Daily Devotion April 14

April 14: Isaiah 11:1-5

KJV Key Verse: Isaiah 11:4
4 But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.

Devotion:
For many years the people of Israel were told of the Messiah that was to come and that He would come from the line of Jesse and that He would do so much. They were told of His second coming where He would judge the remnant. All they would have to do is to believe in Him and to trust and obey His Word. So why did it go so wrong? Why did they crucify Him instead of worshipping Him?

If we look at our own ways and our own lives we can get an insight into why some rejected Him and why some recognised Him. If we are willing to trust God’s Word and to really search our own selves then we may easily believe in Christ. It is also easy to get caught up in the law and leave Christ out of it. If we stick with the rules and regulations we can reject Christ because He, as a man, was breaking the rules that had been set up. But what we need to recognise is that the laws were set up so we could recognise the truth not so we could reject everything.

We do have to be careful because of the number of false prophets and false teachers that will come up to try and persuade us away from Christ. There are many people who may think they have the right to lay down their own truth and their own ways; they may even believe that Christ has given them instruction to do so. What God did in the beginning, though, was to warn us of such people and to remind us that He would never go against His Word. Jesus the man did not go against the Word because He was fulfilling the words of prophecy told many years before.

The tricky part comes for us when we don’t know enough of the word to recognise when Christ was fulfilling scripture and when others come and teach their own words instead of God’s Word. Jesus demonstrated how we should fear God, how we should not judge others, how we should not believe our eyes or ears alone. Christ showed us proper and righteous judgement, caring for the poor and needy and how to uphold the scriptures. Let us follow His example.

Points to Ponder:
Would you have believed Jesus?

Do you know God enough to tell Him apart from others?