Mon.’s Devo - Deliverance and Victory

Read: Joshua 11:1-12:24; Luke 17:11-37; Pslam 84:1-12; Proverbs 13:5-6 When King Jabin heard what had happened to the five kings that fought Israel, he sent messages to King Jobab of Mason, the king of Simeon and the king of Acshaph. He also sent messages to all the kings in the norther hill country, the kings in the Jordan Valley, the kings in the Galilean foothills, the kings of Naphoth-dor on the west; the kings of Canaan both east and west; the kings of the Amorite, Hittites, Perizzites, Jebusites and Hivites. All of these kings came out to fight with their armies and met at Merom to fight Israel. *** God told Joshua not to be afraid because by that time tomorrow He would hand them all over to Israel as dead men. Joshua was to cripple their horses and burn their chariots. So Joshua headed to Merom and attacked the armies of his enemies and God gave them victory. Joshua destroyed every warrior, crippled the horses and burned all the chariots. He then killed the king of Hazor who had once ruled all the kingdoms of the land. Joshua did all the Lord told him to do. *** Joshua killed all the giants, the descendants of Anak in Hebron, Debir, and Anab. Some of them remained in the Philistine land. *** All the 31 kings that the Lord helped Joshua defeat were listed. *** In Luke, Jesus came to a town and was met by ten lepers. They cried out for mercy. Jesus told them to go show themselves to the priests and as they went, they were healed. *** One of them came back to thank Jesus. He was a Samaritan. He couldn’t have shown himself to the priest because he was not a Jew, but he went to the one who would be our High Priest and showed him. Jesus asked why he was the only one who returned to give glory to God. He told the man to stand and go because his faith had made him whole. *** One of the Pharisees asked Jesus when the Kingdom of God would come. Jesus told him it wouldn’t come with a visible sign because the Kingdom of God was spirit and it was already among them… in him. *** Jesus told the man that the Son of Man would return when the day was bright, but first he must suffer and be rejected by his generation. *** When Jesus comes back again, it will be like it was in Noah’s day. People will be partying and oblivious to the fact that they are about to be judged. It was like that in Sodom, right before it was judged with fire and brimstone. None survived but Lot and his two daughters. *** If we hold on to our lives like Lot’s wife, we will not survive. We have to lose our life to Jesus and then we will be saved. Jesus described how two people would be sleeping and one would be taken and the other would survive. When we see death happening all around us we will know these are signs it is the end. Lord, help us to be aware of the day we are living in and respond. Now is the day of repentance and humbling ourselves. It is also the day of hope and great expectation for God’s people as we are about to be delivered from our enemies.