EverydayDevotions.com

Click here to read Isaiah 50 on BibleGateway.com

For your enjoyment, I give you the best joke of Immanuel Kant:

An Englishman at an Indian’s table in Surat saw a bottle of ale being opened, and all the beer, turned to froth, rushed out.
The Indian, by repeated exclamations, showed his great amazement.
Well, what’s so amazing in that? asked the Englishman.
Oh, but I’m not amazed at its coming out, replied the Indian, but how you managed to get it all in.

I’ll pause for a moment whilst you regain you breath after the riotous laughter. (And just a bonus fyi, the first joke on record is a Sumerian comment on the hilarity of flatualence. Date: 1900 BC. Hey, if a joke’s funny, stick with it.)

TWO SPHINXES WALK INTO BAR…

It’s fairly clear that humor has undergone some changes throughout history. What was funny 50 years ago is not funny now; just watch some of the old sitcoms and variety shows from the early days of television. Sure, there are some good moments, but overall the humor does not stand up to the ravages of time.

Of course, change doesn’t necessarily mean improvement. If you look at humor these days, what you’ll see most commonly in the comedy clubs is a ridiculously frequent use of profanities and sexual innuendo. If you look at “family-friendly” sitcoms, you will see sarcasm and mocking others as the mainstay. Is this better than pratfalls and Lucy stomping grapes?

Unfortunately, we have let cultural humor affect us as Christians more than we might think. When was the last time you met someone that never put anyone else down? Most of us can probably count those kinds of people on one hand. Even in churches on any given Sunday, you’ll hear more “funny” comments about dumb bosses, nagging wives, or spoiled children than the seldom heard encouraging word.

THE SMALL SPARK

The Bible tells us that our tongues are powerful; we can build or destroy lives with our words more easily than we can we violence. Isaiah 50 tells us “The Sovereign Lord has given me a well-instructed tongue, to know the word that sustains the weary.” If you are a clever person, if you have a way with words, then you have a responsbility. And that responsibility isn’t to make people laugh or be the life of the party. Your tongue is meant to sustain the weary.

The world is full of weary people. Walk down the street, and note how many of the people you see seem to be carrying an invisible burden. Talk to someone at your coffeeshop, and see how many are genuinely excited about their life. Most of your friends probably have a sense of weariness about them.

This is your opportunity. You can bring life and joy to someone, just by being an encouraging person. Not by pointing out why their life is messed up, not by mocking others with them, not by showing how wise you are. Simply by being an encouragement.

Who can you encourage today?

Click here to read Deuteronomy 22 on BibleGateway.com

Back in the 60s and 70s in the US, there was a popular philosophy that said basically “as long as you don’t hurt someone, you can do whatever you want.” If you want to put toothpaste on your Oreos, go for it. If you want to ride around town on your bike wearing a mumu, have at it. If you want to have a week-long drug-crazed orgy under the guise of a music festival, knock yourself out.

While somewhat outside the norm back then, this mentality has seeped into our culture at large, and now most Americans would agree with the sentiment without a second thought. As long as you don’t hurt someone, as long as your activities only involve consenting adults, as long as you live and let live, then you’re living a moral life.

NOW FOR SOMETHING DIFFERENT

Christianity stands apart on this. Repeatedly in the Bible, we are told not just to avoid doing wrong, but to do right. For example, many religions of the world have some form of the Golden Rule, but it tends to be in a negative phraseology: don’t do to others what you don’t want them to do you, don’t hurt others because you wouldn’t want to be hurt, etc. Jesus flips this around; he says not only should you not do harm, but you should actively seek to do good.

The Old Testament (you remember, the part of the Bible that has nothing to do with Jesus?) has this same sentiment. In Deuteronomy 22, we read the following commands (including the all-too-common fallen cow scenario):

If you see your fellow Israelite’s ox or sheep straying, do not ignore it but be sure to take it back to its owner. If they do not live near you or if you do not know who owns it, take it home with you and keep it until they come looking for it. Then give it back. Do the same if you find their donkey or cloak or anything else they have lost. Do not ignore it. If you see your fellow Israelite’s donkey or ox fallen on the road, do not ignore it. Help the owner get it to its feet.

BUT I TELL YOU…

Biblically speaking, it’s not enough to just not steal; you should actively help someone who has lost their possessions. Finding a dropped hundred dollar bill on the street isn’t a cause for a dinner out; you should try to find the owner. If the cashier gives you too much change, you should give it back, even though it “their fault.”That’s what makes the Christian life so challenging. It’s not just following a list a rules, it’s a continually striving to behave better, to “be perfect, even as the Father is perfect.” Will we ever get there? Probably not (except for my wife, of course. She’s perfect. And cute.) But the command isn’t “don’t be like Satan.” The command is “be like God.”

That should be enough of a challenge to keep you busy for a while.

Click here to read Isaiah 48 on BibleGateway.com

There’s an old saying (old in that I can’t remember where I first heard it, coupled with being too lazy to look it up) that says “most of us spend the week sowing wild oats, then go to church on Sunday and pray for crop failure.” We’ve all seen them in church. Note the man who spends all week developing mathematical irregularities in his business accounting, then makes sure to put an extra twenty bucks into the offering. Pity the poor woman who sees the two people she had been “discussing” earlier in the week talking to each other in the foyer after church. The single who “slipped” during the week, and prays that if there’s just no pregnancy this time, it’ll never happen again; the obese man who prays for a clean doctor’s report whilst planning the after-church run to Burger King; and the parent who promises they’ll monitor their kid more closely, if only those shop-lifting charges are dropped this week.

ALL I WANNA DO IS WHAT I WANNA DO

Why do we do it? Is it just part of our nature? Paul talks about knowing the good he should do, but still doing the other. We know we should spend time in prayer, but the game went late. We know we should read the Word, but that guy on Facebook is soooo wrong; he must be corrected for the good of the world. We know we should give to the poor, but those shoes are only on sale this week. We make excuses because deep-down we believe that what we “want” to do is more important than what we “should” do.

Here’s the question: do we really trust God? He gives us some pretty direct outlines for behavior throughout the Bible, along with what will happen if do or don’t follow them. Do we believe Him? Or do we think “well, yeah, but this is a special circumstance.” Yes, I know I’m supposed to submit to authority, but my boss isn’t even a Christian; I’m sure Jesus didn’t mean to submit to him. Yes, I know I’m supposed to give to the Church, but if I don’t pay this bill, they’ll cut off my cable; surely Jesus wouldn’t deprive me of the NFL. Yes, I know I’m supposed to turn the other cheek, but I can’t just let people walk all over me, right?

FATHER KNOWS BEST

The point is not “can you follow this list of rules to prove you deserve heaven,” but “if you follow these direction, you will have life fuller.” Do you believe it? Do you really trust that even when it seems crazy, God’s way is really the best? Or do you think “if only God didn’t have so many rules, life would be so much better.” Isaiah tells us today that God “teaches what is best for you…if only you had paid attention to my commands, your peace would have been like a river.” Can you do it? Can you follow God’s commands and trust that He knows what’s best, even when it seems “wrong” or “old-fashioned” to you?

God tells us that consequences will follow our decisions.  If we follow his directions, the consequences will be for our benefit; if we don’t, our consequences will come back to bite us in the country hams.  If we plant seeds from God’s word, we’ll harvest His plan for our life.  If we go our own way, then we’ll have to live with the results that we get, rather than what an infinite Creator has planned for us. Which do you prefer?

Will you be excited to reap your decisions? Or are you praying for crop failure?

Click here to read Isaiah 43 on BibleGateway.com

Why is it we like to add to the Bible? A few years ago, one of the more common phrases you would hear in sermons was the idea that “you will never be happy until you get saved,” or something along the lines that when you get saved, then you will have few problems in life. This is an amusing take on the Christian life, since Jesus pretty much guaranteed “in this life, you will have troubles.”  Hard to see how those two ideas are compatible.

One of the biggest (and easiest) dangers of sharing Christ with others is modify the gospel into what we think the Bible “should” say.  We add in our own interpretations, because that’s what the Bible “really” means.  We all do it, and there’s probably no way to really get away from it altogether, but it’s vital that we present the Gospel as close to how it’s presented in the Bible as we can.  You doubt? Let’s consider two scenarios.

A-B

Suggesting that somehow getting saved is your ticket to a life of ease is not only laughingly unBiblical, it’s also harmful. Let’s imagine that you are a non-Christian, and some well-meaning believer tells you that once you get saved, God will remove all your problems. Sounds like a good deal, so you sign up. You walk the aisle, you say the prayer, you buy the study Bible, you join the choir. Six months later, you lose your job because you can’t work because you just got a diagnosis of Brazilian Inflammatory Disease, which your health insurance won’t cover. What now? Where is the problem-free life you were promised? Perhaps this Jesus isn’t who you thought. Perhaps all of it is a lie. Perhaps you were wrong to ever start down this road in the first place.  Maybe that friendly cult down the street is taking new admissions. Soon you’re eating only rice cakes and wearing a lime-green toga.

Now let’s look at what the Bible actually says. Isaiah 42 says “when” you pass through the waters, “when” you walk through the fire, “when” you pass through the rivers; no “ifs” in there. The troubles will come; no doubts, no exceptions, no maybes. But God says I Will Be With You. Yes, troubles will come. They always do in this fallen world; sometimes through our doing, sometimes we are completely innocent. Regardless, they come. But God will be with you. The fire will not consume you. You may have a singe here and there, you may have a smokey smell of a weekend barbecue gone wrong for a while, but you will come through it.

LO

That’s the promise God gives. To go through it with us. To suffer right along with us; to give us that peace that passes understanding in the midst of all the chaos of life. And why? Because “you are mine.” We are His. He has called you by name, out of the billions of people that are or have lived. He knows your name; He’s calling you.

When you understand what the Bible actually says, the problems that come in life will not rock your theology.  After all, why should it surprise you when troubles come, you were already expecting it.  Instead, you can rest in the trust you have that God is working through the troubles to bring about His will.

Take heart; He has overcome the world.

Click here to read Psalm 99 on BibleGateway.com

Back in the day, every playground designed for children had the instrument of humiliation known as the See-Saw or TeeterTotter. Nothing says “hey, you’re a big fatty” like requiring four of your classmates to balance out your girth. Not to be outdone, even the skinny nerds got to enjoy the pleasure of the class athlete jumping off the totter as it reached the towering apex of the pendulum, the sheer terror of the fall, and the coccyx-jarring impact of the gravel-strewn ground. Depending on your location, this was known as the Atomic Drop or Cherry Bomb. Either way, it led to a recess of tender walking around the playground plotting revenge against the offender.

And of course, as one got older, the most important challenge on the playground (aside from pushing down that girl you liked and running away giggling like that suave Prince Charming you are) was to stand astride the SeeSaw like a mighty Colossus and balance out the two sides. Travel the world over, visit any playground for more than an hour (with people around, of course) and it is almost guaranteed that some daredevil of the minor-est degree will attempt the feat.

THE BALANCE BEAM

Have you ever considered why it is we crave to balance things in the world? Why do we try to balance a coin on the edge (admit it, you’ve tried it.)? Why do we want teams to be “even”? Why do we want the rich to become poorer, and the poor to become richer (even though by just about any standard, even the poorest in America are in the top 10% of the world) ? Why do we enjoy watching the mighty politician or televangelist fall?

In all of us, there is something that craves a balance to our existence. Could it be that perhaps God himself is the ultimate in equivalence? Jesus as God and Man? God the Father as Creator and Destroyer of the world? The Holy Spirit as Convicter and Comforter?

ONE WITHOUT THE OTHER

So why should it surprise that God is both merciful and judgmental? Psalm 99 says that God is “to Israel a forgiving God, though you punished their misdeeds.” God, in his infinite balance is both Mercy and Judgment, He is Holiness and Love, He is Infinite and Intimate.

For some reason, we have decided in our culture that a Loving God would/should never punish anyone, or allow anyone to be punished (or even to suffer the consequences of their own actions). However, this type of God is radically out of balance. The God that is revealed in the Bible is in perfect harmony and perfect balance eternally; to deny an aspect of who God has revealed himself to be, is to re-make God in our image.

