Tag: Jesus

Rebel to Righteousness

Numbers 16 38 ESV

Numbers 16

There was a man named Korah who led a rebellion against Moses’ leadership (Numbers 16:2-3). Moses instructed them to put fire and incense in censors before the Lord to let God decide what man would be in charge. Of course, God stayed faithful to Moses and made it clear that Korah and his men were sinning.
God, to punish the rebels’ sin and rid Israel of false leadership, caused the earth to open up and swallow Korah, his household, and his rebellion. Next, God redeemed the sinful situation into a holy one by turning the censors the men used to sin with into a covering for the altar that was holy.
This is a large part of what makes the Christian faith different than other beliefs. In order to be justified, or have right standing, with the gods of many religions, one must work their way into the god or goddesses’ approval; they need to pray enough, give enough, fast enough, and do enough good all with the hope of making the cut. Our God doesn’t work like that. Instead of accepting the good or holy, he seeks the sinful and makes them holy (Mark 2:17), having exchanged our sin with Jesus’ perfection (2 Corinthians 5:21). That is a fundamental difference, that he takes the sinful and makes him holy, instead of expecting the sinful to clean himself up and work his way into his favor which is impossible for man (Rom. 3:10-12). We serve a wonderful God who can turn rebels to righteous before God.

The God of Second Chances – Numbers 17

The story of the rod of Aaron.
The rod was like a stick and these twelve men carved their names on them, out of the twelve one of them sprouted. The one that sprouted was Aaron’s rod and he became the priest. God worked this miracle to prove to the children of Israel that they had been wrong in questioning whom the priesthood rightfully belonged to. God mercifully gave Israel another evidence of his will, to correct their judgment. The miracle was sufficient to silence the complaints of the Israelites. After they realized what they had done, they were terrified and said: “Behold, we perish, we are dying, we are all dying!” God asked Moses to place the rod in front of the alter so that it served as a reminder that they were wrong in questioning God’s authority.
How many times has God given us a second chance? If you haven’t noticed, every morning is an opportunity to serve Him, love Him, give yourself to Him, reconcile with Him, reconcile with your brother, love those around you, enjoy nature, be kind, serve others. My point is, God is merciful and loving, “The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping mercies for thousands..”(Exodus 34:6-7). In His great love, he gives us second chances. However, there will come a day when we will have no more second opportunities.
Andy Cisneros
Today’s Bible reading can be read or listened to https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Numbers+16-17&version=NLT
Tomorrow’s reading will be Numbers 18-20 as we continue the 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan

Seek

Numbers14-15 cain

No matter how many times I read the story, it is hard for me to digest the betrayal of the Israelites in chapter 14. After they saw the land that He promised them, they wanted to return to being slaves in Egypt? What shocks me even more is that we do the same thing today. What do you think Jesus meant when he said this in Luke 9:62, “No one, after putting his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God”? This is alluding to a plow man tilling the ground to prepare it for planting. If the plow man were to look back behind him the rows would be crooked and off course. Jesus is saying that we are like plow men and if we look back and do a poor job then we aren’t fit for the kingdom. What does this have to do with Numbers 14? We can look back today the same way the Israelites did in Numbers 14. They were liberated from slavery in Egypt and given the promise of a new land that was “exceedingly good”. We were liberated from slavery under sin and given the promise of a perfect new earth. The Israelites looked back at their life in slavery and wanted its comforts once again, even knowing they would return to slavery. We can look back at our life of sin and wish we could go back to it, even if we know it will kill us in the end. Sometimes our desires can turn from God and pull us towards a life of sin.

The last two verses of chapter 15 tell us exactly what God desires from us. “Remember to do all My commandments and be holy to your God. I am the Lord your God who brought you out from the land of Egypt to be your God; I am the Lord your God.” Replace the phrase “land of Egypt” with “sin” and apply this to our lives today. Let’s not miss out on our promises because we want to look back to our old life of sin and return to slavery. Let’s keep our eyes on the goal of the kingdom and remember the God who saved us from sin and is bringing us to an “exceedingly good land.” I enjoy looking at the big picture in scripture and seeing how God works on a grand scale. Like how we see God working out the same goal for us and for the ancient Israelites.

