Dean Allen's Daily Devotional

-September 23, 2023-

Good morning, happy Saturday,

“‘Blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting!’ And all the people said, ‘Amen!’ and praised the Lord.”

(1 Chronicles 16:36).

We don’t hear it enough, we don’t say enough: the word amen. It means simply, “so be it. It is a very special word found 76 times in the Bible. It is a short. beautiful, and simple word that is packed with spiritual meaning, significance, and importance. It signifies that we agree with what has been said.

David spoke these words as recorded in 1 Chronicles 16:8-36 and delivered them to Asaph and his brethren to thank the Lord. The word amen comes in at the end of this passage, which is found also in Psalm 105:1-15. Throughout the Scriptures, the word amen is associated with praising God. There several times when a double amen is found, “amen and amen.” When something is repeated it has great meaning.

Hymns have been written on the word amen. I found in our hymnal the following titles: “Amen, Two-Fold Amen, Three-Fold Amen, Four-Fold Amen, and Seven-Fold Amen.” Now that is a lot of amens! The Lord is worthy and when we say amen it is a great blessing. Normally prayers end with amen.

At church it is good and appropriate to say amen out loud not only after someone has prayed, but also while a speaker is speaking from God’s Word. It shows we listening and tracking the speaker. It should be used when we agree with what we have heard and it touched our hearts. It can be overused, but most of the time is underutilized. Personally, I say amen a lot.

The hymn writer Joachim Neander wrote, “Praise to the Lord! O let all that is in me adore Him! All that hath life and breath, come now with praises before Him. Let the Amen sound from His people again: Gladly for aye we adore Him. Amen.” It is very appropriate to end this hymn with word amen.

I urge all God’s people to say amen, again and again. May we praise and thank the Lord together! Have a blessed day and may this wonderful word be found in our hearts and on our lips. If you haven’t said out loud before, try it this Sunday. Stay safe and healthy. Amen.

Let all the people say Amen!

Dean

-September 23, 2023-

Good morning, happy Friday,

“Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it.”

(1 Corinthians 9:24).

Paul was impressed by athletes and compared the Christian life with a race. Each one of us is in the race, in it to win it. We don’t compete in professional sports, but we compete at life, which is far more important. Our race is a marathon not a sprint. We can all win when we follow Jesus from the starting line to the finish line.

To win in life is relying on the Lord’s strength and help in the daily circumstances of life. There are challenges, hard times, and difficulties we must overcome. One of hardest races I ran in my life was in college when the coach asked me to run that 3,000 meter steeplechase. We needed the points for our track team and I took on the challenge. It was so hard. I had to circle the track, and jump over the barriers, including the water jump. By the time I finished, I was exhausted. There were only two of of us who ran it, so I came in second and scored a three points for the team.

Life also can be exhausting. We need endurance to keep going. To win at life, we must be good husbands or wives, good fathers and grandfathers, good neighbors, good friends, and good servants of the Lord. It takes commitment, dedication, patience, and self-control. Paul said in 2 Timothy 4:8, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.”

Let us run to win, to give our all, to leave it all on the field. We may do a lot of things behind the scenes. Have a blessed day, running to win.

Looking to Jesus all the way to the finish line,

Dean

-September 21, 2023-

Good morning, happy Thursday,

“Yet indeed I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, that I may gain Christ.”

(Philippians 3:8).

There are some things in our lives that far exceed any others. They usually have less to do with money, possessions, or any material things. Instead they have to do with our relationships with family and friends. They are priceless.

Years ago Mastercard ran a series of ads on television showing people in various nice settings and what they can buy using their credit card. The ads always ended with the word “priceless.” Such is our relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. It is personal, precious, and priceless. We simply cannot put a value on knowing Christ.

Many know about Christ, few know Christ intimately and personally. Paul, formerly named Saul of Tarsus, hated Christ and Christians and persecuted them, arrested them, and even killed them. He was brought up in Judaism and accomplished many things and had great knowledge of the Scriptures. He was a Pharisee, and considered himself among the spiritual elite.

Then came the day when on the road to Damascus He met Jesus Christ and his life was changed forever. From that point in time, his goal became to proclaim Him and serve Him for the rest of his life. He found the incomparable value of knowing Christ. He considered everything he had known and accomplished as rubbish or as several translations put it, “garbage.” He took it all and laid on the scale and then took what he had in Christ and placed it on the other side of the scale, and there was no comparison. He had gained Christ and all other things he counted as loss.