And that’s just begging for an Eternal Cherry Bomb.

Click here to read Isaiah 33 on BibleGateway.com

One of the big challenges of the post-modern Christian is to separate our understanding of the Bible from our culture.  Not that this is a new thing, of course. The ancient Romans saw the model of the Roman Empire in scripture, and built their church accordingly (looking at you, your Popeness).    The early modern Protestants saw the Enlightenment outlined in Scripture, and many of our modern churches reflect their touch.  So, it should come as no surprise that when post-modern Christians read the Bible, we see our own culture (or what we think are the good parts of our culture) reflected there.

For example, it’s easy for us to focus on turning our country into a “Christian” country.  We want giants of the faith leading us, like Washington (cough-slaveowner-cough), Jefferson (cough-Deist-cough), or Lincoln (cough-astrologer-cough).  We want our country to be the city-on-a-hill that we envision that it was in the past.  Surely God is in favor of democracy, right? After all, everyone knows that’s the best political system, even though the examples of voting are few and far between in the Bible.  (but they’re actually there, you just have to read between the lines.  right?) We know that God is in favor of our political party, right? Every moral and right-thinking person would be.

IN GOD WE TRUST

However, in so doing, we miss what the Bible clearly says about culture, particularly our politics.  Our trust should not be in our legislature, our Prime Ministers or Presidents, or our system of Justice.  Isaiah says in our reading today that the Lord alone is our Lawgiver, our Judge, and our King.  This is not a division of powers; this is recognition that all power, all authority, all right to rule comes not from us, but from the Creator of all that is.  Our own philosophies and political theories are nice, but Jesus is our Lord; period.  There is no voting in heaven; it’s a dictatorship through and through.

Can we accept that? Can we accept that we have no rights, no petitions, no checks and balances on God? He is all and in all and through Him all have their being.  There is no other.  Can we accept that we exist merely by His desire? That without Him, we are nothing.

GIVE IT AWAY

It’s a tough idea for us to swallow in our day.  We have been saturated with the idea that we are all powerful in our own way, that we have the right to do or say or be anything we want.  Can you accept that you have no rights, once you give them away to Christ? Can you accept that maybe we bring as much cultural baggage to Scripture as any unreached people group? Are you willing to give up your vision of who Jesus “should” be, and realize that it is our vision and ideas that must be changed?

Can you accept that He is Lord?

Click here to read Isaiah 2 on BibleGateway.com

When you’re a kid, grownups often talk about the responsibilities that go along with adulthood: rent, insurance, frivolous things like food. What they don’t tell you is one of the greatest joys of being an adult: lying to little kids. Those little urchins will believe anything that a large person tells them, no matter how preposterous.

For example:

Yes There Is A Cub Scout Badge For Washing My Car
When the ice cream truck plays music, it means they’re all out of ice cream.
If you sneeze with your eyes open, your eyeballs will fall out

THAT WAS THEN…WASN’T IT?

Luckily, as we get older, we realize that those people with the deep voices are sometimes wrong, teasing, or imbecilic.  But have you ever wondered if maybe you’re believing lies now?  How would you know?  You didn’t know then; perhaps the things you think are so true now really aren’t.

Rene Descartes famously stated “I think therefore I am.”  But are you sure you are really thinking? When you’re asleep, you think you are awake.  Mirages can be pretty convincing.  Our perception of reality is notoriously unreliable: oars look like they bend in water, sound is affected by the Doppler effect, and our memories are ridiculously faulty. Yet we will continue to trust that perception no matter how much proof comes against it? Why is that?

The truth is that that we have to trust something: either our own perceptions, or an outside source.  Do you think that you accurately perceived the world when you were eight years old?  What makes you think that you are accurately perceiving the world at eighteen? or forty-eight? or eighty?

TRUST AND OBEY…FOR THERE’S NO OTHER WAY

This is the heart of the idea of “belief” in the Bible. It’s not focused so much on “I think that’s real” like you might say about unicorns or dragons. Rather, a better translation is “trust,” such as “I trust my teachers know this information will be on the test, so I’ll do my homework.” It’s a choice to obey; admitting that perhaps we don’t know everything. In the Bible, belief and obedience go hand in hand.  The book of James even says that demons believe in God.  Just knowing or not knowing God is real is not the point: trust and obedience is the point. Jesus says “if you love Me, keep my commands.”  Believing in God necessarily implies that we trust him over our own wisdom.  Can you bring yourself to accept that?

Do you trust that God has the best plan for you? If so, why do you keep trying to figure things out on your own? Why are you fighting for your “rights”? Why are you trying to decide which parts of the Bible are “right”?  Either you trust the Bible is accurate, or you trust some other source, or you trust your own perceptions.

The choice is yours.

Isaiah 2:22 – Stop trusting in mere humans
    who have but a breath in their nostrils.
    Why hold them in esteem?

Click here to read Numbers 45 on BibleGateway.com

[Today’s post is for adults only. Parental guidance is suggested. In fact, more parental guidance would be good in general in our world.]

Ok, today let’s confront an issue that is rampant in our culture: the lack of sex. “Wait a minute,” you say, “our culture is saturated with sex. What we need is more good ole Bible based agape love. Not more of that icky naked stuff. Jesus would never have gone for that.” There’s some truth to that, for sure, but we need to be careful not to throw the booty out with the bath water.

WAIT, THAT’S IN THE BIBLE?

One of the key characteristics of the Bible compared to other religious texts is the unflinching portrayal of reality. The Bible admits that flattery sometimes works, that leaders and kings play favorites, and the rich oppress the poor if they can get away with it. This is not to say the Bible approves of these of things, but it clearly reflects reality. After all, who knows us better than the Creator?

Along with that, the Bible mentions sex at a frequency that some pastors and teachers may be uncomfortable with. The origin of the 12 tribes? A little polygamy, a little male prostitution, and a little incest are all included. Abraham, David, and Judah all could trace the major troubles of their life to sex. As far back as Adam, the two-becoming-one-flesh is central to God’s plan for mankind. And let’s not even get started with Solomon and his racy books.

The problem is that sex and sexuality have been so distorted in our culture, that as a Church we’ve decided it’s best to just ignore it as best we can, except maybe a marriage retreat once a year or so. The idea that couples should enjoy themselves sexually as part of their worship strikes us as odd, and probably somewhat self-serving.

NOT THE LEAST JOT OR TITTLE SHOULD BE CHANGED

Unfortunately, this means that we have to try to avoid all the times the Bible talks about our sexualness. We take verses and say “no, this is really about God’s love, not man-woman love. That would be too racy for God.”(the same God who has descriptions of entrails falling out in the Holy Word apparently thinks that a breast is too disturbing for his people to read). Song of Songs is sometimes portrayed as a metaphor between God and Israel or Christ and the Church. Our reading of Psalm 45 today is similarly regarded as metaphorical, rather than simply a celebration of the marriage of king to his beautiful princess bride.

Why are we so afraid to accept that God created sex for his creations to enjoy? Why do we allow the perversion of the world to rob us of what God created? When was the last time you finished your prayer time with your spouse with a roll in the hay? Does that strike you as inappropriate or crass? Why? When was the last time you heard a sermon on Godly sexual fulfillment? Does that seem out of place at church? Why?

There’s a hesitancy in us regarding sex, but we are sexual beings. We are what God made us – yes there is corruption because of the Fall, but the Bible is full of celebration of human sexuality. Let’s not shy away from it, let’s not pretend that that’s not part of who we are, part of how God designed us. Let’s seek instead to understand how to express sexuality in a pure holy way that is pleasing to Christ.

Let’s try to understand that the Bible is not asking to remove part of our humanity, but to express it fully in the manner that God intended.  Let’s not let culture determine how we read the Bible and the Author’s message to us.  The Enemy seeks to rob us of all the good gifts that God gives; why should this one be any different? Why should we let the Enemy make evil what God intends for good?  To have life and that life to the full; isn’t that what Christ promises and  intends for us?

Plus, smooching is fun.

Click here to read Numbers 8 on BibleGateway.com

This is one of the best times of the year, and not just because it’s fun to sneeze snot all over everyone’s new spring outfits (thanks, pollen!).  All across this great land, thousands of high school and college students are preparing for graduation, the culminating 47 minutes recognizing years of agonizing labor.   It’s enough to make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.  Or to realize the futility of all life.  Either way.

It’s always nice to see all these young men and women with the glow of success fresh in their eyes.  The whole world is their burrito; nothing is impossible.

WHEN YOU HEAR THE CHIME, TURN THE PAGE

That is, until they have to start the new year of college in the fall. Or can’t find a job with that new shiny degree.  Or find out that their alma mater of Bob’s MBA-o-Rama isn’t fully accredited and their degree isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on.  When we check in on these bright young stars in ten years, they’ve become the bitter cynical adults that we all love.  What’s happened?  More importantly, why is this important to our reading today? Prepare yourself; there’s a hard segue coming up.

Exodus through Deuteronomy is a period of transition for the Israelites, graduating from nomadic herdsmen, to slaves, to a nation. During this important time of formation for the Israelite nation recorded in the first few books of the Bible, God put in place the idea that all of the first born children of Israel belonged to Him (it’s complicated. Just trust me for now.)  However, rather than accept all the various tribes, God declared that the entire tribe of Levi would stand in proxy for all those others (a nice setup for Jesus standing in for our sins, by the way).

Imagine that day: you’re in the tribe of Levi.  You, your family, your relatives; you’re the chosen people.  All those other chumps can only look on in jealousy since you get to work in the temple every day.  Your whole life will be surrounded by God’s presence.  It’s like graduation day for Bible college.

THE ROCKS OF REALITY

Yet stats tell us that 50% of new ministers will not remain in ministry for five years; only 1 in 10 ministers actually retires as a minister; 70% struggle with depression, and 90% feel unprepared for the demands of ministry.  What does this tells us?  That life in ministry may not be the cakewalk that the Levites (and possibly some of us) think it may be.  It is relentlessly draining, emotionally challenging, mentally exhausting work, and you never clock out.  Several Levites figure prominently in the stories of God’s judgment to come, and they were held to higher standards than the other tribes regarding sacrifices and lifestyle.  They’re proximity to God, while a blessing, also carried more sacrifice in their lives.

Is that the way you view your pastor? Do you appreciate the extra burden that they are under all the time? Or is it easier to sit back and criticize? To complain about how much or little they work? To complain that their kids aren’t behaving as you think they should? Rather than pointing out everything they’re doing wrong, might it better serve the kingdom of God to support your pastor? To tell him he preached a good sermon this week? To be supportive of her new ideas? To point out their good points to others, rather than their faults? Imagine what a difference it may make in your church.

When people give up their lives to full time ministry, we should respect and honor them.  They may be carrying more than we ever know.

Being chosen by God is a wonderful thing; but it’s not an easy thing.

Click here to read John 3 on BibleGateway.com

Writing a devotional on John 3 is like opening a box of Krispy Kremes and deciding which one to eat: no matter what you pick, you know it’s gonna be awesome.  There’s probably more packed into this chapter than just about any other in the Bible.  So, what to focus on today? Since Tebow has the 3:16 market covered, let’s look at 29-30.

JESUS FIRST, OTHERS SECOND…

What’s the most joyful moment of your life? Is it when you get an award? Graduation? Finding an extra Mt Dew at the back of the fridge? Hitting the snooze alarm for the 3rd time?  Or is it more to do with another’s happiness? Is it when your son hits his first home run in T-ball? When your daughter marries the man of her dreams? When your wife is honored for her work?  The most joyful times in our lives is when we are celebrating someone else reaching their potential, not our own glory.

And yet we continue to seek our own success as if that will bring us happiness.  In today’s verses, John the Baptist has some of his followers tell him that Jesus is “stealing” some of his disciples.  John almost laughs at them, saying “awesome.  that is my whole purpose, to point others to Jesus. ” John understood that his purpose was not focused on his own recognition, his number of followers, his influence; his calling was to direct others to Jesus.  He even reminds them “umm…I’ve already told you that the Messiah was coming; there He is. Go get ’em.”

