March 29, 2012

Thursday: March 29, 2012

Week 3, Day 5

READ: Job 3

BACKGROUND: This is a fairly straightforward passage. Sad & depressing, but straightforward. Remember that everything that Job had – including his family – had been taken from him and he was now afflicted with great disease and personal suffering as well. It isn’t shocking, then, that he declared that he would rather be dead or rather have never been born than to continue living as he was. In all of this, though, he never cursed God for any of the things that happened to him.

By Verse:
3 – Job wished he’d never been conceived
8 – “Let those curse it…” Those = sorcerers who thought they were able to curse a day and make it unlucky.
8 – Leviathan = A giant sea monster capable of destruction.
12 – “The knees receive me” refers to the father receiving a child while sitting on his knees immediately after the delivery.
23 – If we flash back to Job 1:10, we see that God had hedged Job in for his own good and protection and blessing. At this point, though, Job is viewing God’s hedge as a great burden and barrier.

THINK: (From Ray Stedman in: The Power of His Presence)

After this, Job opened his mouth and cursed the day of his birth (Job 3:1). In this chapter we find that Job asks three very poignant questions. The first one is, Why was I ever born? Job hopes his birthday will be forgotten. He is looking back to the day of his birth, and, although he cannot change it, he is saying, May its anniversary be ignored. Let it be a day that is darkened; let no one rejoice in it. Let it be a day of cursing instead of blessing. The reason for Job’s outcry is this was the day he was born, the day that produced him. You can see at this point how his life has become so miserable that he longs for death. Even all that he has enjoyed in the past seems of no value in the face of this tremendous anguish that he must endure.

Although Job comes very close to cursing God, he never does. He does curse the day of his birth, and he curses what God has allowed to happen. You can see how the pressure is increasing, and Job is beginning to break and crumble under it, as this unceasing, unexplained anguish goes on.

I do not think anything is harder for us to bear than unexplained trouble. If we could see some reason for what we have to go through, we could endure it much more easily. But when trouble seems to be pointless, it is a terrible strain on the soul. This is what Job is experiencing, so he cries out, Why was I ever born?

His second question is, Having been born, why didn’t I die at birth? He says, My life has been totally meaningless. It would have been better to have died when I was born. Job views death as a time of rest, a period of solitude and quiet after the tumult and trouble of life. I think many people see death that way. These verses indicate that Job’s understanding of life after death needs to be enlightened a great deal, and that is one of the reasons this suffering came into his life. At the end of the book, Job’s view of death is quite different than it was at the beginning.

Job’s third question is, Why can’t I die now? Job’s argument is, What’s the purpose of my life? Of what use is a life that is so filled with misery that you can do nothing but suffer and feel anguish? My life produces only fear and trouble, so it would be better to end it now. Many people feel that way. I do not think Job is thinking of suicide–he is asking God to take him home. There is no purpose to life, he says, when it is not enjoyable. That is a very common argument, and one of the reasons we have been given this book is to help us understand that life can still have a great deal of meaning, even when it looks absolutely useless.

I thank You, Lord, that though I can’t always see the reason for my suffering, You are at work through it.

ASK: Do we see our lives as giving us the right to demand our own self-centered agenda, or do we receive Life thankfully, as a gift? How do we bear unexplained trouble?

Posted by on March 29, 2012 in Poetry.

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March 28, 2012

Wednesday: March 28, 2012

Week 3, Day 4

READ: Genesis 5-6

BACKGROUND: Chapter 5 is a geneology and, like the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew 1, it is likely selective and not an account of every single generation back to Adam. Though many of us find genealogy to be rather boring reading, it was culturally important to the Israelites to trace their heritage. The most interesting thing about this chapter, though, is how ridiculously long all of those guys lived. I mean, according to Genesis 5 the earliest humans lived for hundreds and hundreds of years. That really begs the question: How? Is that even scientifically possible? The answer is yes. Both secular and Christian scientists agree that there was a great flood in ancient times and that the source of this great flood was very likely a canopy of water that once surrounded the earth collapsing onto the planet. This fits with the description in Genesis 1:7 of God separating the waters below from the waters above. Biologically speaking, with a protective ocean bubble of water surrounding the earth, the effect of the ultraviolet rays of the sun upon humans would be lessened considerably and the aging process would slow down so significantly that humans could live for hundreds and hundreds of years. Without that protective layer (post-flood) about the absolute longest that anyone could possibly live is 120 years – which is what God declared in Genesis 6:3. Pretty crazy, huh?

