Latest / Your Daily Portion with L. David Harris / 12 07 2023 Crossing a Line
Transcript
- 0:01Most of us eat every day, some of us too much, because yesterday's
- 0:05food is not enough to supply energy for today's needs. Why then, do
- 0:10some of us expect yesterday's portion of heavenly manna, the word of God to
- 0:15keep us through today's challenges. On this program, we are going to change
- 0:19all of that. Let's experience God's words today and receive the power we need
- 0:25to live healthy, vibrant lives. Welcome to Your Daily Portion with your host,
- 0:31author speaker, Elle David Harris. Good morning, good morning, good
- 0:34morning. It is Thursday, December seventh, twenty twenty three. Hello,
- 0:39my name is El David Harris. I am your host, and this is
- 0:42your Daily Portion where we give you God's Word every single day, and today
- 0:46is no exception. We are continuing in our Lesson study series. God's mission,
- 0:51my mission, and our caption for today is crossing a line. We'll
- 0:55get into that in just a moment, but first I'd like to say welcome
- 0:58to you and ask you to go over to your day Dailyportion dot com.
- 1:00Please join our online community. Also click the notification bell. If you're watching
- 1:06on YouTube, I want you to like and subscribe and share and do all
- 1:11of that stuff that happens in social media and on podcasts, so that people
- 1:15can know that we are here day in and day out at your Daily Portion
- 1:21program. Also let us know where you are in the world, and that
- 1:23way we can continue to build faith and fellowship. Let's go ahead and pray,
- 1:29and then we will get underway. Father in Heaven, thank you for
- 1:32giving us the privilege of opening your word again. And Father, please teach
- 1:37us how holy you are and how much you love us. Thank you for
- 1:42making us all the same. We are all humans who need to be saved,
- 1:49and I pray God that we will see it that way. In Jesus's
- 1:53name, I pray Amen and aymen again. I don't know if you realize
- 1:57this or not, And really I'm just saying that for a fact, there
- 2:00are some people in everywhere in the world who believe that they are better or
- 2:07different than you, and you're like, but Dave, everybody's different. Like
- 2:13I don't think like you, you don't think like me. You're a man,
- 2:16I'm a woman. Right, You're from whatever country. I'm from whatever
- 2:21country. That's not what I mean. I mean that we were created in
- 2:25the image of God. Adam and Eve were created in the image of God.
- 2:29We are their descendants. All of us have that in common. Okay,
- 2:34Well, if you don't like that, then after the flood, like
- 2:37all of us came through the line of Noah somehow, someway, we all
- 2:42came from that lineage. Okay, so we're all humans. And it's like,
- 2:46well, that's obvious. Day. Well, if that's obvious, why
- 2:49is there racism? If that's obvious? Why is there human trafficking? If
- 2:52that's obvious? Why do some people believe in evolution and that some certain subsets
- 2:58of people are so period than other subsets of people. But what does that
- 3:04have to do with today's lesson? I'm so glad you acts. Let's go
- 3:07ahead and begin by reading from the Book of Acts. That's the Book of
- 3:13Acts, chapter seventeen, and I will read beginning at verse twenty four.
- 3:21And the Bible reads the God who made the world and everything in it.
- 3:25So we're talking about the one true and living God, Blessed be his name,
- 3:30who is Lord of heaven and Earth. Does not live in temples made
- 3:35by human hands, nor is he served by human hands. As if he
- 3:39needed anything. We kind of talked about this the other day. I won't
- 3:43go into that today, because He himself gives life and breath to everything and
- 3:51everyone. May I just say here that since God is our creator, since
- 3:55God is the one who knew what was in him his mind when he made
- 4:00you, then that means you're responsible to him. We are all responsible to
- 4:06the one true and Living God, blessed be his name, who created us.