ALL THIS AND HEAVEN TOO

Then John says the real truth: “Now my joy is complete.”   Real joy does not come from being glorified in ourselves, but in pointing others to Christ.  We are greatest when we become the least. When we fulfill exactly what  our purpose is, others will be running to Jesus, not to us. His joy was full and complete when others were directed to Christ.  John 10:10 says that Jesus came to give us a full, abundant life; that life is dependent on us releasing our own desires for recognition and pointing others to Jesus.  When that’s done, our purpose in life is fulfilled and our time on earth will be abundant.

And then our joy will be complete.

Sigh. This is going to be a rough one today, so prepare yourself.  Normally EveryDay Devotions tries to steer clear of controversial topics, but every once in a while, they come up.  What can we do but face them head on?  So it shall be today.  It’s abortion discussion time, my friends.

The pro-life/pro-choice debate fills our culture these days.  It pits our desire for freedom against our desire to care for the weak.  It even divides families and churches, with strong, Bible-believing Christians on both sides.  The first thing we need to recognize is that being either pro-life or pro-choice is not the measure of our salvation.  When we stand before God on judgement day, He won’t ask if we were pro-life; Jesus will say either “I know him” or “Away from me, I never knew you.”  So, let’s first agree that, while we may be passionate about this, we are still brothers and sisters in Christ.

THE BIBLE TELLS ME…

There are several passages in the Bible that are used to support a pro-life position, such “knit together in my mother’s womb” and other famous passages.  However, there is no question that parts of these passages are poetic (do we really think God has a couple of darning needles in a woman’s belly?).  So these passages are really not conclusive.  So, rather than go through them one by one, since that has been done elsewhere, let’s look at one particular one from today’s chapter.

Exodus 21:22 is used by pro-choice proponents to argue that God does not see a fetus as a living child.  It is usually quoted in English like this: “If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman’s husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine (KJV).” or “If people are fighting and hit a pregnant woman and she has a miscarriage but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman’s husband demands and the court allows.”  The argument follows then that a miscarriage (or abortion) in and of itself is ok (just a fine), but if the mother is injured then there must death to the perpetrator.

At issue of course is the idea of “mischief” or “serious injury” or “further injury.”  What is that referring to? The mother or the child?

TO THE LIBRARY

So, in the time-honored method of arrogant scholars everywhere, let’s look at the Hebrew.  The word for “miscarriage” there does not have the connotation of death that our English term does.  The word is “yasa” and is translated “miscarriage” only here – in other passages of the Bible it is translated as “coming out” or “comes forth.”  In other words, a better translation would be something like this: “And if men struggle with each other and strike a woman with child so that the child comes forth, yet there is no injury, he shall surely be fined as the woman’s husband may demand of him; and he shall pay as the judges decide. But if there is any injury, then you shall appoint as a penalty life for life….”

In this more direct rendering, it seems clear that the “injury” refers to the child.  It actually makes a kind of sense, as a premature child would require more care and thus the fine would help cover some of those expenses.

Once again, this passage is not conclusive.  However, it seems clear that this passage cannot be used as conclusive reason for the use of abortion procedures.    How one wishes to apply that to one’s own beliefs regarding abortion are of course between the one and the One.

While this is a controversial subject for believers, and whatever our conclusions may be, let’s try to remember that we are all servants of Christ.  He is the one that will we stand before, not each other.  A little grace can go a long way to keeping peace as we all struggle to deal with these kinds of topics.

Click here to read Acts 20 on BibleGateway.com

Have you ever been compelled to do something? For example, are you now compelled to ask Mr. Google what “compelled” means?  Never fear: compelled means to force or oblige someone to do something.  You may be compelled by your parents to stop beating a sibling by the threat of a spankering. You may have been compelled by the law to either slow down or pay a reminder fee.  Perhaps you were compelled by the brownies on the counter to eat their little chewy centers.

Notice that “compelled” is different than “suggested.”  A friend may suggest that you pay for your share of the road-trip gas, but they only compel you when they lock the door and start driving away from the gas station in the middle of nowhere.  A bank may remind you to pay your loan, but they only compel you when they start garnishing your wages or taking stuff from your house.

OFF WE GO

In Acts 20, Paul is visiting some friends on his way through Greece and Turkey on his way back to Judea.  However, this is different than the other times Paul has visited.  He tells them that this will likely be the last time he sees any of them.  He’s on his way to Jerusalem, and since that is the home turf of Paul’s greatest enemies, he has a strong suspicion that things are going to get a little burnt on his toast.   His friends urge him to go somewhere else, but Paul replies that he is “compelled by the Spirit.”

When Paul says he is compelled by the Spirit to go to Jerusalem, the word actually means “tied,” as in “I am tied to the Spirit.”  In other words, I am bound tightly to the Spirit, and wherever He goes, I must go. It’s a little different than “forced,” in that you can force someone to do something or go somewhere; but when you are tied to them, they go only where you go.  It’s a relationship taken to its fulfillment.  Paul does not say he wants to go to Jerusalem, and he’s praying for traveling mercies or a hedge of protection.  He’s saying “the Holy Spirit is going to Jerusalem, and since I’m tied to Him, I guess I’m going, too.”

NOT MY WILL… 

Are you so tight with the Holy Spirit that you are forced to go where He goes?  Is your relationship with Christ to the point that you no longer say in your prayers “Jesus, please come with me,” but rather “Jesus, wherever you go, I am tied right to you.”  How many times do we pray “please, God, answer my prayer,” as opposed to “please, God, what is your heart?”

We can often get so focused on our goals and plans, that we tend to simply ask God’s blessings on what we want to do.  What a difference it would make to approach God with the attitude of “what are you doing today? Can I be a part of it?”  It’s a privilege to serve Christ; it’s not a service we provide to Him in exchange for something in return.  We are simply servants, pleased to be in the presence of our Master, wherever He might go.

Are you compelled by Christ today?

Click here to read Genesis 15 on BibleGateway.com

No question about it, the Bible has many passages that are somewhat difficult to understand. Ridiculous might be a better word. Swallowed by a big fish? Really? Coins in a fish’s mouth? And let’s not forget the ever popular maul-children-with-a-bear. Sometimes it seems like God enjoys using the bizarre to get our attention.

Yet there’s a pot of delicious Lucky Charms at the end of the Rainbow of Confusion. If we do a little bit of digging, these confusing passages not only become less confusatory, they may even be some of the deepest passages in the Bible.

MORE THAN A WISHBONE

So what’s going on in Genesis 15? Abram and God are hanging out shooting the breeze, and Abram tells God that he wants some little offspring to run around the tent-stead. God tells Abram to get a bunch of animals, cut them half, and put them in a line. Then Abram falls asleep, and a “smoking firepot with a blazing torch” moves between the carcasses. Seems like a ridiculously uninformative response for an omniscient being.

Once again, a little more info reveals the depth of what is going on here. In the ancient world, when a superior party made a treaty with a vasal, they would both take a “self-maledictory oath.” This is like bringing a curse upon yourself if you are unfaithful to the treaty. In this case, it means something like “if i don’t keep my end of the bargain, then may the same thing happened to me as happened to these animals.” Abram and God are making a deal; Abram will keep God’s commands, and God will bless Abram with children and other merriments.

GOTCHA COVERED

However, Abram already knows that he won’t be able to keep this bargain. His portion of the treaty is to remain faithful to God, and to keep His commands. But Abram already knows that he’s going to fail. He’s revealed himself to be a liar, adulterer, killer, con-man, and who knows what else. Just like all of us, Abram knows that deep down he’s pretty much a despicable scumbag. He basically knows he’s signing his own death warrant.

But this is the beautiful part; God steps in. He passes through the line of carcasses alone, taking Abram’s place. What’s He saying? He’s telling Abram “yes, I know you’re going to break this covenant; but when you do, I’ll make sure the worst of the curse falls on me.” Abram didn’t need to fear; God has it in control.

Jesus fulfilled that promise on the Cross. He took the full brunt of Abram’s (and our) failure. God continues to uphold His end of the deal made with Abram, despite his failure. He was split and tortured for our inability to keep our end of the deal with God. He took our failure and weakness, our sin and selfishness, and took all the pain and curse all on Himself. Is there anything that illustrates God’s grace more?

What ridiculous thing is God doing for you today?

Click here to read Acts 11 on BibleGateway.com

Ministry can be difficult.  Look at poor Peter in today’s reading. He goes out to evangelize, has a eye-opening spiritual experience, witnesses to a completely unreached people group, sees a wonderful revival service, and then gets back home only to have his home church kick him in the spiritual cajones for “eating with uncircumcised men.” What a joyous homecoming. At least he didn’t get stoned.

OLD WHINE SKINS

The problem is that often the challenges to ministry do not come from those outside the church, but from those who are supposed to be on our side. In nearly all surveys of missionary personnel, the number one issue that missionaries deal with is other missionaries.  Many pastors state their biggest difficulty is working with other pastors.  Why is that? The truth is, this should really not be that surprising to us. There are several issues that play into this.

1) We are strongly motivated in ministry because the issues we deal with are eternal. For example, in a business, if somebody rejects your idea, you may lose a promotion or you may lose a client. For those in ministry, it could mean hundreds spend eternity in hell. (That may not be true, but that’s how it feels). In this case, the Jewish leaders believe Peter is defiling himself and throwing the gospel pearl before swine.  Peter justifies his actions by referring to a spiritual experience they all had (the Holy Spirit).

2) Ministry is intensely personal. It encompasses our whole being, our emotions, our thoughts, our actions; everything that makes us “us”. So when somebody challenges that, it can feel like a personal attack.  Notice how Peter responds when the leaders attack him; he simply relates what happened and explains his actions without focusing on defending himself.

3) Our relationship with God is truth, at least for us. In other words, we believe God has spoken to me thusly, therefore this is how God speaks to everyone. It is very difficult to accept that God speaks to people differently, and maybe the ministry that God is calling you too is not the ministry He is calling your fellow workers to. Notice that later on in this chapter, there are some groups of believers that go strictly to the Jews, and some that go to the Greeks (Gentiles). Is it so bad to accept that maybe our passion is not the passion God put into everybody else? It’s surprisingly difficult.

AND NOW THE HAMMER

4) Finally, we fear other people’s calling. This is probably the harshest reality, but one that must be addressed. We are all insecure, and those in ministry seem particularly susceptible. We want God to use us, partly because we want to be used, and partly because we want to be recognized for being used. Jack Hayford once said that all pastors struggle with the giftings of those under them; the successful pastors have learned to embrace and celebrate others (especially those under them) in spite of the struggle. In this passage, the “mature” believers, the Jews, have a problem with the idea “new” believers, Gentiles, being called into the family of God. The only answer to that is time; eventually the Church accepted the Gentiles, but it was not an overnight process. We should expect to struggle with this in ministry, but also expect to overcome it.

In short, the struggle of Peter and the Jews in Acts is the same struggle we deal with today. What do we do when God uses others? Can we accept that? Can we encourage and celebrate their gifts and talents? Or will we hold them down and exalt our own ideas about how God should work? Can we work together even when our visions are different?

Are you willing to allow God to use others?

Click here to read Ezra 8 on BibleGateway.com

Have you ever put your foot in your mouth? Not physically, of course. That’s just gross. Unless you’re a baby, then it’s adorable. Of course, babies can get away with all kinds of gross stuff and be cute; try babbling and drooling when you’re sixteen to impress a girl. Babies get all the breaks.

“Foot in your mouth” means you say something without thinking, and then come to regret it. We’ve all done this. “Hey, when are you due? Oh, you’re not pregnant? Nevermind me, I’m just going to back slowly away.” “Man, that was a pointless meeting. Who plans these things? Oh, you did? Umm…I’m sure it was very informational for some people.” Don’t worry, though. Regretting what we said isn’t a new thing. Look at Ezra.

OPEN MOUTH, INSERT SANDLE

Ezra is planning to take a bunch of people from Babylon back to Jerusalem, a nice leisurely journey of over 900 miles across bandit-infested desert (no shrieking eels, at least). As he’s discussing his plan with the King, Ezra confidently says “Don’t worry, God will take care of us. No problem.”

