Isaiah 56:6-7 “And to foreigners who bind themselves to the Lord to serve him, to love the name of the Lord, and to worship him, all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it and who hold fast to my covenant–these I will bring to my holy mountain and give them joy in my house of prayer.”

The kind of service that God’s people offer him is not dull, boring drudgery. It isn’t the go-through-the-motions kind of work of someone who is just trying to make a living or get the job done. This service is special, and we have a couple of reasons why this is true here.

First, the word translated “serve” doesn’t speak of ordinary service. The word refers to a type of service which is special because of whom you are serving. The task itself might not be any different than that of other people, but it takes on a unique honor and importance because of the one served.

For example, we don’t generally consider cooks to have a distinguished position. It’s not considered glamorous. I also have a relative who used to cook for a living, but he did his cooking at the White House in Washington D.C. His job was considered very prestigious, all because of the person he served.

Janitors may clean buildings all over the world. Salesmen may make thousands and millions of calls on people’s homes every day. Teachers may teach the 3 “r’s” to their students in many different languages in many different schools. But the work which you and I do to maintain our church buildings, call on our neighbor’s homes with the Gospel, and teach the faith to our children comes with a special honor and privilege. We have the honor of serving the one and only God, the maker of all things, and the Savior of all the world with our service.

The other special thing about this service is the force behind it. Isaiah speaks of “foreigners who bind themselves to the Lord to serve him, to love the name of the Lord, and to worship him.” Service to God is a labor of love. What else could it be when we know how he has first served and first loved us? Professor Siegbert Becker once wrote, “It is impossible to see ourselves as sinners deserving eternal damnation in hell and then to come to the conviction that the suffering and dying Christ has procured full and free forgiveness for us by taking our guilt upon himself and by giving his own righteousness to us as a free gift of his love, it is impossible to come to that conviction without coming to love him who gave himself into death that we might have everlasting life….To know him is to love him is more applicable to our Savior than to anyone else.” As the Lord gathers people, he turns them into people who serve him–a service of honor and a service of love.

Perhaps the most shocking thing about this service for the people who lived in Isaiah’s day was the fact that it would come from foreigners. The prophet saw it coming from people like you and me, who are not Jews. No one at that time would have thought we could be God’s kind of people because we belong to the wrong race. We have the wrong family background. But the Lord has graciously made us his own and gathered us to serve him.

The privilege of being the people God has brought to himself and invited into his house of prayer gives dignity to all the ways in which we serve and worship him.

Ephesians 4:30-31, 5:1-2 “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.  Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice… Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children, and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.” 

The problem with all these forms of malice–bitterness, rage, anger, brawling, slander–isn’t just what they do to our love for each other. They certainly do plenty of damage there. Lifelong friends can become enemies, churches split in two, the work of spreading the gospel comes to a grinding halt.

The more serious problem, however, is how these sinful attitudes and actions affect our God.  Paul tells us, “don’t grieve the Holy Spirit of God…” Our Lord takes sin very seriously. He isn’t merely angered by it. It grieves him. Our sins give our Lord pain and heartache. They are still deserving of death and hell.

Though our sins grieve the Spirit of God, Paul tells us that he continues to regard us as his “dearly loved children.” Parents may not always be happy with how their children behave, but they would do almost anything to help them. With a similar and greater love, God has loved us as his dearly loved children. We don’t always please him with our lives, but he loves us just the same. Jesus proved this love by giving himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. He led a perfect life so that he could become an offering without any spot or stain. He was a perfect, sweet smelling sacrificial offering for our sins. He shielded us from the burning blast of God’s anger at sin by stepping into our place and sacrificing himself.

What Jesus did is more than popular legend, a mythological story of events and places long ago. God has also given us a guarantee that forgiveness and heaven are ours. “And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” In Bible times, if someone’s personal seal, a design carved on a cylinder, had been rolled across a document or letter, that made the document legally binding. It guaranteed that this was the real thing, much like your signature on a contract today.

God has given us such a guarantee. He has put his signature on us by giving us the Holy Spirit and faith. The Holy Spirit is our guarantee that we will see the “day of redemption.”