Psalm 90 is a chapter that gives us a big picture view of the world and plainly relays potentially complex ideas into understandable language. When I read Psalm 90, a few things are clear to me. God is eternal. He views time differently than us. He sees our sin and He loves us despite our sin. Sometimes we need reminding of these big picture ideas because they help us understand the world and make us realize what is actually important. We can easily get lost in our everyday activities and bury our minds in worry, but in reality, God is still in control and willing to show us His favor.

Thank you for reading our devotions on Numbers this week. Hopefully we walked away with a renewed respect for God’s holiness, an awe for the awesome work He did in the people of Israel, and a reassurance that He is leading us towards a promise that is better than anything we can imagine. Numbers may sound like a boring math book, but in reality it is a rich record of God’s dealings with His people. As you continue to read through the book of Numbers, see how God deals with His people and make a connection to your life. Where God’s word and application meet, there is life change and understanding.

Josiah Cain

 

 

Today’s Bible reading can be read or listened to at https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Numbers+14-15%2C+Psalm+90&version=NIV

Tomorrow’s reading will be Numbers 16-17 as we continue the 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan

The Key

numb 2&4 cain

Over the last four years I have done a lot of moving. I’ve moved from an apartment, to a house, to a trailer, back to a house, to my in-laws, and now to my home. Not to mention, I have helped plenty of others move during this time. Despite my many moving back aches and cardboard box forts, I’ve experienced nothing in the moving department compared to the Levites in chapter 3-4 of Numbers. These chapters are dedicated instructions for the Levites about how to live around and move the Tabernacle.

A portion of the third chapter is dedicated to uncomplicated, yet purposeful counting of all the male sons of the Levites a month or older.  Remember the Passover in Egypt where God spared the first born sons of Israel while passing judgement over the rest of Egypt’s first born sons? In Numbers 3, we see God take the first born of Israel not to death, but to holiness. Numbers 3:13 says that God is making the Levites “sanctified” to Himself. This word sanctified means to make holy. Instead of killing the first born sons of Israel, God uses them to be mediators between Him and the Israelites. Does this sound like any other first born son to you? Jesus is now the first born son that acts as a mediator between us and God. It is so cool to me that the number of Levite males a month or older and the number of first born sons in Israel are almost the exact same number. God sees the males of the Levites being the ransom in place of the first born sons of Israel. In Numbers 3:39, the number of Levite males comes out to 22,00 and in 3:43 the number of first born males is 22,273. I will draw your attention to the extra 273 first born sons which aren’t covered by the ransom of the sons of Levi. Instead of taking their lives, which is what they would deserve, God only requires the small price of 5 shekels per person. That comes out to a total of 1,365 shekels in exchange for the lives of 273 first born sons. I guess I was wrong in my last post when I joked about Numbers being a math text book. But really, the math should be done from this point on. The point is this: God would rather redeem people than kill people; God opts for mercy instead of judgment. This is just one of the great things about Him that makes Him a God worth worshiping.

Moving on to chapter 4 we again see the detailed and intentional nature of God through instructions He gives the Levites for the Tabernacle. Remember holiness is one of God’s main priorities when it comes to the Tabernacle. We are blissfully reading along in chapter 4, hearing about the job of the sons of Aaron….then we get to verse 15. Things get serious in verse 15. It becomes clear to us that the sons of Aaron took so much caution in covering all the holy objects in the Tabernacle so that when the sons of Kohath come to move the stuff they don’t die! Remember God’s holiness is serious. All it would take for an unclean person to die is to touch a holy object. It doesn’t sound like a simple list of instructions anymore; this is a life or death situation. I thought I had it rough when I had to take the legs off my couch to fit it through the door but at least I wouldn’t die if I accidentally touched it! I like to look at verses 5-20 as the “how not to die when moving the Tabernacle” verses. If you were a son of Kohath, in charge of carrying one of the holy objects, you would be thankful that one of the sons of Aaron did their job well.