By verse:
5:24 – The only part where the genealogy breaks the pattern of saying how old the man was when he died. Enoch did not die. He walked so closely with God that he was taken up into Heaven without dying.
6:2-4 – Really weird passage. “Sons of God” almost always refers to angels or angelic beings in the Old Testament. There is no really good way to read this passage other than to say that some angels were tempted to sleep with human women, and that these unions produced human offspring. This was an act of rebellion by these angels. It is revisited in 2 Peter 2:4 & Jude 6. Also, the apocryphal book of Enoch describes the fall and the condemnation to Hell for these angels.
6 – What a sad verse. Our sin was so great and painful for God that he wished he hadn’t ever created mankind.
14-21 – God gave Noah very specific instructions about how to prepare for the flood.

THINK:  I have 2 younger sisters and a younger brother. Overall, I’d say that I’ve been a pretty good big brother to all of them and I always tried to set a good example (I might pay all of them to visit this site and tell you I was an AMAZING big brother), but, to be fair, I haven’t always been the most trustworthy big brother. I can recall a number of times when I tricked them into doing something or misled them so that I could pull a prank. Once I tricked my sister Kelsey into coming downstairs to the basement in our parent’s house – under the guise that I found a new song I wanted to play for her on the computer – and as soon as she got to the bottom of the stairway I shot her in the head with an airsoft gun. It was pretty hilarious if I do say so myself. 🙂 And once I can remember doing one of those trust activities with my brother James – the ones where one person is blindfolded and they have to pass through an obstacle course by listening closely to the directions spoken to them by their teammate – and I led him right into a wall. Also hilarious. Needless to say, by this point in their lives all 3 of my siblings have a healthy suspicion about what shenanigans may be afoot whenever I say, “Hey, come here…”

Sometimes we think about God in that same suspicious way. We hesitate to do what he is calling us to do because we fear that he doesn’t have our best interests at heart or that he wont be there for us in the end. We avoid following after his call on our lives because we aren’t certain what the cost will be and we aren’t willing to trust him completely. In our pride, we think that we know better than he does and we can make better decisions than he can about what is best for our lives. We foolishly walk around with a blindfold over our eyes and choose to go whatever way we think is best rather than listening to our Guide because we fear that he might lead us astray.

I think Genesis 6:22 is one of the most amazing verses in the whole Bible. Noah did everything just as God commanded him. Wow! God just told Noah to do something that seemed totally outrageous – even insane – but Noah trusted God so completely that he just followed. And that didn’t mean that it was easy. He faced public ridicule for following God. And it took a lot of time and a lot of sweat and hard work to complete the Ark. And at some points during the building of the Ark it seemed pointless – like God was just pranking him and wasn’t looking out for his best interests. But ultimately what happened? Because Noah followed God’s call upon his life and because he trusted God completely, God did something totally incredible in and through the life of Noah.

God wants to do something totally incredibly in and through your life too. But you have to swallow your pride and trust that he knows better than you do, and that his call is always what is best for you. And you can be confident of this: God, unlike big brothers, is always trustworthy!

ASK: What are the areas of my life where, if I’m honest, I think I know better than God? What are the things I know God is calling me to do that I’ve avoided because I don’t trust him the way that I should?

Posted by on March 28, 2012 in Law.

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March 27, 2012

Tuesday: March 27, 2012

Week 3, Day 3

READ: Romans 3

BACKGROUND: This is a bit long because it’s a thick, deep, & sometimes confusing chapter, but it is one of the most important & awesome passages in the whole Bible. I’ll try to keep my thoughts relatively short, but please don’t hesitate to ask questions by posting comments if there is something that confuses you or something you’d like to discuss further!

