Saint Louis, Missouri, United States - Daily Devotions from Lutheran Hour Ministries by Pastor Ken Klaus, Speaker Emeritus of The Lutheran Hour "Penalized for Praying" Monday, 17 November 2014 Daily Devotions spider web(Jesus said) "And I tell you, everyone who acknowledges Me before men, the Son of Man also will acknowledge before the angels of God, but the one who denies Me before men will be denied before the angels of God."(Luke 12:8-9)
Sam Turner is a senior who plays football for Fort Myers High School in Florida. At a recent game, Turner caught a 27-yard pass and scored the team's first touchdown of the game and the first of his career. Immediately, he knelt down in the end zone and said a twofold prayer. The first part of the prayer was offered in appreciation. Turner said, "Lord, I thank You for this talent with which You've blessed me." The second part of the prayer was to pay respects to a teammate, JoJo Brunson, who had been killed in a drive-by shooting.
Even as Turner was praying, one of the refs threw a penalty flag.
The ref's call was Turner had shown unsportsmanlike conduct when he knelt down to pray. The ref said Turner was "calling undue attention to himself." Turner tried to explain that the ref was wrong. He was just trying to thank the Lord. The explanation may have been honest, but the ref's decision to negate the touchdown and slap the team with a 15-yard penalty was not rescinded.
Over the years I've seen all kinds of things happen on high school football fields:
* I have seen players being hit long after the whistle was blown.
* I have seen entire teams whose coaches had taught them how to cause, and get away with causing, great physical damage to their opponents.
* I've seen players do a pretty nice dance, along with a back flip or two after they had scored.
Yes, I have seen those things and worse, but this is the first time I have seen someone being penalized for praying. Well, I suppose, with the war on religion which is being raged, we can expect to see more penalties being thrown at Christians in various arenas. Maybe the best candidate for a position won't get the job because he was seen praying before his interview. Maybe some woman won't get asked out for a second time because she prayed before dinner when she was out on a date.
I suppose there will be all kinds of places where Christians are going to be penalized for unsportsmanlike conduct. In the face of such persecution, Christians can respond a number of ways. Many will become timid and keep their faith all to themselves. In the passage above the Savior said, silence and denial aren't the way His people should go.
Far better is the option Turner has selected for the next time he gets a touchdown. Since he doesn't want his team to be penalized again, he has decided to be more discrete and say his prayers from the sidelines.
Smart lad.
THE PRAYER: Dear Lord Jesus, You gave Your life for my salvation. Grant I may always glorify and give thanks for Your sacrifice. Grant courage and wisdom to the next generation of believers so the world may be touched by the greatness of You. This I ask in Your Name. Amen.
In Christ I remain His servant and yours, 
Pastor Ken Klaus
Speaker Emeritus of The Lutheran Hour®
Lutheran Hour Ministries
Through the Bible in a Year
Through the Bible in a Year
Today Read:
Ezekiel 5: A Jealous God, Not to Be Trifled With
1-2 “Now, son of man, take a sharp sword and use it as a straight razor, shaving your head and your beard. Then, using a set of balancing scales, divide the hair into thirds. When the days of the siege are over, take one-third of the hair and burn it inside the city. Take another third, chop it into bits with the sword and sprinkle it around the city. The final third you’ll throw to the wind. Then I’ll go after them with a sword.
3-4 “Retrieve a few of the hairs and slip them into your pocket. Take some of them and throw them into the fire—burn them up. From them, fire will spread to the whole family of Israel.
5-6 “This is what God, the Master, says: This means Jerusalem. I set her at the center of the world, all the nations ranged around her. But she rebelled against my laws and ordinances, rebelled far worse than the nations ranged around her—sheer wickedness!—refused my guidance, ignored my directions.
7 “Therefore this is what God, the Master, says: You’ve been more headstrong and willful than any of the nations around you, refusing my guidance, ignoring my directions. You’ve sunk to the gutter level of those around you.
8-10 “Therefore this is what God, the Master, says: I’m setting myself against you—yes, against you, Jerusalem. I’m going to punish you in full sight of the nations. Because of your disgusting no-god idols, I’m going to do something to you that I’ve never done before and will never do again: turn families into cannibals—parents eating children, children eating parents! Punishment indeed. And whoever’s left over I’ll throw to the winds.
