Peppered with the evening verses from “dailylightdevotional.org plus Chapter 33 Persistent Prayer: 1996-Vietnam Pg 399-401 from GO NOW: From the Innermost Parts of the Heart to the Uttermost Parts of the World
The Concept of Divine Control: Utmost July 16 Reading Today
How much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him! Matthew 7:11
Jesus is laying down the rules of conduct in this passage for those people who have His Spirit. He urges us to keep our minds filled with the concept of God’s control over everything, which means that a disciple must maintain an attitude of perfect trust and an eagerness to ask and to seek.
Fill your mind with the thought that God is there. And once your mind is truly filled with that thought, when you experience difficulties it will be as easy as breathing for you to remember, “My heavenly Father knows all about this!” This will be no effort at all, but will be a natural thing for you when difficulties and uncertainties arise. Before you formed this concept of divine control so powerfully in your mind, you used to go from person to person seeking help, but now you go to God about it. Jesus is laying down the rules of conduct for those people who have His Spirit, and it works on the following principle: God is my Father, He loves me, and I will never think of anything that He will forget, so why should I worry?
Jesus said there are times when God cannot lift the darkness from you, but you should trust Him. At times God will appear like an unkind friend, but He is not; He will appear like an unnatural father, but He is not; He will appear like an unjust judge, but He is not.
BOTTOM LINE:
Just as Ted Williams on the Wheaties breakfast cereal boxes indoctrinated us during the 50’s-70’s with his athletic speed, strength, and stamina because of eating Wheaties daily, so much the more we must keep the thought that the mind of God is behind all things strong and growing. Not even the smallest detail of life happens unless God’s will is behind it. Therefore, you can rest in perfect confidence in Him. Prayer is not only asking, but is an attitude of the mind which produces the atmosphere in which asking is perfectly natural. “Ask, and it will be given to you…” (Matthew 7:7).
dailylightdevotional.org Evening for July 16. If my mother, Stella Mae Gingerich Erb were alive, today would have been her 100th birthday. She passed in 1972. Didn’t even break 50! She wisely chose & daily demonstrated scripture far surpassing merely the breakfast of champions!
Watch and pray, that ye enter not into temptation. Matt. 26:41
Continue in prayer, and watch in the same with thanksgiving. Col. 4:2
Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you. Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: whom resist steadfast in the faith. I Pet. 5:7-9
Why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say? Luke 6:46
Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves. James 1:22
Wherefore criest thou unto me? Speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward. Exo. 14:15
Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Phil. 4:6, 7