By Verse:
1 – Continuing a discussion from Chapter 2
2 – “Oracles of God” refers to God’s commandments. “Entrusted” means that they were supposed to live them, not just write them down and pass them along.
4 – Quoting Psalm 51:4
5-8 – Paul is careful to note that this (blasphemous) argument isn’t his own, but he is addressing the idea that if our sin makes God’s holiness stand out in comparison then God should be thankful for our sins instead of judging them and we should commit them more often.
10-18 – This is a compilation of different Psalms cut & pasted together. This wasn’t an uncommon thing for Jews or early Christians to do and this compilation may have been Paul’s own or may have been one that was already put together. Among the verses sampled: Psalms 14:1-3, 53:1-3, 5:9, 140:3, 10:7, 36:1 & Isaiah 59:71.
20 – God’s Law cannot save us because nobody can keep it. We can’t keep it because we are messed up & sinful. So, what purpose does the Law serve? It helps us clearly see our sinfulness and how far from God and helpless we are.
22-24 – Every person who ever lived has sinned and broken their relationship with God, but through faith in Jesus every person can be reconciled to him.
3 Super-Important Theological Concepts:
22 – “Imputed Righteousness” – We aren’t righteous. Our faith doesn’t earn us righteousness. God imputes (ascribes to us, counts towards us) HIS righteousness to us because of what Jesus did on the cross
24 – “Justification by Faith” – By God’s gift of grace through faith, Christ’s righteousness is imputed to us we and are counted as justified before God. This is a legal term (dikaioo) that means counted right/set right/declared righteous. This doesn’t mean “made righteous” like a change of character (that comes by the sanctifying power of the Holy Spirit as we live out our Christian lives) and it doesn’t correspond exactly with “forgiven.” Forgiveness occurs over and over again every time we sin. Justification is a once-for-always declaration by God that through faith in Jesus we are counted righteous.
25 – “Propitiatory Atonement” – A number of translations go with “sacrifice of atonement” here (which is a really helpful translation) but the actual Greek word is hilasterion which means propitiation. It is the same word used for the Mercy Seat atop the Ark of the Covenant. Jesus is the new Mercy Seat. The word propitiation means that not only has God chosen to ignore our sins or to look the other way but he has truly counted them gone and his wrath has been absolved. Jesus death on the cross served as a penal substation for us. He paid the penalty the God’s righteousness demanded for our sin and, in doing that, absolved God’s wrath against us completely. That is why Paul says it was a “sacrifice of atonement” or a “propitiation.”
25 – The sins of all the people who lived before Christ were not washed away – they were not absolved or atoned & there was no propitiation for them – before the cross! Participating in the sacrificial system of the Old Testament didn’t earn them forgiveness or satisfy God’s wrath. Instead, they received expiation – God looking the other way and not counting their sins against them – until the cross. On the cross, Jesus accomplished forgiveness and propitiation for all sins of those who believed – in the past, the present, & the future.
27 – We’re all equal and nothing we did earned our salvation. So, nobody can be proud or boastful. Even faith isn’t something we did. Faith is just accepting God’s free gift.

THINK:  One of my favorite TV shows of all time is Discovery Channel’s Deadliest Catch. In the grand scheme of things, it’s pretty much the same thing over and over and over again. They drop pots in the water. They sail around for a little while. They fight horrible weather and stormy seas. They haul the pots off the ocean floor. They dump the crab out of the pots and into their holding tanks. They repeat the process. And yet, despite the repetition, I could watch hours of Deadliest Catch without ever getting bored. There is something fascinating about the fact that, because of the incredible unpredictability of the weather in the Bering Sea, their lives are on the line at every moment. The show’s title, Deadliest Catch, stems from the fact that being a crab fisherman is the deadliest job in America per capita. A higher percentage of crab fishermen die while doing their jobs than any other occupation.

What really fascinates me is how many more crab fishermen would die if it weren’t for the United States Coast Guard. Every year, Coast Guard rescue divers jump out of rescue helicopters and plunge into the frigid waters of the Bering Sea to save crab fishermen who have fallen overboard or whose boats have capsized. They put their own lives on the line – and sometimes lose their lives – to save others. And I think this is particularly noteworthy because the fishermen don’t always necessarily deserve to be rescued. Sometimes they fall overboard because they are acting foolishly. Sometimes their boats sink because they made really poor decisions and they ignored the weather reports. Sometimes the situations they’re in are entirely of their own making – because of their own bad decisions. And their lives aren’t inherently more valuable than the lives of the Coast Guard rescue divers who go out to save them. And yet, no matter how undeserving the fishermen may be, the rescue divers fly out into the perilous storms, plunge into the thrashing waves, and put their lives on the line to save them.

Rescue is the central message of the Bible. Even though we’ve done absolutely nothing to deserve it, even though the situations we get into are often entirely of our own making, even though our separation from God is the result of our own rebellion and sinful choices, God stepped into human history to rescue us. He sent Jesus to die on the cross so that we could be forgiven and free and reconciled to right relationship with him. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and there is not one of us who is righteous on our own. (Romans 3:23, 3:10-11, Psalm 14:1-3) But despite our failures and our sinfulness, God reaches out into our lives and responds to our cries for help. At the cross, he gave his life to rescue ours!

ASK: Have I ever felt like God can’t forgive me or the cross can’t save me because I’m too messed up and I don’t deserve it?  Do I sometimes feel prideful about my faith – and about the way I follow God – as though I did something noteworthy or earned my salvation in any way? If rescue if God’s free gift through the cross, how should I respond?

Posted by on March 27, 2012 in Epistles.

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March 26, 2012

Monday: March 26, 2012

Week 3, Day 2

READ: Matthew 3

BACKGROUND: John the Baptist, like Jesus, was a special character whose birth God foretold (see Luke 1-2). He was actually related to Jesus – via their mothers, Elizabeth & Mary – and God had a very clear purpose and plan for him from the beginning. John was to be one who prepared the way for Jesus by going before him and calling people to repentance for all of their wicked ways.

