MONDAY 26TH OCTOBER
Ruth 1.1-18
Ruth clung to her

Today we begin to look at this very beautiful story of Ruth.  Ruth was one of Jesus’ ancestors. Naomi and her family went to live in Moab, a foreign country, where work was available.  They were all very happy, with her two sons marrying Moabite women.  Sadness struck the family; her husband and two sons died.  Naomi was left with her two daughters-in-law.  When Naomi decided to go home to Bethlehem she advised her sons’ wives to remain in Moab.  When she was telling them how much she would miss them and how sad she’d be without them, they all broke down in tears.  While the other one, Orpah, went to her original home, Ruth clung to her mother-in-law.  She couldn’t stand the pain of parting with her.  She made the decision to go back to Judah with Naomi.  She promised to stay close to her until only death separated them.  She wanted to make Naomi’s people, her people and Naomi’s God, her God, and to go with Naomi wherever she went.  Their relationship was so close.  They were inseparable.

There is a tremendous advantage in being close to the Lord.  God pours so much love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit He has given us.  This makes our relationships with other members of our families so strong and so secure.  The strong bonds of love mean that there are no in-law problems.  Yes, Jesus makes such a difference in our loving.  He draws us so close to each other and makes us want to cling to each other.

PRAYER:  Father, thank you for giving Jesus, your Son, your love gift, to us.  Pour love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit you have given us.  Help all our family relationships grow so strong that we want to cling to each other and love each other with strong bonds of love.  Amen.

TUESDAY 27th. CTOBER
Psalm 119, 1-8
How happy are those who follow God’s laws

Lawlessness and lack of discipline leads people into very unhappy lifestyles.  The whole of life breaks down and relationships break down; everything is in chaos and disorder. Psalm 119, a very long psalm with 176 verses, reminds us almost in every verse of the tremendous importance of keeping God’s laws and doing His will.

Before we can be effective in keeping any law there must be motivation.  Sometimes we are motivated by punishment: a couple of hefty fines soon slows down the speedy motorist. The fear of pain of a hard smack keeps children in order.  The best motivation we can have to keep God’s laws is the motivation of love.  When love motivates us we keep God’s laws happily and willingly and we get much joy living within the bounds of His discipline.  

If we are motivated by the fear of hell or punishment, then we tend to keep the laws rather grudgingly.  We observe them on the outside, but inside we may still be rebellious.

If we love God so much that we seek a relationship with Him with all our hearts, this makes us very happy and we find it so easy to obey.  Love of God makes us really want to fear all His laws and really want to do His will in our lives every day.

PRAYER: Father, we seek you with all our hearts, and we respond to your great love for us by loving you with undying love.  Make us want to do your will and obey all your commands so that a disciplined life with you will keep us continually happy.  Amen.

WEDNESDAY 28th. OCTOBER
Hebrews 9.11-15
Jesus the Bridge Builder

I can remember on the wall at school there was a picture of a whole lot of men trying to build a bridge between Earth and Heaven.  In the picture, Heaven was on a mountain on the other side of a huge bottomless chasm which no-one could cross.  Because they could only build from one side, the bridge was incomplete.  It was unbuildable.  Further up, at the end of a small, rugged pathway, there was a huge cross laid across the chasm.  People were crossing it.

Our scripture reading today tells us that all man’s efforts cannot possibly ever get us a place in Heaven.  All our religious ceremonies and sacrifices, all our good deeds, etc. cannot get us over the chasm into Heaven.  God has made a fantastic promise.  He promised to send a Bridge Builder who would get all who hear His call and want to follow Him up the rugged pathway, into His eternal dwelling.  Jesus is the Bridge Builder.  

He made a fantastic sacrifice.  He offered His own blood, for He was victim as well as priest.  His blood paid for all our sins.  His blood cleansed our consciences from all sin.

We cannot take our sins to Heaven.  As we take the leap of faith and cross the bridge of the cross, we pass through the cleansing bath of Jesus’ blood.  When we get to the other side, we are holy and clean, totally acceptable to God, ready to receive our promised eternal inheritance. We are all saints!

