Luke 24:44-49 Power to Preach
Format for Your Devotions
Instructions: Do not read my example devotion until you have completed your own devotional time in the scriptures. Reading my thoughts first may limit your own understanding. Let the Holy Spirit speak to you alone before looking to see what anyone else has to say, whether it is me, a Bible commentary, or a friend. Let God speak to you before you let another person speak to you. I have provided a format, but modify it to fit your needs. For example, I usually combine my application and prayer together talking to God about the application to my own life. You can go through this devotion process mentally, speaking out loud, or in writing as you wish. Don’t worry if you are not following this process exactly. Sometimes, I add extra information and sometimes I emphasize one part more than others. However, you should always think about what you learn about God from this passage.
Step 1: Pray–Ask for the Holy Spirit’s guidance first of all and that God may reveal the lessons that He wants you to have that day. Request that God protect you from Satan’s distractions (and the devil will try to distract you whether it is pinching the baby or putting you to sleep). Ask to see God more clearly as you read and think about the passage.
Step 2: Read the passage–Read to get an overview of the information first. Then start looking at specific parts after the first reading. You may read a larger or smaller section than I have here because you do not have to follow my organization at all.
Step 3: Understand the passage–You can summarize, ask and answer your own questions about the passage, visualize the story, analyze the characters, and relate this passage to other scriptures and personal experiences.
Step 4: What does this reveal about God?–What do you learn about the Father, Son, and/or Holy Spirit from this passage?
Step 5: Apply this to your own life.
Step 6: Prayer
My Example Devotion: December 31, 2018 Luke 24:44-49
Note: In the devotion examples, I leave my questions and thought processes in the text because I am trying to demonstrate that a devotional time is a dialogue with God about what you are reading from His word. As such, any questions or ideas that you have should be explored by talking it out with God. These example devotions are not my attempts to teach you what the meaning of a particular scripture is. They are an attempt to teach you the process of devotions, which is a combination of prayer and Bible study where you explore ideas with God as you read His word.
Then he said to them, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you, that everything written about me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures, and said to them, “Thus it is written, that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead, and that repentance for the forgiveness of sins should be proclaimed in his name to all nations, beginning from Jerusalem. You are witnesses of these things. And behold, I am sending the promise of my Father upon you. But stay in the city until you are clothed with power from on high.”
(Understanding the Text/ Revelation of God) I never realized before. The Holy Spirit is a promise from the Father. Having Him in our lives is a promise that we can claim. I should never doubt that He is with me always because Jesus said so. Everyone expects Pentecost with fire and thunder and power on display, but that was only an announcement of His coming. He is soft and gentle and unobtrusive. He works subtly and quietly most times so that I forget that He is there with me and feel abandoned. I know in my mind how He works, but my expectations keep getting in the way.
Jesus reminds the disciples that He had already told them about His death and resurrection beforehand, just as He had reminded the two on the road to Emmaus and the angels had reminded the women that Jesus had already told them about it. Why was it so important to repeatedly remind the followers that they had already been told about the events that had transpired before anything had happened? I guess it was so that going forward, they would listen to what Jesus had to say to them. Also, Jesus connected the words that He had told them to the Scriptures. Was He saying that they had neglected the scriptures? Or was He trying to emphasize that from that moment on they were to search the scriptures and understand them? I think that it was the latter, but it could have been both.
Then, Jesus proceeded to fill in the holes in their knowledge that their neglect of study and/or prejudiced thinking had kept them from understanding before. He taught them from the scriptures that the Messiah must suffer and rise on the third day and that the result would be that all the nations would receive a message from God: to turn away from their sins and be reconnected to God. That’s my insight for today: forgiveness is reconnection.
Jesus gave them their marching orders and the plan for how they were to proceed. They were to stay in Jerusalem until they received power from God. Then they were to go out into Jerusalem and tell everyone about Jesus’ death and resurrection for the forgiveness of sins, but they were not to stay at the beginning. The end result would be to proclaim Jesus’ message to the whole world. This, they did.
(Application / Prayer) My application for myself is that I need to let Jesus strip the worldly ideas and superstitions and biases and prejudices from me so that I can clearly see His message. I need to let the Holy Spirit do His work in me. Then, I need to follow the Spirit’s leading to witness to others the message that I know. I am fine with the first step. I have been studying the Bible and reading books about it a lot. The second step is one that I am still in the process of undergoing. I don’t believe that I let the Spirit work in me without resistance to Him. However, I see some progress in this area. It’s the third step that I dread. It sounds simple, just tell people what you know, yet that process is full of messy humans doing messy things. There are all kinds of pitfalls and traps. The people are hurtful, deceitful, and strange. My empathy gets in the way, and their negativity overwhelms me. Their delusions repel me. Their interests bore me. And their fascination with muck makes me nauseous. I have little common ground with them, and am bored to even try, or if I’m not bored, I am worried that they will drag me down to their level. I need your protection and faith in your leading and love that you have for them because I really don’t love them that much, and I don’t want to be with them. I don’t even want to be with the ones I love when they become negative. I want to be with clean pure people who are interested in You, but I know that I have to go in the trenches to fight for the ones who are still in death, and I view that with dread. I need you to be with me and change my attitude.