DONNIE DAILY GEMS FOR FRIDAY APRIL 2:
WORD OF WISDOM
The only problem with buying a book on amnesia is that you are likely to
forget where you put it!
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DAILY DEVOTION
Walk Away
Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
(Romans 12:21, NIV)
When David was a teenager, his oldest brother, Eliab, spoke to him
in the most condescending, disrespectful, and accusatory way in front of
others (see 1 Samuel 17:28). Rest assured that David felt like telling his
brother off, but he kept his mouth closed, turned and walked away. Seeing
such self-discipline, it's no wonder God entrusted David to do great things.
You know that if you argue long enough with someone, you're going to say
things you regret later. A ten-minute argument can set the relationship back
ten years. You have to learn to walk away. You're not going to accomplish
anything positive in a heated, disrespectful, contentious situation. Let
them have the last word, and you keep your peace. The Scripture says that
you "overcome evil with good." You don't overcome disrespect with more
disrespect, or overcome insult with insult, or overcome shouting with more
shouting. You do it by staying respectful. You be the first to walk away.
A Prayer for Today
"Father, thank You that in every way possible Jesus overcame evil by doing
good. Thank You for giving me the grace to overcome evil by doing good as
well. Help me to stay respectful in all of my conversations and every
situation and walk away when necessary. In Jesus' Name, Amen."
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DAILY BIBLE READING
Joshua
Joshua 22 Easy-to-Read Version (ERV)
Three Tribes Go Home
22 Then Joshua called a meeting of all the people from the tribes of Reuben,
Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh. 2 Joshua said to them, "Moses was the
Lord's servant. You obeyed everything that Moses told you to do. And you
also obeyed all of my commands. 3 All this time you have supported all the
other Israelites. You carefully obeyed all the commands that the Lord your
God gave you. 4 The Lord your God promised to give the Israelites peace. And
now, he has kept his promise, so now you can go home. The Lord's servant
Moses gave you the land on the east side of the Jordan River. Now you can go
home to that land. 5 But remember-continue to obey the law that the Lord's
servant Moses gave you. You must love the Lord your God and obey his
commands. You must continue to follow him and serve him the very best that
you can."
6 Then Joshua said goodbye to them, and they left and went home. 7 Moses had
given the land of Bashan to half of the Manasseh tribe. Joshua gave land on
the west side of the Jordan River to the other half of the Manasseh tribe.
Joshua blessed them and sent them home. 8 He said, "You have become very
rich. You have many animals. You have gold, silver, and expensive jewelry.
You have many beautiful clothes. You have taken many things from your
enemies. Go home and divide these things among yourselves."
9 So the people from the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh left the other
Israelites at Shiloh in Canaan. They went back home to Gilead. This was
their own land, the land that Moses gave them, as the Lord had commanded.
10 They went to the place called Geliloth, near the Jordan River in the land
of Canaan. There they built a beautiful altar. 11 But the other Israelites
who were still at Shiloh heard about the altar that these three tribes
built. They heard that the altar was at the border of Canaan at the place
called Geliloth. It was near the Jordan River on Israel's side. 12 All the
Israelites became very angry with these three tribes. They met together and
decided to fight against them.
13 So the Israelites sent some men to talk to the people of Reuben, Gad, and
Manasseh. The leader of these men was Phinehas, son of Eleazar the priest.
14 They also sent ten of the leaders of the tribes there. There was one man
from each family group of Israel who was at Shiloh.
15 So these eleven men went to Gilead. They went to talk to the people of
Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh. The eleven men said to them, 16 "All the Lord's
people sent us to ask you this: 'Why did you do this thing against the God
of Israel? Why did you stop following the Lord? Why did you build an altar
for yourselves? You know that this is against the Lord's command. 17
Remember what happened at Peor? Was the sin we committed there not bad
enough? Because of that sin, the Lord punished his people with a terrible
sickness. And we are still suffering from that sin. 18 And now you are doing
the same thing. You are turning against the Lord. Will you refuse to follow
the Lord? If you don't stop what you are doing, he will be angry with
everyone in Israel.
19 "'If your land is not a good place to worship God, come over to the
Lord's land. This is where the Lord's Tent is. You can have some of the land
and live here. But don't turn against the Lord or against us by building
another altar. We already have the altar of the Lord our God at the Meeting
Tent.
20 "'Remember how Achan son of Zerah refused to obey the command about
things that must be destroyed. That one man broke God's law, but all the
Israelites were punished. Achan died because of his sin, but also many other
people died.'"
21 The people from the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh answered the
eleven men. They said, 22 "The Lord is our God![a] Again we say that the
Lord is our God! And God knows why we did this thing. We want you to know
also. You can judge what we did. If you think we did it because we are
against the Lord or refuse to obey him, you can kill us today. 23 Do you
think we built our own altar because we want to turn away from the Lord? Do
you think we built another altar for burnt offerings, grain offerings, and
fellowship offerings? If that is why we built this altar, we ask the Lord
himself to punish us. 24 But that is not why we built it. We built it
because we were afraid that in the future your descendants might not accept
us as part of God's people. So your children might say to our children, 'You
people have no reason to worship the Lord, the God of Israel. 25 The Lord
separated you people of Reuben and Gad from us by giving you the land on the
other side of the Jordan River. So you are not part of the Lord's people.'
If your children said that, it might make our children stop worshiping the
Lord.
26 "So we decided to build this altar. But we did not plan to use it for
burning offerings and sacrifices. 27 The real reason we wanted our altar was
to show our people that we worship the same God you do. This altar will be
the proof to you and us and to all our future children that we worship the
Lord. We give our sacrifices, grain offerings, and fellowship offerings to
the Lord. We wanted your children to grow up and know that we are also
Israelites like yourselves. 28 In the future, if it happens that your
children say that we don't belong to Israel, then our children can say,
'Look, our fathers who lived before us made an altar. That altar is exactly
like the Lord's altar at the Holy Tent. We don't use this altar for
sacrifices-this altar is proof that we are part of Israel.'
29 "The truth is, we don't want to be against the Lord. We don't want to
stop following him now. We know that the only true altar is the one that is
in front of the Holy Tent. That altar belongs to the Lord our God."
30 Phinehas the priest and the leaders with him heard what the people from
Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh said. They were satisfied that they were telling
the truth. 31 So Phinehas the priest said, "Now we know that the Lord is
with us and that you did not turn against him. We are happy that the
Israelites will not be punished by the Lord."
32 Then Phinehas and the leaders left that place and went home. They left
the people of Reuben and Gad in the land of Gilead and went back to Canaan.
They went back to the Israelites and told them what had happened. 33 The
Israelites were also satisfied. They were happy and thanked God. They
decided not to go and fight against the people of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh.
They decided not to destroy the land where those people live.
34 The people of Reuben and Gad named the altar "Proof That We Believe the
Lord is God."
Footnotes:
Joshua 22:22 The Lord is our God Or "Yahweh is the true God!" Literally, "El
Elohim Yahweh!"
