A 5-week Every Home Devotional

Week 5

Renewal of Passion for the Lost

As is typical for many of us at the start of a new year, you may be processing new goals and desires for your life this coming year. Goal setting can be a great ritual to help us reflect on the goodness of God in our lives and how much he’s done in and through us the previous year.

The Every Home Oikos word for 2024 is renewal. With this in mind, it would be a great idea to focus on seeking the Lord for his renewal in many areas of our lives at the beginning of this new year. We invite you to join us in this journey of renewal as we take each week in January to focus on a specific renewal theme. We will intentionally seek the Lord for his renewal in our spirits, souls, bodies, relationships, and passion for the lost this year.

Day 1: Overview

“Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field’” (Matthew 9:35-38).

As ministry leaders, we feel blessed that God has chosen us to serve him in various roles. At the same time, we get so busy due to our many responsibilities that we forget why we are working so hard. This week, we want to stop and take a moment to remind ourselves of the reason we are serving God at Every Home.

In the passage above, we see Jesus doing his “work,” going from towns and villages, teaching and proclaiming the Good News, and healing every sickness and disease. Can you relate? He was busy! But in verse 36, it says that, while he was ministering, he looked around and saw the crowds of people coming to him, and it says he had compassion on them because they were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. Jesus’ motive in ministry and his desire for people flow out of his passion, love, and compassion for the vulnerable state of humanity, who are dominated by sin and sickness. Jesus loves people, and he wants to heal them. Out of this desire for the sick and helpless, he multiplies his efforts, and in chapter 10, he gives the twelve disciples the authority to heal the sick and set people free from their bondage of sin. And we are invited to partner in this ministry with the harassed and helpless!

The word compassion is a compound word meaning common­­­­­–passion. When did you last genuinely desire to see the lost come to faith? Maybe it has been a while. We have all been there! To renew that passion for the lost, we must intentionally seek to have the same passion (common passion) that Jesus has for the lost. We need to pray and ask God to give us his perception when we see lost and helpless people. Remember, Jesus came to give us life, so we need to learn to see people not as good or bad but as alive or dead. And for those who are not alive, we are to offer them living water and the bread of life: Jesus.

—David Schaal, Global Division

Day 2: Scripture Meditations

Take time throughout the day to prayerfully meditate on these Scriptures.

John 4
Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.
Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)
10 Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
11 “Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? 12 Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
13 Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, 14 but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
15 The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
16 He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
17 “I have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. 18 The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”
19 “Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. 20 Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”
21 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. 22 You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. 24 God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
25 The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”
26 Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”
27 Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?”
28 Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?” 30 They came out of the town and made their way toward him.
31 Meanwhile his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.”
32 But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.”
33 Then his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?”
34 “My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. 35 Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. 36 Even now the one who reaps draws a wage and harvests a crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. 37 Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. 38 I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.”
39 Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” 40 So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. 41 And because of his words many more became believers.
42 They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”
43 After the two days he left for Galilee. 44 (Now Jesus himself had pointed out that a prophet has no honor in his own country.) 45 When he arrived in Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him. They had seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, for they also had been there.
46 Once more he visited Cana in Galilee, where he had turned the water into wine. And there was a certain royal official whose son lay sick at Capernaum. 47 When this man heard that Jesus had arrived in Galilee from Judea, he went to him and begged him to come and heal his son, who was close to death.
48 “Unless you people see signs and wonders,” Jesus told him, “you will never believe.”
49 The royal official said, “Sir, come down before my child dies.”
50 “Go,” Jesus replied, “your son will live.”
The man took Jesus at his word and departed. 51 While he was still on the way, his servants met him with the news that his boy was living. 52 When he inquired as to the time when his son got better, they said to him, “Yesterday, at one in the afternoon, the fever left him.”
53 Then the father realized that this was the exact time at which Jesus had said to him, “Your son will live.” So he and his whole household believed.
54 This was the second sign Jesus performed after coming from Judea to Galilee.

 