PRAYER:  Jesus, thank you for loving us so much that you sacrificed yourself on the cross and built a bridge between Earth and Heaven which we can all cross.  As we take the leap of faith, cleanse us by your blood so that we will be able to become saints and  enter Heaven and be with you for ever.  Amen.

THURSDAY 29th. OCTOBER
Hebrews 9.16-24
Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness

In the old Jewish sacrificial system, the offering of animals in sacrifice and shedding of their blood was the way people came to receive forgiveness of their sin from God.  In the ceremonies, the Bible Scrolls, the tabernacle (church building) and the people were all sprinkled with blood.  They believed that this was God’s way of getting rid of their sins.  It was not very effective.  It must have been terribly messy and unpleasant.

God made a will.  He promised in this will to give everyone the offer of eternal life, but this promise would not come into effect until His Son died.  He was going to send His Son to give us this eternal life.  You see, eternal life was in Jesus.  When God made His will, He said that this life would be made available to everyone.  He willed it to us.  Before the will could become effective, Jesus had to die.  In His will, God said that only those who receive Jesus become His children and are entitled to be benefactors of His will (John 1.12).

Soon after Jesus died and rose again, He ascended into Heaven, where He ever lives in the presence of God.  Now He pleads for us who are entitled to receive eternal life.  He is the executor of God’s will, making sure that all who, by faith, have accepted Him into their lives and trust Him as Lord and Saviour, will receive the eternal life God has promised them in His will.

PRAYER:  Father, thank you that when you made your will, you put my name on it.  I accept Jesus as my Lord and Saviour.  I believe His shed blood cleanses me from all sin to enable me to receive the eternal life you promised through Jesus who ever stands before you to make sure I receive what you have promised.  Amen.

FRIDAY 30th. OCTOBER
Mark 12.13-17
Give to Caesar – Give to God 

The Jews were under foreign domination and under colonial rule from Rome.  They did not like it one bit. The thing they hated the most was having to pay taxes to the foreign government.  The Pharisees wanted to trick Jesus to say something that would make Him unpopular with the authorities.  They asked Him if it were lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not.  Jesus was very wise.  He asked for a coin.  “Whose portrait is this on the coin?” He asked.  They replied, “It is Caesar’s.”  Jesus said, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”  Everyone was absolutely amazed by Jesus’ answer.

What lesson can we learn from this?  It is very simple.  Each one of us has a duty to give to the government for the running of our country and to give to God through His church.  God is not happy when we avoid paying taxes (illegally that is).  God is also very unhappy when people try to avoid giving Him His tythes and giving Him offerings as well.

The main message for the week which we will look at tomorrow, is about loving God.  Remember, giving is love breathing.  If we stop breathing, we die, and if we stop giving to God, our love for Him dies.  How terrible that is!

PRAYER:  Lord, help us to see the importance of supporting the work of the government by paying taxes and supporting the work of the church by giving our tythe.  Pour so much love into our hearts to make giving and sharing easy for us.  Amen.

SATURDAY 31ST. OCTOBER
Mark 12.28-34; Deuteronomy 6.1-9
How much should we love God

Every Sunday we hear this command of God, that we should love God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind and with all our strength. God is very demanding.  To have a relationship with Him we must never be luke-warm or half-hearted.  He gives His all to us and in return He wants us to give Him everything.  Our relationship with God must be one of total surrender.

With all our heart means with all the feelings of our body.  With all our soul means in our spirits in the depth of our being.  With our minds reminds us that love is a decision; with our minds we make the decision to love God.  As we love Him, we love Him with all the strength we can muster.  When God sees us loving with all our strength, His Holy Spirit comes to us to give us more strength and more power to love Him even more.

We love God like this because He’s the only God.  He made us so that He would have people to love and people who would love Him. When we fall in love with someone we can’t get them out of our minds.  We keep thinking about them all day.  God loves us so much that He keeps thinking about us and loving us all day and all night long.  We are never out of His mind.  We are so very, very special to Him.  He wants us to love Him in exactly the same way. How can we show this love?  We show it through worship, praise and adoring Him and also we show Him how much we love Him by loving all the other people He loves.  We love all those around us as ourselves.

