Today’s
Text: 1 John 5:6-13
Anyone who does not believe God has made him out to be a liar,
because he has not believed the testimony God has given about his Son. (Vrs
10b)
Words
of Devotion
One of the most common
experiences of life is to act upon the word or testimony of another person. We
will do the most amazing things in response to the simple declaration of a
person we have never met before. I had the privilege of leading a youth group on
a mission trip. We were to replace a ruff and paint the house. Most of the
teens had never been on a mission trip before, and I was not sure what we would
run into. But we had been given assurance, by means of a letter from a person
in Indianapolis, IN, that someone would meet us at every place we would go and
would help us to get through the entire project that lay ahead of us. On the
strength of that letter, some twenty-five of us committed ourselves to the
tender mercies of a stranger and discovered that it all proved true. The word
of that letter proved true, and on the basis of it, we committed ourselves to a
considerably risky venture.
Is not God more dependable
than people? If you will take the word of a stranger and act on it, can you not
believe the Word of God, especially when He has caused the testimony to be
written down by the eyewitnesses of these events? In addition, when faith is
exercised on the basis of that objective testimony, a confirmation of the
Spirit is given within that makes it wholly believable. Can you not exercise faith on
that basis? John says, if you refuse to do that, then you are treating God
as though He were a liar.
Dr. H. A. Ironside* used to
tell of a man who had doubts about whether he was a Christian. He got down on
his knees and said, “Now, Father, I
want to settle this question. Show me whether I have eternal life or not”. And
opening his Bible, his eyes fell on this verse from 1 John 5. He said in his
prayer, “Father, I don't want to
make You a liar, and it says here that if I don't believe the testimony that
You give about the Son, I'm making you a liar. I don't want to do that”. What
is the testimony?
So then he would read the
next part, and this is the testimony, and he stopped right there. He
was so overwrought that he put his thumb over the rest of the verse and said, “Lord, it says here that if I don't believe
the testimony that you gave concerning your Son, I'm making you a liar, and I
don't want to make you a liar. I believe that I have what that testimony is
right under my thumb here, and I'm going to take my thumb off and read it, and
Lord, help me to believe it, because I don't want to make you a liar”. With
great trepidation he raised his thumb and read, “God has given us eternal life, and this
life is in the Son” (1 John 5:11). All of a sudden it came home
to him. “He
who has the Son has life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have
life” (1 John 5:12). No matter what else he may have, no matter
how religious he may be, if he has not received the Son, he does not have life.
He entered into peace and became a preacher of this great truth.
Life
Application: Do
we find it easy to believe a trusted friend, or even a stranger or the daily
media, but doubt what God says in His Word? Are we making God out to be a liar?
Inspirational
Prayer: Thank You,
Father, for this powerful reminder that my salvation is secure because You
cannot lie. Grant to me the faith to take Your promises at face value.
*If you would like more information on DR H.A. Ironside:
No comments:
Post a Comment