11-12 “Therefore, as sure as I am the living God—Decree of God, the Master—because you’ve polluted my Sanctuary with your obscenities and disgusting no-god idols, I’m pulling out. Not an ounce of pity will I show you. A third of your people will die of either disease or hunger inside the city, a third will be killed outside the city, and a third will be thrown to the winds and chased by killers.
13 “Only then will I calm down and let my anger cool. Then you’ll know that I was serious about this all along, that I’m a jealous God and not to be trifled with.
14-15 “When I get done with you, you’ll be a pile of rubble. Nations who walk by will make coarse jokes. When I finish my angry punishment and searing rebukes, you’ll be reduced to an object of ridicule and mockery, turned into a horror story circulating among the surrounding nations. I, God, have spoken.
16-17 “When I shoot my lethal famine arrows at you, I’ll shoot to kill. Then I’ll step up the famine and cut off food supplies. Famine and more famine—and then I’ll send in the wild animals to finish off your children. Epidemic disease, unrestrained murder, death—and I will have sent it! I, God, have spoken.”
Turn Israel into Wasteland
6:1-7 Then the Word of God came to me: “Son of man, now turn and face the mountains of Israel and preach against them: ‘O Mountains of Israel, listen to the Message of God, the Master. God, the Master, speaks to the mountains and hills, to the ravines and the valleys: I’m about to destroy your sacred god and goddess shrines. I’ll level your altars, bust up your sun-god pillars, and kill your people as they bow down to your no-god idols. I’ll stack the dead bodies of Israelites in front of your idols and then scatter your bones around your shrines. Every place where you’ve lived, the towns will be torn down and the pagan shrines demolished—altars busted up, idols smashed, all your custom-made sun-god pillars in ruins. Corpses everywhere you look! Then you’ll know that I am God.
8-10 “‘But I’ll let a few escape the killing as you are scattered through other lands and nations. In the foreign countries where they’re taken as prisoners of war, they’ll remember me. They’ll realize how devastated I was by their betrayals, by their voracious lust for gratifying themselves in their idolatries. They’ll be disgusted with their evil ways, disgusting to God in the way they’ve lived. They’ll know that I am God. They’ll know that my judgment against them was no empty threat.
11-14 “‘This is what God, the Master, says: Clap your hands, stamp your feet, yell out, “No, no, no!” because of all the evil obscenities rife in Israel. They’re going to be killed, dying of hunger, dying of disease—death everywhere you look, people dropping like flies, people far away dying, people nearby dying, and whoever’s left in the city starving to death. Why? Because I’m angry, furiously angry. They’ll realize that I am God when they see their people’s corpses strewn over and around all their ruined sex-and-religion shrines on the bare hills and in the lush fertility groves, in all the places where they indulged their sensual rites. I’ll bring my hand down hard on them, demolish the country wherever they live, turn it into wasteland from one end to the other, from the wilderness to Riblah. Then they’ll know that I am God!’”
Fate Has Caught Up with You
7:1-4 God’s Word came to me, saying, “You, son of man—God, the Master, has this Message for the land of Israel:
“‘Endtime.
The end of business as usual for everyone.
It’s all over. The end is upon you.
I’ve launched my anger against you.
I’ve issued my verdict on the way you live.
I’ll make you pay for your disgusting obscenities.
I won’t look the other way,
I won’t feel sorry for you.
I’ll make you pay for the way you’ve lived:
Your disgusting obscenities will boomerang on you,
and you’ll realize that I am God.’
5-9 “I, God, the Master, say:
‘Disaster after disaster! Look, it comes!
Endtime—
the end comes.
The end is ripe. Watch out, it’s coming!
This is your fate, you who live in this land.
Time’s up.
It’s zero hour.
No dragging of feet now,
no bargaining for more time.
Soon now I’ll pour my wrath on you,
pay out my anger against you,
Render my verdict on the way you’ve lived,
make you pay for your disgusting obscenities.
I won’t look the other way,
I won’t feel sorry for you.
I’ll make you pay for the way you’ve lived.
Your disgusting obscenities will boomerang on you.
Then you’ll realize
that it is I, God, who have hit you.
10-13 “‘Judgment Day!
Fate has caught up with you.
The scepter outsized and pretentious,
pride bursting all bounds,
Violence strutting,
brandishing the evil scepter.
But there’s nothing to them,
and nothing will be left of them.
Time’s up.
Countdown: five, four, three, two . . .
Buyer, don’t crow; seller, don’t worry:
Judgment wrath has turned the world topsy-turvy.
The bottom has dropped out of buying and selling.
It will never be the same again.
But don’t fantasize an upturn in the market.
