Jehovah-mekoddishkem

Leah Adams, Author, cbn.com

In the Hebrew language, the words sanctify, set apart, and holy are derived from the word qadash. We find this root word used in the name that we will study in this Devotion for our heavenly Father, Jehovah-mekoddishkem.

In Exodus 31:12-13, 16-17, God instructs the children of Israel concerning the Sabbath day and the significance of sanctifying or setting apart a day of rest and worship.

Then the Lord said to Moses, “Say to the Israelites, ‘You must observe my Sabbaths. This will be a sign between me and you for the generations to come, so you may know that I am the Lord, who makes you holy. The Israelites are to observe the Sabbath, celebrating it for the generations to come as a lasting covenant. It will be a sign between me and the Israelites forever, for in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day he abstained from work and rested.'” (NIV)

In this passage we discover the Lord sanctifying or setting apart, not only a day, but the Israelites themselves as His very own people by instructing them to observe the Sabbath. Notice in verse 17 that the covenant was between the Lord and the Israelites forever. God was telling them that they were His people, a set-apart people, a holy people. They were to look different and act differently from all the other peoples of the land.

Repeatedly in the New Testament we are told that the blood of Jesus sanctifies us and sets us apart. Because of Jesus’ blood that was shed on the cross for you and me, we are to look and act different, even peculiar, from the those who do not call themselves Christians.

How should we, with the help of Jehovah-mekoddishkem, look differently than those who are not Christians? Consider a few suggestions for a set-apart life:

• Observe a Sabbath. This means more than simply going to church. It means taking time to rest, reflect on the Lord, and worship Him.
• Offer a simple prayer of thanks before meals.
• Listen to music that encourages you in your Christian walk.
• Choose your close friends carefully. Are they encouraging you and holding you accountable in your walk with Christ?
• Be very selective regarding television programs and movies that you watch. You may feel that you can ‘handle’ foul language or adult content, but why take that chance. Remember the children’s song that says, ‘be careful little eyes what you see, be careful little ears what you hear’?
• Make certain that the words that come out of your mouth are acceptable to God. Turn Psalm 19:14 (NIV) into your personal prayer: “May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.”
• Dress with discretion. Less is not more when it comes to clothing.
• Be very careful not to place yourself in compromising or questionable situations. Shun the very appearance of evil!
• Keep your tongue free from gossip and backbiting.
• Tell the truth. Speak it in love, but tell the truth.
• Be trustworthy and reliable.
• Spend time each day talking to the Lord and reading His Word. He desires to direct and guide your life, but we have to listen and obey.

God is not interested in you and me looking like everyone else in the world. He expects us to look, sound, and act differently than those who are not Christians. He expects us to be a sanctified or ‘set apart’ people.

So, I ask you … in what way do you look different or peculiar because of Jesus living within you? When the unbelieving world cruises around your life, do they consider you to be odd or peculiar because you are allowing Jehovah-mekoddishkem to sanctify you through and through or do they wonder what the big deal is about being a Christian because you look no different than anyone else?

God desires to sanctify us, to set us apart, but He requires our cooperation. We must make the choice to live a sanctified life. Are you making that choice?

Get Your Joy Back

Nina Keegan Author, cbn.com

Were you robbed? Has your joy been stolen? No deadbolt was compromised, no alarm system was set off, you just know at some point your joy had been taken from you. Was it all of a sudden or was it a gradual sinking into despair – so subtle a shift you barely noticed until it was too late?

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. John 10:10 (NIV)

The enemy is that despised thief who steals from us. He tries to mess with us and take everything good that Jesus painstakingly suffered and died for us to have.

Through the blood of Jesus at His crucifixion, we have complete authority over the enemy. No matter what he tries to do to us, we will always win! The Bible says that Jesus died for us to have a blessed, full, and happy life. The enemy has no place in our lives, he is below us, he is under our feet. When we feel ourselves getting down, depressed, frustrated or fearful, we must be armed and ready for battle. We must know The Word of God so we are constantly equipped with the necessary defense!

God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. Philippians 2:9-11 (NIV)

This scripture clearly states that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow—even those from under the earth. The enemy must bow down to Jesus, and he must flee!

How do we get back those things the enemy steals from us? How do we restore and maintain our joy? The good news is that God is in the restoration business. He will give us back double for our trouble and beauty for our ashes!

The story of Job in the Bible is an amazing example of God’s pure loving kindness and faithfulness. The enemy took everything from Job, his family, his home, his wealth, his joy and his health. All through this trial, Job praised God and never gave up. Because of his faith, God restored everything back to Job. He gave Job so much more than he ever lost for the trouble and anguish he had to endure. Job let his faith be bigger than his fear and he got his joy back and was completely restored in every way!