By verse:
1  – The Wilderness of Judea is a barren desert wasteland on the coast of the Dead Sea.
3 – This prophecy is from Isaiah 40:3 (written about 700 years before John the Baptist).
7 – This is the first, but certainly not last, time in the Gospels that we see open challenging of the Pharisees & Sadducees. They were the religious leaders of the day, but they were constantly shown to be practicing outward religiosity rather than inward faith. Repenting of outwardly going through the motions without really having a relationship with God is exactly what John was preaching against!
9 – Some Jews clearly thought they were born into salvation. They thought their lives didn’t matter because they were Jews – descendants of Abraham – so they were “in” no matter what.
11 – Baptism is a form of identification. It doesn’t save people. It didn’t save people back then. When people got baptized by John the Baptist it meant that they were publically identifying themselves with his message of repentance. Jesus, though he had nothing to repent for because he was sinless, identified with that message of righteousness and repentance too. That’s why he got baptized.
11-12 – He is talking about Jesus.
15 – In being baptized by John, Jesus identified himself with the sinners he came to save.
16-17 – This is one of the greatest Biblical explanations/pictures of the Trinity. It is fundamental to our understanding that God is one in 3 persons: The Father, the Son, & the Holy Spirit.

THINK:  It isn’t easy to change. When I was a senior in college I had my appendix taken out (which is a long story for another day) but while the doctor was doing surgery he noticed that I had diverticulitis as well. Without getting into gross details about intestinal walls and stuff, I can tell you that his basic message to me was: If you don’t want this to be a problem for you later in life then you need to make a lifestyle change: you need to eat lots of fiber. That didn’t sound too hard to do, and so I went out and bought a giant thing of Metamucil – and I got a weird look from the lady who rang me up because not a lot of 21 year-olds buy fiber supplements. But here’s the catch: that fiber sat on my shelf for months before I even opened it. I knew what I needed to do, but I just never actually made the decision to do it.

It’s interesting to me that so many people in our world are in the same boat when it comes to following medical advice. For me it certainly wasn’t a matter of life and death; it was a matter of avoiding the possibility of discomfort. For others, however, the stakes are more serious. Studies show that even though almost all patients who receive heart bypass surgery are told that they need to change their lifestyles – healthy eating, exercise, etc. – if they wish to keep living, almost 90 percent of them do not change. They are staring a life or death matter in the face and they choose not to change. It isn’t easy to change.

John the Baptist preached a message of change. Doctors talk about physical change; John talked about spiritual change. He looked out at an evil and depraved generation who had lost their fire for God and gotten so caught up in the external stuff that they ignored what really mattered and he called them to make a change. He called them to repent. “Repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” – Matthew 3:3

But what does it mean to repent? What does that look like? Well, repentance means to make a change. It means to choose to shift the way we think about God and rearrange our priorities. It means allowing a personal relationship with God to define our thoughts, actions, & decisions. Repentance, at the core, means turning around. It means turning around from this path of sin and destruction and separation from God that we are on and making a serious lifestyle change. Change isn’t easy. But if we are willing to confess the areas where we have fallen short and settled for less than God’s best for us and we are willing to turn away from the sins of this world, then God is certainly willing to forgive, heal, & cleanse us. He is so willing to forgive us that he sent his son – a son in whom he was well pleased – to die on a cross for us! The only appropriate response for us is to make a lifestyle change no matter how difficult that is to do.

ASK:

Are there things in my life right now that I need to repent about – that I need to confess to God and turn away from? What are some lifestyle changes that I will have to make if I’m going to be spiritually healthy and give God his rightful place in my life?

Posted by on March 26, 2012 in Gospels.

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March 25, 2012

Sunday: March 25, 2012

Week 3, Day 1
Borrowed, again, since I am totally exhausted from the Amazing Race. Yesterday’s awesome post was written by my little sister. Thanks Cari!

READ: Psalm 4

BACKGROUND:
This is a short Psalm, but it is so powerful. To know that we can be at peace because God is in control is a wonderful feeling.

Verse 3: The concept of being “set apart” by God here is similar to the meaning of the term holy in the Old Testament. We are a holy people – set apart for God’s purposes.

THINK:
A mother and her 4-year-old daughter were preparing for bed. The child was afraid of the dark. When the lights were turned off, the girl noticed the moon shining through the window. “Mommy,” she asked, “is that God’s light up there?” “Yes, it is,” came the reply. Soon another question: “Will He put it out and go to sleep too?” “Oh no, He never goes to sleep.” After a few silent moments, the little girl said, “As long as God is awake, I’m not scared.” Realizing that the Lord would be watching over her, the reassured child soon fell into a peaceful sleep.