Then the time comes to depart, and Ezra realizes what he did. He now has to take 1500 or so people (not soldiers, mind you, just a bunch of fatties who spent their lives living in the Babylon metro area) on foot across the headquarters of Robbers-R-Us. Ezra is having second thoughts; maybe a soldier or two from the king would be nice. But now he can’t, because he was so sure God will protect them. Now what? Ezra comes up with the only solution he can: beg God for protection.

Ever put yourself in that situation? Ever put God on the line? Sometimes we look at this as a bad thing; we don’t want to put God to the test after all. But is that really why we shy away from these statements? Or are we more afraid that if God doesn’t come through, we’ll look like idiots? Is it our humility or our pride that prevents us from confidently declaring what God will do?

THE HOLY FOOL

The Bible is full of people making bold statements about God. God will defeat you, Goliath; God will set his people free, Pharaoh; God will protect me in the lion’s den, king. Strangely enough, God always seems to back these people up.  Ezra and the fatties made it safe and sound in the end.

Maybe being a little foolish is just what God is looking for. He seems to delight in supporting people who make bold, and sometimes ridiculous, statements about Him. Are we able to do that? Or are we more comfortable hanging back and “humbly” saying, Thy Will be done? Which is more pleasing to God?

Are you willing to put your faith in God on the line?

Click here to read Acts 7 on BibleGateway.com

“That’s the last straw.” Have you ever wondered what the last straw really is? Like, for example, when one is hypothetically eating a couple dozen cookies, there comes a point when one knows “hmm…this was a mistake.” But at what point did that happen? Was it the 6th cookie? or the 13th? How would you know?  There’s a time when your kids are fighting that you cross over from “ok guys, time to stop.” to “ok, now I have a hankering for some spankering.”  What is the point when those little tushies cross the line into spatula targets?

In today’s chapter, we find out the last straw for many non-believers.  Stephen, a leader in the early church, is giving a quick history lesson to the Jewish leadership in Jerusalem.  He tells them how God has protected and guided the Jewish people through their history, and how great their country was in the past.  Then he drops the hammer: they are just like the “bad guys” of the past, attacking and betraying God’s prophets.

THE LAST STRAW

Notice that the Jewish leaders may get mad at Stephen when he rebukes them, but he doesn’t actually sign his own death warrant until he brings Jesus into it. Though they can’t have been real excited about him comparing them to the worst of their ancestors (not to mention the ultimate insult: “stiffneck”), they seem content to just be angry with him. But when he says he sees Jesus standing in heaven next to God, then they scream, cover their ears (la la la, i can’t hear you), and drag him outside to stone him.  What’s the difference? Why is it suddenly a stoneable offense?

In a word: Jesus.  People are generally ok with us talking about God. You can have debates about creation and evolution, comparing religions, or taking “In god we trust” off of money, and people can generally remain fairly calm. But once Jesus comes into the picture, specifically that He is Lord (that is to say, that we must submit our wills to his), then you will find people suddenly get very aggressive. Everybody likes to pray “God bless America,” but you don’t hear “Jesus, take my life” quite as often. Why is that?

LORD OR NOTHING

Notice that Stephen doesn’t just claim that Jesus is a great teacher, that He is a prophet, or even the Messiah.  He sees Jesus “at the right hand of God,” ruling with complete authority.  The idea of Jesus as a moral teacher is pretty popular these days, but Jesus didn’t come to be a teacher.  He came to be a sacrifice, to be a King.  Can we accept that? Or is that the last straw for us as well? Is it too much to give Jesus complete control of our lives? Would we rather just pick and choose the good teachings (at least the ones we agree with).

Are you willing to talk about Jesus today? Not about your “religion,” your “faith,” not about your “beliefs”, not even about “God,” but about Jesus as the Lord of your life. Will you stop considering your dreams and desires, and talk about giving up your desires to serve Christ?  Can you approach life like James: “If it is the Lord’s will…”

Are you willing to give up your rights, and maybe your life, to see Jesus at the right hand of God?

Click here to read Genesis 6 on BibleGateway.com

Have you ever read a book on optical illusions? If so, why? You know the pictures are lying to you. Dirty little weasels. And yet you just keep turning page after page, knowing that you hold in your hand nothing but a bound pack of lying Lyersons.  Do we enjoy being fooled? Do we get some thrill from feeling like a moron? Or is there just an inborn distrust in us that doubts our own perceptions.

Uncertainty is part and parcel to the human condition. We know that what we “know” is real, yet we can’t always bring ourselves to believe it. Sometimes what we know is easy to say, yet hard to believe. For instance, do we really believe God is loving? If that’s the case, then every single one of his actions must be informed by His love. We know God is Love (it says so in the Bible somewhere), yet we really suspect is a vindictive jerk.  Can our perception be changed? In other words, as we read through the Bible, is it possible to consider every act of God a loving act? You wish for an example? Very good.

LESS IS MORE

In Genesis 6, we read how God looked around and saw the growing wickedness of people after the Fall. God says “My Spirit will not strive with man forever. Their days will be 120 years.” There are lots of interpretations for this verse, but for the sake of argument, let’s assume the traditional interpretation: the lifespan of men will be cut to 120 years at maximum. Prior to this point, men (and women we assume) lived for hundreds of years. Usually people see this as a punishment, like a spanking with the mortality spatula. We used to live for hundreds of years, and now we only get roughly a hundred years, if we’re lucky.

So, let’s consider this passage in light of God’s love. Is it possible to see this as an example of God’s goodness instead of a punishment?

To start, we need to establish the reason we were created. In light of other passages, it seems clear that we were created for fellowship with God. Before the Fall, God used to walk with Adam every day, just hanging out, drinking some Dew and chewing a banana or two. But then the fall came. We were no longer able to see God face to face. The punishment for sin was death; not immediate physical death, but spiritual death culminating in eventual physical death.

THE TRUTHS WE CLING TO

If that’s the case, man was condemned to live out his life without God’s fellowship. We could not fulfill the purpose we were created for. The result of sin is death; hence, the only way we can be back into that relationship with God is to pass through death. Therefore, the longer we were alive, the longer we are out of that relationship. Instead of enjoying God’s full presence, we were condemned to a life of weeds, toil and suffering.

In his mercy, God shortened that time that we would have to be without Him. By shortening our lives to 120 years, God brought us back into His presence, into full joy, into the complete fulfillment of our creation, hundreds of years sooner.

That sounds just like a loving God to me.

Click here to read Genesis 3 on BibleGateway.com

Ah, the holidays.  In many parts of the world, we are only partway through the “twelve days of Christmas.” (December 25 to January 6).  That means we are right in the middle of the high-risk time for the infectious epidemic known as spoiledbratitis.  In the weeks leading up to Christmas, somehow children are miraculously well-behaved; smiles are wider, obedience is quicker, bottoms are less swattened.  Yet we’ve all see these same children not one week later returning gifts at Walmart or Toys-R-Us, and it seems as if all the demons of the brimstone netherworld have taken up residence in their little adorable spastic bodies.

The toy wasn’t new enough, the phone wasn’t advanced enough, the necklace wasn’t sparkly enough, the new bike was the wrong color, the new tablet is too small, the pants are too long, the dress is too poofy and the book is too booky.  How could ye ole present-giver be so monumentally stupid as to purchase such a worthless piece of eggnog.  If only Mom and Dad had listened to them, they would know exactly what to get.  Some people just shouldn’t have kids.

BILLY’S GARDEN HAS BETTER FRUIT

We might smile and shake our heads (or “accidentally” smack them with our cart as they pass), but have you ever considered how many times we approach God like a spoiled child?  If only He would listen to us, everything would be fine.  It’s only his crazy rules and archaic view of the world (after all, he’s been around forever, how could he possibly know what the best iPhone is?) that make life so difficult.

Look at Adam and Eve in today’s reading.  Not only do they disobey God’s rules about the Eden produce section, the reason they do it is to “be wise…like God.”  Interesting plan.  Even after they screwup, they decide to “fix” the problem on their own, and get some matching fig leaf ensembles.

But when God comes, he tells them the truth.  Their way is not good enough; they will be like God , yes, they know good and evil.  But now they can no longer stay in Paradise.  Similarly, they were right to try to cover their sin, but their way was not enough.  Plants were not enough to cover up their shame; it took the death of a life, an innocent life, to provide a covering for their sin.

HEAVENLY DADDY

Too often, we try to tell God how to be God.  We see all the evil around us – God should do something about that.  My child is dying – God should heal him.  There’s a hurricane coming – God should stop that.  God didn’t do what I thought he should – He must not be God. If He doesn’t do what we want, we throw a tantrum.  “You’re not my mom anymore; I’m gonna run away; I’m gonna go live with Janie’s mom.”  “You must not be God, I’m not going to church anymore, I’m gonna check out other religions/gods.”  Are we really so much different than that lil angelic demon-spawn at Walmart?

Are you able to let God be God? Are you able to look at the way things are and say “I still trust you.”  Are you able to say “I don’t know why I can’t have this fruit, but I’ll take Your word for it.”  Or do you have to know the reason why? Is God only God if He meets your expectations?  Will you still follow when He doesn’t make sense that you can see? Can you accept that He loves you and wants the best for you?

Can you accept that an unreasonable God might have the best reasons after all?

Click here to read Ezra 2 on BibleGateway.com

There’s a lot to be thankful for in this modern world.  The Interwebs give us access to just about any information we need at the touch of a button, not to mention the occasional dancing fox or two.  We can cross the globe in a few hours, only to discover that we don’t really like “authentic” Chinese food after all (hello, eyeball stew).  Not to mention refrigeration; raise your hand if you miss the rancid meat of the days of yore.   Can you imagine food poisoning when you’re locked in a suit of armor? Ish.

The New Year is usually a time when we look ahead and envision all the new joys and conveniences that are sure to come our way in the next twelve months.  It’s good to get a fresh start. Even the Bible reminds us that God’s mercies are new every morning. There’s something comforting to know that no matter what we’ve done in the past, God can start over with us at the point we are right now.

SANTANA’S SAGACITY 

However, all the appreciation and anticipation of the New doesn’t mean we should just forget what happened in the past.  In our chapter today, we read about several families that come to Jerusalem after the Babylonian Exile and claim to be Israelites, yet over the years their families have lost their records.  Whether they never believed that the Jews would ever return or just simply forgot to keep track, the end result was that they could not prove they were of the right family to serve in the temple.  They had let the day to day worries of life take precedence over who they were in God, and had lost the opportunity to be close to God’s presence.

God repeatedly tells us to “remember” throughout the Bible. Even one of the Ten Commandments says to “remember” the Sabbath. What does it mean to remember? Does that mean to just not forget what day Sunday is (or Saturday if you’re a scholar and/or somewhat a pretentious jerk).  Does God think we won’t be able to remember to take a day off every seven days? Clearly there’s more to it than that.

Remembrance in the Bible has less to do with forgetfulness and more to do with elevating something to a position of importance within your thinking. When God “remembers” Israel in Egypt, that doesn’t mean that they slipped his mind. It means that the time was now ripe for the next step of his plan.  When God tells us to “remember,” He is saying “keep this at the center of your mind.” When the Israelites didn’t keep God at the center of their lives, they “forgot” their destiny.

THIS DO…

In what may be the most important moment of Jesus’ life, he turns to his disciples and says “remember me when you do this.” Jesus is saying “elevate me and what I do tonite” to a place of honor in your lives. This is not a reminder from Siri that you need to take some bread and wine this morning at church. This is Jesus telling his followers that nothing is more important than His sacrifice and our relationship to it. Jesus knew that the troubles and worries of life would come along and distract us from what was really important. He implores us to remember.

This year, as we look forward to what God will do in the twelve months, let’s not forget what He did this past year. Let’s “remember” Christ.  Take a minute and think about the prayers you prayed this year.  How many did God answer (even if not in the way you wanted)? How may of those things you were so worried about actually happened?  What happened this year that brought you closer (or farther) away from God?

