DONNIE DAILY GEMS FOR TUESDAY FEBRUARY 7:
WORD OF WISDOM
Courage is fear that has said its prayers.
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DAILY DEVOTION
A Question of Reputation
"Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the
form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself
of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in
the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled
himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross."
Philippians 2:5-8
After a long and successful business career, Raymond Donovan agreed to serve
as Secretary of Labor under President Ronald Reagan. In 1987 Donovan and
several others were charged with larceny and corruption in relation to a
subway construction project. After the trial, in which Donovan and all the
other defendants were acquitted of all charges, Donovan held a press
conference on the steps of the courthouse. In his statement Donovan asked,
"Which office do I go to to get my reputation back?"
Webster's Dictionary defines reputation as the "Estimation in which a person
or thing is commonly held, whether favorable or not; character in the view
of the public, the community, etc." It's important to have a good reputation
in the sense that we are not dragging the name of God (which we, as
Christians, carry wherever we go) through the mud by our lives. That is what
David did in his sin with Bathsheba. The prophet Nathan said, "Howbeit,
because by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the
LORD to blaspheme, the child also that is born unto thee shall surely die"
(2 Samuel 12:14).
But our concern should never be the prideful kind that cares about
reputation for our own sake. Instead, like Jesus we should be willing to be
looked down upon and falsely accused as long as we are doing right. The
world does not have to admire us, but we should live in such a way that our
faith is evident and real.
If we are more concerned with God's reputation than with ours, we will be
more effective for Him.
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DAILY BIBLE READING
Leviticus 25-27New King James Version (NKJV)
The Sabbath of the Seventh Year
25 And the Lord spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying, 2 "Speak to the
children of Israel, and say to them: 'When you come into the land which I
give you, then the land shall keep a sabbath to the Lord. 3 Six years you
shall sow your field, and six years you shall prune your vineyard, and
gather its fruit; 4 but in the seventh year there shall be a sabbath of
solemn rest for the land, a sabbath to the Lord. You shall neither sow your
field nor prune your vineyard. 5 What grows of its own accord of your
harvest you shall not reap, nor gather the grapes of your untended vine, for
it is a year of rest for the land. 6 And the sabbath produce of the land
shall be food for you: for you, your male and female servants, your hired
man, and the stranger who dwells with you, 7 for your livestock and the
beasts that are in your land-all its produce shall be for food.
The Year of Jubilee
8 'And you shall count seven sabbaths of years for yourself, seven times
seven years; and the time of the seven sabbaths of years shall be to you
forty-nine years. 9 Then you shall cause the trumpet of the Jubilee to
sound on the tenth day of the seventh month; on the Day of Atonement you
shall make the trumpet to sound throughout all your land. 10 And you shall
consecrate the fiftieth year, and proclaim liberty throughout all the land
to all its inhabitants. It shall be a Jubilee for you; and each of you shall
return to his possession, and each of you shall return to his family. 11
That fiftieth year shall be a Jubilee to you; in it you shall neither sow
nor reap what grows of its own accord, nor gather the grapes of your
untended vine. 12 For it is the Jubilee; it shall be holy to you; you shall
eat its produce from the field.
13 'In this Year of Jubilee, each of you shall return to his possession. 14
And if you sell anything to your neighbor or buy from your neighbor's hand,
you shall not oppress one another. 15 According to the number of years
after the Jubilee you shall buy from your neighbor, and according to the
number of years of crops he shall sell to you. 16 According to the
multitude of years you shall increase its price, and according to the fewer
number of years you shall diminish its price; for he sells to you according
to the number of the years of the crops. 17 Therefore you shall not oppress
one another, but you shall fear your God; for I am the Lord your God.
Provisions for the Seventh Year
18 'So you shall observe My statutes and keep My judgments, and perform
them; and you will dwell in the land in safety. 19 Then the land will yield
its fruit, and you will eat your fill, and dwell there in safety.
20 'And if you say, "What shall we eat in the seventh year, since we shall
not sow nor gather in our produce?" 21 Then I will command My blessing on
you in the sixth year, and it will bring forth produce enough for three
years. 22 And you shall sow in the eighth year, and eat old produce until
the ninth year; until its produce comes in, you shall eat of the old
harvest.
Redemption of Property
23 'The land shall not be sold permanently, for the land is Mine; for you
are strangers and sojourners with Me. 24 And in all the land of your
possession you shall grant redemption of the land.