Reading though chapter 4 and hearing how the jobs of these different people are broken down reminds me of the body of Christ. We have different positions and skills which allow us to come together and work for God. Moving the Tabernacle in a holy and dignified way was no easy task, so too is serving God and His son, Jesus. It takes a team effort with everyone pitching in to make it a success.

Reading this also gave me another idea. Maybe we should only ask people between the ages of 30-50 to help us move. I should have quoted Numbers 4:3 to all the people who have asked me to move over the years. But in all seriousness, there is one big take away that I see from Numbers chapter 4; it is a lesson taught all over the Old Testament. Keeping God’s holiness and His people being holy are top priorities. We need to be holy as God is holy (Lev. 19:2). That is a direct command from God to us. We see this in how God treats even the moving of the Tabernacle. Holiness is key. When God was setting up the nation of Israel He wanted to make sure that they were going to stay separate from the world, separate from their idol worshiping neighbors. All the laws and rules are supposed to help them stay righteous and holy. Of course, we know that this is an impossible task for us to do on our own. Thankfully, we have a God who understands us and knows that we need help. This is why all of history, all of God’s plans, even back in Numbers with the counting of some Jewish men, was leading to the revealing of Jesus. Don’t think for a second that we are redeemed by accident. God was working out the world to be in such a way that you now, reading this post, have the option to be redeemed and righteous. We might be tempted to skip these boring chapters of the Bible where all we do is read about how many 30-50 year olds were in the household of Gershon, but we would miss out on watching God reveal his plans. Seeing God act with such intentional detail reminds me that God is not too big to deal with our everyday highs and lows. God works in the details of our lives today, just as He did in the lives of the Levites moving the tabernacle.

Josiah & Amber Cain

 

Today’s passage can be read or listened to at https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Numbers+3-4&version=NIV

Tomorrow’s passage will be Numbers 5-6 as we continue our 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan

 