If we remember, this may just be the year that God calls us into his service or deeper into his presence.  Isn’t that what the New Year is all about?

Click here to read Acts 1 on BibleGateway.com

A new year upon us, my friends. And there was much rejoicing in the land. Whoopadeedoo.

As with any new year, you may be tempted to make this year better than last. You should just drop that notion right now. The odds are it will be pretty similar to last year, at least the parts you can control. Just same ole same ole; an endless day after day of under appreciation, aggravation, and petty annoyances.  Sound depressing? Take heart, my friend. Let’s see what the Bible says to us to start out our year. I betcha a leftover Christmas turkey (only dark meat though) that God has something to turn that frown upside down.

EENY MEENY MINEY…

In Acts 1, we read the story of the replacement of Judas. Obviously, you can’t just have eleven disciples. That would just be awkward. So Peter gets up one day and calls on who’s hanging around praying to pick someone to to replace Judas, but how to decide who it should be? After all, who wouldn’t want to be one of the Twelve? You get to carry leftover baskets, push annoying children away from Jesus, and have a brutal martyrdom to look forward to.  There’s gotta be a pretty long line for that gig.

To thin the field, the disciples propose a simple criterion: the new Twelver had to have been a follower of Jesus from the time of His baptism to the Ascension. Think about that for a moment. There was somebody (actually, two somebodies, at least) that had been a follower of Jesus for over three years. They had seen him raise Lazarus; they had seen the feeding of the five thousand; maybe they were one of the Seventy-Two that were sent out to be Jesus’ witnesses. Yet for all that, they were never allowed to be one of the “Twelve,” the inner circle, the ones Jesus ate with, hung out with, taught, and entrusted with his greatest missions.  In fact, we hear nothing about them at all in any of the Four Gospels.

Have you ever felt left out? That you give and give, and nobody appreciated you? That other people always get the credit and the attention? That you are always on the outside looking in? Imagine Matthias and Joseph Barsabbas following Jesus, always looking over the disciples shoulders, watching them get in the boat to watch Jesus walk on water, watching them walk off with Jesus to enjoy the last Passover. And yet, even after always never making the cut, they stuck it out. Day after day, week after week, year after year. They were still there with the disciples praying, waiting for the “promise of the father” in the Upper Room.

THE CLOCK STRIKES

Suddenly, Peter calls them forward. They haven’t been forgotten after all. The disciples (and we can assume, probably Jesus) had noticed them all along. They had seen their faithfulness. They were recognized and one was brought into that inner circle.

This year, there may be circumstances beyond your control. You may feel like you are following Jesus more closely than others, and yet they get the recognition and the praise. They may get the glory for putting on that special event, while you get blisters and a sore back from setting up and tearing down all the chairs and tables. You might go home at night and read all the praise raining down on people on Facebook, while your status gets two likes, one of which is your mom. Remember Matthias. Our mission is not to be the great, or even the known. We are called to be faithful. That’s all. Stay as close to Jesus as you can, for as long as you can. That’s our calling.

And who knows. This may be the year your name is called.

Click here to read Daniel 1 on BibleGateway.com

Sometimes certain concepts are hard to get ahold of. Like prepositions aren’t good to end sentences with. Or that pizza can actually be a health food. Or that beehive hairdos were once considered fashionable.

But one of the most difficult concepts for Christians to accept is that suffering can actually be God’s plan. We tend to pray for “safe travels,” divine healings,  and a good parking spot at the mall. We believe that God wants us to have a reliable car, that Grandma should either be healed or taken to heaven, and that if we have “enough” faith that all the lights will be green.

“YES, CAN I HAVE THE ‘NO PAINING’ SECTION?

This is really a foreign concept to the Bible. In fact, sometimes it’s hard to figure out exactly where this idea comes from. If we just look at a few of the people that we “know” were in God’s will, almost all of them suffered quite deeply. Joseph? slavery and jail. David? Exiled, overthrown, lost several children. Paul? Whipped, shipwrecked, imprisoned, starving. Jesus? Rejection, poverty, and an almost unimaginably painful death. Why in the world would we think that our walk with Christ should be any different?

However, as one of our great sages has spoken, don’t panic. Each of these guys also had encouragements as well. Joseph? God intended the evil for good, to save many. David? A man who was intimately in love with God and seen as one of the greatest kings in Israel’s history. Paul? Contentment and peace in all circumstances. Jesus? Risen, exalted, reigning forever.

In Daniel 1, we read about how “the Lord delivered Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, along with some of the articles from the temple of God. These he [Nebuchadnezzar] carried off to the temple of his god in Babylonia and put in the treasure house of his god.”  Can you imagine? Not only is the city conquered and Daniel and his buddies taken into captivity, but all of “God’s stuff” is stolen and taken to a foreign deity. Surely this can’t be God’s will, can it? Yet the Bible clearly says it was God who allowed this to happen.

INSERT FAVORITE “LO” VERSE HERE

The truth is that a walk with Christ will rarely be painless, and is certainly no guarantee of a life of ease. We don’t follow Christ because of material things that He does for us (though those can be nice), but because of who He is. Jesus doesn’t promise that life will be a walk in the park (in fact, he all but guarantees we’ll have trouble and trials), but He does make one overarching promise: He will be with us. What more do we need?

Do you have “enough faith” to believe that your sufferings today could be God’s will?

Click here to read 2 Samuel 20 on BibleGateway.com

If you had one word to describe yourself, what would it be? Is it possible to sum up a person with one adjective? For instance, if a friend of yours was describing you to someone else, what would they say? “She’s that friendly girl who works at the bank.” “He’s that tall guy at the gym.” “She’s that grouchy lady at church.” “He’s that obnoxious guy at the office.” Almost makes a man paranoid.

In today’s chapter, we meet two people, both of whom are described with one word. one is “a troublemaker named Sheba son of Bikri.” What a great reputation. Not “a man named..” Not “a soldier named…” Is there a worse way to describe someone?

The second is simply called “a wise woman.” It’s interesting that she is not given a name. She is just the “wise woman of Abel.”

AMASA TROUBLE

Notice the results of these two people. Sheba gets people riled up and in defiance of authority; people like Amasa. Poor Amasa. He gets all fired up from Sheba, and then gets his daily dose of iron in the form of a dagger in the intestines. On the other hand, the wise woman saves all the people of her village by talking Joab out of his agression.

At the risk of restating the obvious, the Bible is clear in I Corinthians 15 that hanging around bad people will corrupt our own character. Who knows, maybe if poor Amasa had been hanging around the wise woman instead of a troublemaker, maybe he would have come to a less pointy end.

CHARACTERS WANTED

We need to be careful about who we choose to hang around with. If we choose to date a non-Christian, is it more likely that our character will improve them, or that theirs will deprove us? (yes, there is the rare occassion when it turns out well, but how often?) If we hang around business men that have “iffy” practices, how long will it be before we pick up on them? If we constantly listen to music that has non-Godly messages, how long will it be before our actions and thoughts start to reflect those messages?

Today the challenge is take a moment and look at who we are spending our time with. If you had to choose one word to describe them, what would it be? Do you want that word to describe you?

Click here to read Mark 5 on BibleGateway.com

Since it’s summer, it’s only fitting that we talk about camp now and again. After all, it’s the one week a year that young people get away from their parents, spend time with God, and of course try to talk to a pretty girl in the Snack Shop. (“hey baby, i think God’s calling me to ministry. The ministry of smooch.”) Nothing draws a young person closer to God like than freezing showers, reconstituted eggs, and a round of dodge-ball.

In all seriousness, some of the times that many of us felt closest to God were at those summer Bible camps. For whatever reason, be it the focused time, the air of expectation, or just God’s divine Will, He seems to speak often at camp. More than one camper has really felt God’s presence for the first time, and what is the natural reaction? “Let’s have camp all year.”

UP UP UP IT GOES

Wanting to stay on that spiritual high point is not unique to our culture. Several times in the Bible, people experience God’s presence, and they want to just stay in that one place (Peter on the Mount of Transfiguration, for example). In today’s chapter, we meet a demon-possessed man whom Jesus delivers, and his reaction is probably similar to ours: he wants to stay with Jesus.

But Jesus turns him down. Why? Is it because Jesus is leery of having a chain-breaking lunatic in his little club? Not at all. He tells the man “you should stay here and tell people what God has done for you.” It’s more important that the man’s neighbors and friends see the change in his life.

GO TELL IT OFF THE MOUNTAIN

The mountain-top experience that we have God are great, and we should cherish those moments, but we need to be careful not to be so caught up in our time with God that we miss Jesus’ command: Go into the all the world. To focus on our own time with God at the expense of others can be not only immature, but also selfish and self-destructive. If our lives are to be a reflection of Jesus, we should imitate his choices as best we can. Notice that Jesus left his position of sharing in God’s glory (in God’s literal presence) in order to share with us. Should we do any less for our fellows?

How can you share your latest mountain-top experience with someone else today?

Click here to read Jermiah 15 on BibleGateway.com

Futility. Such a great word. It almost laughs at our futile attempts at spelling or pronouncing it correctly. How many words can openly mock you with their meaning by their very existence?  It’s so universal, too. How many of us have felt the proverbial wall against our forehead as we try to explain simple concepts to the dunderheads who surround us on a daily basis? (it’s called a “turn-signal, people.)

“SMITE THEM, AND THEY SHALL BE SMOTEN”

The lives of the Old Testament prophets are often a study in futility. They try repeatedly to share God’s truth with the Israelites, and time and again the Israelites listen only long enough for God to relieve their immediate suffering before disobeying God once again. CoughSoundsFamiliarcough.  Poor Jeremiah, the futiliest of the futile in the Bible, spends so much time futilely trying to convince his fellows to follow God that we could almost put his picture in the dictionary next to “don’t even bother.”

Many times we may feel the same hopelessness. We pray and pray for that loved one, and they still refuse to come to God. We preach and preach, and the congregation just looks at their watch waiting for the game to start. We give and give, only to have someone mock us for being selfish. How do we deal with it? We may do like Jeremiah, asking God to make them listen, or somehow make Himself more clear to people.

WONDER(FUL) WALL

But notice how God answers Jeremiah in verses 19 and 20: “if you utter worthy, not worthless, words, you will be my spokesman. Let this people turn to you, but you must not turn to them…I will make you a wall to this people… for I am with you.” God turns it back on Jeremiah; He will not make Jeremiah’s listener’s more receptive or his task easier, but He will strengthen Jeremiah.

We often ask the same thing; we want God to make our path through life as easy as possible. We want a nice home, a fun job, well-behaved kids, a church that is enjoyable but not too challenging, and a good retirement package. Yet God repeatedly says in the Bible that an easy life is not his goal for us. Instead, he walks with us through the storms. He makes us strong to stand against mockers. He makes us as stubborn as those who reject him.

Stand firm today; Someone is right beside you.

It’s awfully tempting to take the Gospel personally.  If we preach to a crowd, and a thousand people get saved, we consider that God must really be using us (or that other evangelist). We do a little dance, maybe write an article in the denomination’s magazine, maybe start a tv show.   If we preach, and the people in the pews fall asleep, we think we have failed God.  We go hide in our home, eat a box of donuts, and start looking at truck-driver want ads.

MAYBE IT’S NOT ABOUT US

Could is be that whether or not people accept the Gospel is not our responsibility?  After all, not even everybody who listened to Jesus became a follower, and he was probably pretty familiar with the Gospel.  The Bible says several times that “some believed.”  In other words, people heard the same message, and some accepted and some didn’t.

In today’s chapter, we see the apostles also had trouble, despite having a good reputation. Notice that the disciples and believers were held in high regard in the early days, and still people did not “dare” to join them.  Why is that?  If they were so well-regarded, why not join in?  The problem is that the leaders were against Jesus and his followers, and association could be embarrassing or even dangerous.  People were reluctant to give up their lifestyles to become a follower of Christ.