That “day of redemption” exceeds our comprehension. The phrase “day of redemption,” tells us we will be finally, completely free of all the effects of sin. In other places Scripture promises no pain, hardship, tears, hunger, or violence. We may not understand all the positive things we will have. But the present gift of the Holy Spirit is our promise that the day will come, and its gifts are ours.

Until then, we live as the children God loves, and imitate the one who gave so much to have us.

Mark 14:32-38 “He (Jesus) took Peter, James, and John along with him, and he began to be deeply distressed and troubled. ‘My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death,’ he said to them. ‘Stay here and keep watch.’” Going a little further, he (Jesus) fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him. ‘Abba, Father,’ he said, ‘everything is possible for you. Take this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.’ Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. ‘Simon,’ he said to Peter, ‘are you sleeping? Could you not keep watch for one hour? Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation.’”

Let’s say you are at the doctor because he wants to discuss the results of your latest blood test. It turns out you are pre-diabetic. If you are going to avoid going on insulin, you need to cut back on the sweets and the carbs. After the visit you return to work. Next to the office is a donut shop. Wafting through the air is that sweet smell of donuts in the fryer. Every day it confronts you when you arrive. Many days it has pulled you all the way in. It will still be calling each morning when you get out of your car. Is that disappointing? Or does it feel almost comforting?

Is temptation your friend or your enemy? You know the right answer. But that doesn’t make it easy to resist. In the Garden of Gethsemane Jesus warned his disciples about the lure of temptation. These three men were caught in an internal tug of war. Which was stronger: love for Jesus or desire for personal comfort?

They could see that Jesus is in obvious distress. When ever had they seen him ask for help like this? He had never hinted he might need assistance himself. No doubt these three were eager to do their part.

But their stomachs were full from the Passover Feast. Jesus’ words at the dinner had been emotionally draining. It was late. Now Thursday had almost turned into Friday. The night was chilly, and they were sitting there while a few yards away Jesus was pleading and sobbing. Their eyes were heavy. You know that feeling when you are driving late at night, and your head bobs, and you drive for stretches when perhaps you didn’t actually sleep, but you have no memory of the last mile you have traveled?

The three friends fall. Three times before this evening is over love loses to personal comfort. Temptation wins. They sleep.

We don’t find that hard to understand. We know how hard it is to tell the body “no.” My spouse, my children, my friends may need me to show a little self-control, to demonstrate some discipline. But the craving, the urge, won’t leave me alone. “Forget you,” we finally say. “I don’t care. I’m going to do what I want.”

That was one temptation. There was another like it, only immeasurably more intense. Would the choice be love, doing what my neighbor needs, or seeking personal comfort? “Going a little further, he (Jesus) fell to the ground and prayed that if possible the hour might pass from him.” Jesus didn’t desire rest. He wanted to avoid the pain. And this was no ordinary pain. They would whip him until they tore the skin and flesh from his bones and the blood flowed. For six hours they suspended his body from a cross with spikes and watched him slowly suffocate. Even God in heaven turned away from him while his body endured eternal justice for the crimes of all humanity. No, it wasn’t a nap that tempted Jesus. It was some way, any way out from suffering unlike anyone else has ever endured.

And if he gave in to the temptation? Then love was lost. Hanging in the balance was not the need of an individual friend or family member. It was the eternal fate of all humanity. Would heaven be ever empty and hell forever full? It all depended on how Jesus responded to this temptation.

Jesus submitted his will to God’s. “Yet not what I will, but what you will.” Doesn’t that attitude sum up the entire Christian life? Every day is a new opportunity to crucify our will, our desires, in favor of our Father’s. Every day is an opportunity to say, “Not my will, but your will be done.” Here Jesus’ prayer reveals that he knows what to do with temptation when it seems too much to bear.

There is something better here. Gethsemane is not just our example. It’s our victory. Our battle with temptation does not begin where Jesus’ battle ended. Ours ends here, too, in the garden, when our great saving Substitute overcomes. We still wrestle to resist the magnetic pull of one temptation after another. The force feels irresistible. You fall, often. So do I.

But our heavenly Father does not see a beaten sinner pulling himself up from the ground after another loss, ever. He sees a perfect son, a holy daughter, submitting to his will. He sees us in Jesus’ skin embracing the path he wants us to follow.

