For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith, and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God, not by works, so that no one can boast. Ephesians 2:8-9
Jesus Tells Us…There are so many things you get graded on. There are report cards for school and points for sports. There are scores for talent shows and beauty contests. And in a few years, you’ll even be tested on your driving. Almost everywhere you go, you are graded on how well you perform. But I don’t keep score. Not ever. And I don’t grade you on your performance. There is no heavenly grade book that says: Prayer Time, B, Kindness, A-, Patience C+. So, change your focus from your performance to My loving Presence. The light of My love shines on you always, no matter how well you’re doing or how you feel.
Jesus Concludes…you don’t need to worry about making the grade. Because you are My child, it’s A+ all the way!
Ephesians 2:8-9; Ephesians 3:16-19; Psalm 62:8
Footnotes Ephesians 2:8-9 When someone gives you a gift, do you say, “That’s very nice, now, how much do I owe you?”
No, the appropriate response to a gift is “Thank you!” yet how often Christians, even after they have been given the gift of salvation, feel obligated to try to work their way to God. Because our salvation and even our faith are gifts, we should respond with gratitude, praise, and joy.
Passage Ephesians 3:16-19 16I pray that out of his glorious riches, he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18may have power, together with all the Lord’s holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, 19and to know this love that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.
Footnotes Ephesian 3:17-19 God’s love is total, says Paul. It reaches every corner of our experience. God’s love is wide, it covers the breadth of our own experience, and it reaches out to the whole world. God’s love is long, it extends throughout our lives and into eternity. God’s love is high, it rises to the heights of our celebration and elation. God’s love is deep, it reaches to the depths of discouragement, despair, and even death. When you feel shut out or isolated, remember that you can never be lost to God’s love.
Passage Psalm 62:8 Trust in him at all times, you people, pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge.
Footnotes Psalm 62:3-7 David expressed his feelings to God and then reaffirmed his faith. Prayer can release our tension in times of emotional stress. Trusting God to be our rock, salvation, and fortress (62:2) will change our entire outlook on life. No longer must we be held captive by resentment towards others when they hurt us. When we are resting in God’s strength, nothing can shake us.
Jesus Tells Us is from the Jesus Calling 365 devotions for kids.
THE WORLD…we see history
Queen VICTORIA
The Roman Empire doubtless controlled a larger percentage of the known world in its time, and the Mongols ruled over more acreage, but never has one country realized so great a spread over the globe as did Great Britain during the long reign of Queen Victoria in the 19th century. She is regarded historically as having been politically neutral in an age when England’s vying parties produced extraordinarily forceful leaders (Benjamin Disraeli, William Gladstone) and having remained a stern, one-dimensional moralist in a time when her country produced cutting-edge writers and thinkers. (Robert Browning, Charles Darwin, Charles Dickens, Rudyard Kipling, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, John Stuart Mill, Robert Louis Stevenson) Victoria became queen at the age of 18, and married to her cousin Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha not long thereafter. She loved him deeply, and he would prove invaluable to her. Albert and Victoria had nine children before his premature death, and the marriages of those offspring would lead to British alliances with Russia, Germany, Greece, Denmark and Romania. In the meantime, there were the wars, the Crimean, the Boer Wars in South Africa, and conquests in the Far East. Victoria added the title Empress of India to that of Queen of England. The Victorian Age, as the period extending until and even a bit beyond the queen’s death in 1901 is called, was marked by a nationalistic confidence in the country’s might, fueled by the industrial revolution and a sense of righteousness, even when the Empire was in the wrong. That strength flowed from a most remarkable queen.