Maybe things aren’t so different now.  There was a recent study showing that professing Christians were less likely to be hired in certain professions.  Would you be wiling to give up your job to publicly declare yourself a Christian, or would it be easier to just stay quiet?  Follow Jesus quietly in your home?  After all, shouldn’t religion be a “private” matter? Isn’t it easier to be “open-minded” than to take a stand?  After all, who wants to be laughed at or yelled at?

THEN AGAIN…

Don’t misunderstand, sometimes people have good reason for disliking us, and it’s not always because of Jesus.  Perhaps we’re arrogant, perhaps we’re condescending, perhaps we’re a little disconnected from reality, perhaps we like t0 consider ourselves martyrs or missionaries on par with the heroes of the faith, perhaps we’re just plain ole jerks.  Not every time somebody dislikes us can be traced to Jesus.

However, let’s not completely discount it either.  Jesus was pretty clear that people will hate us because of Him.  In reality, this is a spiritual world, and the darkness can’t stand the light.  It is what it is.  We need to accept that if we proclaim Jesus, certain people will not like us for that very reason, even if they don’t exactly know what the reason is.  Are we ready to give up popularity, a good job, friends, or advancement for Jesus? Are we willing to be made “foolish” in the eyes of the world?  Are we willing to submit our desires, our lifestyles, our every act and thought to the Lord of Creation?

We must never lose sight that it’s really all about Him.

Click here to read Joshua 24 on BibleGateway.com

Ignorance can be bliss. If you don’t know exactly how a twinkie is made, you can just sit back and eat a dozen with no thought for what exactly you’re putting in you gullet. If you don’t know about tetanus, you can play in that deserted junkyard all day without a care in the world. If you don’t know Leia is Luke’s sister, you can avoid that slightly creepy feeling when she smooches him before swinging across that pointless chasm in the Death Star.

Unfortunately, once we gain knowledge, then we are held responsible for it. Once we know what’s true, we can’t pretend not to know anymore. Not only that, it seems in the Bible that God is actually willing to cut people slack for ignorance, but once they commit to serving Him, his standards go way up.

THINK CAREFULLY

It’s kind of ironic in our age of…oh, let’s saying begging… people to come to God, that Joshua actually almost flat-out tells the Israelites not to commit to serving God. Why? Because he knows they won’t be able to, and they will bring judgement on themselves if they commit now. It seems a far cry from our “raise your hand with no one looking” type of mentality.

It seems that we have a very light view of commitment in our modern world. If we have a bad day at work, we just quit. If we don’t pass a test, we drop out of school. If we have a fight with the spouse, we call a divorce attorney, or get an online lawyer, navigate here for more. If something is hard, we just figure it’s time to move on to something that’s a little less stressful.

DO OR DO NOT

Joshua tells the Israelites to carefully consider the promises they make. If they have no intention of serving God, they shouldn’t commit to serving him. We should follow the same advice. If you have no intention of being faithful to your spouse, don’t go down the aisle. You will have days that you consider it a terrible mistake; be prepared to stick it out through those days. If you have no intention of working hard, don’t apply for that job. You will have days when it seems the boss has an intellect rivaled only by garden tools; follow his authority anyway.

If you have no intention of submitting to God, don’t call yourself a Christian. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that a one-time hand raise is the same as serving Jesus as your Lord. Jesus said no one who looks back is worthy of being his disciple. It’s a serious thing, and should not be undertaken simply because an emotional moment. God will hold us to that promise; are we ready for that commitment?

What commitments are you taking lightly today?

Click here to read Matthew 26 on BibleGateway.com

Is there anything that fills the common man with a sense of drunken power more than knowing a secret about somebody else? Let’s say you know that Bob in Cubicle A113 is going to be fired on Friday, and he doesn’t know yet. Doesn’t that give you the feeling of an omnipotent deity? We stroll around the office, “burdened by our terrible knowledge.” We are dying for someone to ask us why we are suddenly so mature-looking with our majestic countenance, just so we can sadly shake our heads as if to say “oh poor pathetic mortal; I would not dream to cast such a heavy weight upon thy shoulders.”

Have you ever kept a secret? Not about your wife’s birthday present, but about yourself. Do you keep that one activity under wraps? Do you make sure to watch that TV show after everyone else is in bed, with the volume turned way down? Do you clear your browser history after visiting that one site? If we find ourselves keeping secrets, one of the questions that we try to avoid is exactly Why are we doing it.  Do we really think God is fooled?

A SECRET PLOT IS A FOOT

Notice that the Pharisees in today’s passage started “plotting in secret.” Why? If they were doing what was right for the whole people (as they claimed), if they were doing “God’s Work,” why would it be necessary to keep it a secret? Perhaps they should have taken a few minutes and asked themselves Why it was necessary to meet at night?

Secrets make us feel powerful. They make us feel that we are in control of what people know about us, that we are the ones with ultimate authority. Yet ask yourself, when was the last time somebody told you a secret that really surprised you? Isn’t the normal reaction “yeah, i kinda figured something like that was going on.” Perhaps people know more about us than we really think. Maybe keeping secrets isn’t so much giving us power, as taking away the strength and comfort that we might in another.

GO INTO THE LIGHT

We need to ask ourselves the reason for keeping the secrets that we do. Is it to protect someone else? There may be some legitimately valid reasons to keep a secret. Is it to spare ourselves embarrassment? Maybe others would say “yes, I deal with the same thing.” Is it to keep on doing the things we know we shouldn’t do? The bible says that evil loves the dark; perhaps we keep secrets for the same reason?

What secrets are you keeping today? Are you willing to bring them into the light?

There’s always a bit of tension between God’s blessings and our own work.  Jesus tells us that we should not worry about the future because God will provide all our needs, yet he also tells us to be wise with money. Will God bless us or does it all depend on us? How do we reconcile these two seemingly dissimilar ideas?

Imagine with me, if you will, a wee lil puppy (warning: shameless attempt at cutess in the illustration). If one is teaching a puppy to trust his owner, do you just fill a giant tub up with dog food and throw the dog in so he knows his needs are met? The answer is no; even if you tried it a bunch of times. Hypothetically. In order to teach a puppy to trust, you put the food in a dish on the floor, and the puppy wags and wiggles his little way over to the smorgsabord.

“BUT THAT HILL IS SO FAR AWAY”

In the book of Joshua, the descendants of Joseph faced a similar quandry. After the conquest of Canaan, they were all given a certain piece of land, but the Manassites (joseph’s decendants) felt that they had gotten ripped off with a parcel that was too small for them, and they asked Joshua for more land. Joshua answers “sure, you can have all the land over that hill over there, just go get it.” But the people said, “umm…there’s other people there. and they have cool rides. Can’t we just have land right here from one of the other Israelites?”

See the problem? God was providing a blessing for them, but they had to go take it. They had to put forth the effort and trust that God would give them victory; God did not just hand it to them.

BEHOLD, I AM THE GREAT GENIE OF THE LAMP

What is it about us that wants God to just provide our needs without any effort? We seem to have this idea that if God loves us, he should give us money to get out of debt; He should give us a new car (doesn’t he know how bad it stinks?); he should take care of that boss (doesn’t he know what a jerk he is and how much better we could run the company?). Would you give your children any and every thing they wanted? Is that what a loving father teaches his children?

Perhaps our concept of God’s Love needs a little rethinking.  Maybe He’s asking us to go take the hill with Him, instead of giving us the easy life in the plain.  Sometimes the best lessons come with a little struggle. Maybe He’s not so interested in granting our every wish and desire as helping us mature and, gasp, learn to trust Him more.

Are you willing to put forth the effort to find out?

Click here to read Psalm 33 on BibleGateway.com

Traversing through the entire Bible, one must admit that there are some areas of the road that are tougher than others (looking at you, Leviticus). But every once in a while, we come to a chapter that is like strolling through a green meadow; a meadow that is full of cotton candy vendors and plush lazy boy chairs. Let us partake of this wonderland together today.

“DUDE, TUNE THAT HARP!”

Psalm 33:3 is perhaps the most common favorite verse of musicians everywhere. And since musicians are typically known as children who never grow up (seriously, banging on drums for a living?), it seems only fitting that we acknowledge their favorite verse before they throw a hissy fit. Or steal our cords. Just to keep it simple today, we’ll focus on musicians in a church worship team.

Psalm 33:3 has three commands in its shortness. One, sing a new song. Now don’t get too defensive; hymns are great. There’s a depth to them that is often lacking in modern worship songs. But, every generation approaches God’s throne in their own way, and it seems that God enjoys variety enough that learning a new worship song or two is probably ok. So while modern songs may seem a bit repetitive at times or a bit simplistic, let’s not be too quick to judge the new wine but our old flabby wineskins

Two, play skillfully. True story; there was once a musician in a worship team who argued that the band didn’t need to practice, they just needed to pray and God would give them more skill. While the faith is nice, God tends to honor the effort that we put forth. For all you musicians out there, all those Psalms didn’t just fall out of David’s head; he played that sweet harp for hours out in the field. Don’t forget to do “whatever you do as unto the Lord.” When your fingers start bleeding, then you know you’ve probably practiced enough for one day.

Three, a loud noise. Oh, how some of us love this part.  Depending on your preferred translation, it will either say to play and shout for joy, or play with a loud noise.  In either case, we’re talking quiet chants here. There are many churches who equate volume with irreverence, and let’s be honest, it’s hard to worship when your ears are ringing.  However, at every concert and sporting event, the joyful audience is hardly quiet. They are, in a sense, exalting their team, and high volume is a part of it.  It seems appropriate that our celebration of God should not shrink from that exuberance.

CODA

Normally, this is where we’d sumup the day’s reading and suggest an overall point. But it seems a little pointless today, since the attention span of most musicians

SQUIRREL!

Click here to read Job 35 on BibleGateway.com

Elihu, the speaker in today’s reading, is one of the great unfortunately-ignored people in the Bible  If you’re not familiar with his story, let’s summarize:  Job loses everything he has; his three friends (Bildad, Eliphaz, and Zophar) come to “comfort” him and eventually get into a theological debate about suffering, good, and evil; Elihu is apparently somewhat younger than the others, so he holds his tongue until the end of the book when they’re all angry and tired before letting loose with an explanation of why they’re all wrong.  Gotta love a guy that waits till everybody exhausts themselves, then jumps on the wreckage.

INTRO TO GOD 101

With the small caveat that God refutes some of what Elihu says here,  he makes some very interesting points in his speech.  In fact, he hits on some of the key problems in our own relationship with God.  In verse 2, Elihu challenges Job on his very premise:  do we as people have the right to challenge God?  This is one of the most prevalent attitudes in our world today.  We want our relationship with God to be like a semester at Hogwarts; we learn some stuff, and then we learn to say/do/study the right words to get God to do what we want.  You will hear it voiced with statements “God wouldn’t do that…Why doesn’t God do something about…I don’t believe in a God like that.”  Elihu argues that we cannot tell God what is appropriate for Him to do, because , duh, he’s God.  Yet don’t we do this all the time? We tell God what He has to do so we’ll obey/believe/serve Him.  We leave parts out of the Bible that we don’t like, because “My God wouldn’t do that, and if He would, I don’t want that kind of God.” Isn’t it somewhat ridiculous for us to tell God He has to meet our standards before we’ll listen?

THE GREAT AND POWERFUL ME COMMANDS THEE!

Secondly, in verse 14, Elihu argues that when people claim they can’t see God, they are fooling themselves.  This is a corollary (look it up in a dictionary, people) to his first statement.  God can do what he wants, including decide how He reveals himself.  We often hear people argue that God needs to make himself known, and then everybody would believe in Him.  Elihu instead points out the foolishness of this line of thought.  God reveals Himself in nature, the Bible, and ultimately in Jesus, but we say ‘that’s fine, but You also need to reveal yourself by answering my prayer, or healing this person,etc”  We somehow think that God owes us the proof that we demand, in the manner that we demand.  For example, if God is real, he’ll take care of all the poor people.  Or make that person nice to me.  Or help me get a good job.   So, apparently, God not only has to justify his existence to us, but also His actions.  Seems reasonable.  In OppositeLand.

