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Key Bible Verse: "But I warn you—unless you obey God better than the teachers of religious law and the Pharisees do, you can't enter the Kingdom of Heaven at all!" (Matthew 5: 20). Bonus Reading:John 3:5–15

In a yard near us, a sign recently appeared with these words on it: Mom on strike. Michelle had "moved" into her children's tree house and vowed she wasn't coming down until a few things changed.

A local television station saw the sign and ran a story in which they interviewed her. They then interviewed her husband. He said, "I've told the kids to cool it with the back talk. I've told them to do their chores again. We're doing everything we can to get her to come down."

It makes perfect human sense that when you've offended someone, when you've done something that's not right, you want to make it up to that person. It makes perfect human sense—but it makes no spiritual sense. In [today's Key Bible Verse], our Savior took pains to make it clear that if we're depending on what we do to make ourselves right with God, we're barking up the wrong tree.

We want God to come from whatever tree house in heaven He occupies and be here. But how do you get God to come down when His standards are so high?

—Bryan Chapell in Preaching Today

Adapted from: Preaching Today (219) by permission.

Copyright © 2002 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.
Click here for reprint information on Men of Integrity.

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Prayer for the Week

Thank you, Jesus, for dying in my place, so that the Father could pardon a rebel like me.

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