He once had law, now he had grace; he once taunted his knowledge, then he counted his knowledge of Christ far greater; he once tried to destroy the church, then he built it. He gave up his own plans, ambitions, and dreams for a higher calling of serving the greatest Master.

How about you, my friend? Do you know Christ? Have you accepted Him as your Lord and Savior? Is He your everything, your all in all? Are you willing to do whatever He desires above all things? There is a Christian song we sing that says, “He is my everything, He is my all; He is my everything both great and small; He gave His life for me, made everything new, He is my everything, now about you?”

Have a blessed day in Christ, with Christ, and for Christ. Nothing can compare to knowing Him, loving Him, living for Him, and serving Him. Stay safe and healthy.

Finding the best of the best, that Jesus is better than all the rest,

Dean

-September 20, 2023-

Good morning, happy Wednesday,

“ Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart.” Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass.”

(Psalm 37:4-5).

One of the keys to our walk with the Lord is to delight in Him from our hearts daily. God promises us if we delight in the Lord He will give us the desires of our hearts. To delight in the Lord is to put Him first, surrender fully to His will, and honor Him in all we do. The Lord loves to give good things to His children. Isaiah 58:14 says, “Then you shall delight yourself in the Lord; and I will cause you to ride on the high hills of the earth, and feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father, the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

God does not always give what we want, but He always gives us what we need and what is good for us. Psalm 84:11 says, “For the Lord God is a sun and shield; The Lord will give grace and glory; No good thing will He withhold from those who walk uprightly.” When we delight in the Lord we soon find out that His delights become our delights, and His will becomes our will.

Part of the process is to commit our ways to the Lord freely, fully, and forever, and to trust in Him. He knows us, loves us, and cares for us. He wants the very best for us in every way. When someone loves another, he or she, delights to give them what they like and what they want. Giving a gift requires the best preparation and presentation. So it with Lord with us.

I love the phrase, “He shall bring it to pass.” God not only says He will do it, He does it. Jesus said in John 14:14, “If you ask anything in My name, I will do it.” He can turn our dreams into realities; our wishes into happenings, and desires into delights.

Have a blessed day delighting in Jesus and He will give us the desires of our hearts. Stay safe and healthy.

Trusting the One who amazes us, surprises us, and delights us,

Dean

-September 19, 2023-

Good morning, happy Tuesday,

“I know that nothing is better than for them than to rejoice and to do good in their lives, and also that every man should eat and drink and enjoy the good of all all his labor—it is the gift of God.”

(Ecclesiastes 3:12-13).

King Solomon is the Preacher and writer of the book of Ecclesiastes. He also wrote two other books: Proverbs and Song of Solomon. His main subject in Ecclesiastes is life under the sun, that it is vanity of vanities. Life without Christ is barren, fruitless, unsatisfying, unfulfilling, and empty. Nothing in this world can fill the void in the human heart except the Lord.

The Preacher has advice for all believers on how we can find true satisfaction this side of heaven. It is not in pleasure, riches, honors, achievements, or any earthly things. It is in Him. There are five things we are urged to do: rejoice, do good, eat, drink, and enjoy the good of our labor.

• Rejoice – Rejoicing in the Lord is a blessing in our lives. Happiness is based on our experiences and circumstances, but joy is based on our relationship with Christ. Joy wells up inside of us and then is reflected on our faces and in our lives. Our dear brother Allan gave us a wonderful message on joy this past Sunday. The joy of the Lord is our strength.

•. Do good – We are not saved by good works, we are saved for good works. Paul told us in Ephesians 2:11, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.” Doing good for others is good to the Lord.

•. Eat and drink – Eating and drinking always go together. We need both of them to live and survive. All things come from the Lord and a blessing, as long as we realize their source and that they are a gift from God. In 1 Corinthians 10:31 it says, “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

•. Enjoy the good of all your labor – There is a certain enjoyment in labor, both in our jobs and in the Lord’s work. We read in 1 Corinthians 15:58, “Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”

All these things are a gift from God. James wrote, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning” (James 1:17). Have a blessed day living the life that God has given us for His glory. Stay safe and healthy.

Let us use the gifts to bless the Giver, for His blessings last forever,

Dean