He sees our many surrenders to sin painted in deep red, washed in Jesus blood, until he can’t see them anymore. He sees them nailed to Jesus’ cross and buried in his tomb, disposed of forever. Today he doesn’t see them at all because Jesus embraced his cross, fulfilled his Father’s will, and saved the world.

Luke 15:3-7 “Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Does he not leave the ninety-nine in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home. Then he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, ‘Rejoice with me; I have found my lost sheep.’ I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who do not need to repent.”

The open sinners were gathering around Jesus to hear his word. The Pharisees and teachers of the law, who lived outwardly moral lives, had only criticism for him. Which group contained candidates to become part of Heaven’s Greatest Joy?

I like it when people do things right the first time. I am satisfied if the waiter brings me the wrong order but quickly corrects it after we discover the mistake. I probably give a bigger tip and may even put in a good review of the place if everything is right from the start. I am satisfied when my mechanic owns up to the mistake he made repairing my vehicle and fixes it at no extra charge. I compliment his work, recommend him to others, and keep bringing my car back if he is consistently getting the diagnosis and repair right on the first try. I was satisfied when my children apologized for their bad behavior. It gave me a sense of pride when they chose to do the right thing all along.

We may tend to focus on things like behavior, results, success. Our Lord likes good behavior, too. But he is focused more on the people themselves. It gives him joy simply to have them, to have them back with him safe and sound.

Maybe that’s not so hard to understand. I took great pride in my children when they made the honor roll, or walked the stage at their graduations, or were commended for their work as lifeguards in a special ceremony. But that was nothing like the joy I felt on the day we learned my wife was expecting, or the day they were born. Then, before this little person could do anything, when all he or she did was exist, there was joy just to have them, joy that they had made it into our world and into our family safe.

Our repentance is like our spiritual birthday, one that happens over and over again. It is the day that we die to sin and live to God. It is the day that doubt and fear, resistance and contradiction, give way to faith and trust and love. It is the day Jesus’ love wins us for his side, however shaky and weak that new allegiance may be at first. Then he can say, “This one belongs to me now, and if the devil wants him back he will have to fight me for him.”

Repentance is the change of mind and heart that make us belong to God, a new birth into a new life. With every sin confessed and promise of grace grasped, that new birth keeps producing new life. When he finds us, our Lord claims all of us for himself all at once. But at the same time his love and forgiveness keep winning more and more of ourselves for him. His ownership grows with each new conquest.

Having us, owning us, making us his very own–that’s what gives our Lord his greatest joy. That’s not something that happens with the spiritually self-satisfied who think that they have made it on their own. They still belong to themselves. They always will. That’s something God does only with sinners: not too proud to admit their sins, ready to let Jesus carry them home. That’s the circumstance no one would have expected if Jesus did not reveal it as heaven’s greatest joy.

May we never be too good, or too proud, to be the sinners Jesus seeks, Jesus finds, and Jesus rejoices to call his own.

1 Corinthians 2:6-13 “We do, however, speak a message of wisdom among the mature, but not the wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age, who are coming to nothing. No, we speak of God’s secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been hidden and that God destined for our glory before time began.”

The earth is flat and the moon is made of green cheese. Autumn leaves turn colors because little fairies come out at night and paint them orange and yellow while we are sleeping. Breaking a mirror will give you seven years of bad luck. If I told you that I believe all these things, you would probably think that I was making a joke. If I insisted, you might think that I had finally cracked. If everything else about me seemed normal, you might consider me a fool.

I don’t believe that the earth is flat, the moon is made of green cheese, fairies paint the leaves, or breaking mirrors negatively affects your future. But I know that some of the Bible truths we believe sound just about as strange to much of the world around us. Christian faith leads some to wonder if we have taken leave of our senses.

God’s wisdom and the world’s wisdom often part ways with each other because God’s wisdom is hidden from this age in which we now live. The difference between these two kinds of “wisdom” is not a simple matter of two alternative paths. Jesus Christ–the Way, the Truth, and the Life, the narrow door and the narrow path–is the only way to the Father and eternal life. That is God’s wisdom. The general equality of all world religions is the world’s wisdom, or worse, the generic, empty “spirituality” more and more people are adopting. These lead neither to God nor to life. To quote Paul’s words here, “they are coming to nothing.”

