[Newsletter] Daily Devotionals

[littlejane at rgcministries.com]

Returning God?s Love


Read: Malachi 3:16-18


?I have loved you,? says the Lord.  ~ Malachi 1:2


The book of Malachi begins with this wholehearted word from the Lord  
to His halfhearted worshipers: ?I have loved you? (1:2). Though Israel  
had long been the object of God?s love, they no longer returned His  
love.

God listed the ways His people had offended His love through their  
disobedience. Israel?s response was to question God. When He implored  
them, ?Return to Me, and I will return to you,? they questioned Him in  
their blindness, ?In what way shall we return?? (3:7). With divine  
?tough love,? the Lord exposed their many blind spots. He did this so  
that they might repent and accept His love, and return it with  
wholehearted obedience.

We too are often halfhearted in our faith, appearing to love and serve  
God but really loving and serving ourselves. Today, as in Malachi?s  
time, God looks for people who reverence Him by maintaining two  
spiritual practices: speaking to each other about Him, and meditating  
with God?s people; the second is fellowship with God Himself. Not only  
are we to receive and share God?s love, we are also to return it  
through glad obedience.

Such worshipers are God?s ?jewels? (v.17). Are you one of them?

~ Joanie Yoder

?We love you Jesus,? we often will say
But are we as ready His will to obey?
Let?s heed what God?s Spirit would have us to do ?
That?s how we show Him a love that is true.

~ D. De Haan


Thought For The Day:
To love God is to obey God.