Divine Discovery: Thursday

Thursday
Read: Romans 1:6
Journal Question: Write a prayer asking God to restore your life and bring you back to life?

All Day Beach Trip

Saturday, August 7th All Day Beach Trip
Where: Meet at Matt and Christie Murray’s House @ 8:00 carpool to Dohenny State Beach near Dana Point
Return: 9:00 pm (Drivers will drop off students at home)
Cost: $5 (Includes Food, Activities, and Transportation)

Divine Discovery: Wednesday

Wednesday
Read: Revelation 4
Journal Question: What is dead in your life and needs God to turn it around?

Divine Discovery: Tuesday

Tuesday
Read: Colossians 1:9 - 20
Journal Question: How often have you felt that you want to go back to the start? Can you recall the most recent time?

Divine Discovery: Monday

Monday
Read: Psalm 139:13 - 16
Journal Question: How did the Coldplay video, “The Scientist,” make you feel?

Divine Discovery: Thursday

Read
Hebrews 13:5 5
Keep your lives free from the love of money and be content with what
you have, because God has said,
"Never will I leave you;
never will I forsake you."

Reflect
There’s an old saying: “Money can’t buy happiness.” The
saying isn’t true. Money can buy happiness. You can buy all kinds of
things that’ll make you happy: new shoes, baseball tickets, a DVD, a cool
car. All of these things can make you happy. But here’s the thing:
happiness is only temporary. The shoes will go out of style, the baseball
game will end, the DVD will get boring after the tenth time you watch it,
and even the car will get old and broken down.

Instead of pursuing happiness, pursue contentment. Being content
basically means being satisfied with what you have. And being satisfied is
a good feeling. It’s a secure feeling.

So how do you find contentment? It comes from trusting God. It’s
acknowledging that everything you have is a gift from God. It’s admiring
and appreciating the things God has given you. It’s learning how to use
the things God has given you to be a blessing to others. It’s knowing that
God will always provide you with the things you need.

Respond
Read Matthew 6:25-34 and Matthew 7:9-11. Reflect on these
words, and pray, asking God to help you to find true contentment.

This devotion can be found at

Divine Discovery: Wednesday

Read
Matthew 6:1-4
1 "Be careful not to do your 'acts of righteousness' in front of others, to be seen by them. If you do, you will
have no reward from your Father in heaven.
2 "So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues
and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 3 But when
you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward
you.

Reflect
Remember on Monday, we talked about caring for others
because we owe it to them? Our motivation in loving our neighbors
should be that Jesus commanded us to, and that by keeping His
commands, we honor God. Our motivation should be honoring God, not
making ourselves look good.

I live on a rural road. Last winter on several occasions, when the snow
plow came by, it completely wiped out my mailbox and my neighbor’s.
Because of our differing work schedules, I was always able to get out
there to survey the damage before he was. I’d have both mailboxes fixed
before he got home from work. He never knew who did it.

It was really cool to have the opportunity to share the love of God this
way. It feels good to make somebody’s life easier. It feels good to make
somebody happy. I wasn’t doing it for recognition. I wasn’t doing it so
he’d owe me a favor. In fact, I didn’t want him to know it was me. This is
going to sound weird, but it was fun that he didn’t know who did it!

He actually caught me the last time (which is why I can write about
this). He said that the previous time the mailbox had been knocked down,
he and his wife and son were all in bed with the flu for a week. He was
dreading having to go out in the cold to fix the mailbox. He said he
couldn’t believe it when he looked out and the mailbox was back on its
post!

Respond
Start looking for some ways that you can help others through
random acts of kindness. Pray that you will recognize these opportunities
as they present themselves.

This devotion can be found at

Divine Discovery: Tuesday

Read
James 3:13-17
13 Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the
humility that comes from wisdom. 14 But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not
boast about it or deny the truth. 15 Such "wisdom" does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual,
demonic. 16 For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.
17 But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure; then peace-loving, considerate, submissive, full
of mercy and good fruit, impartial and sincere.

Reflect
This passage is all about the difference between how society wants us to live and how God wants us
to live.