25 'If one of your brethren becomes poor, and has sold some of his
possession, and if his redeeming relative comes to redeem it, then he may
redeem what his brother sold. 26 Or if the man has no one to redeem it, but
he himself becomes able to redeem it, 27 then let him count the years since
its sale, and restore the remainder to the man to whom he sold it, that he
may return to his possession. 28 But if he is not able to have it restored
to himself, then what was sold shall remain in the hand of him who bought it
until the Year of Jubilee; and in the Jubilee it shall be released, and he
shall return to his possession.
29 'If a man sells a house in a walled city, then he may redeem it within a
whole year after it is sold; within a full year he may redeem it. 30 But if
it is not redeemed within the space of a full year, then the house in the
walled city shall belong permanently to him who bought it, throughout his
generations. It shall not be released in the Jubilee. 31 However the houses
of villages which have no wall around them shall be counted as the fields of
the country. They may be redeemed, and they shall be released in the
Jubilee. 32 Nevertheless the cities of the Levites, and the houses in the
cities of their possession, the Levites may redeem at any time. 33 And if a
man purchases a house from the Levites, then the house that was sold in the
city of his possession shall be released in the Jubilee; for the houses in
the cities of the Levites are their possession among the children of Israel.
34 But the field of the common-land of their cities may not be sold, for it
is their perpetual possession.
Lending to the Poor
35 'If one of your brethren becomes poor, and falls into poverty among you,
then you shall help him, like a stranger or a sojourner, that he may live
with you. 36 Take no usury or interest from him; but fear your God, that
your brother may live with you. 37 You shall not lend him your money for
usury, nor lend him your food at a profit. 38 I am the Lord your God, who
brought you out of the land of Egypt, to give you the land of Canaan and to
be your God.
The Law Concerning Slavery
39 'And if one of your brethren who dwells by you becomes poor, and sells
himself to you, you shall not compel him to serve as a slave. 40 As a hired
servant and a sojourner he shall be with you, and shall serve you until the
Year of Jubilee. 41 And then he shall depart from you-he and his children
with him-and shall return to his own family. He shall return to the
possession of his fathers. 42 For they are My servants, whom I brought out
of the land of Egypt; they shall not be sold as slaves. 43 You shall not
rule over him with rigor, but you shall fear your God. 44 And as for your
male and female slaves whom you may have-from the nations that are around
you, from them you may buy male and female slaves. 45 Moreover you may buy
the children of the strangers who dwell among you, and their families who
are with you, which they beget in your land; and they shall become your
property. 46 And you may take them as an inheritance for your children
after you, to inherit them as a possession; they shall be your permanent
slaves. But regarding your brethren, the children of Israel, you shall not
rule over one another with rigor.
47 'Now if a sojourner or stranger close to you becomes rich, and one of
your brethren who dwells by him becomes poor, and sells himself to the
stranger or sojourner close to you, or to a member of the stranger's family,
48 after he is sold he may be redeemed again. One of his brothers may redeem
him; 49 or his uncle or his uncle's son may redeem him; or anyone who is
near of kin to him in his family may redeem him; or if he is able he may
redeem himself. 50 Thus he shall reckon with him who bought him: The price
of his release shall be according to the number of years, from the year that
he was sold to him until the Year of Jubilee; it shall be according to the
time of a hired servant for him. 51 If there are still many years
remaining, according to them he shall repay the price of his redemption from
the money with which he was bought. 52 And if there remain but a few years
until the Year of Jubilee, then he shall reckon with him, and according to
his years he shall repay him the price of his redemption. 53 He shall be
with him as a yearly hired servant, and he shall not rule with rigor over
him in your sight. 54 And if he is not redeemed in these years, then he
shall be released in the Year of Jubilee-he and his children with him. 55
For the children of Israel are servants to Me; they are My servants whom I
brought out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.
Promise of Blessing and Retribution
26 'You shall not make idols for yourselves;
neither a carved image nor a sacred pillar shall you rear up for yourselves;
nor shall you set up an engraved stone in your land, to bow down to it;
for I am the Lord your God.
2 You shall keep My Sabbaths and reverence My sanctuary:
I am the Lord.
3 'If you walk in My statutes and keep My commandments, and perform them,
4 then I will give you rain in its season, the land shall yield its produce,
and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit.
5 Your threshing shall last till the time of vintage, and the vintage shall
last till the time of sowing;
you shall eat your bread to the full, and dwell in your land safely.
6 I will give peace in the land, and you shall lie down, and none will make
you afraid;
I will rid the land of evil beasts,
and the sword will not go through your land.
