Daily Devotion: WHEN THEY ALL DESERT US

in #life7 years ago

There are times when everyone around you just seems to desert you. You can be surrounded by lots of people, and yet still be completely alone. You’re carrying heavy burdens, but there’s no one to share the load. You have worries and concerns, but there’s no one to pour your heart out to. You’re struggling to make it through, and there’s no one prepared to lend a hand.

It happened to Jesus. At the time when He needed them most, His friends, the Disciples, His family, all deserted Him. Even Peter, who promised to stick with Him through thick and thin, denied Jesus three times. And so, He died, completely alone.

It happened to the Apostle Paul too. Almost everyone had deserted him when he was locked in a Roman dungeon … right there in in his hour of greatest need.

Do your best to come to me soon, for Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica; Crescens has gone to Galatia, Titus to Dalmatia. (2 Timothy 4:9-10)

I’ve seen it too. You head off out into a global media ministry like Christianityworks and all these people want to join you – it sounds so exciting and glamorous. But actually, it’s hard work. And when the going gets tough … well, many fall by the wayside.

You know what we want to do when that happens? We want to give up. We look around at all the rest who have turned back, and we ask ourselves … why should I keep going? If God can’t be bothered to put people next to me who’ll share the load, if God can’t even make sure I have one friend – just one! – to lean on, what’s the point?

So, there’s the Apostle Paul. He’s been out there for years now, proclaiming the Gospel. And not only has everyone deserted him, but:

Alexander the coppersmith did me great harm; the Lord will repay him according to his deeds. Beware of him yourself, for he strongly opposed our message. At my first defence no one came to stand by me, but all deserted me. May it not be charged against them! (2 Timothy 4:14-16)

How would you react? How would you feel? Hmm. Here’s Paul’s response:

But the Lord stood by me and strengthened me, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. So I was rescued from the lion’s mouth. The Lord will rescue me from every evil deed and bring me safely into his heavenly kingdom. To him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. (2 Timothy 4:17-18)

When everybody else deserts you and fails you, God will be there to stand by you. He’ll be faithful to the end.

That’s His Word. Fresh … for you … today.
Source: christianityworks.com

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Awesome post @msg768!! Good reminder for today!!

Meh. Thanks for cross-posting stuff verbatim. Here's my flag. Enjoy. 🚩

I've mentioned the source. ;)

Cute smiley winking faces do not do plagiarism justice. ;)

Why verbatim cut-and-paste instead of commentary or fair use snippets?

Plagiarism is when you don't mention the source. ;)

You. Are. Wrong. ;) Stop doing this. You should edit the post, remove the plagiarized content (which is all of it), and repent. You should try original content creation for awhile until you get the concept of attribution and fair use.

I just found out what your name means. How creative is that!

This is the first flag I've ever seen. Thanks for expanding my experiences here on Steemit.
I've seen Cheetah before. I like all the robots that I have come across.
I wonder how many robots there are.

Thanks. The cheeetah bot is a very powerful and useful bot because it compares this story with tons of websites. On the case here, the original author is someone who works for a major website. Now this post is made virtually identical to it, stealing the content and trying to make money off of someone else's work.

How ironic that Christians think that copy pasting is valuable content, when this is liable to get Steem in trouble.

This content is being used without permission, makes no attempt to use it fairly. This is cheating and is not okay. It's why YouTube videos get take down notices and one reason why Google penalizes copycat websites that mirror content.

As for my flag, it's not actually the red icon next to my post, it's sort of hidden in the block chain sort of. I posted my comment to notify the poster of my displeasure, and my comment is now being hidden by retaliatory flags.

This is still up. @steemcleaners, I did not know about you when I first saw the post, but I do now.

I think my flagging has been vindicated. Thanks everyone for supporting my replies. I do not understand why the author has refused to take down his or her post. It is down to about $2, and so why bother?

Fair use needs to be checked with each web site before using any content. (EDIT)

This is not fair use, it's not a licensed ie permitted use of that content. Go read the original website's terms of use, read my other comments here about cheating. This is clearly a copyright violation, so lumping it into the word plagiarism and referring to the legal or accepted definition is splitting hairs.

The poster should create content, not copy it verbatim without permission and against copyrights. Thus due credit is not given, which in this case is...

USED BY PERMISSION.

and this makes it plagiarism, or at minimum, a copyright violation.

You are wrong and flagged yourself now.

Agreed if the site says used with permission. I stand corrected.

Not all have deserted you! ;-)
Fair use needs to be checked with each site. (EDIT)

Bahahahah! Good one!! Threw you a follow brother :)

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