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Daily Devotionals
Truths to Live By - One Day at a Time
Devotional: August 25th

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“But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead.”

Paul had a narrow scrape with death in the province of Asia. We cannot be sure exactly what happened, but it was so serious that if we had asked him, “Is it going to be life or death?” he would have said, “Death.”

Most people whom God uses have had a similar experience at one time or another in their lives. Biographies of great men of God record marvelous deliverances from disease, from accidents, from personal attacks.

Sometimes God uses this kind of experience to get a man’s attention. Perhaps he is riding the crest of the wave as far as material prosperity is concerned. Everything is going his way. Then suddenly he is laid low with illness. The surgeon removes yards of cancerous intestines. This causes him to reevaluate his life and to rethink his priorities. Realizing how short and uncertain life is, he determines to give the rest of it to the Lord. God raises him up and gives him many additional years of fruitful service.

It was different in Paul’s case. He had already yielded his life to the Lord for service. But there was the dangerous possibility that he might try to serve in his own strength, and by his own cleverness. So the Lord brought him to the brink of the grave in order that he might not trust in himself but in the God of resurrection. There would be many times in his tumultuous career when he would face predicaments beyond human solution. Having already proved the sufficiency of the God of the impossible, he would not be daunted.

These close encounters with death are blessings in disguise. They show us how frail we are. They remind us of the folly of this world’s values. They teach us that life is a short story that can end very unexpectedly. When we face death, we realize that we must work the works of Him that sent us while it is day, for the night is coming when no man can work. In a sense we all have the sentence of death in ourselves—a healthy reminder to put Christ’s interests first and to depend upon His power and wisdom.

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