The Bible says where there is pain in the night, joy comes in the morning. We are to have the mind of Christ and be completely transformed in God’s image. God says He will fight your battles for you and you will not even have to lift a finger in your own defense! The great I AM is never too busy or on a God hiatus. He’s always ready to fight for us. Call on Jesus … Jesus! He will never leave you or forsake you. He rescues you in times of trouble. He will honor you and deliver you from all evil. He will always cause you to triumph and you can do all things through Christ who strengthens you. With God, you are always more than a conqueror!

When you are feeling down and feel your joy and peace slipping away, get in the presence of God and boldly confess that the joy of the Lord is your strength. Pray continuously and trust that God can and will perfect all that concerns you. He will fight for you always … all ways!

You make known to me the path of life; you will fill me with joy in your presence, with eternal pleasures at your right hand. Psalm 16:11 (NIV)

He Will Restore Your Soul

Staff writer, desiringGod.org, Jon Bloom

King David wrote Psalm 22 and Psalm 23, but if we weren’t told that, we might not believe it. These two ancient songs of the faith are about as different as they could be. The first few verses of each psalm capture its tone. Here are the first two verses of Psalm 22:

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, from the words of my groaning? O my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer, and by night, but I find no rest. (Psalm 22:1–2)

Now, read the first three verses of Psalm 23:

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside still waters. He restores my soul. He leads me in paths of righteousness for his name’s sake. (Psalm 23:1–3)

In Psalm 22, David feels forsaken by an unresponsive God. In Psalm 23, David feels shepherded by an ever-attentive God. In Psalm 22, David’s soul is in restless agony. In Psalm 23, David’s soul is restored to a trust-fueled rest in the Good Shepherd’s care.

Two Perspectives on Reality

It is a beautiful and merciful providence that these two starkly different psalms are placed right next to each other, authored by the same person. Because they illustrate the diverse ways we experience the strange reality that is the life of faith in our world. If we live long enough, we all experience the occasional agonizing phenomenon of God’s apparent silence. And we all will also experience God’s kind restoration, peace, and protection. In fact, we eventually come to realize that what felt like abandonment was a merciful nearness and shepherding of a kind we hadn’t previously understood or perceived. We discover that God’s promises are infinitely more substantial and reliable than our perceptions.

But there’s an even deeper beauty and mercy in this poetic and thematic juxtaposition. Both psalms are messianic — they foreshadow and prophesy of Jesus. And in this profound realization, we discover that the order in which these psalms appear is no accident.

Jesus Was Forsaken

We know Psalm 22:1. Its first sentence is among the most famous in the Bible. For Jesus screamed them out while in unfathomable agony on the cross: Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani? (Matthew 27:46).

Stop and think over this sentence. Delve into it as deep as you can. You will never get to the bottom of it.

There was a moment, at the crux of history, when God was God-forsaken. To we who are not God, and who are only able to experience a few dimensions of reality, this is mysterious. But it was not a mystery; it was horrifyingly real. God the Son, the eternal delight of the Father, the radiance of the Father’s glory, the exact imprint of the Father’s nature, and the Father’s earthly visible image (Hebrews 1:3; Colossians 1:15) became in that incomprehensively dark moment unholy sin — our unholy sin (2 Corinthians 5:21). And while that moment lasted, the holy Father and the Holy Spirit could not abide the holy Son made unholy. God became the object of God’s wrath. A terrible, once-for-all-time fissure rent open between the Father and Son.

For Jesus, it was a truly hellish moment, which is why, in the words of R.C. Sproul, Jesus’s Psalm 22:1 scream “was the scream of the damned. For us.” Out of a love for us we have hardly begun to fathom, he took upon himself our damnable curse, becoming the propitiation for our sins (Galatians 3:13; 1 John 4:10). And he did it for us so that our curse would be eternally removed and we might become the objects of God’s eternal mercy, clothed forever with the holiness and righteousness of God (2 Corinthians 5:21).

Psalm 22 does far more than give us words to pray during our seasons of spiritual desolation. It gives us words to grasp the desolation God the Son experienced to purchase our peace and restoration.

So That You Will Never Be Forsaken

This restoration, the great messianic restoration, is what made David sing for joy in Psalm 23. The Good Shepherd, having laid his life down for the sheep (John 10:11), gives his sheep eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will be able to snatch them out of his hand (John 10:28).

No one. Not “death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord,” the great Shepherd of the sheep — even though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death (Romans 8:38–39; Hebrews 13:20; Psalm 23:4).

