『Reformed Devotionals Daily Podcast』のカバーアート

Reformed Devotionals Daily Podcast

Reformed Devotionals Daily Podcast

著者： Bringing the timeless truths of Scripture into the everyday lives of believers
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 Bringing the timeless truths of Scripture into the everyday lives of believers. Each day we take the next piece of the Bible and reflect on it together to help you see how Jesus is the hero of every passage of scripture. Each day we also have a spiritual challenge for you to help you grow.

reformeddevotional.substack.comChris Pretorius キリスト教 スピリチュアリティ 聖職・福音主義
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  • God softens hearts

    God softens hearts
    2025/09/09
    Have you ever been in a situation where you had no choice but to face something you had been avoiding? That’s where Jacob and his sons find themselves in Genesis 43.Genesis 43 (ESV)Now the famine was severe in the land. And when they had eaten the grain that they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Go again, buy us a little food.” But Judah said to him, “The man solemnly warned us, saying, ‘You shall not see my face unless your brother is with you.’ If you will send our brother with us, we will go down and buy you food. But if you will not send him, we will not go down, for the man said to us, ‘You shall not see my face, unless your brother is with you.’” Israel said, “Why did you treat me so badly as to tell the man that you had another brother?” They replied, “The man questioned us carefully about ourselves and our kindred, saying, ‘Is your father still alive? Do you have another brother?’ What we told him was in answer to these questions. Could we in any way know that he would say, ‘Bring your brother down’?” And Judah said to Israel his father, “Send the boy with me, and we will arise and go, that we may live and not die, both we and you and also our little ones. I will be a pledge of his safety. From my hand you shall require him. If I do not bring him back to you and set him before you, then let me bear the blame forever. If we had not delayed, we would now have returned twice.”Ah yes, the old stubborn Jacob… He specifically told his children not to go back to Egypt, because he believed that he had already lost Simeon there. But there is nothing quite so humbling as being brought to your knees by utmost desperation. He finally has to bend his knee to God, because the famine was severe in the land. How often could we spare ourselves pain if we just bent our knees to God’s will earlier… Also here we see Judah begin to emerge as a different man. This is the same Judah who once sold Joseph for silver. Now he offers himself as a pledge for Benjamin’s safety. Sin had once made him selfish, but the hardship he had gone through is beginning to soften his heart. Isn’t this what God often does? He brings us and takes us to the utmost ends of ourselves, so that he can reshapes our character through the process. Then their father Israel said to them, “If it must be so, then do this: take some of the choice fruits of the land in your bags, and carry a present down to the man, a little balm and a little honey, gum, myrrh, pistachio nuts, and almonds. Take double the money with you. Carry back with you the money that was returned in the mouth of your sacks. Perhaps it was an oversight. Take also your brother, and arise, go again to the man. May God Almighty grant you mercy before the man, and may he send back your other brother and Benjamin. And as for me, if I am bereaved of my children, I am bereaved.”I bet you didn’t expect pistachios when you opened the Bible today! I certainly didn’t. Anyway, here we see Jacob finally letting go of his stubbornness. Notice his prayer: “May God Almighty grant you mercy.” For all his faults, Jacob knew that if mercy was going to come, it had to come from God. Jacob has had to rely on God’s mercy many times before and in the end, after all his stubbornness he knows deep down that he can still rely on it now. Sometimes that is what faith looks like. We hold on to and grasp something tight for such a long time that it ultimately cripples us. But in the end, in faith and in trusting in God’s mercy, we finally open our hands and entrust it to God. Maybe you feel like this today… here is your opportunity to let it go.So the men took this present, and they took double the money with them, and Benjamin. They arose and went down to Egypt and stood before Joseph. When Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he said to the steward of his house, “Bring the men into the house, and slaughter an animal and make ready, for the men are to dine with me at noon.” The man did as Joseph told him and brought the men to Joseph’s house. And the men were afraid because they were brought to Joseph’s house, and they said, “It is because of the money, which was replaced in our sacks the first time, that we are brought in, so that he may assault us and fall upon us to make us servants and seize our donkeys.”Do you see how guilt and fear twist their thinking? Is that not often how guilt and fear work? Instead of trusting in God’s mercy and expecting kindness from Joseph, they expect punishment. They cannot imagine grace. That is what guilt does to the heart… it makes us suspicious. But could it be that we miss out on the joy of blessings that God has sovereignly arranged for us as a result of our fear or guilt? Something to think about…So they went up to the steward of Joseph’s house and spoke with him at the door of the house, and said, “Oh, my lord, we came down the first time to buy food. And when we came to...
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    9 分
  • The Sin that Haunts us