Making a Different People : Blessings and Curses

Leviticus 26-27

Leviticus 26 12 NIV
Chapters 26 and 27 of Leviticus makes it seem like the book ends twice. While the valuations of 27 help us understand tithes and how giving to the Lord means more than money, indeed EVERYTHING we have, it seems like 26 was the “original” ending. The author, editors, and priests who God inspired to write and work in this text ended, first, with a powerful section on blessing and curses.(See note below)
The narrative of the Exodus, that is, God crushing the Egyptians and their gods, leading his people out to worship him, and then bringing them into the promised land, is the climax of the Torah, and arguably the CENTRAL NARRATIVE of the Old Testament. That is why God has repeated something over and over and over again. I hope you caught it, as I noted that when something is repeated, God wants you to pay attention. Here it is in 26:13 “I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt so that you would not be their slaves, and I broke the bars of your yoke and made you walk erect.” Think about how many times you have heard something like this in the commands of Leviticus. God keeps grounding his commands in the beautiful reality that he has brought this people, the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, out of the land of Egypt. He has redeemed them from slavery. Because he has done that, he wants them to walk in a way that is different and better than the nations around them. If they don’t walk that way but turn away, then he will allow the trouble of this world to overtake them, in order that they might cry out to him. However, if they do obey, then he will give them unending blessings and he promises, “I will also walk among you and be your God, and you shall be My people.” (26:12)
I hope you see the parallel to our lives as we follow Christ. The CENTRAL NARRATIVE of creation is the Exodus led by Jesus, who broke us all out of the bondage and slavery to sin and has set us free. As Jesus brings us into the Canaan of the Kingdom of God, not just the future Kingdom on the Earth, but the present rule and reign of God, he looks to us and says, “there is a better way to live.” He gives us a holy way of life, grounded in his love and his sacrifice. But, better than before, we are able to become changed from the inside out because of the power of God flowing through us. No longer must we simply keep outward laws and regulations, but our hearts can become pure. God can change our desires and our destiny.  We are able to become children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and heirs according to the promise of God. If we follow the way of God, through the power of the Spirit of God, all the while redeemed through the Son of God, then one day we will see God. The metaphor of Leviticus, God saying “I will also walk among you” will become reality. We will be in the full, unmitigated glorious presence of God, in the Land of Promise, His Kingdom.
May you, my brothers and sisters, become a different people.
May the principles and practices of Leviticus shape you into a holy people.
May the mercy and justice of God be made evident to you in all of scripture, and especially in Leviticus.
May the blood of Jesus, a perfect lamb, without spot or blemish, cover you, redeem you, cleanse you of all sins.
May God, my brothers and sisters, bless you!
Jake Ballard
————————————
Note : To be fair, this is a hunch, not a statement of fact or even a solid belief. If you disagree and believe that Moses, or whoever authored this book, wrote it this way on purpose as directed by God, then that is certainly an acceptable view. I just want to point out the fun, interesting quirks of books. This is similar to how John 20:30-31 is a good ending to the book, as well as John 21:24-25. Just some fun food for thought, but not the focus of the devotion. Keep reading above.
————————————
(Jake Ballard is Pastor at Timberland Bible Church in South Bend, IN. He lives in the Michiana Area with his wife, daughter, and in the summer, two more little ones. If you’d like to say hi you can find him on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/jacob.ballard.336  You can also hear more teachings at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs_awyI1LyPZ4QEZVN7HqKQ  If you want to have an interesting conversation with him, just say “I don’t like the ninth guy in a blue police box.” God bless!)
Today’s Bible reading can be read or listened to at https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus+26-27&version=NIV
We made it through the book of Leviticus and learned about God on the way.
Keep reading!  Tomorrow we begin the book of Numbers (chapters 1 & 2) as we continue on our 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan

Making a Differing People : Lex Talionis and the God of Justice.

Leviticus 24-25

Leviticus 25 55 NIV
Depending on your source, Mahatma Ghandi and Martin Luther King, Jr. both believed that “an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.”
While we know from our reading and devotions that Jesus completes the laws of the Old Testament, and specifically changes the interaction of Lex Talionis, or the Law of Retribution, in Matthew 5:38-42, we must also not pass over the laws given in Leviticus 24 and 25 too quickly.
For example, the year of jubilee is fascinating, not least because we don’t have any concrete evidence ANYONE EVER practiced it! The idea was that the poor who sold themselves into slavery should be freed. I want to be very clear : SLAVERY IS WRONG. Morally, it is repugnant, and praise God it is outlawed around the world and being fought against by many organizations. However, in the time of the Israelites, slavery was practiced, especially as a way to pay off massive debts owed for any and all reasons. While we should be rightfully repulsed, in Leviticus 25, God drags humanity forward in the midst of their issues by giving some fascinating commands : If your countryman becomes so poor and has to sell himself, treat him as a hired man. (25:39-40) And no matter what is sold or bought, it all goes back in the year of Jubilee, (25:13) so you may all be equal, and in that year the slave must be set free. (25:54)

 

