August 4 Daily Devotional

Bible Reading

Devotional

A respectable person may have an unrespectable brother. This can be very embarrassing for the respectable one. Never ask, "How is that brother of yours, the one who used to be in jail?" Our decent friend is ashamed of that brother and would rather not talk about him.

But there is amazing comfort in Hebrews 2:11: the Son of God is not ashamed to call us his brothers and sisters!

The eternal Son of God saw the rebellion on our planet. He saw you and me bowed down and wounded. We were in the prison of our sins, thoroughly unrespectable. Then he said something like this to his Father, "Father, those creatures of yours are lost and dying. I want to go and share their lot. I want to live their life, and I want to die their death. I want to become their brother so they may become your children."

That's how Christ became our trailblazer. He walked ahead of us, right through the jungle of our misery, through sin and death and hell, and opened a path to the Father. With great joy he stood before the Father again and said, "Here am I, and the children God has given me" (v. 13).

Jesus Christ is not ashamed of us.

If we absorb this truth and then recall the occasions when we were ashamed to be associated with Jesus, we groan under a burden of guilt.

If we reflect on the fact that Jesus is not ashamed to call us brothers and sisters, how can we ever again prefer the company of the rich and the popular? No, since Jesus unashamedly embraces us, we count it our highest honor to identify with the least of his brothers and sisters.

Once we know how unworthy we are of Christ's love, we will never be ashamed of each other.

REFLECTIONS

Jesus calls you his brother or sister. What does that mean to you?

Andrew Kuyvenhoven's Daylight, a modern devotional classic, was originally published by Paideia Press in 1977. This updated edition is copyright 2009 by Faith Alive Christian Resources. You can order a copy of this revised version of the book directly from the publisher.

A man of many accomplishments, Andrew Kuyvenhoven is probably best known for his contributions to Today (formerly The Family Altar), a widely-used monthly devotional booklet associated with the Back to God Hour. Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations for this updated edition of Daylight are from the Holy Bible: Today's New International Version copyright 2001, 2005 by the International Bible Society.