Your Gift Makes Room

Your Gift Makes Room By Kirk Hunt

A man’s gift makes room for him,
And brings him before great men.

Proverbs 18:16 NKJV

God is against bribes, but He is for generosity. May the Holy Spirit convict (not condemn) you about graft, but He will commend you for giving. The gifts you give make room for you. What do you put in that space?

“Make room” is not just a reference to physical space. Your room may be the positive opinion of decision makers. Perhaps your gifts open the opportunity to witness to souls about Jesus. Are you wise with the opening made by your gifts?

As a Christian, a follower of Jesus Christ, you have gifts and are a minister. Your gifts are not just for your benefit. You are intended and custom-made to benefit the men and women around you. By giving your gifts, you almost literally compel souls to make space for you in their lives. What do you place in that hard-won place?

The healing of a skillful doctor or nurse usually gets the gratitude of the patient. Even difficult students speak well of a key teacher who taught important skills and knowledge. The friend who comes through at midnight earns warmth from a friend’s heart. Given a door to another’s spirit, what will you choose to leave behind?

Your gifts lower defenses. Your gifts draw consideration. Your gifts soften hearts. What do you do with that precious opportunity for God’s Kingdom?

Think: My gifts open the door to interactions with men and women.

Pray: “Lord, help me to have faithful courage over what, where and when You command.”

 

Copyright © March 2018, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

Shammah’s Lentiles

Shammah’s Lentils By Kirk Hunt

And after him was Shammah the son of Agee the Hararite. The Philistines had gathered together into a troop where there was a piece of ground full of lentils. So the people fled from the Philistines. But he stationed himself in the middle of the field, defended it, and killed the Philistines. So the Lord brought about a great victory.

2 Samuel 23:11-12 NKJV

Shammah stood his ground in a field of lentils. I always imagine him alone, matching his soft brass knife against a squad (or maybe a platoon) of hard steel swords. Valiantly, Shammah fought the fight of his life over a patch of beans.

Why there? Why then? Why single-handed? Scripture does not say. The Bible only records that God used one man to bring about a great victory.

Shammah’s lentils are a symbol of the victories God gives despite impossible circumstances. To those without faith, it seems God’s men and women too often risk everything, against ridiculous odds, for nothing of value. Even God’s faithful sometimes feel alone and friendless against endless hordes.

You are not alone. Jehovah-Shammah, the God who is there, fights beside you. Like Shammah bar-Agee, God will bring about a great victory through you.

What has God called you to do? Champion the cause He set in your heart. Nurture the soul he put in your path. Despite all of the really good reasons you should pull back, push forward in God’s power.

It may seem that you are defending a patch of beans against impossible odds. Be confident in fulfilling the call of God. Be faithful and God will deliver victory through your faithful courage.

Think: If God sent me, the issue is not trivial, and the odds are not impossible.

Pray: “Lord, help me to have faithful courage over what, where and when You command.”

 

Copyright © March 2018, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

Endure

Gift Minister By Kirk Hunt

But he who endures to the end shall be saved.

Matthew 24:13 NKJV

Endurance is the hallmark of a champion. Endurance allows you to continue on when others have given up in discouragement, or fallen in exhaustion. To win, you must first endure.

Athletes deliberately develop their endurance in order to better excel at their sport. The strategies of coaches, teams and individual competitors always include outlasting opponents. Military leaders may call it “toughness” but that does not change the fundamental character of staying on task after others have given up or fallen down.

Endurance is far more than physical stamina. A large portion of enduring is simply deciding that you will not quit. Often, athletes complain about “betrayal” by their own bodies. Their minds are fully prepared to continue, but their bodies stop at the edge of exhaustion (or worse). Physics or biology more often limit us than our mind-power or will-power.

Men and women of God have more than willpower to call upon. God grants endurance to those who ask, in His purpose. His power can suspend the laws of nature. His grace can give the gift of persistence. His mercy can push back the limiting results of poor decisions.

Who needs you to stay on task? What part of His Kingdom needs you to continue on after everyone else has given up or passed out? What stronghold, yours or theirs, needs just a few more strikes of the hammer before it falls?

You can be a Gospel champion. First, decide you want to endure. Second, ask God for what you need to endure. Everything after that is just time or miles.

Think: Endurance is not optional in the life of a Christian.

Pray: “Lord, help me to endure through your power, grace and mercy.”

 

Copyright © February 2018, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

Gift Minister

Gift Minister By Kirk Hunt

As each one has received a gift, minister it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

1 Peter 4:10 NKJV

You have a gift or gifts. God gave it (or them) to you as part of the “saints of God” package. Use them to minister, as a good steward of God’s grace.

Do not make it complicated or difficult. You have an ability, skill or talent that makes you uniquely valuable and useful, especially to the Kingdom of God. If you are not using it, you are not being a good steward of His gift to you.

You do not get to age out. There is no disability clause. Wherever you are, no matter whom you are with, you have a God-given gift. I pray you are using your gifts to demonstrate the many paths of grace. When God does not send angels, He sends men and women just like you.

