and fight with them. However, because of rumors and David’s reputation, God uses that so that David is able to get out of the situation and not have to fight against his own brothers. As we saw yesterday, God didn’t tell David to go on this plan…
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Christian Devotional – January 29, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 28 What do you do when God doesn’t seem to answer? Read 1 Samuel chapter 28. Saul was in a difficult situation. The armies were massing against him, and he didn’t know what to do. He wanted to hear from the Lord, but it seemed like the Lord wasn’t answering him. While Saul ends up going to extreme measures to try to find an answer from the Lord, what we find out is that he already knew the answer. God had already shared with him what he was going to do and there wasn’t anything new to share with him. Saul just didn’t like the…
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Christian Devotional – January 28, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 27 What happens when you go somewhere that God doesn’t tell you to? Read 1 Samuel chapter 27. Nowhere in this chapter does it say that David asked God what to do. Nowhere does it say that God directed David to follow this path. David thought to himself and made a decision. Unfortunately, David’s decision resulted in him having to lie on a regular basis to the leader of the area he was in. David had been kept safe from Saul by God through this whole time, why did he feel that he had to go do something else? So often, while God is taking…
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Christian Devotional – January 27, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 26 Respecting God’s calling on others. Read 1 Samuel chapter 26. Again, David has an opportunity to do harm to Saul and again, David spares his life. If we were given the opportunity to do harm to our enemies, would we? Would we seek to spare them? We are to treat people with the respect that they deserve as God’s creation.
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Christian Devotional – January 26, 2023
The God who Hears, Day 25 We know that God hears us, but do we hear each other? Read 1 Samuel chapter 25. This is a great story about a very wise woman and a foolish man. Today as I read it, I am reminded of the role that David played. He was angry and his pride had been wounded. Yet, he was willing to hear Abigail and he made a better decision as a result. God hears us, but do we hear God? When we are angry or feel that we have been wronged, do we still listen or are we so focused on revenge that we fail to…