7 You will chase your enemies, and they shall fall by the sword before you.
8 Five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall put ten
thousand to flight;
your enemies shall fall by the sword before you.
9 'For I will look on you favorably and make you fruitful, multiply you and
confirm My covenant with you.
10 You shall eat the old harvest, and clear out the old because of the new.
11 I will set My tabernacle among you, and My soul shall not abhor you.
12 I will walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My people.
13 I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, that
you should not be their slaves;
I have broken the bands of your yoke and made you walk upright.
14 'But if you do not obey Me, and do not observe all these commandments,
15 and if you despise My statutes, or if your soul abhors My judgments, so
that you do not perform all My commandments, but break My covenant,
16 I also will do this to you:
I will even appoint terror over you, wasting disease and fever which shall
consume the eyes and cause sorrow of heart.
And you shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it.
17 I will set My face against you, and you shall be defeated by your
enemies.
Those who hate you shall reign over you, and you shall flee when no one
pursues you.
18 'And after all this, if you do not obey Me, then I will punish you seven
times more for your sins.
19 I will break the pride of your power;
I will make your heavens like iron and your earth like bronze.
20 And your strength shall be spent in vain;
for your land shall not yield its produce, nor shall the trees of the land
yield their fruit.
21 'Then, if you walk contrary to Me, and are not willing to obey Me, I will
bring on you seven times more plagues, according to your sins.
22 I will also send wild beasts among you, which shall rob you of your
children, destroy your livestock, and make you few in number;
and your highways shall be desolate.
23 'And if by these things you are not reformed by Me, but walk contrary to
Me,
24 then I also will walk contrary to you, and I will punish you yet seven
times for your sins.
25 And I will bring a sword against you that will execute the vengeance of
the covenant;
when you are gathered together within your cities I will send pestilence
among you;
and you shall be delivered into the hand of the enemy.
26 When I have cut off your supply of bread, ten women shall bake your bread
in one oven, and they shall bring back your bread by weight, and you shall
eat and not be satisfied.
27 'And after all this, if you do not obey Me, but walk contrary to Me,
28 then I also will walk contrary to you in fury;
and I, even I, will chastise you seven times for your sins.
29 You shall eat the flesh of your sons, and you shall eat the flesh of your
daughters.
30 I will destroy your high places, cut down your incense altars, and cast
your carcasses on the lifeless forms of your idols;
and My soul shall abhor you.
31 I will lay your cities waste and bring your sanctuaries to desolation,
and I will not smell the fragrance of your sweet aromas.
32 I will bring the land to desolation, and your enemies who dwell in it
shall be astonished at it.
33 I will scatter you among the nations and draw out a sword after you;
your land shall be desolate and your cities waste.
34 Then the land shall enjoy its sabbaths as long as it lies desolate and
you are in your enemies' land;
then the land shall rest and enjoy its sabbaths.
35 As long as it lies desolate it shall rest-
for the time it did not rest on your sabbaths when you dwelt in it.
36 'And as for those of you who are left, I will send faintness into their
hearts in the lands of their enemies;
the sound of a shaken leaf shall cause them to flee;
they shall flee as though fleeing from a sword, and they shall fall when no
one pursues.
37 They shall stumble over one another, as it were before a sword, when no
one pursues;
and you shall have no power to stand before your enemies.
38 You shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall
eat you up.
39 And those of you who are left shall waste away in their iniquity in your
enemies' lands;
also in their fathers' iniquities, which are with them, they shall waste
away.
40 'But if they confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers,
with their unfaithfulness in which they were unfaithful to Me, and that they
also have walked contrary to Me,
41 and that I also have walked contrary to them and have brought them into
the land of their enemies;
if their uncircumcised hearts are humbled, and they accept their guilt-
42 then I will remember My covenant with Jacob, and My covenant with Isaac
and My covenant with Abraham I will remember;
I will remember the land.
43 The land also shall be left empty by them, and will enjoy its sabbaths
while it lies desolate without them;
they will accept their guilt, because they despised My judgments and because
their soul abhorred My statutes.
44 Yet for all that, when they are in the land of their enemies, I will not
cast them away, nor shall I abhor them, to utterly destroy them and break My
covenant with them;
for I am the Lord their God.
45 But for their sake I will remember the covenant of their ancestors, whom
I brought out of the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations, that I might
be their God:
I am the Lord.'"