The country is bankrupt because of its sins,
and it’s not going to get any better.
14-16 “‘The trumpet signals the call to battle:
“Present arms!”
But no one marches into battle.
My wrath has them paralyzed!
On the open roads you’re killed,
or else you go home and die of hunger and disease.
Either get murdered out in the country
or die of sickness or hunger in town.
Survivors run for the hills.
They moan like doves in the valleys,
Each one moaning
for his own sins.
17-18 “‘Every hand hangs limp,
every knee turns to rubber.
They dress in rough burlap—
sorry scarecrows,
Shifty and shamefaced,
with their heads shaved bald.
19-27 “‘They throw their money into the gutters.
Their hard-earned cash stinks like garbage.
They find that it won’t buy a thing
they either want or need on Judgment Day.
They tripped on money
and fell into sin.
Proud and pretentious with their jewels,
they deck out their vile and vulgar no-gods in finery.
I’ll make those god-obscenities a stench in their nostrils.
I’ll give away their religious junk—
strangers will pick it up for free,
the godless spit on it and make jokes.
I’ll turn my face so I won’t have to look
as my treasured place and people are violated,
As violent strangers walk in
and desecrate place and people—
A bloody massacre,
as crime and violence fill the city.
I’ll bring in the dregs of humanity
to move into their houses.
I’ll put a stop to the boasting and strutting
of the high-and-mighty,
And see to it that there’ll be nothing holy
left in their holy places.
Catastrophe descends. They look for peace,
but there’s no peace to be found—
Disaster on the heels of disaster,
one rumor after another.
They clamor for the prophet to tell them what’s up,
but nobody knows anything.
Priests don’t have a clue;
the elders don’t know what to say.
The king holds his head in despair;
the prince is devastated.
The common people are paralyzed.
Gripped by fear, they can’t move.
I’ll deal with them where they are,
judge them on their terms.
They’ll know that I am God.’”
1 Timothy 4: Teach with Your Life
1-5 The Spirit makes it clear that as time goes on, some are going to give up on the faith and chase after demonic illusions put forth by professional liars. These liars have lied so well and for so long that they’ve lost their capacity for truth. They will tell you not to get married. They’ll tell you not to eat this or that food—perfectly good food God created to be eaten heartily and with thanksgiving by believers who know better! Everything God created is good, and to be received with thanks. Nothing is to be sneered at and thrown out. God’s Word and our prayers make every item in creation holy.
6-10 You’ve been raised on the Message of the faith and have followed sound teaching. Now pass on this counsel to the followers of Jesus there, and you’ll be a good servant of Jesus. Stay clear of silly stories that get dressed up as religion. Exercise daily in God—no spiritual flabbiness, please! Workouts in the gymnasium are useful, but a disciplined life in God is far more so, making you fit both today and forever. You can count on this. Take it to heart. This is why we’ve thrown ourselves into this venture so totally. We’re banking on the living God, Savior of all men and women, especially believers.
11-14 Get the word out. Teach all these things. And don’t let anyone put you down because you’re young. Teach believers with your life: by word, by demeanor, by love, by faith, by integrity. Stay at your post reading Scripture, giving counsel, teaching. And that special gift of ministry you were given when the leaders of the church laid hands on you and prayed—keep that dusted off and in use.
15-16 Cultivate these things. Immerse yourself in them. The people will all see you mature right before their eyes! Keep a firm grasp on both your character and your teaching. Don’t be diverted. Just keep at it. Both you and those who hear you will experience salvation.
____________________________
Through the Bible in a Year
Today Read:
Ezekiel 5: A Jealous God, Not to Be Trifled With
1-2 “Now, son of man, take a sharp sword and use it as a straight razor, shaving your head and your beard. Then, using a set of balancing scales, divide the hair into thirds. When the days of the siege are over, take one-third of the hair and burn it inside the city. Take another third, chop it into bits with the sword and sprinkle it around the city. The final third you’ll throw to the wind. Then I’ll go after them with a sword.
3-4 “Retrieve a few of the hairs and slip them into your pocket. Take some of them and throw them into the fire—burn them up. From them, fire will spread to the whole family of Israel.
5-6 “This is what God, the Master, says: This means Jerusalem. I set her at the center of the world, all the nations ranged around her. But she rebelled against my laws and ordinances, rebelled far worse than the nations ranged around her—sheer wickedness!—refused my guidance, ignored my directions.