God takes a terrible institution, and begins to create boundaries around it. Remember, if this law had not been given, ALL slavery would be morally justifiable and ALL treatment of slaves would be unimpeded. But starting in Leviticus, God begins to prune this terrible human sin, begins to eradicate it among his people. God is taking barbarous humanity and forcing it to be graceful and merciful, to a degree.
Add to that the law of ‘an eye for an eye’ and we begin to see where God directly challenges the law codes of other nations.
In Leviticus 24:19-20, we read, “If a man injures his neighbor, just as he has done, so it shall be done to him: fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth; just as he has injured a man, so it shall be inflicted upon him.” Of course, Christ changes this law, but in the day it was given this was REVOLUTIONARY.
First, God is trying to stop something: exactly what happens in the life of Samson, specifically in chapter 15. Samson wants to go to his wife, but her father gave her to another man. Samson, in a rage, ties 300 foxes together in pairs, puts torches on their tails, and they burn the crops. Then the Philistines learn who Samson’s family is and burn his family. And then he slaughters the Philistines… OK, so God wasn’t trying to stop EXACTLY that scenario, but trying to stop the PRINCIPLE of that scenario. In our world, before the Law of God or without Law, violence is cyclical and escalating. Samson gets ticked off, so he burns crops, so the Philistines burn his wife, so he slaughters Philistines. It’s not pretty but it is the pattern of humanity. You attack my tribe and kill one person, we attack back and kill five people and you attack back… until we are all dead. Among the Israelites, God was saying, “when someone harms you, you only get to harm them back to a certain degree; namely, the way in which they harmed you.” This is a massive leap forward in our cultural and social interactions.
Of course, other national law codes were doing this at the time of the Jews, such as the ancient Babylonians (and possibly the Ancient Egyptians). But, while they may have grasped a portion of God’s truth, the Babylonians specifically missed a small but crucial detail. Leviticus 24:22 says, “there shall be one standard for you; it shall be for the stranger as well as the native.” In the Babylonian Law code, punishment was meted out based on the different classes of people involved. Men who owned land were above free men who were above slaves. If a man who owned land harmed a slave, financial compensation may have been owed, but if a slave harmed a landed man, then the slave could lose his hands or his life.
Not so with the people of God. Men were respected across socio-economic lines or boundaries. If a priest killed a peasant, the priest would die. In a law about punishment, God actually gives one of the strongest cases for the equality of all men (and women!) in Old Testament scripture. Whether or not the law was followed perfectly is quite beside the point; in principle, all people were equal.
This is why taking our time with the texts of Leviticus is so important. As you have seen this week, instead of getting stuck in “boring” and “confusing” laws, we are seeing God create a different people, a better people, a holy people. Praise God that we don’t have to follow all the Old Testament codes, but praise God even more that in these laws, he began to create a people who were BETTER, who were more CIVILIZED, more mature, more conscious of their place before each other and before God.
In Leviticus, God creates a people who are different, equal and free. As all people should be.
Jake Ballard
Today’s Bible reading can be read or listened to at https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus+24-25&version=NIV
Tomorrow’s Bible reading will be the final two chapters of the book of Leviticus as we progress through the 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan

