Devotional Guide, Today’s Reading – Monday, November 15, 2021

Theme: SELF APPRAISAL

Text: ‘But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only deceiving your own selves. For if any be a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass: For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was.’ – James 1: 22-24’

Comment: Those who hear the word of God preached to them and accept it are under obligation to put it into practice. The word preached serves as a mirror through which believers appraise or examine and purge themselves of their sins, knowing that “all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do”. (Hebrews 4:13) We should always remember that it is not those who are merely hearers of the law who are just before God, but the doers. – Romans 2: 13-15. See also Revelation 1: 3; 1 Corinthians 15:1, 2.

It is a dangerous act of self-deceit to deliberately indulge in iniquity after the blood of Jesus Christ had been shed for us. (1 John 1: 7). Said Saint Peter, ‘For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world through the knowledge of the Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, they are again entangled therein, and overcome, the latter end is worse with them than the beginning. For it had been better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than, after they have known it, to turn from the holy commandment delivered unto them. But it is happened unto them according to the true proverb, The dog is turned to his own vomit again; and the sow that was washed to her wallowing in the mire.” – 2 Peter 2: 20-22. Compare Hebrews 10: 26, 27; Luke 6: 47-49.