As Christians, we may confidently commit both the night and the day to our ever-faithful God. He is fully aware of our fears in the dark as well as our frustrations in the light. We can be assured of His constant care. His loving eye and protecting hand are always upon us.

Perhaps you face lonely hours because of illness or the loss of a loved one. The shadows of the night make the anxiety of your situation seem greater than ever. Doubts arise and fears flood your soul, robbing you of your needed rest.
Trust the heavenly Father, and with the psalmist you will be able to say, “I will both lie down in peace, and sleep; for You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety” (Psalm 4:8). Remember, God is always awake.

In His care confiding
I will sweetly sleep,
For the Lord my Savior
Will in safety keep. —Psalter

Written by: Paul VanGorder in Our Daily Bread, April 5, 2006

ASK: Do I trust in God during dark and difficult times in my life? How does it change the way I live to know that he is in control?

Posted by on March 25, 2012 in Psalms.

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March 24, 2012

Saturday: March 24, 2012

Week 2, Day 7

READ: Joshua 3-5:12

BACKGROUND: This passage has great significance in that it marks the crossing of the boundary into the promised land! The Israelites’ faith in God was renewed and strengthened when it was about to be most severely challenged, while at the same time the Canaanites’ fear was greatly increased. The author uses an “overlay” technique where he narrates the entire story and then returns to various points in the event to focus on several details.

By Verse:
3:3 The Ark of the Covenant was the most sacred furnishing from the tabernacle (Ex. 25:10-22). It signified the Lord’s throne, the Lord himself went into the Jordan ahead of his people as he led them into the land.
3:10 God’s method for bringing the Israelites through the water was to prove once again that He is the one true God and the god of the Canaanites (Baal) is not.The Lord passed first through the water and then waited while all of his army passed through to show that he is Lord over the waters and he is able to establish his own order in the world. Everyone who heard about this miracle would know that this land was the Lord’s.
4:6 A stone monument was commonly used as a memorial to remind future generations of what had happened at that place.
5:1-12 The two covenantal ceremonies that took place at Gilgal (cirucumcision and the Feast of the Passover) were significant preparations for the defeat of the promised land.
5:12 The transition from eating manna to eating the “produce of the land” ended 40 years of dependence on God’s special provision. Manna was God’s gift for the desert journey; from now on he provided Israel with food from the promised land.

THINK: I spent a week each summer at Pine Lake Camp in Eldora, IA while I was growing up. We always spent one afternoon at the Ropes Course. I dreaded the Ropes Course. After repeating the same challenges every summer for years, I had a hard time getting excited about completing the course. However, one challenge held enough thrill to keep it exciting year after year – the Trust Fall. One person would climb onto a platform about five feet off the ground while the rest of the cabin would stand below with their arms stretched out to catch the person that fell backwards off of the platform. I loved getting to free-fall off of that platform even though I never had complete confidence that the group waiting for my fall would really catch me. I couldn’t see them as I was falling, and there was always a good chance one of them would move too soon and I’d go crashing to the ground. Ultimately, I just had to trust that they were going to do what they said they were going to do…and thankfully they always did.

Let me remind you of God’s words to Joshua in chapter one, verse nine, “Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.”  God didn’t repeatedly remind Joshua to be strong and courageous because he was about to make Joshua’s life incredibly. He had to remind Joshua to be strong and courageous because he was calling Joshua to be faithful and obedient through some enormous challenges.

The challenge we read about in chapters 3-5 was just that – enormous. Joshua was charged with leading the Israelites (approximately 40,000 people!) across the Jordan River (approximately 1,000 yards) into the Promised Land. In verse eight, God prepares Joshua for this enormous feat by telling him what to tell the priests who would be the first in line, “When you reach the edge of the Jordan’s waters, go and stand in the river.” Joshua must have thought God was crazy and those priests must have been terrified! Just like in the trust fall, those men had no way of seeing how God was going to protect them from these powerful waters. God did not stop the water from flowing until their feet had touched the river (vs. 15). God required these men to take steps of obedience before they could see the miracle he was about to perform to protect them.

God could have easily said, “Check it out – I built a bridge right over the top of the Jordan,” so those men could have seen how He was going to provide.  Instead, God asked them to move forward in obedience and trust He would make a way for them.

I believe God asks the same of you and me. We desperately want God to give us a vision of his specific blueprint for our lives – where we should go to college, what career we should pursue, who we’ll marry, what jobs we should apply for.  God doesn’t often work that way. Instead, often He calls us to move forward in obedience without knowing exactly what’s ahead. Sometimes you may hear God telling you to end a relationship, but you hold on waiting to know who your next relationship will be with first. Or you know God’s calling you to volunteer in a ministry, but you have no idea how you’d find the time to do it. Unfortunately, I have often ignored God’s promptings to witness to friends and neighbors because I am too afraid of how they’ll respond and what our relationship might look like after I share Jesus with them.