Our great Shepherd has walked through this valley before us and for us. In this valley, he was stricken and afflicted, betrayed, beaten to a bloody pulp, and brutally crucified by evil. He was pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities (Isaiah 53:5). He was smitten and forsaken by God (Isaiah 53:4; Psalm 22:1).

And he did this for us so that he might say to us, “I will never leave you nor forsake you” (Hebrews 13:5).

He Will Restore Your Soul

In this world we will have tribulation (John 16:33). The Bible’s portrayal of tribulation is realistically horrible. Psalm 22 is a description of David’s tribulation, and it was severe. But it is also a description of Jesus’s tribulation, which was infinitely more severe than David’s — or ours.

Do you feel forsaken by God? Jesus understands. He truly understands more than you know. We can feel forsaken by God; Jesus was forsaken by God. We feel lonely; Jesus was, for a horrible moment, truly alone. As our Great High Priest, he is able to sympathize with us in all our weaknesses, since he was tempted in every way that we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15).

But Jesus does far more than sympathize with us. As our great sacrificial Lamb, he atoned for every sin we commit in all our weak, faithless stumbling, removing our curse forever by becoming our curse. And as our great Shepherd, he is leading us through every tribulation — no matter how severe — to eternal restoration.

That is the promise of Psalm 23, purchased by the price of Psalm 22: your Good Shepherd will restore your soul forever. He was forsaken by God, scorned and mocked by men, and his hands and feet were pierced (Psalm 22:1, 6–7, 16) for your sake. So that he could guide you through every evil valley, honor you before every evil enemy, pursue you with goodness and mercy every day of your earthly life, and bring you to live with him in his house forever (Psalm 23:4–6).

Psalm 22 may be your song for a brief night, but Psalm 23 will be your song for an eternal morning (Psalm 30:5).

Trust God with Every Moment

Pam Morrison, Author, cbn.com

“Now an angel of the Lord said to Philip, ‘Go south to the road – the desert road – that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza.’” (Acts 8:26 NIV)

A friend mentioned a nudge from God received on the job. He works in a nursing home. While seeing to the needs of an elderly resident recently, he felt the strong impression to pray for her right then. He prays regularly for those he serves, but silently, in obedience, he began to lift her to God.

What happened next was that this withdrawn woman with the glazed over look of so many institutionalized older adults, began to share about her life. “She just opened up and told me many things about herself,” said my young friend. Though filled with strong faith, he was pleasantly surprised about the reminder: God is with us every moment and will order our steps – giving us direction in the present. Why we’re surprised at His ready help and direction is curious. It’s there in His Word about His availability to those dependent on Him:

“Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, ‘This is the way; walk in it.’” (Isaiah 30:21 NIV)

A fictional book that I just finished has one character offer this thought, “The great lie of this broken universe is that God cannot be trusted and that we have to take care of ourselves. That’s the lie that snagged Eve.” (Jake Colsen, So You Don’t Want to Go to Church Anymore)

It’s the lie that can snag any of us – “Everything’s up to me. I’m on my own. I have to figure out what to do next.” And so comes the temptation not to pray or to pray with little hope and to act without having listened for guidance.

But God knows our needs before we speak them. He knows the needs of others and how we might intersect with them. He has plans not just for a distant future but for this day just as Jesus said,

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? … For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, …” (Matthew 6:25, 32-34 NIV)

This is a huge step to take in trusting God – to believe that He cares about THIS day and that He has mapped these 24 hours out for us, if we’ll lean on Him.

The story of Philip helps me to grasp this wonderful idea – that God cares about us moment to moment and will orchestrate a Divine schedule with us. Philip, along with most of the early Church, was driven out of Jerusalem by persecution, just when the Church was beginning to explode with growth. Philip had been named a church “deacon.” Fleeing to Samaria this “deacon for a season,” under God’s leading, stepped into the role of a powerful preacher, healer, and miracle worker. Then, again, under God’s leading and provision, he took the road into the wilderness to explain the gospel to one lone African man – a time of one on one ministry that led to the man’s baptism and some think, to Africa being invaded by the gospel.

After this, there were more towns. Philip went forward not knowing what would come next. He demonstrated an openness to being led daily.

One of the greatest shifts we can make as Christ-followers is to start each morning simply praying, “I’m here, Lord. What‘s on our schedule?” God will give impressions through His Word, other people, circumstances, the nudges in our hearts. There are, perhaps, certain things fixed on the calendar.  Yet, believing that in the midst of this, God will bring what we have not planned, could not foresee, and cannot resource except by His strength, helps us to get up unruffled, hope-filled, and ready to touch other lives with His grace. And if you are in a difficult season, being able to stay focused and present, non-anxious about next week or next year because you hold onto the words, “I am with you,” is to know peace and usefulness in the storm.