A World Changer's Devotion

World Changers In The Bible

Daniel: Keep Your Quiet Times

Daniel 6:10

     Now when Daniel learned that the decree had been polished, he went home to his upstairs room where the windows opened toward Jerusalem. Three times a day, he got down on his knees and prayed, giving thanks to His God, just as he had done before. 

     Daniel was a young man who lived in a city called Babylon. He loved the Lord with all his heart and kept his quiet times strong everyday. In fact, he prayed several times a day. God blessed his life so much that some of the other leaders were jealous because he had so much power. They tried to find something to accuse him of, but "they find no corruption in him,what Daniel is really made of because he was trustworthy and neither corrupt nor negligent" (Daniel 6:4)

     Daniel was totally, wholeheartedly sold out to the Lord. He was a man of honor who dealt with honesty and truth. Since they could find no valid means to dishonor him, they made a law that said if you prayed to anyone besides the king for thirty days, you would be thrown into the lion's den. The king, not paying much attention to what he was doing, got tricked into making the law. Since he didn't believe in God anyway, he didn't realize that Daniel prayed that much.

     Now here is what I want you to pay close attention to. Daniel found out about the law, and he determined in his heart that he was going to do what was right, no matter what. Verse 10 shows what Daniel is really made of: "Now when Daniel knew that the writing was signed, he went home. And in his upper room, with his windows open toward Jerusalem, he knelt down on his knees three times on that day, and prayed and gave thanks before his God, as was his custom since his early days."

     The first character quality is commitment to God and to quiet times,no matter what the circumstances. No matter what the situation is, you keep focused on the Lord. You leave the world behind. You say. "People can do whatever they want to do to me. It doesn't matter. I love God with all my heart, and I'm going to do everything that I can to pursue Him with all that I am." Daniel knew that he might ever die because he had chosen to keep his quiet times strong, but he didn't care.

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David: A Worshiper

    David was worshiper. If you are going to change the world, if you are going to do something for God, then you really have to get into worship. When you worship, you are consumed with the presence of God. And the presence of God changes the world.  He is the One who uses you to do something incredible to make history in this world.

     The Bible describes David as somebody who grew up taking care of his father's sheep. He was out in the field all the time watching the sheep. He used to take his harp with him. As he sat there watching the sheep, he would write songs and sing from his heart telling the Lord how much he loved Him.

     David was really into God. He was not singing some cheesy songs that he had seen on an overhead. He was making them up himself and singing them with all his heart (Ephesians 5:18). As a result, the presence of God came into his life to the point that he did incredible things even before he met Goliath.

     Look at 1 Samuel 17:34-37

    But David said to Saul, "Your servant has been keeping his father's sheep. When a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock, I went after it, struck it and rescued it the sheep from its mouth. When it turned on me, I seized it by its hair, struck it and killed it. Your servant has killed both the lion and the bear; this uncircumcised Philistine will be like one of them, because he has defied the armies of the living God. The LORD who delivered me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine."  Saul said to David, "Go, and the LORD be with you."

     David is telling King Saul about the things that God had used him to do while he was out just worshipping the Lord. God gave Him the strength to overcome a bear and a lion and to kill them both. It didn't start by David's wanting to kill a bear and lion. It started when David went after the Lord and worshipped Him with all His heart.

     One of the things that marked David throughout his life was that he was a worshiper. We know that he was a major contributor to the most incredible songbook ever to be written in the book of Psalms. David was incredibly creative when he wrote his psalms. He was praising God for all kinds of different things and in all kinds of  different ways. He was determined to let God hear his heart's cry and his excitement in worshiping. David took particular things in life - the things that other people took for granted like the mountains, the trees, and the blessings he had in his life - and he made whole songs about them.

    Psalms 119 is the longest chapter in the Bible. David very creatively expresses to the Lord how committed he is to really worship Him. We read things like, "At midnight I will rise to give thanks to you, because of your righteous judgements" (v.26). He is worshiping God in the middle of the night!  "Your statutes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage" (v.54). David is singing about all the things that God told the Israeelites to do. David made up songs about loving the Lord with all of his heart. He is saying that he loves the stuff  God told him to do. " Seven times a day I praise you, because of your righteous judgements" (v 164). Develop the character of David; develop the heart of a worshiper.

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Lydia: An Open Heart to the Things of God

Acts 16: 11-15

     From Troas we put out to sea and sailed straight for Samothrace, and the next day on to Neapolis. From there we traveled to Philippi, a Roman colony and the leading city of the district of Macedonia. And we stayed there several days.

    On the Sabbath we went outside the city gate to the river, where we expected to find a place of prayer, We sat down and began to speak to the women who had gathered there. One of those listening was a woman named Lydia, a dealer in a purple cloth from the city of Thyatira, who was a worshiper of God, The Lord opened her heart to respond to Paul's message. When she and and the members of her household were baptized, she invited us to her home. "If you consider me a believer in the Lord," she said, "come and stay at my house." And she persuaded us.

    As Paul traveled around from place to place preaching, he went to the city of Philippi to take the gospel. He preached a number of days there. One day a rather wealthy woman named Lydia responded to his message of Christ. The Bible says that the Lord opened up her heart to respond to what Paul was saying. Lydia was a woman with an open heart. She was a woman who was willing to live on the edge. She was a woman who was sensitive to what God was saying, and then she did something about it.

    The character quality that we want to note here in Lydia's life is her open heart to the things of God. God used her after she gave her life to the Lord to begin a church in her town. It was her openness that helped to start a whole church. As a result, the church in Philippi became a thriving, fired up church living for God. Paul wrote the letter to the Phlippian church to follow up on the work he had begun there. That is where we get our book of Philippians in the Bible. Lydia was a woman with a soft heart and the bravery to respond.