November 11 Daily Devotional

Bible Reading:

Romans 3:9-24

⁹What then? are we better than they? No, in no wise: for we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles, that they are all under sin;
¹⁰As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:
¹¹There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.
¹²They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.
¹³Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips:
¹⁴Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness:
¹⁵Their feet are swift to shed blood:
¹⁶Destruction and misery are in their ways:
¹⁷And the way of peace have they not known:
¹⁸There is no fear of God before their eyes.
¹⁹Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God.
²⁰Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight: for by the law is the knowledge of sin.
²¹But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets;
²²Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference:
²³For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;
²⁴Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:

Devotional:

When a child is born into the world he seems so innocent and so pure. It is not difficult, really, to think of him as a tabula rasa, a clean slate, whose environment will imprint upon him the evil that becomes by manhood such a part of his life.

It is here that many of us get on the wrong track as parents. We fail to see the need of training the child when he is such a tiny baby. We readily recognize that he needs love and it is very easy to give him this because he is so lovable. But it is more difficult to recognize his need of discipline and training and give it to him. Indeed, the need for discipline in the infant is difficult to discern unless we are aware that the innocence we are assuming is only apparent!

It is important for us to study Romans 3 along with Romans 1 to learn what God says about the nature of man. The inherently sinful nature of man may be very ugly and depressing for us who are parents to contemplate. But it is the truth of God and we need to be reminded of it that our backbones might be stiffened! This chapter should impress upon us the need gently to train, instruct and correct from the earliest days. Beginning with the simple lesson that beds are made for sleeping and that mother knows that her baby needs sleep, the training should proceed. The proud, self-assertive spirit of the baby needs gradually but surely to come to rest in the wisdom of those parents to whose care God has intrusted him.

Romans 3 should also impress upon us the need to communicate as the years proceed the liberating gospel of God both by our example and our precept.