- 4:11We keep going verse twenty six. From one man, he made every
- 4:16nation. I think I said that already of every of the human race,
- 4:19excuse me to inhabit the entire earth, depending determining their set times and fixed
- 4:27limits of the places where they would live. So wherever you happen to be
- 4:31like me, it's uh, what is it five oh four in the morning
- 4:36where I am wherever you are. It may be a different time, different
- 4:41time zone. But no matter what that is. You may have come from
- 4:44a different culture, You may have a different native tongue, You may who
- 4:48knows. There's a lot of things. You could be shorter than me,
- 4:50taller than me. You could be larger in stature than I am, or
- 4:54smaller in stature. But we are all created from one root person, and
- 5:01every nation on the human race that would inhabit the entire earth. God said
- 5:06where we would live. He gave fixed limits. You're not going to live
- 5:10on Mars or Pluto. You're not going to live in the water. You're
- 5:13going to live on the land, and so forth. Let me keep going.
- 5:16Okay, so verse twenty six gives something very interesting. I went to
- 5:20read from the SDA Bible commentary on that. Paul is stating the historical truth
- 5:27that all people and consequently all nations sprang up from one common ancestor adam.
- 5:33Okay, nothing to see here, folks, that's not new. The belief
- 5:36was one that no Greek, especially no Athenian, was likely to accept.
- 5:44This is why we need to understand context, brothers and sisters here. It
- 5:48is for such the distinction between Greek and Barbarian was radical and essential. The
- 5:58one was, by nature meant to be a slave of the other. What
- 6:04they believed that one was to be, the Barbarian was to be the Greek's
- 6:10slave. I think that there are cultures all around the world, there are
- 6:14situations all around the world where there are people who believe that way. It
- 6:16may not be that you're Greek and you have Barbarians. We're talking about a
- 6:21long time ago but we see where the classism and racism thing has gone completely
- 6:30awry on planet Earth. Let me keep reading, but there was no place
- 6:33in Paul's theology for a quote superior race. Y'all can fill in the blank
- 6:41there. You understand this happens today on planet Earth. Let's keep going verse
- 6:46twenty seven, so that they would search for God and perhaps grope around for
- 6:51him and find him, though he is not far from any one of us.
- 6:56Let me just say here, have you ever felt like you couldn't find
- 7:00God? Have you ever felt that because somebody said that you did not measure
- 7:05up to their standard. It doesn't matter what the standard was, but they
- 7:09gave one, they invented one, and they say you can't measure up,
- 7:13and therefore you're less than. You are not qualified, you are not great,
- 7:18you are not accepted acceptable. Well, God is saying here that there
- 7:24is no superior person, no matter what the distinction is. And by the
- 7:29way, he is making himself available to all who ask seek and enough huh,
- 7:33even those who are not quite sure how to find God or to seek
- 7:39after God. The Bible says that the heavens declare the glory of the Lord.
- 7:43Yes, and all that he made display his handiwork. And in the
- 7:46Book of Romans he said that all of nature is a testament of God,
- 7:51and it reveals the eternal Godhead. Like so we need to understand this again
- 7:57from the commentary on verse twenty seven. Might feel after him. That means
- 8:01to touch and to feel, or to grow. This describes how blind people
- 8:07may grow to find their way, wondering where the obstacles may be right,
- 8:15to feel around, to say, okay, how can I move safely from
- 8:18one point to another? But this is now for us, in our spiritual
- 8:22blindness, to be groping for the knowledge of God. This is how people
- 8:28find him. Okay. The altar of the unknown God was a witness that
- 8:33they had not found the war the world by wisdom. They did not know
- 8:37God. They did not find God by But Paul brought the assurance that the
- 8:43true seeker could know God desires to be found. He is a rewarder of
- 8:50them that diligently seek Him. Okay, verse twenty eight. For in Him
- 8:54we live and move about and exist, as even some of your poets have
- 9:00said, for we too are His offspring. I'm going to read from the
- 9:07book Ministry of Healing, page one twelve. Here, through the agencies of
- 9:13nature, God is working day by day, hour by hour, moment by
- 9:18moment to keep us alive, to build up, and to restore us.
- 9:22The power working through these agencies is the power of God. You see.
- 9:28God did not wind us up and say all right, well, yeah,
- 9:31let me know how it happens, whatever happens in your life, just let
- 9:35me know. No, God actively keeps us alive, and he actively positions
- 9:39us so we can get to know Him no matter who we are. Have
- 9:43a wonderful day, Peace. Thanks for joining us listening. Friends. Always
- 9:46remember we cannot live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from
- 9:50the mouth of God. This has been your daily portion with el David Harris.
- 9:56Make it a great day. Yeah,