Daily Bible Verses for 3/9/2017

Daily Verse(s)
Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. 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. Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.

Reading Notes
One of the first things James tells us as we begin this section is not to be deceived. The Greek word used is “planao” which means not to be seduced or lured away. Not to be led astray in the wrong direction. And in this case not to let the things of this fallen world lead us away from Christ. Moreover, James gives us this advice with good reason. The Bible calls Satan the “father of lies” and says “he was a deceiver from the start.” Deception is the number one trick of Satan and this fallen world we live in. Together they want to entice us away from God. They want to lure us away from Jesus with bait that appeals to our sin nature and our sinful desires. One of the primary emotions Satan plays on is blame and pride. When bad things happen, Satan and the fallen world we live in, want us to blame God. They want us to believe God has done something wrong. They want us to ignore sin, ignore the nature of this fallen world and blame God.

Satan would love nothing more than for us to get angry at God and break our fellowship with Him. When in fact, God has only love for us and concern for our eternal good. Satan works incredibly hard to blind us to the truth. And the truth is, bad things happen because of the fallen world we live in. A fallen world, which Satan himself helped to bring about. This fallen world brings with it chaos, disease, frail bodies, old age and death. In addition, our sins and the sins of others can bring harm and destruction into our lives as well as the lives of others. And the spiritual warfare waged around us serves no other purpose than to bring chaos, loss and destruction into the lives of all people. As followers of Jesus, we have to remember the battle is waged in the spiritual realm before it ever reaches us in the physical. Therefore, we are looking to Jesus, who is our redeemer, and we do so wearing the full armor of God, why? For Christ alone, has made us the first fruits of creation through our redemption by His blood, shed for us at the Cross of Calvary.