Daily Devotions from Lutheran Hour Ministries by Pastor Ken Klaus, Speaker Emeritus of The Lutheran Hour "A Captive Audience" for Wednesday, 24 June 2015

Daily Devotions from Lutheran Hour Ministries by Pastor Ken Klaus, Speaker Emeritus of The Lutheran Hour "A Captive Audience" for Wednesday, 24 June 2015

(Jesus said) "... But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. And the son said to him, 'Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.' But the father said to his servants, 'Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.' And they began to celebrate."[Luke 15:20b-24]
A captive audience.
I heard of one priest in Indiana who got tired of his people leaving before the end of church. He had electric door locks installed to stop them from leaving early. The fire marshal had him remove the locks and the switch he operated from his pulpit.
But there are other kinds of captive audiences.
For example, there is Kwale Medium Security Prison in Kenya. At Kwale, men -- who have broken the law and been banished for a time from society -- find themselves true captives. They have not only lost their liberty, many of them have also lost hope.
Maybe that is why the hearts at Kwale are so ready to hear of Jesus Christ.
One pastor who works with some of the inmates at the institution has said, "Prison is the only place where you can find over 100 men listening to the Gospel (who are) in no hurry. ... This is the right place, with the right target audience, at the right time, with the right message of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ."
Using movies and Bible Correspondence Courses these men behind bars are being freed by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Through studies of the Word, those who have been charged and convicted of crimes are being told they can be forgiven. They are learning that the same Savior who once set free a thief, who hung on the cross next to Him, can also free them from their sins and give them another life, a better life, a saved life in Jesus.
And does it all make a difference?
Mr. Suleiman Adam, a former Muslim who came to know his Savior while in Kwale Prison, graduated from Lutheran Hour's Bible Correspondence Course. Clutching his certificate in his hand, he said, "This is the best gift that I have received ever since I stepped in prison. Now I have (a) certificate to show to the world that my incarceration was not in vain. Our Lord Jesus Christ has turned it for my good."
In short, Adam is no longer a captive.
THE PRAYER: Dear Lord, grant that Your Gospel may be preached to all who are imprisoned by sin, the devil, and death. May the Holy Spirit forgive and set them free in Jesus. In the Savior's Name we ask it. 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
Today Read:
Song of Solomon 6: [Chorus]

1 Where has your darling gone,

you most beautiful of women?

Which way did your darling turn,

so that we can help you find him?

[She]

2 My darling went down to his garden,

to the beds of spices,

to pasture his flock in the gardens

and to gather lilies.

3 I belong to the man I love, and he belongs to me;

he pastures his flock among the lilies.

[He]

4 You are as beautiful as Tirtzah, my love,

as lovely as Yerushalayim,

but formidable as an army

marching under banners.

5 Turn your eyes away from me,

because they overwhelm me!

Your hair is like a flock of goats

streaming down Gil‘ad.

6 Your teeth are like a flock of sheep

that have just come up from being washed;

each of them is matched,

and none of them is missing.

7 Your cheeks are like a pomegranate

split open behind your veil.

8 There are sixty queens and eighty concubines,

as well as young women beyond number;

9 but my dove, my perfect one, is unique,

her mother’s only child,

the darling of the one who bore her.

The daughters see her and call her happy;

the queens and concubines praise her.

10 “Who is this, shining forth like the dawn,

fair as the moon, bright as the sun” —

but formidable as an army

marching under banners?

[She]

11 I had gone down to the nut orchard

to see the fresh green plants in the valley,

to see if the vine had budded,

or if the pomegranate trees were in bloom.

12 Before I knew it, I found myself

in a chariot, and with me was a prince.

[Chorus]

7:1 (6:13) Come back, come back, girl from Shulam!

Come back, come back to where we can see you!

Why are you looking at the girl from Shulam

as if she were dancing for two army camps?

[He]

2 (1) How beautiful are your feet in sandals,

you daughter of princes!

The curves of your thighs are like a necklace

made by a skilled craftsman.

3 (2) Your navel is like a round goblet

that never lacks spiced wine.

Your belly is a heap of wheat

encircled by lilies.

4 (3) Your two breasts are like two fawns,

twins of a gazelle.

5 (4) Your neck is like a tower of ivory,

your eyes like the pools in Heshbon

by the gate of Bat-Rabbim,

your nose like a tower in the L’vanon

overlooking Dammesek.

6 (5) You hold your head like the Karmel,

and the hair on your head is like purple cloth —

the king is held captive in its tresses.

7 (6) How beautiful you are, my love,

how charming, how delightful!

8 (7) Your appearance is stately as a palm tree,

with its fruit clusters your breasts.

9 (8) I said, “I will climb up into the palm tree,

I will take hold of its branches.”

May your breasts be like clusters of grapes,

your breath as fragrant as apples,

10 (9) and your mouth like the finest wine.

[She]

May the wine go straight to the man I love

and gently move the lips of those who are asleep.

11 (10) I belong to my darling,

and his desire is for me.

12 (11) Come, my darling, let’s go out to the country

and spend the nights in the villages.