    The Sin that Haunts us
    2025/09/08
    Have you ever had the experience where something you thought you got away with, comes back to bite you? Maybe it was some secret sin you committed, which turns out to be not so secret. Maybe it is something you have felt guilty about for a long time, and the guilt just grew and grew until it became a burden to you. We see something of that in our passage today. Today I am going to try something a little different, I will be working through the passage as we go, and pause here and there to make a few devotional comments.Genesis 42 (ESV)When Jacob learned that there was grain for sale in Egypt, he said to his sons, “Why do you look at one another?” And he said, “Behold, I have heard that there is grain for sale in Egypt; go down and buy grain for us there, that we may live and not die.” So ten of Joseph’s brothers went down to buy grain in Egypt. But Jacob did not send Benjamin, Joseph’s brother, with his brothers, for he feared that harm might happen to him. Thus the sons of Israel came to buy among the others who came, for the famine was in the land of Canaan.Interestingly we see that the land of Canaan, which would later become the land overflowing with milk and honey, a land known for its abundance, is now the land of famine. This is often how God works to bring about renewal and drive redemption forward. It makes me wonder, with everything going on in the world today, what is God doing at the macro level to help redeem the micro level?Now Joseph was governor over the land. He was the one who sold to all the people of the land. And Joseph’s brothers came and bowed themselves before him with their faces to the ground. Joseph saw his brothers and recognized them, but he treated them like strangers and spoke roughly to them. “Where do you come from?” he said. They said, “From the land of Canaan, to buy food.” And Joseph recognized his brothers, but they did not recognize him. And Joseph remembered the dreams that he had dreamed of them. Once God has decreed something to happen, it will happen. God gave Joseph his dreams and here they are coming true! You see, we can fight against God’s plans for us, we can scheme against God’s plans for others, but in the end what God wills, God does. In fact it is often our very sinful and broken actions that are used by God precisely to do his will. So it is with Joseph - what man had intended for evil, God has intended for good. And so it is with Jesus, we killed the Son of God, but He used that very wicked act to bring about the salvation of all who would believe.And he said to them, “You are spies; you have come to see the nakedness of the land.” They said to him, “No, my lord, your servants have come to buy food. We are all sons of one man. We are honest men. Your servants have never been spies.” He said to them, “No, it is the nakedness of the land that you have come to see.” And they said, “We, your servants, are twelve brothers, the sons of one man in the land of Canaan, and behold, the youngest is this day with our father, and one is no more.” But Joseph said to them, “It is as I said to you: you are spies. By this you shall be tested: by the life of Pharaoh, you shall not go from this place unless your youngest brother comes here. Send one of you, and let him bring your brother, while you remain confined, that your words may be tested, whether there is truth in you. Or else, by the life of Pharaoh, surely you are spies.” And he put them all together in custody for three days.On the third day Joseph said to them, “Do this and you will live, for I fear God: if you are honest men, let one of your brothers remain confined where you are in custody, and let the rest go and carry grain for the famine of your households, and bring your youngest brother to me. So your words will be verified, and you shall not die.” And they did so. Then they said to one another, “In truth we are guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the distress of his soul, when he begged us and we did not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us.” And Reuben answered them, “Did I not tell you not to sin against the boy? But you did not listen. So now there comes a reckoning for his blood.” These brothers’ guilt had presumably haunted them for many years. We cannot escape our sin and wickedness. It sticks to us like superglue. But it seems that in the years the brothers had become wiser as they have become older. They now take responsibility for what they have done, they recognise God’s hand in this and that God often uses our very sin to sanctify us and to change us. They recognise that their distress is because of the distress they caused Joseph. People often say “sin is its own reward”. Turns out that is true.They did not know that Joseph understood them, for there was an interpreter between them. Then he turned away from them and wept. And he returned to them and spoke to them. And he took Simeon from them and ...
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    11 分
  • Pit to Power