But they are packaged and marketed to you and me in a way that make them hard to resist. They keep wearing away at our resistance. The spin is that if you adopt the world’s wisdom, you will be more popular, you will have more fun, you must be more intelligent, you are more just or fair. If you reject the world’s wisdom in favor of God’s, you are an extremist, intolerant, someone who thinks you are better than others, or just plain ignorant. It’s a great marketing campaign, maybe the best that ever was. You feel its tug, don’t you.

In contrast, Paul’s “message of wisdom” is talking about the gospel, God’s “secret wisdom.” The Lord of glory was crucified for us. Look at the facts of Jesus’ life. If God didn’t intervene in human history, who would have known about this person named Jesus who lived and died in the obscurity of Roman occupied Israel? When Jesus was born, who would have known unless God sent angels to tell the shepherds, “Today in the city of David a Savior has been born to you. He is Christ the Lord.” When Jesus died on the cross, who really believed they were crucifying the “Lord of glory”? Even his disciples seemed to have given up on the idea. When Jesus rose again, it took the intervention of angels again to convince the women that the body was alive, not stolen. And the disciples didn’t believe until Jesus began appearing to them himself. Without God’s own intervention, this all would have remained God’s little secret.

More than these historical facts, God’s secret wisdom includes the meaning of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. His secret wisdom is the thing God was doing for us. God entered our world as one of us, paid for all our sins by his own death, freely forgave every sin and set us free from them, made life and immortality our own as his gift. Who would have guessed that? Grace is the operative word for our relationship with God. It is our confidence of his love, our hope that we will live with him. It is not “obedience,” or “purpose,” or “effort,” or “sincerity,” or “passion.” It is grace, God’s gift-love, that has been hidden from the ages, including our own.

One commentator has noted, “No heathen people ever conceived a god who would actually take care of those who placed their reliance on him.” They live in fear, not faith. They have to work their magic and pay their dues to keep their gods happy and themselves safe. A God who freely loves them as a Father, and freely forgives? That’s our message, Paul says. That’s God’s wisdom. By giving us the gospel and leading you to faith, God has let you in on this secret.

It’s not a secret that he wants us to keep.

2 Peter 1:19“And we have the word of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.”

Someone once asked me whether or not I believed the age of miracles was over. In the Bible, accounts of miracles tend to be bunched together around a few historical characters: Moses, Elijah, Jesus, and the Apostles. But I don’t know if there ever was an “age of miracles.” God’s power has always been at work in the lives of his people. From time to time he still works in our world in ways that can’t be explained naturally.

The miraculous is an indispensable part of Christianity. Just think about how much of the Christmas account describes things miraculous, or what would be left of it without them. But our faith does not depend on being eye witnesses of miracles. We have something better in the word. We have “the word of the prophets made more certain.” All by itself, God’s word has always been 100 percent reliable. There has never been a problem with God’s word.

But there has been a problem with me. You and I might not be like those who consider the Bible a collection of myths. We don’t dismiss miraculous events as fantasies. But we still have subtle ways of showing our lack of trust. Even Christians mistrust God’s law. The Bible clearly forbids sex outside of marriage. That didn’t prevent unmarried Christians I know from claiming they prayed to God about it, and insisting that in their case God was making an exception. Jesus equates hatred with murder. Yet many Christians try to justify hateful feelings because they believe their situation is somehow unique or exceptional. I have heard adult Christians propose that “he started it” was a valid reason to treat someone else unkindly.

Sometimes we just don’t think God’s word is sufficient for our faith, or enough to convert someone else, and we yearn for a visible demonstration of God’s power. But what does Jesus say about that sort of thing? “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign.” In such ways we demonstrate our own lack of trust in God’s word.

Peter shores up our flagging faith when he promises, “We have the word of the prophets made more certain.” Is it just a coincidence that the events surrounding Jesus’ birth, and life, and death, and resurrection fulfill so many prophecies made hundreds and even thousands of years before he lived? We read the prophecies of Moses, or David, or Isaiah. We find that these are not vague generalities like your horoscope that might fit the lives of dozens of people you know. They describe exactly the specific places and events and circumstances in Jesus’ life. They demonstrate a reliability which has never failed.