Let’s choose to move forward in obedience and not fear, so the world may see God’s glory through us like they did through the Israelites that day (Joshua 4:24)! The same God who parted the Jordan River for 40,000 Israelites and delivered them to the Promised Land is the God we serve today. He is worthy of our obedience. We can trust with full confidence that He holds our future in the palm of His hands and will work all things together for the good of those who love him (Romans 8:28).

ASK: What steps of obedience do I need to take? What do I need to do to increase my trust in God and decrease my fears?

Written by: Cari Widdel

Posted by on March 24, 2012 in History.

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March 23, 2012

Friday: March 23, 2012

Week 2, Day 6
During particularly busy seasons of my life I’ll have to borrow from time to time from others to supplement these devotions. Today is one of those days. The “Think” section is from a devotion written by Marvin Williams in Our Daily Bread in December 2010.

READ: Isaiah 4-6

BACKGROUND:

4:2 – “Branch of the LORD” refers to the Messiah
5 – This imagery recalls God’s presence with Israel during their time in the desert.
5:7 – This verse is very poetic in Hebrew because the words justice & bloodshed are very similar and the words righteousness & distress are very similar as well.
8 – Land in Israel could never be permanently sold. No matter what happened, all land was reassigned to its original owners during the Year of Jubilee.
26 – The “banner” was used by armies to signify their camp – the place of safety and belonging that they could call home.
6:1-13 – One of my passages in the whole Bible. A vision of heaven. A true realization of the separation between the holiness of God and the sinfulness of all of us. A call from God upon the life of an imperfect man. A response from Isaiah of “Hineni!” – “Here I am!” This is a great chapter for all of us to read and take to heart!

THINK:

Leonard Ravenhill (1907–1994), a British evangelist, once said, “The greatest miracle God can do today is take an unholy man out of an unholy world, make that man holy, then put him back into that unholy world and keep him holy in it.” This seems to be what God did to Isaiah when He called him to speak to His people.

Around the time of the death of Uzziah, one of Judah’s more successful kings, Isaiah had a vision of God. The prophet saw Him as the true King of the universe, sitting on a lofty throne. In the vision, Isaiah saw seraphim worshiping God with a hymn that praised His holiness, majesty, and glory.

Isaiah’s vision of God led to a true vision of himself as unholy and broken before God. “Woe is me, for I am undone!” Isaiah said (6:5). This recognition of sin led him to a need for and the reception of God’s cleansing grace (v.7). Newly cleansed, Isaiah was commissioned to spread God’s message (v.9). The Lord sent Isaiah into an unholy world, not only to live a holy life but also to tell an unholy people about a holy God.

The Lord wants to show Himself to us, thus giving us a truer vision of ourselves, a deeper need for His grace, and a greater commitment to live and speak for Him. What a miracle!

Upon my life shed forth Thy grace, Till others seek Thy loving face; Oh, may no thing be seen in me To cause a soul to stray from Thee! —Roberts

ASK: Have I ever felt so unworthy and messed up that I didn’t believe God could use me? How does God want to use me to change my world today?

Posted by on March 23, 2012 in Prophecy.

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March 22, 2012

Thursday: March 22, 2012

Week 2, Day 5

READ: Job 2

BACKGROUND: Satan, in trying to discredit God, said that Job was only faithful because of all the blessings God had given him. When the blessings were all destroyed and Job remained faithful, however, he had to come up with a different theory. In chapter 2 he charges Job with being willing to give up the lives of his sheep, cattle, servants, and children in order to spare his own. Again, God permits him to test Job.

By verse:
3 – “You incited me” does not mean tricked, tempted, or forced. God cannot be made to do anything that is against his will. It simply means that Satan asked God for permission to do what he did.
7 – The exact sickness with which Job was afflicted is unknown. It was pretty nasty though according to the descriptions in this chapter and the others that occur throughout the book.
8 – Ashes signify mourning. The scraping signifies that he was “unclean” according to the Law, which was a major embarrassment for a man of his stature.
9 – Job’s wife’s suggestion here, is basically that all that is left for Job is to die and he obviously doesn’t have God’s favor so he might as well speed up the process by cursing God. According to Leviticus 24:16, the penalty for this is death.