46 These are the statutes and judgments and laws which the Lord made between
Himself and the children of Israel on Mount Sinai by the hand of Moses.
Redeeming Persons and Property Dedicated to God
27 Now the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 "Speak to the children of Israel,
and say to them: 'When a man consecrates by a vow certain persons to the
Lord, according to your valuation, 3 if your valuation is of a male from
twenty years old up to sixty years old, then your valuation shall be fifty
shekels of silver, according to the shekel of the sanctuary. 4 If it is a
female, then your valuation shall be thirty shekels; 5 and if from five
years old up to twenty years old, then your valuation for a male shall be
twenty shekels, and for a female ten shekels; 6 and if from a month old up
to five years old, then your valuation for a male shall be five shekels of
silver, and for a female your valuation shall be three shekels of silver; 7
and if from sixty years old and above, if it is a male, then your valuation
shall be fifteen shekels, and for a female ten shekels.
8 'But if he is too poor to pay your valuation, then he shall present
himself before the priest, and the priest shall set a value for him;
according to the ability of him who vowed, the priest shall value him.
9 'If it is an animal that men may bring as an offering to the Lord, all
that anyone gives to the Lord shall be holy. 10 He shall not substitute it
or exchange it, good for bad or bad for good; and if he at all exchanges
animal for animal, then both it and the one exchanged for it shall be holy.
11 If it is an unclean animal which they do not offer as a sacrifice to the
Lord, then he shall present the animal before the priest; 12 and the priest
shall set a value for it, whether it is good or bad; as you, the priest,
value it, so it shall be. 13 But if he wants at all to redeem it, then he
must add one-fifth to your valuation.
14 'And when a man dedicates his house to be holy to the Lord, then the
priest shall set a value for it, whether it is good or bad; as the priest
values it, so it shall stand. 15 If he who dedicated it wants to redeem his
house, then he must add one-fifth of the money of your valuation to it, and
it shall be his.
16 'If a man dedicates to the Lord part of a field of his possession, then
your valuation shall be according to the seed for it. A homer of barley seed
shall be valued at fifty shekels of silver. 17 If he dedicates his field
from the Year of Jubilee, according to your valuation it shall stand. 18
But if he dedicates his field after the Jubilee, then the priest shall
reckon to him the money due according to the years that remain till the Year
of Jubilee, and it shall be deducted from your valuation. 19 And if he who
dedicates the field ever wishes to redeem it, then he must add one-fifth of
the money of your valuation to it, and it shall belong to him. 20 But if he
does not want to redeem the field, or if he has sold the field to another
man, it shall not be redeemed anymore; 21 but the field, when it is
released in the Jubilee, shall be holy to the Lord, as a devoted field; it
shall be the possession of the priest.
22 'And if a man dedicates to the Lord a field which he has bought, which is
not the field of his possession, 23 then the priest shall reckon to him the
worth of your valuation, up to the Year of Jubilee, and he shall give your
valuation on that day as a holy offering to the Lord. 24 In the Year of
Jubilee the field shall return to him from whom it was bought, to the one
who owned the land as a possession. 25 And all your valuations shall be
according to the shekel of the sanctuary: twenty gerahs to the shekel.
26 'But the firstborn of the animals, which should be the Lord's firstborn,
no man shall dedicate; whether it is an ox or sheep, it is the Lord's. 27
And if it is an unclean animal, then he shall redeem it according to your
valuation, and shall add one-fifth to it; or if it is not redeemed, then it
shall be sold according to your valuation.
28 'Nevertheless no devoted offering that a man may devote to the Lord of
all that he has, both man and beast, or the field of his possession, shall
be sold or redeemed; every devoted offering is most holy to the Lord. 29 No
person under the ban, who may become doomed to destruction among men, shall
be redeemed, but shall surely be put to death. 30 And all the tithe of the
land, whether of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the tree, is the
Lord's. It is holy to the Lord. 31 If a man wants at all to redeem any of
his tithes, he shall add one-fifth to it. 32 And concerning the tithe of
the herd or the flock, of whatever passes under the rod, the tenth one shall
be holy to the Lord. 33 He shall not inquire whether it is good or bad, nor
shall he exchange it; and if he exchanges it at all, then both it and the
one exchanged for it shall be holy; it shall not be redeemed.'"
34 These are the commandments which the Lord commanded Moses for the
children of Israel on Mount Sinai.
New King James Version (NKJV)
Scripture taken from the New King James VersionR. Copyright C 1982 by Thomas
Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