Society says, “Look out for number one.” Society says we have to get ourselves ahead...at all costs. That
generally means we have to prop ourselves up by pushing other people down. This scenario plays itself out all
the time on all the TV reality shows. The contestants have to scheme and conspire and lie and backstab to make
themselves look better than everybody else. It’s called selfish ambition: getting ourselves ahead regardless of the
cost to anybody else.

Is it possible we do the same thing in an effort to be friends with popular people?

Society motivates us by envy.. The popular kids have the nicest clothes, date the coolest people, and seem to
have more fun and better lives. And we want that. We’re jealous.

Society’s wisdom tells us to be motivated by jealousy, to brag about ourselves so we look good, to get ourselves
ahead no matter what, even if it means lying to people.

But God’s wisdom tells us to be motivated by mercy and consideration. God’s wisdom tells us to pursue peace
and harmony, truth and purity in all things.

Respond
Spend some time reflecting on how you might be jealous or might be hurting others to get yourself
ahead. Then, pray for God’s wisdom to take over those situations instead.

This devotion can be found at

Divine Discovery: Monday

Read
Romans 13:8-9 8
Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has
fulfilled the law. 9 The commandments, "You shall not commit adultery," "You shall not murder," "You shall not
steal," "You shall not covet," and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command:
"Love your neighbor as yourself."

Reflect
Have you ever borrowed money from somebody? Maybe you forgot your lunch money one day and
needed a friend to spot you a couple bucks. You’ll pay him back tomorrow.

When you borrow money, you make a promise to pay it back. Did you ever forget to bring in the extra money
the next day to pay back your friend? You feel bad about it, because, in a way, you’ve broken your promise. And
you can’t help but wondering if your friend is starting to consider you untrustworthy. If you’ve ever had a friend
not pay you back, you know how you can feel used or taken for granted. You want to get that debt paid as soon
as possible so there are no hard feelings.

Paul reminds us in this passage that we aren’t to let our debts go unpaid. He knew the bad feelings that can
result from unpaid debts. And he reminds us that breaking a promise isn’t very Christian-like.

But then Paul says something else that’s very interesting. He says that loving our neighbor is a debt! He says
we owe it to other people to care for them, to help them, and to make their lives better. Have you ever thought
of it that way before?

Respond
We shouldn’t approach loving others as something they are lucky we’re doing because we’re nice
people. Instead, we should act like we owe everybody a thousand dollars and we forgot to bring it in. We should
care for others because we feel like we owe them big time.

This devotion can be found at

Divine Discovery: Thursday

Thursday
Read: 1 Timothy 1:12 - 14
Journal Question: What do you suppose opting into God’s plan looks like for you? Talk to God about what you think this means and write out what you’re praying...

Divine Discovery: Wednesday

Wednesday
Read: Isaiah 55:8 - 9
Journal Question: What is the craziest thing you can think of that God would lead you to do? Why do you think it’s crazy?

Camelot Fun Center Night

Thursday, July 8th Camelot Fun Center Night
Where: Meet at Murray’s House, Carpool to Camelot Fun Center in Anaheim
When: 6:00 pm - 11:00 pm (Drivers will drop off students at home)
Cost: $5 includes Mini-golf and Laser Joist
(Optional: Bring extra money for arcade, and snacks)

Divine Discovery: Tuesday

Monday
Read: Psalm 139
Journal Question: We as humans were meant to live in relationship with God. That is how we are the most satisfied. But somehow, we’ve forgotten that, and, in fact, we often run from what he’s doing because we’re afraid it will hurt us. Can you think of a time in you life when something you were sure was going to be a bad thing turned out to be something good - and then you realized God was working for your good in it? Write a note to yourself so you’ll remember when that was.



Tuesday
Read: Jeremiah 23:23 - 24
Journal Question: What does it mean for you to turn your life over to God and opt in to his plan? Is that a step you’re ready to take? Why or why not?

Divine Discovery: Thursday

Thursday
Continue to work on Memorizing Romans 3:36
Journal Question: Tell God about the state of your heart now and what you’re thinking