Today's Reading
Leviticus: all those offerings! Some were to remind the people that blood must be shed to forgive sin. Others were reminders of the commitment people needed to make to God in every part of their lives. Now we have the sufficiency of the Christ and the indwelling Holy Spirit, freeing us from trying to keep up with God via religious ritual. Wow!
In Mark, Jesus called His disciples, then set 12 apart as apostles. They were so busy they couldn't eat. Jesus' family struggled and most didn't believe in Him, the religious leaders argued against Him and the demons ran the other way. What a picture!
This passage in Psalms is very precious to me. The name of my other blog, "Dwell & Cultivate," is taken from a different translation of verse 3. Sometimes it takes many years to turn hard ground to a fertile field. What a privilege, though, to watch God bring life from once futile soil.
Proverbs: One verse brings comfort and the other one a challenge in today's tough economic times.
Comments are coming back up. What do YOU think today?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Sean here. I like the first verse of Psalm 37, it is simple but speaks profoundly - "Don't worry about the wicked, or envy those who do wrong." Often times we can get caught up and focused on thinking about what other people do, especially those that may be getting away with doing something wrong. Not that it is bad to discern right and wrong and possibly confront the issue; however, sometimes we can put entirely too much energy and waste our time by thinking about the wrong of others. God provides a simple reminder for us and that is to not sweat the small stuff; after all God is in charge and has a plan for all of it.
ReplyDeleteI love your insight, Sean. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteI can't get over how specific and detailed (and strange) all of God's laws are. I've heard people say that God's laws to the Israelites were really just things we know by good common sense now- God was just helping them establish a society... But the more I read about God's sacrificial system, the more I'm aware of how little I really understand God and his ways. I believe that there were some real reasons for the intricacies of all the laws he gave the priests, but I've given up trying to see the logic in them. Instead, I see all these rules and add them to the pile of things about God that's beyond my understanding. Maybe someday in heaven, it'll all make sense... How amazing that a being who is so vastly beyond us, chooses to love us and care about the details of our lives!
ReplyDeleteLev. 6:7 has a passage of words that I probably have blown by before, but really stuck out today. "making you right with him (God)". As benign as those words may seem in passages full of laws and sacrifice, that is what it is all about - being right with God. That's why Jesus died, so we could be "right with him". I am once again humbled.
ReplyDeleteI love the passage in Psalms today. Years ago I had a turqoise blue pen (I like colored pens) and underlined the first word of all three verses - Psalm 37 verses 3, 4, & 5. TRUST, DELIGHT and COMMIT. Trust in the Lord and do good. . . . Delight yourself in the Lord . . . and Commit your way to the Lord. Love it!
ReplyDeleteOn another note - it's always puzzled me as to why Christ kept telling the people He healed and the demons He cast out to not tell anyone who He was. They never listened to Him and went ahead and told everyone. Why is that? I know Christ knew His death was coming, but this speed it up?
Ranelle, I think Christ's primary mission was not to draw large crowds, but the proclaim the Gospel of the Kingdom and train the disciples who would take over after He went back to heaven. He may have had numerous reasons, but I think the most important was that He said what He heard the Father saying.
ReplyDelete