Making A Different People : Repeated, Enhanced, and Focused

Leviticus 19-21

Leviticus 19 18 NIV
Today, let’s start with a quick rundown of the laws of each section and chapter, and then go back and focus on some important points.
Leviticus 19 has a lot of different laws covering many topics. You may notice some repetition between Leviticus and Exodus (and even other parts of Leviticus). Leviticus 19:3 is very similar in the command about honoring mothers and fathers in Exodus 20:12, for example. Moreover, certain laws are enhanced, like how the peace offering of Leviticus 3 is to be eaten. Leviticus 19 goes through topics like lying, going to psychics and mediums, and being honorable and above board in business.
Leviticus  20 contains laws that are about being faithful : being faithful to God over other Gods, being faithful to God over mediums, being faithful to your spouse over adultery, and being faithful to family over sexual gratification. God warns that being faithful is a prerequisite to possessing the promised land, and if the Jews act unfaithfully, the land will “spew you out!”
Leviticus 21 enhances all the laws so far and talks about how a priest must act and what priesthood requires. The life of a priest was a holy and blessed honor, but not everyone could be a priest, only a select group of people.
I know it’s a lot. But let’s break it down to three key elements:
Repeated : When God repeats something, he wants you to pay attention. For example, he gave us four gospels. Obviously, the story of Jesus was important enough to get four testimonies. So, when we see a law get repeated, we need to take inventory of that law. As noted above, some of the laws in this section are repeated from Exodus in the twelve commandments, some are repeated from Leviticus 18, and some will be repeated again in Deuteronomy. Look for repetition and see if you should follow that command in practice (how to be pure sexually) or if you should follow it in principle (how to sacrifice well).
Enhanced : Be careful that you are paying attention to commands and to whom they are addressed. When we look at the commands of Leviticus 21, we can see that there are additional regulations put on priests, not just any old Tom, Dick or Harry… or even Theophilus, Dan or Hananiah. Today, because of Christ, all believers comprise a royal priesthood.(1 Peter 2:9) But, even in that royal priesthood, those who are leaders, teachers, pastors, elders and deacons are held to stricter standards, and must be above reproach in their leadership. (For more on these requirements, see James 3:1(teacher); 1 Timothy 3(qualifications for overseer and deacon); Titus 1 (qualifications for elders) ; 1 Peter 5:1-4 (elder=pastor=overseer[all words refer to the same office]).)
Focused : Jesus gave many commands, but when asked what is the greatest commandment, he did something both completely expected and completely unexpected. First, he quotes the Shema, the ultimate Creed of Judaism : “Hear O Israel, YHWH is our God! YHWH Alone!” And he follows this quote up with the command that follows, “Love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.” This comes out of Deuteronomy 6:4ff. BUT, then he does something completely not expected. He FOCUSES in on a second answer, a commandment that was so important to Jesus it was LIKE “Love God with everything you have.” That command is found in Leviticus 19:18b: “Love your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus took a small phrase in the middle of Leviticus and said “according to God, this is the second most important commandment in all scripture!” According to Jesus, “Love God, Love People” summarized the whole law and the prophets (Matthew 22:40), which is another way to say the entire Old Testament. Quite a lot of focus given to something in the middle of a bunch of laws, related to not bearing a grudge!
If you ever wonder WHY reading Leviticus is important, remember, Jesus used Leviticus 19:18b to give us the SECOND GREATEST COMMANDMENT. That’s pretty important.
Jake Ballard
Today’s Bible reading passage can be read or listened to at https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus+19-21&version=NIV
Tomorrow’s passage will be Leviticus 22-23 as we continue on the 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan

Making a Different People: Healing and Uncleanness

Leviticus 14-15

Leviticus 14 2 NIV
Leviticus 14 and 15 have many rules about how to stay ritually clean and become clean, even after something that would make a person ritually unclean, like leprosy or bodily discharges. While this is, again, good but weird, we get the REASON for all these rules in Leviticus 15:31.  “Thus you shall keep the sons of Israel separated from their uncleanness, so that they will not die in their uncleanness by their defiling My tabernacle that is among them.”(NASB) Another paraphrase, the Easy-to-Read Version, puts it this way: “So you must warn the Israelites about being unclean. If you don’t warn the people, they might make my Holy Tent unclean. And then they would have to die!” God didn’t want disease, discharge, sickness, and other things that could be damaging to the community to come into the tabernacle or the temple, where everyone would gather. The community was being protected by God by keeping these rules. If someone ignored these rules and put the community in jeopardy, they would have to die.
But there was also MERCY in these rules. Though the leper may be called unclean, there was a process where they could be made clean again. Though these bodily discharges COULD be bad, there was a process for being made clean again. A person was not neglected by the community forever; there was always a way back in.
Today, that way back into the community of God, to become clean before him, is Jesus. And Jesus is better than the rules of the law. Here, the sickness had to end, the disease had to stop; only then could one be made clean and come before God in honor and with sacrifices. However, Jesus himself takes away the diseases, he makes us clean. This is why the story in Luke 8:42-48 is so powerful. A woman, who was ritually unclean because of her bleeding, believed Jesus could heal her. She risked everything to simply touch his coat. Every person in that crowd, and Jesus himself, became ritually unclean because of the law in this part of Leviticus. But Jesus was not concerned about his cleanness, but about the woman’s healing. Praise God that we have a healer, a priest, who can not only make us clean and allow us into the community, but can take away our diseases and give life to our bodies!
Jake Ballard
Today’s Bible reading can be read or listened to at https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Leviticus+14-15&version=NIV
Tomorrow’s reading will be Leviticus 16-18 as we continue on our 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan

Starving for God

Job 21-23

Job 23 12b NIV

Poor Job.  I do pity him.  But not just for the extreme losses and suffering he endured.  Not just for the additional pain of unsympathetic, accusing friends.  But for being born when he was.

Previously we have mentioned Job’s yearning for a mediator – someone to stand before God on his behalf.  Someone in the middle who would reach out his hands to touch both God and man and draw them together.  Wise Job.  Can you imagine how thrilled he would have been to have the opportunity to meet, listen to, accept and follow the Messiah, God’s Son Jesus?  But, it wasn’t time yet.

It also wasn’t time yet for him to hold God’s precious living, giving words of life in his lap.  Job knew the power and gift of God’s words.  He stated, “I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread” (Job 23:12).  But, at this time in history God would speak when He chose, where He chose, to whom He chose, and the record of his words would be passed down, mostly orally, to any who would listen. It was a good start – but Job longed for more.  He said:

“If only I knew where to find him;
if only I could go to his dwelling!
 I would state my case before him
and fill my mouth with arguments.
 I would find out what he would answer me,
and consider what he would say to me.”

(Job 23:3-5, NIV)

We know that Job will get the amazing opportunity to have the Almighty speak directly to him (that is coming in next week’s reading).  But that didn’t help him yet at the time of today’s passage.  He is searching for God.  He is starving for God’s word.  He needs to hear from God.  And he does not yet have the gift of God-breathed scriptures on his lap or in the palm of his hand.  God’s Word is powerful and a great treasure.  What a blessing we have in the gift of the Bible – where we find God, His wisdom, love, majesty, truth, encouragement, correction, as well as His Son, forgiveness, and a hope and a plan for eternal life.  It is an incredible gift to hear God.  It is an incredible gift to read the words of God.  It is a gift we too often ignore.

God warns that His Word will not always be readily available.  “The days are coming,” declares the Sovereign LORD, “when I will send a famine through the land– not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the LORD.” (Amos 8:11). Perhaps He was first referring to the 400 years of silence that would take place between the inspired Old Testament and New Testament.  But, I fear that it also refers to a time in the end days.  Perhaps we are seeing the beginnings of it even now.  Prepare by stockpiling God’s Word in your heart now.  It will help you both today and tomorrow.

If you ever feel God is distant – check to see how far away your closest Bible is.

If you ever feel you can’t hear God – turn off the distractions and open His Word.

If you ever feel you are starving for God – feast on His Word.

 

Seeking God in His Word,

Marcia Railton

 

To read or listen to today’s passage – https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Job+21-23&version=NIV

Tomorrow’s reading will be Job 24-28 in our 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan

 

 

 

 

Seek!

Jer 29 13

“For I know the plans that I have for you, declares YHWH, plans for welfare and not for calamity to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon Me and come and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.” – Jeremiah 29:11-13

 

Most Christians, myself included, are eager for God’s blessings, assistance, and attentiveness to our needs. We crave to know our Creator in an intimate way and desire that He listens to our prayers. However, we often forget that there needs to be effort on our part as well. In the same way that a relationship with a spouse is a 2-way street, requiring effort from both members of the relationship, so we are expected to put some effort into our relationship with our Heavenly Father. We are told, clear as day, that we will only achieve that intimate relationship with God when we “seek after Him with all of our heart”.