7 “Therefore this is what God, the Master, says: You’ve been more headstrong and willful than any of the nations around you, refusing my guidance, ignoring my directions. You’ve sunk to the gutter level of those around you.
8-10 “Therefore this is what God, the Master, says: I’m setting myself against you—yes, against you, Jerusalem. I’m going to punish you in full sight of the nations. Because of your disgusting no-god idols, I’m going to do something to you that I’ve never done before and will never do again: turn families into cannibals—parents eating children, children eating parents! Punishment indeed. And whoever’s left over I’ll throw to the winds.
11-12 “Therefore, as sure as I am the living God—Decree of God, the Master—because you’ve polluted my Sanctuary with your obscenities and disgusting no-god idols, I’m pulling out. Not an ounce of pity will I show you. A third of your people will die of either disease or hunger inside the city, a third will be killed outside the city, and a third will be thrown to the winds and chased by killers.
13 “Only then will I calm down and let my anger cool. Then you’ll know that I was serious about this all along, that I’m a jealous God and not to be trifled with.
14-15 “When I get done with you, you’ll be a pile of rubble. Nations who walk by will make coarse jokes. When I finish my angry punishment and searing rebukes, you’ll be reduced to an object of ridicule and mockery, turned into a horror story circulating among the surrounding nations. I, God, have spoken.
16-17 “When I shoot my lethal famine arrows at you, I’ll shoot to kill. Then I’ll step up the famine and cut off food supplies. Famine and more famine—and then I’ll send in the wild animals to finish off your children. Epidemic disease, unrestrained murder, death—and I will have sent it! I, God, have spoken.”
Turn Israel into Wasteland
6:1-7 Then the Word of God came to me: “Son of man, now turn and face the mountains of Israel and preach against them: ‘O Mountains of Israel, listen to the Message of God, the Master. God, the Master, speaks to the mountains and hills, to the ravines and the valleys: I’m about to destroy your sacred god and goddess shrines. I’ll level your altars, bust up your sun-god pillars, and kill your people as they bow down to your no-god idols. I’ll stack the dead bodies of Israelites in front of your idols and then scatter your bones around your shrines. Every place where you’ve lived, the towns will be torn down and the pagan shrines demolished—altars busted up, idols smashed, all your custom-made sun-god pillars in ruins. Corpses everywhere you look! Then you’ll know that I am God.
8-10 “‘But I’ll let a few escape the killing as you are scattered through other lands and nations. In the foreign countries where they’re taken as prisoners of war, they’ll remember me. They’ll realize how devastated I was by their betrayals, by their voracious lust for gratifying themselves in their idolatries. They’ll be disgusted with their evil ways, disgusting to God in the way they’ve lived. They’ll know that I am God. They’ll know that my judgment against them was no empty threat.
11-14 “‘This is what God, the Master, says: Clap your hands, stamp your feet, yell out, “No, no, no!” because of all the evil obscenities rife in Israel. They’re going to be killed, dying of hunger, dying of disease—death everywhere you look, people dropping like flies, people far away dying, people nearby dying, and whoever’s left in the city starving to death. Why? Because I’m angry, furiously angry. They’ll realize that I am God when they see their people’s corpses strewn over and around all their ruined sex-and-religion shrines on the bare hills and in the lush fertility groves, in all the places where they indulged their sensual rites. I’ll bring my hand down hard on them, demolish the country wherever they live, turn it into wasteland from one end to the other, from the wilderness to Riblah. Then they’ll know that I am God!’”
Fate Has Caught Up with You
7:1-4 God’s Word came to me, saying, “You, son of man—God, the Master, has this Message for the land of Israel:
“‘Endtime.
The end of business as usual for everyone.
It’s all over. The end is upon you.
I’ve launched my anger against you.
I’ve issued my verdict on the way you live.
I’ll make you pay for your disgusting obscenities.
I won’t look the other way,
I won’t feel sorry for you.
I’ll make you pay for the way you’ve lived:
Your disgusting obscenities will boomerang on you,
and you’ll realize that I am God.’
5-9 “I, God, the Master, say:
‘Disaster after disaster! Look, it comes!
Endtime—
the end comes.
The end is ripe. Watch out, it’s coming!
This is your fate, you who live in this land.
Time’s up.
It’s zero hour.
No dragging of feet now,
no bargaining for more time.
Soon now I’ll pour my wrath on you,
pay out my anger against you,
Render my verdict on the way you’ve lived,
make you pay for your disgusting obscenities.