The Bible says that no one who stands before God on Judgement Day will be able to say “i didn’t know,” we are all without excuse when it comes to God’s righteousness.  How much more foolish would it be to blame God because He didn’t act the way we wanted?  Do we really think God is going to say “ok, good point. I should have asked you first about how to run the universe.  Come sit here beside me on the throne, oh wise mortal, and let’s straighten this cosmos out.”  The Bible says that anyone that says “there is no God” is a fool; how much more foolish is it to say “yes, there’s a God, but He needs to get my approval before he acts.”

See what I mean about Elihu being da man?

Click here to read Exodus 16 on BibleGateway.com

Sometimes I’m amazed there’s not more face-punching in the Bible.

All of us have felt the frustration of knowing what’s going to happen, telling someone what’s going to happen, and then watching as that person appears to be shocked and perplexed when the very thing happens that we happened to mention would happen. What is it about us that we can’t just trust others?

Me: Hey, don’t touch that pot, it’s hot.
Passerby: Really? *touches pot* Ouch! hey, that’s hot.
Me: Ok…”don’t” give me a million dollars.

MAGGOTY BREAD (FOR THREE STINKIN’ DAYS)

Things have always been this way, as today’s chapter illustrates so nicely. Let’s summarize: Israelites complain about no food in the desert; God provides Manna. Moses tells people to gather only enough manna for one day; Israelites gather more, which produces maggots and the  stank. Moses tells people to gather twice as much on Saturday, because there will be no manna on Sunday.* People go out on Sunday to look for manna. Moses punches the three Israelites nearest to him. Large brawl ensues. Aaron, recording for the Bible, decides to edit out the brawl for publication.

Blame it on original sin, the devil, too many Twinkies, or space radiation if you wish, but it’s pretty obvious that most of us react pretty strongly to people telling us what to do. We must find out for ourselves. In some ways, that’s not a bad thing; it’s that tendency to find out that has helped us to advance past leeches in the medical field. In other ways, such as bucking the bible, it usually turns out fairly negatively.

FORD’S CRAMPING ALL MY FUN

We sometimes get the idea that the directions in the Bible are there to “test” us, to see if we’re really faithful enough to God to warrant a trip to heaven. Instead, we need to try to look at the Bible as an “owner’s manual” for life. Example: Thou shalt not commit adultery. The point is not to take away our freedom, but rather God saying “I made you this way; if you go against this intention, your life will not go well.”

It’s like an car manual saying “change the oil every 3000 miles.” If you don’t change the oil, and the car break down, is that cause the manufacturer is coming to your house and smashing your engine to teach you a lesson? No, it because you didn’t follow the directions of the person who knows how it should run.

Today, the challenge for us is to strive to change our perception. Learn to see the Bible as an owner’s manual, rather than a test, and I think we will get closer to the heart of God.

And hopefully, there’ll be less face-punching all around.

*Please refrain from standard “Is sunday the sabbath debate?” We get it; you’re very smart.  Shut up.

Click here to read Exodus 12 on BibleGateway.com

One of the difficulties of living the Christian life is that often people outside the Christian family have a partial understanding of what the Bible says, and then they judge the whole Bible (and Christ) from that fragment of knowledge.

Passerby: So I hear one of Jesus’ disciples hung himself.
PewPotato: Yep.
Passerby: So the bible teaches that all Christian should kill themselves?
PewPotato: Of course no…
Passerby: I knew it. Just a cult.  You’re crazy.  When’s your Suicide Day?
PewPotato: Umm…

One of our primary responsibilities as ambassadors of Christ is to hopefully present a more complete picture of His Word. Exodus 12 highlights one of these often misunderstood principles.

The bible is often seen as racist to many (both within and without of the Church) with a passing acquaintance with it. They point to the genocide’s of Joshua and Judges, and to the emphasis on the Jewish people over the Gentiles, particularly in the Old Testament. There are several places wherein Jews are forbidden to marry those outside the nation, and even some executions for breaking these commands. Hence, some have come to the conclusion that the Bible is against minorities and particularly against Gentiles of any stripe.

THE REST OF THE STORY

However, this is a fairly simplistic view and misses the point of these measures in the ancient world. The emphasis of these regulations is not racial purity, but rather religious holiness. Consistently throughout the Bible, if a foreigner was willing to follow God’s direction, they were welcomed into God’s family, either Judaism in the Old Testament or the church family in the New. For example, see the stories of Ruth and Rahab, both of whom were not only foreigners, but despised for their national religious apostasy. Yet both were accepted into the Jewish community,and ultimately were ancestors of Jesus, showing not only God’s acceptance but his glorification of foreigners.

Today’s passage deals with the event and celebration of Passover. This is the quintessential Jewish holiday, wherein God officially “created” the Israelite nation. There are several regulations and limitations about who can participate, both in this chapter and through the rest of the Old Testament.

Yet look at verse 49: “The same law applies both to the native-born and to the foreigner residing among you.” Yes, foreigners were restricted from observing the Passover, but if they were willing to submit to God’s requirements for the Jews (in this case, circumcision , they were welcomed into God’s family. The restrictions had nothing to do with race or ethnicity, and everything to do with spirituality.

WE ALL WEAR WHITE ROBES IN THE END

Racism has no place in God’s Kingdom; even nationalism should be held very lightly in a Christian’s life. We are citizens of God’s Kingdom, not of any particular country. It seems that we sometimes confuse our patriotism (or political party affiliation) for religious zeal, and they are not synonymous  Throughout the Bible, God repeatedly stresses that in his kingdom (and hence the Church), there is no hierarchy of race or nationality. We need to be careful that we apply the same love and acceptance “both to the native-born and to the foreigner.”

Anything else comes from our desire to put ourselves above our fellow sinners, and that kind of pride should make all of us tremble before the True King.

Click here to read Genesis 25 on BibleGateway.com

Genesis is one of my favorite books of the Bible. It’s so easy to read; not as easy as a month’s worth of Far Side of course, but slightly easier than Leviticus. However, sometimes Genesis makes a powerful point, but leaves the punch unsaid. It’s like Thanksgiving dinner, but then leaving off the pie. The exclamation point is missing, and it leaves me wanting a little bit of Bible pie. Well, in line with my obvious commitment to benefit mankind by sitting on my rear and typing, today we shall dish up the holy pie.

NOTHING, WHAT’S STEW WITH YOU?

In Genesis 25, we get to meet the brothers of Esau and Jacob. It might be a bit of an understatement to say they had a strained relationship. While sibling rivalry exists in every family, you rarely see brothers handing out death threats or dangling a bowl of soup in front of a starving brother for money. But that’s what we see Jacob doing; Esau comes home from a long day on the hunting trail, and Jacob is working over the Foreman Grill with a large steak for him. Esau begs for a lil taste, which Jacob is happy to give him…in exchange for his birthright. In essence, Jacob offers to sell a sirloin if Esau will give up his future. Surprisingly, Esau agrees.  However, the Bible makes the rather drastic comment that Esau “despised” his birthright.

It used to appear to me that Esau got kind of a bum deal. He was starving, and his conniving brother ripped him off in a moment of weakness. To top it off, the Bible treats it like his fault, and for thousands of years people have been laughing at his moron-acy. Yet if we think about it a little longer, we can see that perhaps Esau is more at fault that might first appear.

WHAT IF

Let’s do a Let’s Pretend. Fact one – Esau knew that God had blessed Grandpa Abraham and Papa Isaac, so he knew the blessing of God was coming down to the next son in line. Fact two – he knew Abraham had been greatly tested by God, and was subsequently blessed. Fact three – ok, i lied; i have no fact three.

So, let’s pretend that Esau, rather than selling his birthright, says no. He replies “Jacob, i’m really starving, but I know if you don’t provide for me, God will provide some other way, because He has promised to be faithful to our family.” Do you really think God would not have honored that? Maybe Esau would be the blessed one; maybe he would have had the big family; maybe we’d be talking about the “children of Esau” and the Esaulite nation in the Middle East today. If had just waited a small bit longer, who knows what would have happened.

How many times have we missed out on God’s full blessing because we bail out when we get a little hungry? Maybe if we had prayed just five more minutes, God would  have spoken louder. Maybe if we had stayed just two minutes longer at church, we would have made a lifelong friend. Maybe if we had read one more verse, we would have heard the Holy Spirit speak and change our lives.

Today, I challenge you to give God just a little more. If you usually read a chapter in the Bible everyday, read 2. If you spend 5 minutes in prayer, spend 7. Your life may just change forever.

Click here to read Acts 22 on BibleGateway.com

When I was a kid, my brothers and I had a bit of a climbing problem. No bridge, building, or tree was safe from our vertical determination. However, you may be startled to learn that some people don’t appreciate children climbing on their places of business. So, we moved on to climbing up billboards, particularly those of well known national hamburger chains. Of course, boys being boys, eventually you have to raise the stakes, and we decided that to really show our superiority, we must not only ascend the heights of commercial advertising, we must also get our dance groove on.

So, one day, I was climbing up the Wendy’s sign with my older brother egging me on as usual (don’t deny it, you know you did.) In any case, after my ascent, I decided to forgo my usual MC Hammer impression and opted for the classic German dance instead. Unfortunately, we were unaware that this was a fairly new sign that had not been completely assembled, and as I got to the dramatic conclusion of my interpretative dance, coinciding with the end of the sign, the “Y” shook loose from the sign. Being the manly man that I am, I screamed like a girl and slid down the pole as fast as I could, joining my brother in time to watch the rather sizable letter drop 30 feet onto the roof of a parked BMW. Which just goes to show: it’s all fun and games until someone polka’s the Y out.

FUN AND GAMES

During our trip though the Bible, I’ve noticed that many times there is an “until.” For instance, one of the great stories of Jesus is when he feeds the five thousand, wherein Jesus uses 5 loaves of bread and 2 fish to feed the crowd at Bethsaida Square Gardens. However, immediately after that Jesus says “I am the bread of life,” and many of these same people leave him. They are excited to be around Jesus during the miracles, but when he reveals the cost of following him they are no longer interested .

Similarly, in our reading today Paul tells his story to a crowd of Jewish people. They love the first part of his tale, as God reveals himself to Paul and changes his life. That is, “until” Paul mentions that God has sent him to the Gentiles, which enrages them to the point that they call for his death, rip their clothes off, and throw dust in the air (tantrum, anyone?).

ALL IN

It seems that most of us have an “until” in our life. We are more than willing to follow God during the good times, but when things get tough we find ourselves drifting away. We attend church faithfully, until hunting season starts. We tithe always, until the money gets tight. We get up early to have devotions every day, until the ball game goes late the night before. We trust God with our future, until it means leaving our hometown/job/house/income, etc. If you look at your life, I don’t think you would have to look far to find your own “until.”

What is it in your life that is holding you back from following Christ completely? Are you holding back your finances? Your hobbies? Your time? Are you willing to give it up? Do you want to get to heaven and hear God say “well done” or “that’s pretty good, you followed me until…” Our walk with Christ is a constant challenge of moving past our “untils”, until we are transformed into His image.

Oh, and by the way, the whole sign story isn’t “true” in the strictest sense, at least as far as my parents know. Let’s keep it that way.

Click here to read Nehemiah 7 on BibleGateway.com

I can deny it no longer; I have somewhat of a Bible-crush on Nehemiah. As we’ve seen elsewhere, Nehemiah was a genius when it came to city administration, but I have to admit that even with my rose-colored Nehemiah-shaded glasses I’ve never noticed this particular gem of his until today. In today’s reading, notice how Nehemiah gives specific directions to the city leaders about when the city gates should be opened. Normally, the gates would be opened when the sun came up, when the city was just waking up, and closed when the sun went down. However, in this case, Nehemiah considerably shortened the business hours of Jerusalem. It seems that there may have been several reasons for this.

KNOCK KNOCK

1) Security
The best times for an enemy to attack would be either early morning before the whole city is awake and active or late in the evening when everyone is settling down for the night. Nehemiah’s plan insured that the gates would remained closed until the majority of the city was awake and alert, and that they would close before people started drifting off to beddy bye time.