Acts 9
Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
“Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked.
“I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
The men traveling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone. Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus. For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything.
10 In Damascus there was a disciple named Ananias. The Lord called to him in a vision, “Ananias!”
“Yes, Lord,” he answered.
11 The Lord told him, “Go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and ask for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying. 12 In a vision he has seen a man named Ananias come and place his hands on him to restore his sight.”
13 “Lord,” Ananias answered, “I have heard many reports about this man and all the harm he has done to your holy people in Jerusalem. 14 And he has come here with authority from the chief priests to arrest all who call on your name.”
15 But the Lord said to Ananias, “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel. 16 I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.”
17 Then Ananias went to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord—Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here—has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” 18 Immediately, something like scales fell from Saul’s eyes, and he could see again. He got up and was baptized, 19 and after taking some food, he regained his strength.
Saul spent several days with the disciples in Damascus. 20 At once he began to preach in the synagogues that Jesus is the Son of God. 21 All those who heard him were astonished and asked, “Isn’t he the man who raised havoc in Jerusalem among those who call on this name? And hasn’t he come here to take them as prisoners to the chief priests?” 22 Yet Saul grew more and more powerful and baffled the Jews living in Damascus by proving that Jesus is the Messiah.
23 After many days had gone by, there was a conspiracy among the Jews to kill him, 24 but Saul learned of their plan. Day and night they kept close watch on the city gates in order to kill him. 25 But his followers took him by night and lowered him in a basket through an opening in the wall.
26 When he came to Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples, but they were all afraid of him, not believing that he really was a disciple. 27 But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles. He told them how Saul on his journey had seen the Lord and that the Lord had spoken to him, and how in Damascus he had preached fearlessly in the name of Jesus. 28 So Saul stayed with them and moved about freely in Jerusalem, speaking boldly in the name of the Lord. 29 He talked and debated with the Hellenistic Jews, but they tried to kill him. 30 When the believers learned of this, they took him down to Caesarea and sent him off to Tarsus.
31 Then the church throughout Judea, Galilee and Samaria enjoyed a time of peace and was strengthened. Living in the fear of the Lord and encouraged by the Holy Spirit, it increased in numbers.
32 As Peter traveled about the country, he went to visit the Lord’s people who lived in Lydda. 33 There he found a man named Aeneas, who was paralyzed and had been bedridden for eight years. 34 “Aeneas,” Peter said to him, “Jesus Christ heals you. Get up and roll up your mat.” Immediately Aeneas got up. 35 All those who lived in Lydda and Sharon saw him and turned to the Lord.
36 In Joppa there was a disciple named Tabitha (in Greek her name is Dorcas); she was always doing good and helping the poor. 37 About that time she became sick and died, and her body was washed and placed in an upstairs room. 38 Lydda was near Joppa; so when the disciples heard that Peter was in Lydda, they sent two men to him and urged him, “Please come at once!”
39 Peter went with them, and when he arrived he was taken upstairs to the room. All the widows stood around him, crying and showing him the robes and other clothing that Dorcas had made while she was still with them.
40 Peter sent them all out of the room; then he got down on his knees and prayed. Turning toward the dead woman, he said, “Tabitha, get up.” She opened her eyes, and seeing Peter she sat up. 41 He took her by the hand and helped her to her feet. Then he called for the believers, especially the widows, and presented her to them alive. 42 This became known all over Joppa, and many people believed in the Lord. 43 Peter stayed in Joppa for some time with a tanner named Simon.

Day 3: A Message from Tanner and Beth Peake

Day 4: Personal Reflection Prompts

Take some time today to journal and reflect on these questions.

  1. Look around and see the lostness of people.
  2. See the lost not as subjects of God’s wrath but objects of his love.
  3. Remind yourself of your faith story, recounting how far Jesus has carried you.

Day 5: A Message from Cleopas Chitapa, Africa Continental Director

Think about every statement Jesus said, explaining his pursuit for the lost. “The Son of man came to seek and to save the lost” (Luke 19:10). Imagine the widow of Luke 15, turning on the light in the dark to look for the lost coin, sweeping every corner and diligently searching until she finds it. What about the shepherd leaving the 99 in the field to seek the one lost sheep? The lost soul is worth fighting for until they are found.

What comes to mind when Jesus says, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me”? (John 4:34). It’s true, at times, we can be absorbed in the busyness of ministry without considering why it exists in the first place. How do we reignite our passion for the lost when we are found in this place?

First, we need to align our hearts with God’s spirit. You cannot serve correctly when God’s burden is not your burden. So, prayer and the Word fan our fervency. 

Second, always keep your calling in front of you. When Paul spoke to Timothy, he would remind him, as a soldier, never to meddle in civilian affairs but to stay duty-bound. Vision is as stubborn as a honey badger, but your vision never becomes a reality until your vision becomes your daily obsession.

Third, feed your Great Commission zeal. I remember a time I would watch Billy Graham almost every other day. Since 1945, thousands descended the terraces of his crusades to come to Christ. The altar call anthem, “Just as I am, without one plea,” would always bring me to tears. We are the salt of the earth. Pray today that you do not lose your saltiness.

Day 6: Prayer Suggestions

Take time throughout the day to offer these prayers to the Lord.

  1. Pray that God would open your eyes to see the lost as a ripe harvest field.
  2. Pray for opportunities to engage non-Christians in a spiritual conversation.

Day 7: Meditative Prayer

Take time throughout the day to slow down and quietly pray this prayer.

Inspire me, Lord,
To seek the lost and broken.
Guide my heart, my hands, and my feet
To bring them home to you.

See, I am doing a new thing!
Now it springs up; do you not perceive it?
I am making a way in the wilderness
and streams in the wasteland.
Isaiah 43:19
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