THINK:  When I got home from work today, my 2 year-old son, Jimmy, was out in the yard. He was excited to see me pull into the driveway and, as I got out of the car, he ran up and told me, “You’re awesome Daddy!” And I thought, it’s great that he’s still too young to know any better. 🙂 Then my wife asked him, “Why is Daddy awesome?” And he thought for a moment and all he could come up with is, “Because he plays with me.” That about summed it up in his mind. And, in fairness to him, playing with kids toys may be the extent of my awesomeness. But it made me stop to think. In his young mind, at that moment, his feelings of love and affection towards me were based only on what I contribute to him when I play trains or let him ride me around like a horse.

I wonder if sometimes we relate to God in that same way. Our love for God and our commitment to him are based upon what he does for us. We love him because he’s done so many great things for us and blessed us so richly. It’s easy to love God for what he does for us. And that’s a good thing! He died on the cross for us. But what about when the circumstances change and the blessings dry up and we find ourselves in the midst of trials? Do we still love God when life isn’t perfect?

Job certainly had to wrestle with this question  after everything he owned was destroyed and his own body was attacked by a ravaging disease. And yet, even when tempted and prompted to turn away and curse God, Job remained faithful and said, “Shall we indeed accept good from God and not adversity?” He understood the bigger picture of God’s sovereignty in our world. But that is a hard concept to grasp. A lot of us get very frustrated whenever God doesn’t do exactly what we want and perform in our lives like a magic genie in a bottle who pops out to grant all of our wishes and than fades away again when “we don’t need him.” And when things go wrong – because our culture has the mindset that life should just be easy all the time – people reject God and call his love and goodness into question. We don’t know why bad things happen in our lives. We can’t always see or understand God’s plans. But we know he is in control. And ultimately, our love for him has to be based on his holy and loving character and not just upon the blessings he gives us.

ASK: Have I ever gotten mad at God because things were hard and they weren’t working out the way I wanted? What is an appropriate attitude towards God in that situation?

Posted by on March 22, 2012 in Poetry.

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March 21, 2012

Wednesday: March 21, 2012

Week 2, Day 4

READ: Romans 2

BACKGROUND: This is a heavy chapter, full of Paul’s regular run-on sentences. I’m not going to be able to cover all the questions you might have in this small space, but please feel free to ask in the comments section about anything in here that you’d like more clarity on.

By verse:
6 – The same idea/phrase is found in Psalm 62:12, Proverbs 24:12, & Matthew 16:27.
7 – Good works are good, but good works do not save us.
12 – Paul is saying that those who don’t know God’s law will be judged differently than those who do. But we will all face judgment for the things we’ve done and the offenses we have all committed against God’s holiness.
14 – This is a cool verse. Paul is saying that in every human, whether they know God or not, there is a Divine spark and conscience that leads us to do good and act morally even if we don’t fully understand it or, for that matter, pay attention to it.
25-28 – Paul is writing to Jews to tell them circumcision doesn’t save. Basically the message is: Just because you were born into it and your parents had faith and you went through the religious rituals when you were young doesn’t, by any measure, mean that you are saved and right before God.
29 – The phrase “by the Spirit” is key here. It reminds us who is really accomplishing things in our lives – that it is not by our own power or our own giftedness but by the power of the Holy Spirit working in and through us.

THINK: I recently heard author and pastor Francis Chan give this illustration and it struck me as I applied it both to my life as a parent and my life as a Christ-follower. Here’s my personalized version of it: If I ask Jimmy to go and clean up his room, what exactly is it that I expect him to do? The really simple, obvious answer is that I expect him to walk to his room, pick up his toys and his books, make his bed and actually clean his room. And the simple answer is the correct one. When I ask my son to clean his room I have an expectation that he will do just that.

But what would happen if, like 15 years from now when Jimmy is a teenager and is old enough to understand exactly what I mean and what I expect, I asked Jimmy to go and clean his room and he responded “Wow! You bet! That sounds awesome!” but when I went to check he hadn’t done anything. I’d probably be bothered by his inaction, and I’d confront him. And what if he then said, “Dad, it was so great what you said that I just memorized it. I know it by heart. ‘Jimmy, can you go clean up your room?’ See, I memorized it. I even memorized it in multiple languages so I can share your words cross-culturally. In Spanish, it’s ¿Diego, puede ir a limpiar su habitación? Oh, I’ve also invited some friends over and we’re gonna do a study on your words. We’re really gonna try to learn a lot about them and we’ll try to dissect the grammar and the perlocutionary intent so that we fully understand the phrase ‘Jimmy, can you go clean up your room?’” That all sounds super nice – real warm and fuzzy and respectful. But at the end of the day none of it matters if he never gets around to actually putting the words in to practice and cleaning his room.

This is what Paul is driving at in Romans 2:13, “For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous.”