In your eyes, your gift may not seem big or flashy. That does not mean that you cannot touch lives or impact souls. Use what He gave. Watch the blessings ripple out, farther and greater than you thought.

All of the gifts God has already given you can be used to build His Kingdom. The gifts you possess can benefit you, yours and others. All it takes is a heart willing to trust Him and a spirit generous enough to pass on His grace to others.

There may be sweat-stained headbands in your future. Your shirt might become tear-soaked. You may even have to put on a bandage or two. When you stand before His throne, such things will testify to your stewardship of His grace.

Think: I should be using my gift(s) to build God’s Kingdom.

Pray: “Lord, help me to use my gift from You to build Your kingdom.”

 

Copyright © February 2018, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

Still Know, Know Still

Still Know, Know Still By Kirk Hunt

Be still, and know that I am God;
I will be exalted among the nations,
I will be exalted in the earth!

Psalms 46:10 NKJV
Please also read Psalms 46:1–11

In these days of unending motion and turmoil, Scripture commands us to be still and know. While knowing requires some level of contemplation, that is not point of this verse, or chapter, of Psalms. Do you have a complete, instinctual and unshakable knowledge of God? Do you truly understand His unending power and absolute authority over all creation, especially your personal affairs?

As a Christian, you should have a deep and absolute knowledge of the fact of God’s power and authority. You should no more question the absolute greatness of God than the existence of gravity. After all, gravity is just one of many concepts He casually made up while creating the universe.

Christians do not seek the rules for their own sake. We pursue the Rules-Maker. What understanding we glean from the world simply magnifies His majesty.

Stop and take a few minutes to re-consider the immeasurable length, depth and breadth of our omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent God. Reserve in your heart and mind an unmovable and unshakable knowledge of who He is and what He can do. In that paused moment decide, once and for all, how that knowledge will influence your everyday thoughts and actions.

God allows us to act with a great level of freedom. Do not confuse God’s restraint and allowance with a lack of power or authority. His grace and love is so great He does not make us, or them, robots.

Pause for a moment. Think about Him. Know that He is God

Think: I should stop and remember that God is a great and powerful God.

Pray: “Lord, help me to remember just how big you really are.”

 

Copyright © January 2018, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

Yet Will I Trust Him

Yet Will I Trust Him By Kirk Hunt

Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him. Even so, I will defend my own ways before Him.

Job 13:15 NKJV

In the space of a day, maybe a week, Job lost everything a man can lose. Job’s children died, his wealth destroyed or stolen, business wrecked, health lost and even his friends turned on him. Still, Job declared, “Yet will I trust Him.”

Authentic trust and true love are an active choice, not passing feelings. Rich or poor, well or sick, do you love God first and truly? It is easy to trust someone or something that heaps only blessings on you. What happens when the flow reverses is the real test.

Battered and beaten, seemingly past human endurance, Job declared his faith in God. Eyes and sores weeping in equal measure, a mere man decided that the God of heaven continued to have his confidence. Armed with Scripture and empowered by the Holy Spirit, am I capable of the same naked faithfulness. Are you prepared to love God despite what he allows to happen in and to your life?

What would happen if the first two chapters of Job happened to you? Would you remain faithful to the God of heaven? Would you continue to love God, despite your losses and wounds?

Job illustrates the standard for trust in God. There will come a time in your life when you will have to declare for or against God. Will you continue to trust and love God despite the hurts and losses of the short run?

Think: Do I really trust God through bad times?

Pray: “Lord, help me to always trust You, no matter the circumstances.”

 

Copyright © January 2018, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

Weapons Of Our Warfare

Weapons Of Our Warfare By Kirk Hunt

For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds

2 Corinthians 10:3–4 NKJV

From his jail cell in Birmingham, Alabama Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. confronted the clergy who criticized his leadership during the Birmingham Campaign. King’s fostering of tension and even crisis did not involve violence or threats. “For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal,” ought to be the strategy of activists the world over.

In his “Letter from Birmingham Jail” Dr. King declared the strategy of the Birmingham Campaign: “Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue.” The marchers did not carry bombs. Not one of the young teenagers facing fire hoses or attack dogs raised a gun.

God’s people have powerful weapons at our disposal: Scripture, prayer, fasting, personal sacrifice. We can change the culture. We can build the Kingdom of God. To do so, we must wield Godly (spiritual) not mundane weapons.

Too often, we try to use the mundane weapons of carnal men: media buys, political power, legal proceedings. Too often we avoid touching the hurting, comforting the distressed, confronting the wicked. God’s Church cannot change the culture comfortably or from a distance.

To change the culture, God’s people will have to deploy spiritual weapons. The scars of Apostle Paul’s beatings, stonings and whippings gave him the gravitas and credentials. When he spoke to the hardened men of the Praetorian Guard they listened and believed.

If you are truly a man or woman of God, you can have an impact. You have access to the spiritual weapons of God. Are willing to wield them as His faithful soldier?