I won’t look the other way,
I won’t feel sorry for you.
I’ll make you pay for the way you’ve lived.
Your disgusting obscenities will boomerang on you.
Then you’ll realize
that it is I, God, who have hit you.
10-13 “‘Judgment Day!
Fate has caught up with you.
The scepter outsized and pretentious,
pride bursting all bounds,
Violence strutting,
brandishing the evil scepter.
But there’s nothing to them,
and nothing will be left of them.
Time’s up.
Countdown: five, four, three, two . . .
Buyer, don’t crow; seller, don’t worry:
Judgment wrath has turned the world topsy-turvy.
The bottom has dropped out of buying and selling.
It will never be the same again.
But don’t fantasize an upturn in the market.
The country is bankrupt because of its sins,
and it’s not going to get any better.
14-16 “‘The trumpet signals the call to battle:
“Present arms!”
But no one marches into battle.
My wrath has them paralyzed!
On the open roads you’re killed,
or else you go home and die of hunger and disease.
Either get murdered out in the country
or die of sickness or hunger in town.
Survivors run for the hills.
They moan like doves in the valleys,
Each one moaning
for his own sins.
17-18 “‘Every hand hangs limp,
every knee turns to rubber.
They dress in rough burlap—
sorry scarecrows,
Shifty and shamefaced,
with their heads shaved bald.
19-27 “‘They throw their money into the gutters.
Their hard-earned cash stinks like garbage.
They find that it won’t buy a thing
they either want or need on Judgment Day.
They tripped on money
and fell into sin.
Proud and pretentious with their jewels,
they deck out their vile and vulgar no-gods in finery.
I’ll make those god-obscenities a stench in their nostrils.
I’ll give away their religious junk—
strangers will pick it up for free,
the godless spit on it and make jokes.
I’ll turn my face so I won’t have to look
as my treasured place and people are violated,
As violent strangers walk in
and desecrate place and people—
A bloody massacre,
as crime and violence fill the city.
I’ll bring in the dregs of humanity
to move into their houses.
I’ll put a stop to the boasting and strutting
of the high-and-mighty,
And see to it that there’ll be nothing holy
left in their holy places.
Catastrophe descends. They look for peace,
but there’s no peace to be found—
Disaster on the heels of disaster,
one rumor after another.
They clamor for the prophet to tell them what’s up,
but nobody knows anything.
Priests don’t have a clue;
the elders don’t know what to say.
The king holds his head in despair;
the prince is devastated.
The common people are paralyzed.
Gripped by fear, they can’t move.
I’ll deal with them where they are,
judge them on their terms.
They’ll know that I am God.’”
1 Timothy 4: Teach with Your Life
1-5 The Spirit makes it clear that as time goes on, some are going to give up on the faith and chase after demonic illusions put forth by professional liars. These liars have lied so well and for so long that they’ve lost their capacity for truth. They will tell you not to get married. They’ll tell you not to eat this or that food—perfectly good food God created to be eaten heartily and with thanksgiving by believers who know better! Everything God created is good, and to be received with thanks. Nothing is to be sneered at and thrown out. God’s Word and our prayers make every item in creation holy.
6-10 You’ve been raised on the Message of the faith and have followed sound teaching. Now pass on this counsel to the followers of Jesus there, and you’ll be a good servant of Jesus. Stay clear of silly stories that get dressed up as religion. Exercise daily in God—no spiritual flabbiness, please! Workouts in the gymnasium are useful, but a disciplined life in God is far more so, making you fit both today and forever. You can count on this. Take it to heart. This is why we’ve thrown ourselves into this venture so totally. We’re banking on the living God, Savior of all men and women, especially believers.
11-14 Get the word out. Teach all these things. And don’t let anyone put you down because you’re young. Teach believers with your life: by word, by demeanor, by love, by faith, by integrity. Stay at your post reading Scripture, giving counsel, teaching. And that special gift of ministry you were given when the leaders of the church laid hands on you and prayed—keep that dusted off and in use.
15-16 Cultivate these things. Immerse yourself in them. The people will all see you mature right before their eyes! Keep a firm grasp on both your character and your teaching. Don’t be diverted. Just keep at it. Both you and those who hear you will experience salvation.
____________________________
Lutheran Hour Ministries
660 Mason Ridge Center Dr.
St. Louis, Missouri 63141 United States
1(800)876-9880
____________________________
660 Mason Ridge Center Dr.
St. Louis, Missouri 63141 United States
1(800)876-9880
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