We hear God’s word and his law all the time. We hear it at church and in small groups and house groups. We read the Bible and read through Thoughin2 or some other devotional literature. But do we actually do what it says? We know exactly who God is calling us to be – our failures in this life are not often a matter of a lack of knowledge. But do we allow that knowledge to so penetrate and define our lives that our actions reflect it? Many of us are wet sponges – we’ve been soaking up a lot of truth. Are we willing to be wrung out in order to spread that truth to the world?

ASK: When I think about my walk with God right now would I characterize myself as more of a hearer of the word or a doer? What are some practical ways in which I can put my faith into action this week?

Posted by on March 21, 2012 in Uncategorized.

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March 20, 2012

Tuesday: March 20, 2012

Week 2, Day 3

READ: Psalm 2-3

BACKGROUND: Psalm 2 is known as a royal psalm because its primary subject is God’s kingship, and it is one of 11 royal psalms in the book. Also, this particular passage was used during the coronation ceremony for the Israelite kings in the line of David. Probably the most interesting thing about Psalm 2, though, is that it is prophetic poetry. It is a messianic psalm in that it foretells the coming Messiah and the judgment of the world. Psalm 3, according to the title, was written by David while he was running for his life from Absalom, his son, who was trying to kill him and assume the throne. This was an incredibly difficult and painful time in David’s life and, for a while, it looked as though Absalom might succeed. The story is found in 2 Samuel 15-18.

By verse:
2:2 – The phrase “Anointed One” is used in most English translations. This is the Hebrew word “Messiah.” Messiah & Christ (Greek) both mean anointed one. This is Jesus, the Anointed One of God. And if you reject Jesus, as verse 2 says, then you reject the God who anointed him.
7 – The idea of Father-Son language being applied to kingship was common in the Ancient Near Eastern world. It was commonly used to describe a suzerain-vassal relationship wherein the suzerain (the powerful king who ruled a huge territory) was said to be like the father of the vassal (the less powerful king who ruled under the suzerain with some autonomy over a small portion of the suzerain’s vast territory.)
9 – Revelation 2:27 & 19:15 repeat this prophecy about the Son.
12 – “Kiss the Son” isn’t because Jesus likes kisses. The kiss being referred to here is a sign up submission and respect.
3:3 – Lifting up head = Restoring dignity

THINK:  In October, at our Fall Fling camp retreat, our entire group was tasked with working together to complete a series of challenges and we were competing against all the other groups there to do them the best and the fastest. Among other things, we carried each other across a dodgeball arena, traversed some platforms with a couple of boards, and played 10-person tug-of-war against a horse…and won! But the worst of the challenges – in my opinion the worst by far – was one where we were tasked with picking a “president” who put on a white t-shirt and then protecting that president as we made our way across a football field while being bombarded with paintballs. I’m fairly certain that the idea for this challenge sprung out of Camp Shamineau staffers just really wanting to shoot people with their paintball guns. But either way, we were given an assortment of garbage can lids and small wooden shields to protect us – and our president – from the barrage. And the rule was that as soon as you got shot you were out. So, about 10 of us – the unlucky few – set out with our small makeshift shields across that field with our president tucked in behind us. We did well for a short while. Then, we started getting picked off. I got nailed directly in the ankle, and thankfully in my crouched position my jeans were just high enough to not be covering my ankle. That was just dandy.

Ultimately, the worst part about the challenge was that we went in knowing our shields stunk. Shields basically have 1 function: to shield you! But if the shield is way smaller than you are then, inescapably, parts of you aren’t going to be shielded. At camp, the tiny wooden shields barely shielded the hand you used to hold them much less anything else. And there was nothing to shield my ankle. In the end, taking one shot with a paintball gun isn’t that terrible of an experience. It’s not fatal. Anticipating it is almost worse than having it happen. The worst part of that challenge wasn’t getting shot so much as it was looking at the poor excuses for shields that were there and knowing that it was just a matter of time before I got shot.

I think sometimes we go through life with a lot of fear and trepidation. We’re just waiting for something horrible to happen and for everything to fall apart. We walk out into a hostile world full of brokenness and evil and hatred and pain and just wait for it to hit. We wait to get shot. And sometimes that fear and that waiting is crippling. But the good news is that we don’t have to live our lives in fear. Psalm 3:3 says, “But you, LORD, are a shield around me, my glory, the One who lifts my head high.” God is a shield that we can trust! He isn’t a lame Shamineau shield. He is a shield all around us. He loves us and protects us and works all things out for our good. And that doesn’t mean that our lives are going to be completely free of pain or frustration or suffering or loss. Those things are a part of the broken world we live in. But we can have confidence that God is with us and that he will carry us through. We don’t need to live lives of fear because we have a good shield!

ASK: Do I sometimes let my fears overwhelm me? What difference would it make in my life if I always remembered and had great confidence in the fact that God is a shield around me?

Posted by on March 20, 2012 in Psalms.

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