2) Correct Priorities
It’s easy for the busy-ness of life to take over our lives before we realize it. By making sure that the gates, and by implication the city business sector, did not open until later and closed early, Nehemiah made sure that people had time to attend to their spiritual lives first thing in the morning and last thing at night. Bookending the day with prayer and devotion is good model for us to emulate today as well.

3) City Development
The Jews had just returned to Jerusalem in Nehemiah’s time, and it make sense that he would want the people to be working on cleaning/rebuilding the city as much as possible. This is similar to when people take off early during the summer work day so they can get home to mow the lawn, paint the deck, fix the torlet, or restock the lawn gnomes in the front yard. The more time people have, the more likely they will give at least some of it to fixing up the city.

Think this doesn’t apply to us today? Oh, how very double dip with chocolate chip wrong you would be.

SET A GUARD

Having trouble finding time for God in your busy schedule? Studies have shown that the best time to study is early morning or late at night. In other words, if you are struggling with your devotion time, perhaps getting up a little earlier or turning off the TV a little earlier would open up some time for you to spend in the Word.

Secondly, if you want to protect your spiritual life, beware the early morning or late night hours The Bible says that sin loves the darkness, and Internet traffic analysis shows that piracy, cheating, and porn traffic all go up when the sun’s down. Work while the sun’s shining, and be very careful when it’s not, or you may find yourself under attack.

Finally, make sure to take time away from work to spend on your own backyard. And I don’t mean the daffodils. Make sure that whatever your line of work, you make time for your family. If the house is rundown, the castle won’t stand long.

Nehemiah knew a small change in schedule could change the future of the whole city. What small change can you make today?

Click here to read Genesis 11 on BibleGateway.com

As you may have gathered from various other points throughout this site, Everyday Devotions is a little bit a stickler when it comes to what the Bible actually says (*coughretentivecough*).  Nothing gets a burr under the saddle quite like people misrepresenting the Bible text.  And before you get on your high llama about the pot calling the kettle black, we can all agree that today’s passage is one of the most misquoted in the entire Bible.  Put on your hip waders, my fellow Bible travelers, we’re going in.

RABBLE BABBLE

The tower of Babel is one of the most famous of all stories in Genesis. Let’s sum up the popular conception.  Some naughty people were living in some place, and they decide to build a big ole honking tower to reach God. God apparently doesn’t like people dropping by unannounced, so instead of helping them with their lincoln-log project, He decides to punish their insolence by mixing up their languages so that they can’t understand each other. Satisfied with another fine day of divine wrath bringing, God watches the poor jabbering masses wander off into the sunset to become the languages that we know and love today. Or manana, if you’re Spanish. And it’s tomorrow.

Here comes the burr: that’s almost a complete fabrication of the story. If this story were in pants form, it would be completely aflame. However, rather than rant and jump about in frustration at the injustice of this interpretation, let’s look at what the text actually says so at least we’ll be in the right, even if everybody else is wrong.

NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT

Point numero uno: the Babel-ites do not build the tower to reach God; there were plenty of higher mountains around if they wanted to gain elevation. They build the tower so that a) they will be famous (“make a name for ourselves”) and b) to not be scattered over the whole earth. In other words, they want to be well known and to be in charge of everybody, instead of letting all those servants of theirs go wandering off all over the world.

Point numbero two-o:  nowhere in the text does it say that God cursed them. In fact, later on in Revelation we see that there are many languages in Heaven, therefore languages cannot be a symptom of sin or they would not be in heaven.

Point numero three-o: the point of confusing the languages was to get the people to fulfill God’s command from Genesis 1:28 to cover the whole earth. The people at Babel were purposely trying to avoid fulfilling God’s commands, and God merely gave them a little boost to help them get back on the right track. The point of the languages was not to punish, but rather to help people receive the full blessing (i.e. the whole world) that God had for them.

While there maybe Sunday School teachers rolling over in their blue-haired graves, it is very hard to sustain the traditional understanding of this passage. For one more confirmation, look at Acts 2; when the disciples are baptized in the Holy Spirit, they speak with “other tongues,” confirming that other languages are a gift from God, not a curse or punishment.

So celebrate those foreign languages. Eat some nachos and soy sauce whilst you drive around in your volkswagon on your way to the chateau. You’ll have all eternity to enjoy the blessing of Babel.

Click here to read Matthew 9 on BibleGateway.com

In the words of one of the epic wise men of our time, many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our point of view. For instance, it’s undeniably true that a playoff system is far better for college football than the bowl system; unless of course you are a major college power, in which case the bowl system is better for your greedy, soul-less bowl promoters. Both cases are true, depending on your point of view and level of evilness. If point of view can change how we perceive life, the question naturally follows: what should our perspective be?

DO YOU SEE WHAT I SEE?

When you approach the “world,” i.e the people that don’t go to your church, what do you see? It seems that often we see “the others” as something less than friendly. Many of us are on various church email lists or facebook groups. In general, what kind of tone do these groups have about non-believers? Is the tone encouraging? Is it inviting? Or is it threatened? Is it talking about how God loves everyone, or about how some groups are destroying our heritage/culture/faith/country/etc.? What would Jesus think about these groups?

In our reading today, we see that when Jesus saw the “others” in the crowd, he “had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless.” Is that how you see people outside of your church? Do you have compassion on them? When you see people drinking at the local watering hole, do you say to yourself “man, I’m glad I’m not like those drunken sinners,” or do you say “God, how can I show these people your love?” Are you secretly glad when the stinky homeless guy who visits your church sits somewhere else, or does your heart break when you see him? When you see that woman with that revealing dress walk down the street, do you want help her see that God loves her no matter what, or do you think less complimentary thoughts about her attire?

One of the great challenges of the Christian life is to adjust our vision to see the world as Jesus sees it. It seems like we more often see non-christians as harassers rather than the harassed, or we are filled more with fear or disgust at the sight of the effects of sin rather being filled with compassion. How do we change our perspective?

YOU TURN YOURSELF ABOUT

Truth be told, it doesn’t seem like the Bible spells this one out, but Jesus does give us a couple of pointers that may help. He says “pray…to the Lord…because the workers are few.” It seems then that our first job is to pray; pray for God to change our vision and our hearts. We pray to the Lord; we must get to know Jesus or we will never see the world as he does.

Second, our beliefs must affect our actions. Though there are plenty of secular charities out there that do great work (i’m looking at you, Bono), the reality is that our relationship to Christ can greatly affect our compassion. The Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey reported that “the average annual giving among the religious is $2,210, whereas it is $642 among the secular. Similarly, religious people volunteer an average of 12 times per year, while secular people volunteer an average of 5.8 times.” If our focus is on Christ, our giving will reflect that.

Finally, we need to realize that the workers are few, so we need to get busy. We must realize that our work is needed, and that the most important thing we do is to just get started. Doing a little bit of something is far better than doing a whole lot of nothing. Often times once we start on the work, God reveals more of his vision to us, which leads us into more work, and more vision. We have to get started.

What will you see today?

Click here to read Acts 8 on BibleGateway.com

Why is it that the right thing is always so painful? Why do you have to work so hard to work out? Why is it better to save than to spend? Why is it better to think of others instead of ourselves? Why is it better to eat asparagus instead of a dozen snickerdoodles? One would think that God would make all the stuff that’s good for us also the easiest, wouldn’t one?

Well, today we get a little insight into God’s perspective on the whole pain thing. Let’s jump back just a bit to set the stage: in Acts 1, Jesus tells his disciples “you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” Sounds pretty good; a little talking, a little traveling, and it’s all good. But as Acts progresses, the disciples seem to be a little slow-going. We read how “every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts…and all the believers used to meet together in Solomon’s Colonnade.” The new believers enjoyed their new-found fellowship and joy, but they weren’t really doing what Jesus commanded.

COURSE CORRECTION

So, now we come to Acts 8, and Saul (soon to be Paul) gets his Pharisee Posse together to round up them nasty believers. He goes from house to house and puts anyone he finds into prison. Thus “On that day a great persecution broke out against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria…those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went.” Sound familiar? The disciples had been reluctant to leave the comfort of Jerusalem and the home church and carry the Good News to the rest of the world; so God either sent or allowed persecution to come against them, in order to encourage them.  A little divine swat on the tushy, if you will.

Notice how many of the great stories of Acts come after this point. It was the persecution that laid the groundwork for the great things that God did in the future. Though it’s unlikely that the disciples appreciated the persecution at the time, there’s little doubt that the miracles and wonders came as a result of the disciples being “forced” to obey Jesus’ command to spread out. God used the pain of persecution to get the believers back into his will and to show them a fuller glory.

RICE CAKE AND RAISINS

This is not to say that all pain in our lives is sent by God (after all, this world is not how God intended it thanks to Adam and the Evester), but Romans tells us that God works all things together for our good. Whether or not God is actually sending the pain is a matter of debate for the tweed-suit crowd, but we can trust that God is using that pain to advance his kingdom and bring us closer to himself. That means we should not necessarily be asking God to deliver us from pain or ask “Why are you doing this?” but rather we should be asking “How are you using this?” It’s not easy to change our perspective (actually, i’d rather have my toenails pulled out) but it’s important to understand that God’s desire is not necessarily for us to have an easy life, but rather a fulfilled life.

Now I have a choice to make: here sits my yogurt and my Hershey Kisses. Decisions are painful.

Click here to read Genesis 7 on BibleGateway.com

Can I share a pet peeve with you? Actually, I have several pet peeves, like when you’re eating a box of oreos and your kids keep whining like “we haven’t eaten in three days, Daddy. Can’t we please have one oreo?” Seriously. If you want to eat, go get a job and stop wasting all your money on diapers. I don’t know if that’s really a pet peeve; just seems so obvious. But, for something a little more universal, let’s look at a biblical pet peeve. Go and ask ten people who Noah was. At least eight of them will say “the guy with the ark.”  Then ask how long he was on the ark. Almost everyone will say forty days. It’s just common knowledge. The problem is it’s not true.

EIGHTEEN SCORE AND FIFTEEN DAYS

In Genesis 7, we learn that Noah gathered up his own personal zoo and packs them all into his big ole barge. But when the waters come, it’s not only rain; the waters also come up from the “springs of the deep.” In other words, somehow water came up as well as down, possibly as geysers or something similar. This downpour lasts for forty days, as most people know, but Noah and his family don’t come out immediately after the rain stops. In fact, the flood covers the earth for 150 days. But even now, the Noah’s don’t get to come out. In chapter 7, it says that the rains came when Noah was 600 on the “17th day of the second month,” and chapter 8 says that they came out of the ark when he was 601 on “27th day of the second month.” In other words, they were on the ark for one year and ten days, or 375 days. That’s a long cry from 40 days.

So what’s the peeve? So many people are “certain” of what the Bible says without actually reading it. It seems that we are all guilty of this. How many times have you heard people quote “God helps those who help themselves” as if it’s in the Bible? (it’s not.) Or that we all have a guardian angel (not mentioned in the Bible). Or that “God works in mysterious ways”? None of these things are in the Bible, but they sound so good we figure they must be in there somewhere.

HEZEKIAH 15:12

It seems that the more one reads the Bible, the more one is surprised as much by what is not there as what is. For example, did you know that many English translations do not even have the word “lucifer” in them? True story. Many people who actually manage to read the whole Bible make comments such as “I never imagined that was in the Bible,” especially when it comes to some of the more violent and racy parts. The truth is the Bible reflects reality and who we are as people, which is sometimes surprising, sometimes shocking, sometimes disgusting, and sometimes inspiring. But more importantly, it’s about who God is, and therefore it seems like it might be fairly important to actually see what He tells us about Himself. Just my opinion.

Since it’s January, let’s make a deal. As we move through the Bible for these little readings, let’s agree to actually read the chapter. I’ll even put a handy-dandy little link at the top of the page for you to click on. All you have to do is click and read. That way, when we finish going through the Bible, hopefully we’ll actually know what the Bible says, rather than what somebody heard somebody say about what sounds like it might be in the Bible. Not to mention that God may just say a thing or two to us in the process. Pretty sweet.

Guess I better feed these kids. Oreo wrappers are edible, right?