    Pit to Power
    2025/09/07
    Have you ever noticed how quickly life can turn around? Joseph goes from prison rags to royal robes in a single day. That’s what we see in the rest of Genesis 41.Genesis 41:37–57 (ESV)This proposal pleased Pharaoh and all his servants. And Pharaoh said to his servants, “Can we find a man like this, in whom is the Spirit of God?” Then Pharaoh said to Joseph, “Since God has shown you all this, there is none so discerning and wise as you are. You shall be over my house, and all my people shall order themselves as you command. Only as regards the throne will I be greater than you.” And Pharaoh said to Joseph, “See, I have set you over all the land of Egypt.” Then Pharaoh took his signet ring from his hand and put it on Joseph’s hand, and clothed him in garments of fine linen and put a gold chain about his neck. And he made him ride in his second chariot. And they called out before him, “Bow the knee!” Thus he set him over all the land of Egypt. Moreover, Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I am Pharaoh, and without your consent no one shall lift up hand or foot in all the land of Egypt.” And Pharaoh called Joseph’s name Zaphenath-paneah. And he gave him in marriage Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera priest of On. So Joseph went out over the land of Egypt.Joseph was thirty years old when he entered the service of Pharaoh king of Egypt. And Joseph went out from the presence of Pharaoh and went through all the land of Egypt. During the seven plentiful years the earth produced abundantly, and he gathered up all the food of these seven years, which occurred in the land of Egypt, and put the food in the cities. He put in every city the food from the fields around it. And Joseph stored up grain in great abundance, like the sand of the sea, until he ceased to measure it, for it could not be measured.Before the year of famine came, two sons were born to Joseph. Asenath, the daughter of Potiphera priest of On, bore them to him. Joseph called the name of the firstborn Manasseh. “For,” he said, “God has made me forget all my hardship and all my father’s house.” The name of the second he called Ephraim, “For God has made me fruitful in the land of my affliction.”The seven years of plenty that occurred in the land of Egypt came to an end, and the seven years of famine began to come, as Joseph had said. There was famine in all lands, but in all the land of Egypt there was bread. When all the land of Egypt was famished, the people cried to Pharaoh for bread. Pharaoh said to all the Egyptians, “Go to Joseph. What he says to you, do.” So when the famine had spread over all the land, Joseph opened all the storehouses and sold to the Egyptians, for the famine was severe in the land of Egypt. Moreover, all the earth came to Egypt to Joseph to buy grain, because the famine was severe over all the earth.What a turnaround. Just hours before, Joseph was a forgotten prisoner. Now Pharaoh himself is exalting him, giving him authority over the whole land of Egypt. He is dressed in royal clothes, given a new name, paraded through the streets while people bow before him.But even with all this glory, Joseph never forgets what God has done. The names of his sons say it all. Manasseh: “God has made me forget all my hardship.” Ephraim: “God has made me fruitful in the land of my affliction.” Joseph knows who lifted him from the pit to put him in power.And notice this: when the famine comes, Pharaoh tells the people, “Go to Joseph.” Joseph has become the source of bread, not just for Egypt, but for the whole world.Do you see how this points us forward? Joseph is a shadow of Jesus. Jesus, too, was lifted up from suffering and humiliation to glory and authority. And just as the world came to Joseph for bread to survive, the world must come to Jesus for the bread of life. He is the one who gives us what we truly need.For us, this passage is humbling but encouraging. It is humbling, because all the good in our lives comes from God’s hand, not our own. Sure we can trick ourselves, look over the kingdom we have been put in charge of and say to ourselves “I have done this”, but we haven’t. Everything we have is a gift from God that has been sovereignly put there for his purposes.At the same time this passage is encouraging because the same God who was with Joseph in the pit and the place of power, is with us in Jesus himself. He is with us in our afflictions, he is with us in the pit, and he is with us in the places of power. No matter where we go, we carry God-with-us, with us.PrayerFather, thank You for exalting Joseph and providing bread through him. Thank You even more for exalting Jesus, who gives us the bread of life. Help us to remember that every blessing comes from You. Teach us to trust You in hardship and to look to Christ for all we need. In His name, Amen.Reformed Devotionals Daily is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a ...
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    6 分
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