13 (12) We’ll get up early and go to the vineyards

to see if the vines have budded,

to see if their flowers have opened,

or if the pomegranate trees are in bloom.

There I will give you my love.

14 (13) The mandrakes are sending out their fragrance,

all kinds of choice fruits are at our doors,

fruits both new and old, my darling,

which I have kept in store for you.

8:1 I wish you were my brother,

who nursed at my mother’s breast;

then, if I met you outdoors, I could kiss you,

and no one would look down on me.

2 I would lead you and bring you to my mother’s house,

and she would instruct me.

I would give you spiced wine to drink,

fresh juice from my pomegranates.

3 His left arm would be under my head

and his right arm around me.

4 I warn you, daughters of Yerushalayim,

not to awaken or stir up love

until it wants to arise!

[Chorus]

5 Who is this, coming up from the desert,

leaning on her darling?

[He]

I awakened you under the apple tree.

It was there that your mother conceived you;

there she who bore you conceived you.

[She]

6 Set me like a seal on your heart,

like a seal on your arm;

for love is as strong as death,

passion as cruel as Sh’ol;

its flashes are flashes of fire,

[as fierce as the] flame of Yah.

7 No amount of water can quench love,

torrents cannot drown it.

If someone gave all the wealth in his house for love,

he would gain only utter contempt.

[Chorus]

8 We have a little sister;

her breasts are still unformed.

What are we to do with our sister

when she is asked for in marriage?

9 If she is a wall,

we will build on her a palace of silver;

and if she is a door,

we will enclose her with panels of cedar.

[She]

10 I am a wall, and my breasts are like towers;

so in his view I am like one who brings peace.

11 Shlomo had a vineyard at Ba‘al-Hamon,

and he gave the vineyard to caretakers;

each of them would pay for its fruit

a thousand pieces of silver.

12 My vineyard is mine; I tend it, myself.

You can have the thousand, Shlomo,

and the fruit-caretakers, two hundred!

[He]

13 You who live in the garden,

friends are listening for your voice.

Let me hear it! —

[She]

14     — Flee, my darling!

Be like a gazelle or young stag

on the mountains of spices!

Acts 7:22 So Moshe was trained in all the wisdom of the Egyptians and became both a powerful speaker and a man of action.

23 “But when he was forty years old, the thought came to him to visit his brothers, the people of Isra’el. 24 On seeing one of them being mistreated, he went to his defense and took revenge by striking down the Egyptian. 25 He supposed his brothers would understand that God was using him to rescue them, but they didn’t understand. 26 When he appeared the next day, as they were fighting, and tried to make peace between them by saying, ‘Men, you are brothers! Why do you want to hurt each other?’ 27 the one who was mistreating his fellow pushed Moshe away and said, ‘Who made you a ruler and judge over us? 28 Do you want to kill me, the way you killed that Egyptian yesterday?’[a] 29 On hearing this, Moshe fled the country and became an exile in the land of Midyan, where he had two sons.

30 “After forty more years, an angel appeared to him in the desert near Mount Sinai in the flames of a burning thorn bush. 31 When Moshe saw this, he was amazed at the sight; and as he approached to get a better look, there came the voice of Adonai, 32 ‘I am the God of your fathers, the God of Avraham, Yitz’chak and Ya‘akov.’ But Moshe trembled with fear and didn’t dare to look. 33 Adonai said to him, ‘Take off your sandals, because the place where you are standing is holy ground. 34 I have clearly seen how My people are being oppressed in Egypt, I have heard their cry, and I have come down to rescue them, and now I will send you to Egypt.’[b]

35 “This Moshe, whom they rejected, saying, ‘Who made you a ruler and judge?’ is the very one whom God sent as both ruler and ransomer by means of the angel that appeared to him in the thorn bush. 36 This man led them out, performing miracles and signs in Egypt, at the Red Sea and in the wilderness for forty years. 37 This is the Moshe who said to the people of Isra’el, ‘God will raise up a prophet like me from among your brothers’[c] 38 This is the man who was in the assembly in the wilderness, accompanied by the angel that had spoken to him at Mount Sinai and by our fathers, the man who was given living words to pass on to us.

39 “But our fathers did not want to obey him. On the contrary, they rejected him and in their hearts turned to Egypt, 40 saying to Aharon, ‘Make us some gods to lead us; because this Moshe, who led us out of Egypt — we don’t know what has become of him.’[d] 41 That was when they made an idol in the shape of a calf and offered a sacrifice to it and held a celebration in honor of what they had made with their own hands. 42 So God turned away from them and gave them over to worship the stars[e] — as has been written in the book of the prophets,

‘People of Isra’el, it was not to me

that you offered slaughtered animals

and sacrifices for forty years in the wilderness!

43 No, you carried the tent of Molekh

and the star of your god Reifan,

the idols you made so that you could worship them.

Therefore, I will send you into exile beyond Bavel.’[f][Footnotes:

Acts 7:28 Exodus 2:14

Acts 7:34 Exodus 3:1–2

Acts 7:37 Deuteronomy 18:15

Acts 7:40 Exodus 32:1, 23

Acts 7:42 Jeremiah 19:13

Acts 7:43 Amos 5:25–27]

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