Just before He died, Jesus gave us another commandment – to love each other as He loves us; that is, to be willing to love everyone, even those who hurt us, and sacrifice everything for them.

PRAYER:  Lord God, you are the only God.  You made us for one purpose and one purpose only; because you want people to love.  We surrender our all to you and love you one hundred percent.  We also love everyone just as you love us, by letting Jesus die for us.  Amen.

SUNDAY 1st.NOVEMBER
  ALL SAINTS DAY
THIS WEEK’S MESSAGE

God is love so it is only natural that God requires all those He has made, ALL OF US, to love Him as much as He loves us!

AS we read and re read the New Testament of the Bible we are constantly reminded of God’s enormous love for us.   Jesus God’s own Dear Son who had always been with God since the beginning of time became a man and shared our common life.  He showed his love by fully identifying Himself with us.  

He was always so loving, so compassionate and so kind. In total humility He made Himself to be one with us.

The full extent of Jesus’ love was seen in his suffering, death and Resurrection.   He went through all that to pay the penalty our sins deserve and to set us free form our sins to become God’s sons and daughters.   Greater love has no man than this that He lays down His life for His friends. When He laid down His life He gave us all the free gift of eternal life! He enabled us to become His Saints  He did this because He loved us all so much that He never wanted to let us go!   He wanted us to be with Him for ever and ever!

When we see how much God loves us how can we do anything else but respond to his love.   We respond by surrendering our lives to Him and putting all our faith and trust in Him.  He is showing His love by knocking on the doors of our hearts.  We respond by opening the door and letting him come in to be our Lord and Saviour. This is when we become His Saints.

When Jesus comes in He does a wonderful miracle for each of us.   He gives us the power to love.   This is the power He released when He died on the cross for us. He pours this love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit He has given us  (Romans 5:5)

When Jesus does this for us He fills us with Joy.  God enables us to put Jesus First, others second and ourselves last.   We automatically love God more than anything and we find it easy to love each other in the same way that Jesus loves us.

Let’s all experience this Joy  as the happiest people on earth

MONDAY 26TH OCTOBER
Ruth 1.1-18
Ruth clung to her

Today we begin to look at this very beautiful story of Ruth.  Ruth was one of Jesus’ ancestors. Naomi and her family went to live in Moab, a foreign country, where work was available.  They were all very happy, with her two sons marrying Moabite women.  Sadness struck the family; her husband and two sons died.  Naomi was left with her two daughters-in-law.  When Naomi decided to go home to Bethlehem she advised her sons’ wives to remain in Moab.  When she was telling them how much she would miss them and how sad she’d be without them, they all broke down in tears.  While the other one, Orpah, went to her original home, Ruth clung to her mother-in-law.  She couldn’t stand the pain of parting with her.  She made the decision to go back to Judah with Naomi.  She promised to stay close to her until only death separated them.  She wanted to make Naomi’s people, her people and Naomi’s God, her God, and to go with Naomi wherever she went.  Their relationship was so close.  They were inseparable.

There is a tremendous advantage in being close to the Lord.  God pours so much love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit He has given us.  This makes our relationships with other members of our families so strong and so secure.  The strong bonds of love mean that there are no in-law problems.  Yes, Jesus makes such a difference in our loving.  He draws us so close to each other and makes us want to cling to each other.

PRAYER:  Father, thank you for giving Jesus, your Son, your love gift, to us.  Pour love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit you have given us.  Help all our family relationships grow so strong that we want to cling to each other and love each other with strong bonds of love.  Amen.

TUESDAY 27th. CTOBER
Psalm 119, 1-8
How happy are those who follow God’s laws

Lawlessness and lack of discipline leads people into very unhappy lifestyles.  The whole of life breaks down and relationships break down; everything is in chaos and disorder. Psalm 119, a very long psalm with 176 verses, reminds us almost in every verse of the tremendous importance of keeping God’s laws and doing His will.

Before we can be effective in keeping any law there must be motivation.  Sometimes we are motivated by punishment: a couple of hefty fines soon slows down the speedy motorist. The fear of pain of a hard smack keeps children in order.  The best motivation we can have to keep God’s laws is the motivation of love.  When love motivates us we keep God’s laws happily and willingly and we get much joy living within the bounds of His discipline.  