 

When I was growing up, I often went to church services and programs, but never put any effort into developing my faith. I assumed that, because Jesus died for my sins, that I wasn’t expected to do anything else. I told myself, “God knows I’m just young and dumb. He will forgive me”, without ever considering how much I personally needed to change and seek after Him. It took a dramatic act of God to get my attention and drive me to look deeper into my relationship with Him. Fortunately, God led me to Atlanta Bible College, where I was able to pursue Him intentionally and with great vigor. It was during this time that I truly felt that my relationship with Him had really  begun.

 

While not everybody’s story is the same as mine, the same command from God applies to all of us: “Seek me”. We need to be intentionally developing our relationship further with our Father if we expect Him to do the same for us. So, as we begin a new year and a new decade, I want you to consider the following questions:

 

  1. How is my relationship with God and Jesus currently?
  2. How much effort am I putting into that relationship?
  3. What can I do to develop that relationship further this year?

 

May you be blessed as you seek after your Heavenly Father in 2020!

-Talon Paul

 

One way to be Seeking God in 2020 is to commit to daily being in His Word – a most wonderful place to find Him!  Come join us on a chronological Bible reading plan!  Print out the 2020 Chronological Bible Reading Plan and start reading on January 1.  Subscribe to be a follower at the SeekGrowLove.com site and you will receive daily email devotions based on that day’s reading.  Come Seek Him!  You won’t be disappointed when He shows Himself to you.  It’s well worth the effort!   And, change a life by inviting a friend to seek with you.                                         – Marcia Railton, Editor

Seek Grow Love

(We had a name change last night!   What was formerly FUEL Bible Reading Blog – Grow16BibleReading has changed to a simpler SeekGrowLove.com.  Here you will still find daily devotions from various writers, all based upon God’s unchanging Word, encouraging and instructing us on how to Seek His Kingdom, Grow in Our Faith, and Love God & Others.  SeekGrowLove.  In the New Year we will begin a Chronological Bible Reading Plan – but more on that tomorrow.  Now for today’s devotion from Bethany!)  

Hebrews 4_14

Have you ever met someone and felt an immediate and unexplained kinship with them? The connection between you and your new friend provides the opportunity to relate in unique ways. 


About a decade ago, I was attending a fairly large church and looking for a small group Bible study to become involved with. The church had an online catalog of all the small groups that met and I chose to visit one that coincided with my demographics – single and thirty-something. 


Within minutes of meeting the existing members of the Bible study group, it felt as if we had known each other for years. We talked about ourselves and eventually our conversation turned to where we had grown up and gone to school. We discovered that two of us had attended the same high school – I was just a few years younger. While we didn’t know each other back in the day, we realized that we had a few mutual friends. Our instant familiarity now made sense. 


There’s something special about the people that you grow up with – even if you don’t know them at the time. You share common experiences, mutual friends, and a general understanding of the community that helped shaped you as an individual. 


For my friends and I, we were able to share more deeply, quickly and our friendships are still some of the most important more than 10 years later. 


Hebrews 4:16 starts off with “Let us THEN approach the throne of grace with confidence…” What allows us to do this? What’s the THEN there for? We need to back up and read verses 14 and 15 to be clued in. We can approach the throne of grace with confidence, because the one who sits on the throne is able to sympathize with weaknesses because He had been tempted in every way, as we are, yet was without sin. 


Jesus is familiar with what it’s like to live on this earth with all of its guts and glory because He’s done it Himself. Jesus is not a high priest who is oblivious to our situations. Our confidence comes from knowing that He can relate to us. The mercy and grace that we are offered is because Jesus first walked in our shoes. He knows what we need, when we need it, how we need it and why it’s needed. 


What an incredible gift this is to us! To know that our Savior is approachable because He can relate to our needs is such a comfort. 


So let this be your reminder that there is nothing too big or too small for you to bring before the Son of God. You will find all that you need to sustain you. Have confidence in this Good News.

 

Bethany Ligon