Watching Daily At Wisdom's Gates

  If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me,” even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you. Psalm 139:11-12 We can't hide from God. In the beginning, there was God, and God is light. Then God created natural light. Even in natural darkness, God can see clearly. When people do wrong, they like to do it in the dark, literally or metaphorically. Thieves tend to operate at night. We don't tend to like to publicise our wrongdoing. Do we really think that if we do wrong in the dark, God can't see us? He's omniscient; He's all knowing. It's best to be honest with God about our iniquities. God doesn't just want us to confess our sins, only to remain in the dark. He wants us to come into the light of Christ, to repent of our wrongdoing and be transformed into Christ's likeness. By His Spirit this is possible. 'God, please don't let us delude o

  But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 2 Corinthians 12:9 ESV Paul had a ‘thorn in the flesh’. We don’t know for sure what it was. We know he had an eye condition because the Galatians Christians would have plucked their eyes out and given them him if they could! So maybe that was his thorn in the flesh. Another contender for Paul’s thorn in the flesh was some opponent to his ministry. In the old testament, Canaanite enemies of God’s people are described as thorns in their flesh. So perhaps there’s some known (like Demas or Alexander) or unknown opponent of Paul referred to here. Essentially however, we don’t know for sure what Paul’s thorn in the flesh was because we don’t need to know. What we do need to know is that God’s powerful grace is sufficient for us in whatever we’re going through. The Apostle Paul wasn’t

  Devote yourselves to prayer with an alert mind and a thankful heart. COLOSSIANS 4:2 (NLT) Prayer isn’t just a chore. It is something we ought to devote ourselves to. Like we’re hopefully devoted to our earthly fathers, how much more should we be devoted to our heavenly Father?! Prayer isn’t something passive. It’s not some mystical experience where we empty our minds and repeat empty mantras. With prayer, we’re waging spiritual warfare, calling down the power of God upon our situations. We’re to pray intelligently. We’re to be watchful and alert as to how we can most strategically call down God’s help. Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labour in vain. There’s to be an expectancy in prayer. If we don’t have faith that God’s going to answer us, we may as well not pray. Instead, we’re to pray with a thankful heart, looking out for the answers to our prayers, which will always be what’s best for us in the eternal scheme of things. ‘Dear Father God, please help us

  But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream! AMOS 5:24 (NIV) Amos lived in unjust times (as per usual for the world throughout history. The rich got richer off the back of their oppression of the poor. He lived during one of the economically better times of Israel’s history, but he wasn’t afraid to speak out against all the unrighteousness that was going on. Apart from all his pronouncements of impending judgement on the northern kingdom of Israel (that were fulfilled by the Assyrian Empire), there are also bright glimmers of hope in Amos’s prophecies, such as this verse. He imagined justice and righteousness as flowing water that never fails to bless the land. He looked forward to the advent of the Lord Jesus Christ, who has inaugurated the kingdom of heaven, defined by justice and righteousness. There’s still plenty of injustice and unrighteousness in the world to this day. Yet in God’s kingdom, justice and righteousness are the order of

  His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 2 PETER 1:3 (NIV) God is powerful. We can see that in all that He has made: the mighty mountains, the roaring seas, the sun, moon, and stars etc. He’s not just some distant force in the universe, His power comes through for mere mortal creatures like us. We might be naturally sinful, but we can supernaturally godly, by the power of God. There’s no excuse for sinful, addictive behaviour. We need to partner with God to become like Him by His Holy Spirit. We become godly by knowing God. This knowledge isn’t just an intellectual thing, it’s a relational knowledge. Having been called by God, we can know Him personally as our Lord and Saviour. Why did God call us? For His glory. He is glorified by transforming bad people like us into godly people, by His grace. He’s good to us even though we don’t deserve it. ‘Almighty God, we’re so gratefu

  For the Lord your God is living among you. He is a mighty Saviour. He will take delight in you with gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will rejoice over you with joyful songs. Zephaniah 3:17 NLT It's amazing that the Lord God Almighty, holy as He is, can dwell amongst sinners like us. He can do this because He's a mighty Saviour. We know this because Christ died for our sins. God doesn't begrudgingly save us. He delights to bring joy and gladness to us. He doesn't want us to be miserable. It's because of God's love that we needn't be fearful. We can be confident in Him. He's the only One we need to fear, and He assuages our fears. Music is divine. Even God Himself rejoices over us with singing. We were made to make a joyful noise to the Lord, for His glory. 'O Lord, how amazing it is that You rejoice over sinners like us with singing. We praise You for our salvation and ask that You would help us to walk worthily of

  Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom. James 3:13 ESV Biblical wisdom isn't necessarily having a PhD. It's about knowing and choosing to do what is right in any given situation. It's not about blowing our own trumpets. Jesus said we're not to let our left hands know what our right hands are doing. In other words we're not to broadcast our good deeds. They will go before us and we'll have treasures in heaven for voluntarily doing the right thing. We're not to show our works so that people can massage our egos with rounds of applause. Instead, we are to lead by example. We are to show people the best way to live, for the glory of God and the blessing of others. Knowledge puffs up but love builds up. Knowing the right thing to do isn't commendable. Actually doing it is what really matters, in meekness and humility. 'Father in heaven, please help us to be wise and understandi

  The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight. Proverbs 9:10 ESV People tend to assume that fear is always a negative thing. It isn't necessarily so. Fear of fire for example is a good thing, otherwise we might get burned. The fear Solomon is talking about isn't a blind fear that causes us to run away from God in terror. He's referring to the kind of fear a child has not to upset their dad. They don't just fear His discipline, but his displeasure. If the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, then knowing God relationally (not just intellectually) is insight and the heart of wisdom. God is love, and to truly know Him we need to trust that Christ loved us and gave Himself for us. When we know the perfect love of God, the fear that initially made us realise we needed to make our peace with Him melts away. There is no fear in love. Fear should bring us to Christ for reconciliation. Love will keep us in His care.

  Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. Proverbs 3:5-6 ESV We’re to trust God wholeheartedly. It’s no good disbelieving Him. We need to entrust our lives to Him in whom we live and move and have our being. Elsewhere in Proverbs it talks about how we naturally try and justify ourselves and our actions. Here we’re warned against such self-confidence. We’re not to lean on our own very limited and often wrong understanding. By default, we don’t want to submit to God. We want to be gods ourselves, dictating how we live our lives. Yet God is our Creator, Lord and Saviour, we need to humble ourselves before His majesty. There’s a wonderful promise here (conditional upon us submitting to God). If we submit to God, He will make our paths straight. If we trust in Jesus, He is the way, the truth and the life- the One in whom we get to know God as our Father for eternity. ‘Faithful G