DAY 827 - Great Wealth Gone in One Hour (請按此處收聼廣東話Cantonese podcast click here)

                        Today's Reading: Revelation 18:9-24

** If you would like to learn a simple and good way of Daily Devotion method please read my “Count Down 5” from my Devotion on Fire blog:

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To use this simple and good way of Daily Devotion method please click this link:

 .Subject Shifting Devotion.pdf

Please click this link to read Revelation 18:9-24

English(ESV): https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation 18&version=ESV

Chinese: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=启 示 录 18&version=CUV

Bible Study

     This passage has more to say about he fall of Babylon. Can you believe that all kinds of great wealth can be gone in just one hour if God acts? Can you believe the wealth you have got through all those years can be gone in one hour?

Let's take a look at what Bishop N.T. Wright says (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/N._T._Wright ) :

    

      For Babylon has gained her power from the monster, and the monster from the accuser, the satan, the old dragon who, though out of sight for the moment, is remembered from chapter 12 and will shortly reappear.  The whole system is built on lies, on false accusations and false claims.  So much of Revelation is about being able to tell the difference between the lie and the truth; and so many of the lies appear as accusations.  That is why it is so difficult to overthrow the Babylons of this world, unless it is simply by the force of the new Babylon, whatever that may be.  In fact, it is impossible - except through the blood of the lamb, and the faithful witness of his followers. 

N.T. Wright. Revelation for Everyone. Louisville,KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2011, p.165.

    Have you seen those kind of Babylonian system surrounding us in our world, nation, workplace, church, family and everywhere? Those excessive luxuries, lies, accusations and persecutions? How are you going to be able to see the real situation and not joining in that lifestyle of excessive luxuries, rumours, lies, accusations and persecutions? How can you avoid yourself not living in that kind of Babylonian lifestyle without knowing that can bring to your own destruction someday? 

Let's have a time to be still and give the Holy Spirit space to speak through the passage we have just read. Offer this time up to Jesus as you listen to him, while listening to "Gabriel's Oboe":  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmax47l2hLU

Spiritual Journal

    The title I heard from Jesus today is: Great wealth gone in one hour

    What I receive today is to give us a warning of what we are working so hard each day. If all those you have been working so hard are wealth and fame, health and big family, can you believe all those things can be gone in not only an hour but in an instance? 

    The point John wants to make in todays message is that God is in total control. In His good time even the long established evil system by Satan himself in the symbolic name of Babylon can be gone in just an instance. 

    Let's humble ourselves to be under the lordship of our Lord Jesus Christ so that what we are working hard each day have an eternal value so that we won't waste our time, money and life!

    Remember, just as Bishop Wright says, it is impossible to get rid of those Babylonian lifestyle except through the blood of Christ and the faithful witness of His followers. Are you willing to pay the high price like what Jesus did? Or, are you going to accept the temptation of the Babylonian lifestyle to live in a way just like those people in a future heading to destruction? 

Choose wisely! 

      

Dear Lord Jesus,

Help us to be certain that we are not living in a Babylonian lifestyle but a true lifestyle of Christlikeness.  In Jesus name we pray. Amen.

Please click this link to worship with us -

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZJWZQyLzDRQ

10,000 Reasons (Bless the Lord) Matt Redman

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You may choose to follow my other daily blog: 

Daily Devotion on Fire 2(2 years plan -One year New Testament, one year Old Testament): 

http://bishopsilas2.blogspot.ca/

Daily Devotion on Fire (3 years and 3 months plan, one chapter a day to finish reading the whole Bible): 

http://bishopsilas.blogspot.ca/

Break.Build (40 days daily devotion- For Renewal or First Step for new Christians): http://www.breakbuild.blogspot.ca/

Emmanuel330 (40 weeks First Step Bible Study): 

http://emmanuel330.blogspot.ca/

This blog:

Discipler 123 (Daily devotion using N.T. Wright's NT for Everyone as source)

http://discipler123.blogspot.ca/

Rev. Nicky Gumbel's daily devotion: Bible in One Year

http://www.htb.org.uk/bioy