It’s no wonder that Peter encourages, “…you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts.” Why listen to the Word’s witness? The words of Scripture are so much more than just “God’s Little Instruction Book” or “Chicken Soup for the Soul.” A simple message like, “Jesus so loves you that he died for your every sin. Dear Child of God, your sins are all forgiven,” are filled with the miraculous power of God. When people hear them, a little miracle takes place in human hearts. A bright beacon of faith, and hope, and love begins to shine where there was only uncertainty, and despair, and loneliness before.

We don’t need to see the events of the first Christmas, or Jesus’ death and resurrection, or his shining in all his glory on the mountain (the event Peter is referencing in this context). When we listen to the Word’s witness, Jesus himself lives and shines in our hearts. By faith he is closer to us than he ever was to those who saw his physical body but never put their faith in him. His word makes me so sure that he loves me, so sure that he forgives me, so sure that now I belong just to him, that my hearts is filled with faith.

That is all the miracle we will ever need.

Galatians 2:15-16 “We who are Jews by birth and not ‘Gentile sinners’ know that a man is not justified by observing the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ.”

Peter had come to visit Paul and Barnabas in the city of Antioch. This was the first city where the Gospel was reaching not only Jews, but also Gentiles, and in large numbers. When Peter first arrived, everything was fine. He associated with the Gentile members freely. He even ate their food, some of which had been considered unclean in the law of Moses.

That was no small matter for a Jew. Not only had they learned to regard such food as sinful, they often saw such foods as simply distasteful. You might compare their reaction to the revulsion most of us would have to eating live caterpillars. Nonetheless, Peter practiced his Gospel freedom in Christ. The ceremonial law no longer applied since Jesus fulfilled it. Peter was well aware, and he ate with his Gentile friends.

Then other Jews visited from Jerusalem. All Peter’s Gospel freedom flew out the window. He was afraid of what they might think of him, so he stopped eating with the Gentiles. He shunned their food, even shunned their company.

Peter’s actions were wrong for a couple of reasons. First, what he did was motivated by fear, not love. When fear is our motivation, we are falling back on work-righteous ideas. God’s punishment or man’s disapproval drive our actions. When fear of consequences governs what we do, we are being legalistic and self-righteous.

Second, Peter was putting the gospel message in jeopardy. His behavior was affecting everyone around him. He was leading both Jews and Gentiles to believe that faith in Jesus was not enough. This threatened the eternal salvation of souls.

Sometimes we act out of fear, too. We want others to consider us good, but we are not acting out of love. We may not have hang-ups with Old Testament ceremonial law anymore, but something similar is going on when we apply the word “must” to some long-held “tradition.” This can be true whether we are insisting the tradition continue or end. Either way, we are adding to the gospel.

Even godly morals can become a device for denying the sufficiency of God’s grace. Fear or hope of reward deny that Jesus’ death on the cross was enough. We may not say that we are trying to pay for our own sins out loud, but any action that comes from fear instead of love comes from the same legalistic root.

God’s law is not the answer for our sins. It exposes them. Paul tells us that through the law we become conscious of sin. But it can’t provide a solution, and it is powerless to give us the faith which can. “The law brings wrath,” Paul says in Romans. It even makes sin spring to life. It cannot give us spiritual life.

Instead, we are justified by faith in Jesus Christ. He lived the life the law demanded as our substitute. He died the death the law demands for our sins. For that reason, God declares that we are not guilty. He forgives us.

When we hear this, the point is not: “God says I am not guilty, but I really am.” This is the same God who said, “Let there be light” and light appeared. When he says something, it is real and true. If he says I am not guilty, then I am not.

This answer for sin is ours by faith. It is not a one-time experience from the past. It forms an ongoing relationship of trust and confidence established by God himself. By this same faith he applies forgiveness to us every day. If Jesus’ life and death are ours, we are not guilty. Ever.

1 John 5:1 “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God, and everyone who loves the father loves his children as well.”

Christians are people of faith. By ‘faith’ we don’t mean ‘optimistic wishfulness,’ or ‘the anticipation of possible success,’ or even ‘educated guesses,’ or ‘informed opinions.’ Christian faith is about certainties. The things which we believe are things of which we have become convinced, no less than I am convinced that I am alive, or that this chair in which I am sitting is made of wood, or that the grass outside is green.