If we are motivated by the fear of hell or punishment, then we tend to keep the laws rather grudgingly.  We observe them on the outside, but inside we may still be rebellious.

If we love God so much that we seek a relationship with Him with all our hearts, this makes us very happy and we find it so easy to obey.  Love of God makes us really want to fear all His laws and really want to do His will in our lives every day.

PRAYER: Father, we seek you with all our hearts, and we respond to your great love for us by loving you with undying love.  Make us want to do your will and obey all your commands so that a disciplined life with you will keep us continually happy.  Amen.

WEDNESDAY 28th. OCTOBER
Hebrews 9.11-15
Jesus the Bridge Builder

I can remember on the wall at school there was a picture of a whole lot of men trying to build a bridge between Earth and Heaven.  In the picture, Heaven was on a mountain on the other side of a huge bottomless chasm which no-one could cross.  Because they could only build from one side, the bridge was incomplete.  It was unbuildable.  Further up, at the end of a small, rugged pathway, there was a huge cross laid across the chasm.  People were crossing it.

Our scripture reading today tells us that all man’s efforts cannot possibly ever get us a place in Heaven.  All our religious ceremonies and sacrifices, all our good deeds, etc. cannot get us over the chasm into Heaven.  God has made a fantastic promise.  He promised to send a Bridge Builder who would get all who hear His call and want to follow Him up the rugged pathway, into His eternal dwelling.  Jesus is the Bridge Builder.  

He made a fantastic sacrifice.  He offered His own blood, for He was victim as well as priest.  His blood paid for all our sins.  His blood cleansed our consciences from all sin.

We cannot take our sins to Heaven.  As we take the leap of faith and cross the bridge of the cross, we pass through the cleansing bath of Jesus’ blood.  When we get to the other side, we are holy and clean, totally acceptable to God, ready to receive our promised eternal inheritance. We are all saints!

PRAYER:  Jesus, thank you for loving us so much that you sacrificed yourself on the cross and built a bridge between Earth and Heaven which we can all cross.  As we take the leap of faith, cleanse us by your blood so that we will be able to become saints and  enter Heaven and be with you for ever.  Amen.

THURSDAY 29th. OCTOBER
Hebrews 9.16-24
Without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness

In the old Jewish sacrificial system, the offering of animals in sacrifice and shedding of their blood was the way people came to receive forgiveness of their sin from God.  In the ceremonies, the Bible Scrolls, the tabernacle (church building) and the people were all sprinkled with blood.  They believed that this was God’s way of getting rid of their sins.  It was not very effective.  It must have been terribly messy and unpleasant.

God made a will.  He promised in this will to give everyone the offer of eternal life, but this promise would not come into effect until His Son died.  He was going to send His Son to give us this eternal life.  You see, eternal life was in Jesus.  When God made His will, He said that this life would be made available to everyone.  He willed it to us.  Before the will could become effective, Jesus had to die.  In His will, God said that only those who receive Jesus become His children and are entitled to be benefactors of His will (John 1.12).

Soon after Jesus died and rose again, He ascended into Heaven, where He ever lives in the presence of God.  Now He pleads for us who are entitled to receive eternal life.  He is the executor of God’s will, making sure that all who, by faith, have accepted Him into their lives and trust Him as Lord and Saviour, will receive the eternal life God has promised them in His will.

PRAYER:  Father, thank you that when you made your will, you put my name on it.  I accept Jesus as my Lord and Saviour.  I believe His shed blood cleanses me from all sin to enable me to receive the eternal life you promised through Jesus who ever stands before you to make sure I receive what you have promised.  Amen.

FRIDAY 30th. OCTOBER
Mark 12.13-17
Give to Caesar – Give to God 

The Jews were under foreign domination and under colonial rule from Rome.  They did not like it one bit. The thing they hated the most was having to pay taxes to the foreign government.  The Pharisees wanted to trick Jesus to say something that would make Him unpopular with the authorities.  They asked Him if it were lawful to pay taxes to Caesar or not.  Jesus was very wise.  He asked for a coin.  “Whose portrait is this on the coin?” He asked.  They replied, “It is Caesar’s.”  Jesus said, “Give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s.”  Everyone was absolutely amazed by Jesus’ answer.

