"You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden." Matthew 5:14
How have we been discharging the duties of citizenship in our great and blessed land? Is our country, our city, our town, our neighborhood, our street, the better for our having lived here? Have we by our Christian witness and by our daily actions made a constructive contribution to the betterment of our community?
Or have we merely been the passive and ungrateful recipients of all the bounties, both spiritual and material, that God has showered on us through our land, its institutions, and its government?
In His Sermon on the Mount Jesus said that Christians are to be lights -- not sponges! They are to give forth -- not merely soak up. They are to show the way to others -- not obscure it.
God puts His lights in dark places so they may spread their rays where they are needed. The world today -- our nation, our community -- needs nothing more than the light of the Gospel, which God has put into our hands. Wherever we are, God has placed us there "for such a time as this" (Esther 4:14).
May the light of the Gospel shine forth from our lives into the land we love the most.
PRAYER: Dear Lord, "Bless our native land; firm may it ever stand!" for Jesus sake. Amen.
(Devotions from "The Abundant Life" copyright 1998, CPH. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be printed, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of Concordia Publishing House. Permission is granted for one-time e-mailing of this link to a friend. For information on other devotional material, please contact CPH at 800-325-3040 or visit CPH at www.cph.org.)
Today's Bible Readings: Psalms 89, 92 Psalm 91 Philippians 3
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