This makes us… odd. To some who don’t share our faith we will seem backwards and naive because the things we believe are things we have never “seen” and cannot prove in the ordinary way. To some we will seem arrogant, because in being so certain about the teachings of our faith, we are discounting and denying the things that they believe.

One of these certainties we have by faith is the fact that we are God’s children, spiritually born into God’s own family. How do we know? What makes us so sure? I can think of  reasons that might give us doubts. Usually children resemble their parents in some way. If you looked at my four children, and you knew only my wife, you might think of the old Sesame Street song: “One of these things is not like the others, one of these things just doesn’t belong. Can you tell which thing is not like the others, by the time I finish my song?” One of my children gets his looks more from me, I believe. I leave it to those who know our family to decide which is which.

If we are born of God, do we look like him? Does our behavior suggest a family resemblance? Does it distinguish us from everyone else? We have to admit that many times it is hard to tell any difference based on how we act.

We worry about money, health, and safety just like people who don’t know God as their kind and loving Father in heaven. We don’t live every moment in absolute peace about the way in which he will provide and protect. Our lifestyles can be just as self-indulgent as those who don’t believe Jesus is anything special.

So how do we know? How do we know that God has given us birth, that we are his children? John says, “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.” It doesn’t start with behavior. It starts with faith. We believe that Jesus is the Christ. For us he is not merely “Interesting Historical Figure,” “Founder of a Famous Religion,” “First-Century Philosopher,” “Mesmerizing Middle-Eastern Mystic.” Jesus is the Christ, our God and Savior. Everything we celebrate about Jesus’ death on the cross and his resurrection from the dead, we believe. We believe it as something far more than a sad and tragic miscarriage of justice followed by a miraculous return to life. This death is God’s own payment for our sins. We are forgiven, freed from guilt, liberated from the debt in which we were trapped. This living and glorified God-man, this empty grave, is a preview of our own bright future. Like Jesus our bodies are going to be revived and glorified. We will leave our tombs behind us, and live and walk with God in a land where there is no more death, or mourning, or crying, or pain, for the old order of things has passed away, and God has made everything new.

This message, this promise, is the womb in which our faith is formed, the means by which the miracle of spiritual birth takes place. It is the power by which we believe that Jesus is the Christ. Person after person has fallen under its spell–sinners and skeptics, doubters and deniers: fully armed and ready to debunk the Christian story, but in the end, won by his love, and confessing Jesus Christ as Lord. That faith, born of those truths, is how we know that God has given us birth, that we are the children of God.

Hebrews 13:5b “God has said, ‘Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.’”

This promise covers everything. If you would remember nothing but this promise of God, you would be equipped for anything you might face in life. The words are the words of God himself. In the whole history of the world, from creation until this day, he has never been known to break a promise. Not one. You can be certain that every day of your lives this promise he gives will still be valid. Any other gifts you might receive will wear out or lose their luster with time, but not this one. This gift from your Savior will be there until the day you die.

What he promises is nothing less than to be your helper in any and every situation. He will never leave you. When it looks like your ship is sinking, your dreams have been dashed, your fortune lost, your life and health ebbing away, he will always be with you to hold you up and give you care. He will never forsake you.

Even at times when our hearts have been cold and hard, and we have turned to follow our own ways instead of his ways, he doesn’t abandon us. He patiently calls us back to himself. He forgives us no matter how great the guilt. He takes care of us, no matter how great the problem.

Think for a moment about how all-encompassing this promise truly is. When God first spoke these words, it wasn’t here in the book of Hebrews. He used Moses to speak them to the children of Israel before they entered the Promised Land. There he was assuring them that, even though war and bloodshed were staring them in the face, he would never leave or forsake them. They could trust him when their very lives and the lives of those they loved were in such danger.

Here this promise is applied to our daily needs. Even when it looks like we have come to the end of our resources, the cupboard is bare, the well is dry, the purse is empty, God promises to uphold you and to provide. His resources never run out, and we can trust him for our daily bread.

Today you can claim this promise for yourself. Life can be a roller coaster ride as we balance the competing demands of family, work, church, and community. But whatever the future holds, God’s promise still stands: “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”