Think: Our struggle to change the culture requires that we use spiritual weapons.

Pray: “Lord, help me to build Your Kingdom Your way.”

 

Copyright © January 2018, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

He Would Not Drink

He Would Not Drink By Kirk Hunt

And David said with longing, “Oh, that someone would give me a drink of the water from the well of Bethlehem, which is by the gate!” So the three mighty men broke through the camp of the Philistines, drew water from the well of Bethlehem that was by the gate, and took it and brought it to David. Nevertheless he would not drink it, but poured it out to the Lord.

2 Samuel 23:17–18 NKJV
Please also read 2 Samuel 23:15–19

 

In a moment of human weakness, David wished out loud for something he knew he could not have. Through cunning, skill and boldness three of David’s finest soldiers risked their lives to bring David a canteen of water. In humility and reverence, David would not drink.

Once these three men had been losers. Or whiners. Or deadbeats. After their time with David they had been transformed into mighty men. Their hard-won heroism, skill and courage had transformed mere water into an offering fit only for God.

To the untrained eye, the canteen was full of water from a specific well. To spiritual eyes, the precious vessel was full of the blood of living champions. David instinctively knew only God was worthy of their offering.

As leaders in God’s Kingdom, we are privileged: we get to help men and women become champions for, and in, God. And when they are so much more than anyone expected, there is a temptation to think more of ourselves than we should. Like David, we must keep our awe of God’s power and humility regarding our role as God’s instruments.

Fulfill the role God has given you. Be pleased when the “least of these” become mighty men and women. Remember it is His power that transforms souls.

Think: They become champions because of God’s power, not mine.

Pray: “Lord, thank you for guiding me to help others.”

 

Copyright © January 2018, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

He First Loved

He First Loved By Kirk Hunt

We love Him because He first loved us.

1 John 4:19 NKJV

In prayer, I step out of my mundane living room and into the august grandeur of His presence. Seated on His Throne, His full glory and holiness shines out, promising nothing but perfect justice and impeccable judgment. Instead, He first loved me.

Our infinite and all-powerful God is perfection, holiness and justice. Mankind should have been found guilty in judgment long ago. Instead, He first loved us.

Jesus chose to reconcile man to God in righteousness. Father-God allowed Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross to tear the veil and once again allow us free access to Himself. He acted because He first loved us.

Grace gives gifts we can never earn or be worthy to receive. Mercy blocks the results of our sin, despite the condemnation and judgment we have so richly earned and deserved. After all, He first loved us.

His love is not blind, yet we are precious in His sight. God moved heaven and earth to make provision for us. We should understand he did so because He first loved us.

We should return His love with all our hearts and mind. It should be easy, since He gave the first proof. He first loved us.

This New Year’s Day, consider the eight words of 1 John 4:19. Make your plans understanding how He loves you. Map out your strategies, understanding how much He loves them. Your work should be easy, considering He loved you first.

Think: God reached to me first. How will I respond?

Pray: “Lord, thank you for loving me first.”

 

Copyright © December 2017, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.

They Worshiped Him

They Worshiped Him By Kirk Hunt

And when they had come into the house, they saw the young Child with Mary His mother, and fell down and worshiped Him. And when they had opened their treasures, they presented gifts to Him: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

Matthew 2:11 NKJV

Waves of men crowded into the little barn to give reverence to a child cradled in a feeding trough. The shepherds likely came first, especially considering they received divine declaration of the Savior’s birth. The magi calculated His birth through the stars and prophecies, then came at great expense to recognize His importance. However they learned of Christ’s birth, they came and worshiped Him.

The shepherds, lowly even among the common folk, likely gave gifts limited to sincere hearts, bowed in awestruck wonder. The magi were able to add valuable and tangible gifts to their worship, but ultimately they worshiped Him just as the shepherds did. Early or late, formally educated or practically trained, they worshiped Christ the same way. Their hearts were humbled before the King of heaven.

As you consider Him this Christmas, think about the manger. Thank Him for a grace that would endure humble circumstances. God gave the ultimate Gift wrapped in literal rags. Jesus surrendered the glories of Heaven to endure the human condition.

He lived as a mere man among common people, His royal lineage little more than a technicality. By coming as the least of these, He ensured that all men gained complete and unhindered access to the throne of God. Before He had a chance to reconcile men to God, wise men, shepherd or magi, worshiped Him.

Like the magi, or the shepherds, I pray you have found Him and are wise enough to worship Him. Understand that you do not come to Him empty-handed. The most important gift He wants is a heart that rejoices in Him and adores His presence.

Give your gifts. Mere goods do honor Him. Your heart, on the other hand, delights Him.

Think: No matter how I know, I know He is Lord and Savior.

Pray: “Lord, accept the gift of my heart.”

 

Copyright © December 2017, Kirk Hunt

This devotional is brought to you courtesy of CadreMen Press. You can purchase a copy of Blessed and Blessing: Devotionals For Gospel Champions from your favorite bookseller or directly from CadreMen Press.