Most of us eat every day, some of us too much because yesterday's food
is not enough to supply energy for today's needs. Why then, do some
of us expect yesterday's portion of heavenly manna the word of God to keep us
through today's challenges. On this program, we are going to change all of
that. Let's experience God's words today and receive the power we need to live
healthy, vibrant lives. Welcome to your Daily Portion with your host, author
speaker, Elle David Harris. Good morning, Good morning, Good morning.
It is Sabbath, December two, twenty twenty three. Hello, my name
is El David Harris. I am your host, and this is your Daily
Portion where we give you God's Word every single day, and today is no
exception. We are continuing in our Lesson study series. God's Mission, My
mission, and our caption for today is Mission to the Unreached, Part one.
Mission to the Unreached Part one. We'll get into that in just a
moment, but first I'd like to say welcome to you and ask you to
go over to your Daily Portion dot com, join our online community, and
also let us know where you are in the world. Again at your Daily
Portion dot com this is a way that we build faith and fellowship. Let's
go ahead and pray, and then we will get underway bother and Heaven.
Thank you for this Sabbath morning and for the privilege you have entrusted to us
to be able to connect with you and then connect with others. Please fill
us with your holy spirit. Teach us not to try to do this on
our own. Keep ministry simple and powerful through your spirit. In Jesus' name,
I pray Amen and a man again. Mission to the unreached. There
are people around the world that just literally don't know God. There are some
that don't even know what to call God, much less to know and believe
it him. There are people who have rejected God. I have friends when
in particular that it just is a burden to me because this friend is so
belligerent and antagonistic toward the concept of God. And all of our friends are
who are godly people who love God. So there is a mission to the
unreached. Some of the people we know, some of the people we don't
know. But there is a mission. Nonetheless, I'm going to base really,
I'm using the Lesson study. The Lesson study is based on acts chapter
seventeen and other passages that will go throughout next week beginning tomorrow, but I
want you to focus on chapter seventeen of Acts. Okay, and so we
begin by reading just a couple of verse. Well, let's read verse seventeen
first. Therefore did he in the synagogue we're talking about Paul Synagogue with the
Jews and with the devout persons, and in the market daily with them that
met him. So what we want to do is make an effort to be
in various settings. And I know that that sounds simple, but the only
way we can reach people who don't know God is if we're with them.
Some of you lives sterile lives. Some of you take it too far where
it comes to not connecting quote with the ungodly. And it's like no,
no, no, no, no, no, no, no no no.
Wherever you happen to be, be it in church or outside of church,
in temple or outside of temple, right, if it's in your gym
where you do exercise, if it's on a sports part of me, sports
field, or some kind of coffee shop where you do your work, right,
and please don't get caught up on coffee, and don't text me about
that, because you would be missing the point. In that case. Some
people go to those places to use the internet and do their work. It's
better than working from home sometimes, so in those settings, right, and
so many others that I could cite, God is saying to engage in diverse
communities, just like Paul did. Also, we can get here in let
me go through to Romans chapter one and verse sixteen. It's very simple.
For I am not ashamed of the Gospel of Christ. It is the power
of God unto salvation to everyone that believes. I want you to get outside
of your comfort zone. We all need to do that. At times.
There are people who are ashamed of the gospel. They don't want to be
stigmatized, they don't want to be rejected, they don't want to be seen
as fill in the blank. Who knows what times we hold back when we
see somebody who's in need of a blessing, We see somebody who's in need
of deliverance from some vice of sin or besetting sin, and we are reluctant
to share because we're like, oh, maybe they'll think we're judging them.
Well, let me ask you, if you have the kindness of God,
do you have his spirit and you see somebody who's drowning in the sea and
you are a swimmer, do you say that same thing? Then? Do
you say, well, maybe the person that's drowning is going to be offended
if I go and save their lives. Maybe the person who's drowning who is
fighting me as I go and attempt to save his or her life, I
have to knock him out so I can drag him back into shore. Maybe
they'll be offended. Or do you say, wait a minute, now their
life is at stake, and since their life is at stake, I will
stop at nothing to be of a service and assistance to them for their quality
of life to improve. Yeah, okay, so I think that we get
the point. The Gospel of Christ is unto salvation. It is the rescue.
It is the life saver for people who are drowning in their human predicament,
drowning and addictions, drowning in sin problems, drowning drowning and broken relationships.
God is saying, please, do not be selfish, expand your comfort
zone, and do not limit yourself to say that, Well, maybe they'll
think a certain way about me, so I won't go to them. That's
what Jonah did, and you see where that got him. All right,
let's read from Acts, chapter seventeen, verses twenty two and twenty three.
This is very interesting to me. As I passed by and beheld your devotions,
this is what Paul is saying on Mars Hill. Mars Hill, Okay,
held your devotions. I found an altar with this inscription to the unknown
God. These individuals were polytheists. They worshiped all kinds of different quote and
unquote gods. Ha. And so Paul was looking for an opportunity. I
think a couple of days ago I said that we should pray for wisdom and
an opportunity to reach people. Well, he was looking for an opportunity or
a basis for discussion or whatever in order to lead these people to God.
And so, among the hundreds of gods, maybe thousands, I don't remember,
Ah, among the hundreds of gods that were there, false gods,
he noticed one that he could capitalize on. He said, okay, well,
they're not talking about thor or Zeus here. They're not talking about any
of these others. A this one says unknown. Aha, there is one
that is not known to you. Remember when Nebuchadnezzar had an encounter with the
children of God, right three Hebrew boys, in particular Hananiah, Michel Azariah.
He said, who will this God? Who is this God? That
he will deliver you from my hands? It's like, yeah, you on
an introduction, I can give you one of those. And God introduced himself.
You can read about that in the Fiery Furnace incident. I think it's
Daniel chapter two. Yeah. And so the Unknown God. This was the
basis of the common ground connection that Paul was establishing. Since we're talking about
God, gods, since we are talking about that, I want to capitalize
on this, maximize it. And then he begins to teach and share about
the God who created the heavens and the earth and the sea and all that
in him is. He talked about how they could connect to the one true
and living God to the exclusion of all of those others that they had fabricated.
Long story, long story. Also, you can address intellectual curiosities.
I'm sure as he opened up the understanding and the word concerning the quote unknown
God, there were people because of where he was who had a higher sense
of learning and thought and reasoning and wanted to know more. And in this
case the brother should be available. We should be available to have conversations in
all times. The Bible says that we should be ready always to give a
reason for the hope that is within us, with meekness and with fear.
And we adapt our methods to the situation as God gives us strength of a
wonderful rest of your sabbath, peace. Thanks for joining us listening. Friends.
Always remember we cannot live by bread alone, but by every word that
comes from the mouth of God. This has been your daily portion with el
David Harris, make it a great day. Yeah,