They
had turned away from the Lord. They had chosen to go their own way
(Jeremiah 2:13). When, Lord, our message isn’t popular, help us to
remember that it’s Your message – not ours. You have not called us to
preach a superficial message. You’ve called us to preach a searching
message. We are to invite our hearers to think about what their wrong
choices were doing to them: ‘Have you not brought this on yourselves by
forsaking the Lord your God when He led you in the way?’ (Jeremiah
2:17). We are to leave them in no doubt about where their wrong choices
are leading them – ‘“Your own evil will punish you, and your turning
from Me will condemn you. You will learn how bitter and wrong it is to
abandon Me, the Lord your God, and no longer to remain faithful to Me”,
I, the Sovereign Lord Almighty, have spoken’ (Jeremiah 2:19). This
isn’t what people want to hear. It’s what they need to hear. Help us to
be faithful to You – even when it’s difficult and discouragement is
never very far away from us.
We thank You, Lord, that our determined enemy - Satan - is Your defeated enemy. To us, the devil seems so powerful. In Your eyes, He is defeated - defeated by Jesus, our crucified Saviour and risen Lord. Jesus has triumphed over Satan. He has won the victory for us (1 John 3:8; Hebrews 2:14-15). Lord, Your Word says, "Resist the devil and he will flee from you" (James 5:7). Will he really flee from us? He flees from Jesus - but, surely, not from us? Have we not forgotten something? - Jesus won the victory for us. He gives His victory to us. Help us to resist the devil - in the victorious Name of Jesus. He will flee from us. Why? Because Jesus is Lord over Satan. It's not us he's fleeing from. It's Jesus. When the devil comes 'knocking on our door', help us to send Jesus to the door - and send him packing!
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