Speaker 1: 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.
Speaker 2: Good morning, Good morning, Good morning. It is Wednesday, January
twenty nine, twenty twenty five. 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 Love and Justice, and our caption
for today is God does not afflict willingly. God does
not afflict willingly. We'll get into that in just a moment,
but first I'd like to say welcome to you and
ask you to please go over to your Daily Portion
dot com. Please join our online community. Please pick up
your Daily Portion companion guide for this quarter's lesson I'm
not talking about the quarterly I'm talking about the Companion Guide,
where we apply the lesson in four key areas of
our lives. And this will determine if I'm going to
continue to produce that book or publish that book. So yeah,
please do that and also let us know where you
are in the world at your Daily portion dot com.
This is one of the ways that we continue to
build faith and fellowship. Let's go ahead and pray and
then we will get underway. Father and Heaven, thank you
for giving us this new day and for giving us
a window into your character, your intent for us, your
love for us. And I pray that we will love
you with every everything that we have and everything that
we are, and help us to live according to your truth.
In Jesus' name, I pray a man and a man again.
God does not afflict willingly. Yeah that's a big deal,
because there are some people who feel like God is
an angry God, like they are running away from lightning bolts,
They're running away from what they would consider to be
the tyrant in the sky. But God has no desire
to destroy any human being. The Bible says that God
does not take pleasure in the death of those who die,
and he's talking about especially those who are dying under judgment.
He's saying, so therefore turn yourselves and live. Of course
he was speaking to some specific people, but that still
is the character of God. No pleasure. Hell Fire was
created for the devil and his angels. So at the
appropriate time, God is going to destroy the devil and
his angels. And unfortunately, people who just literally refuse to
accept love. Whose you who are are more interested in
fear and hatred than love and God. Yes, so let's
go to the Bible Book of Ezra. I know there's
some people who've not seen the Book of Ezra. In
Forever Ezra, chapter five, and we'll read verse twelve. We
did a lesson study several quarters ago where we focused
in Ezra and Nehemiah. Here we go verse twelve. But
after that, our fathers had provoked the God of Heaven
unto wrath. You see God can be provoked, provoked the
God of Heaven unto wrath. He gave them into the
hand of Nebek Kidnezzar, the king of bath Babylon, the
child Dion, who destroyed this house and carried the people
away into Babylon. And so even when God, because he
was provoked by his own people to wrath, they chose
to forget about all of the times that he gave
them a way to amend their ways, forget all of
the chances that He had given them to do his
will when it was easier to do it, if you
want to say, if there's such a thing as easier, ah,
and they needed some additional help, let's call it those individuals.
Of course, his people now are in Babylonian captivity, as
we as we would say. But you know, even as
he gave them over into Babylonian captivity, he put bounds
on what the Babylonians could do. There were some terrible
things that happened while they were in captivity, but he
even then gave bounds to or boundaries to the Babylonians.
To say, this far and no farther, Let's go to
Jeremiah chapter fifty one. Jeremiah chapter fifty one, and then
and then will make some more sense of this. And
we'll read beginning at verse twenty four, and the Bible reads,
and I will render unto Babylon to all. I will
render unto Babylon and all of the inhabitant inhabitants of Chaldea,
all their evil that they have done in Zion in
your sight, set the Lord. Okay, let me read it
in another translation. But I will repay Babylon and all
who live in Babylonia for all the wicked things they
did unto Zion right before the eyes of you, Judean,
says the Lord. Verse twenty five. The Lord says, beware,
I oppose you, Babylon. You are like a destructive mountain
that destroys all the earth. I will unleash my power
against you. I will roll you off the cliffs and
make you like a burned out mountain. So the truth
is that sometimes when God would allow would allow people
to chastise God's people, that they would go too far,
that they would go too far. As a parent, do
you go too far when you chastise your child? And
God is saying, okay, there is a way that you
have to correct. There is a way that you can chastise.
But sometimes humans go too far. When you are in
law enforcement, when you are in the government, wherever you
happen to be in the world, do you overstep or
overreach the bounds that God has set forth, Paul talks
about how these things should function. Have we gone too
far in how we meet out justice? That's a question.
But we see that since God is watching and he
is not willing to owv extent or to over afflict,
his goal is to if he has to chastise, his
goal is to bring people back into right relationship with him.
We're not talking about judgment at the end of time
as yet. We're talking about there are times that God
is bringing people back into line. But sometimes those who
are used by God go too far, and this is
what happened. And so of course now Babylon has a
problem with God because because of course they had gone
too far. And so we're going into our Companion Guide
to page Let's go to page seventy nine, seventeen nine
and eighty, and we're going to focus our attention here
on the relationship one because as I said to those
who don't have the guide, we have four different ways
to apply, and we're going to go with relationships using
the acronym win wil. What is important now under relationship development,
God's reluctance to bring judgment shows his desire for people
to change and to reconcile. This should guide us in
how we handle conflicts and disappointments in our relationships. So,
if you're building a relationship and there are times that
things get very difficult or or worse, then looking at
the model that God has shown us in the passages
we just read and others, we are like, okay, okay, okay.
God's goal is to reconcile. What is our goal? Is
it to pay somebody back? Is it is it to
do something more? Well? You be the judge. I internalize
the insight. Think about a strained relationship in your life.
Please don't type it in the chat, not today. Think
about it. Is it your husband? Is it your husband
or wife? Is it with your adult children? Is it
with someone that you were formerly friends with but something's
not going quite right? Think about that individual or those individuals.
Are you quick to judge or condemn? Consider how you
can extend patience and grace, allowing space for reconciliation and healing.
And then next best move in reach out to someone
with whom you are having a conflict. Offer a gesture
of peace, whether it's a kind word or notes or
invitation to talk, show them that you are open to
reconciliation and healing. God does not afflict willingly do you.
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us listening to 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,