What lesson can we learn from this?  It is very simple.  Each one of us has a duty to give to the government for the running of our country and to give to God through His church.  God is not happy when we avoid paying taxes (illegally that is).  God is also very unhappy when people try to avoid giving Him His tythes and giving Him offerings as well.

The main message for the week which we will look at tomorrow, is about loving God.  Remember, giving is love breathing.  If we stop breathing, we die, and if we stop giving to God, our love for Him dies.  How terrible that is!

PRAYER:  Lord, help us to see the importance of supporting the work of the government by paying taxes and supporting the work of the church by giving our tythe.  Pour so much love into our hearts to make giving and sharing easy for us.  Amen.

SATURDAY 31ST. OCTOBER
Mark 12.28-34; Deuteronomy 6.1-9
How much should we love God

Every Sunday we hear this command of God, that we should love God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind and with all our strength. God is very demanding.  To have a relationship with Him we must never be luke-warm or half-hearted.  He gives His all to us and in return He wants us to give Him everything.  Our relationship with God must be one of total surrender.

With all our heart means with all the feelings of our body.  With all our soul means in our spirits in the depth of our being.  With our minds reminds us that love is a decision; with our minds we make the decision to love God.  As we love Him, we love Him with all the strength we can muster.  When God sees us loving with all our strength, His Holy Spirit comes to us to give us more strength and more power to love Him even more.

We love God like this because He’s the only God.  He made us so that He would have people to love and people who would love Him. When we fall in love with someone we can’t get them out of our minds.  We keep thinking about them all day.  God loves us so much that He keeps thinking about us and loving us all day and all night long.  We are never out of His mind.  We are so very, very special to Him.  He wants us to love Him in exactly the same way. How can we show this love?  We show it through worship, praise and adoring Him and also we show Him how much we love Him by loving all the other people He loves.  We love all those around us as ourselves.

Just before He died, Jesus gave us another commandment – to love each other as He loves us; that is, to be willing to love everyone, even those who hurt us, and sacrifice everything for them.

PRAYER:  Lord God, you are the only God.  You made us for one purpose and one purpose only; because you want people to love.  We surrender our all to you and love you one hundred percent.  We also love everyone just as you love us, by letting Jesus die for us.  Amen.

SUNDAY 1st.NOVEMBER
  ALL SAINTS DAY
THIS WEEK’S MESSAGE

God is love so it is only natural that God requires all those He has made, ALL OF US, to love Him as much as He loves us!

AS we read and re read the New Testament of the Bible we are constantly reminded of God’s enormous love for us.   Jesus God’s own Dear Son who had always been with God since the beginning of time became a man and shared our common life.  He showed his love by fully identifying Himself with us.  

He was always so loving, so compassionate and so kind. In total humility He made Himself to be one with us.

The full extent of Jesus’ love was seen in his suffering, death and Resurrection.   He went through all that to pay the penalty our sins deserve and to set us free form our sins to become God’s sons and daughters.   Greater love has no man than this that He lays down His life for His friends. When He laid down His life He gave us all the free gift of eternal life! He enabled us to become His Saints  He did this because He loved us all so much that He never wanted to let us go!   He wanted us to be with Him for ever and ever!

When we see how much God loves us how can we do anything else but respond to his love.   We respond by surrendering our lives to Him and putting all our faith and trust in Him.  He is showing His love by knocking on the doors of our hearts.  We respond by opening the door and letting him come in to be our Lord and Saviour. This is when we become His Saints.

When Jesus comes in He does a wonderful miracle for each of us.   He gives us the power to love.   This is the power He released when He died on the cross for us. He pours this love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit He has given us  (Romans 5:5)

When Jesus does this for us He fills us with Joy.  God enables us to put Jesus First, others second and ourselves last.   We automatically love God more than anything and we find it easy to love each other in the same way that Jesus loves us.

Let’s all experience this Joy  as the happiest people on earth