Deuteronomy 5-17, Mark 15- Luke 1:56

Okay, so I missed not one but three days of the blog. Now I get to try to catch you all up. I encourage you not to get discouraged when you miss a day or two or three. This is time you’re giving to God in order to bring yourself closer to him. If you don’t see a friend for a few days isn’t it nice to spend some extra time with them to reconnect? It is the same with God. Don’t beat yourself up; just get back in the game.
The LONG reading today begins with the great commandment. First and foremost, we are to love God. Not just a god, but the LORD our God. God expects us to internalize the covenant we have with him. It should be part of our very being. We need to make it the core of what we talk about, how we behave, how we interact with other people, what we turn to when we are having issues or temptations, and what we teach to those around us. When it talks about “fearing the Lord”, it isn’t talking about being scared. It is talking about obeying his commandments and respecting God. Putting him in the place he belongs in our hearts and lives. Love is the root of obedience. If you truly love someone, you do your best to do what they ask and what pleases them. That is selfless love. There isn’t a lot of that anymore, yet that is exactly what God calls us to. We spend way too much time thinking that we should love ourselves regardless of what that does to those around us, or to God. If we truly love God, accept him as our savior, and choose him as our Lord then we will obey him, and teach those around us to do the same. That is the focus of this chapter in Deuteronomy.
Verses 4-9 are called the Shema in Jewish culture. Every morning and evening the rabbis recite it for those gathered. Why? So that it will be the center of their thinking. The whole point of the Old Testament was to clarify that there is only one God. Everyone around them worshipped multiple Gods. Man didn’t comprehend that God is beyond what we can do, he does it all. God has committed himself to us in love and we are to give him all of us that we can. God didn’t just make a covenant with a few people. He made it with generation after generation. We can all enjoy the blessings that come with it, if we choose to enter into that covenant.
In chapter 7, Moses goes on to discuss the blessings and victory that comes from following God. God doesn’t just expect us to follow rules and regulations because he feels like controlling us. It isn’t about control. It is about knowledge. God knows everything. He knows what choices will ultimately lead to, he knows exactly the consequences that will follow actions, and he knows what will happen in the future. People in our culture spend tons of money on talking to psychics, and they aren’t even right 10% of the time. Yet people do exactly what they tell them to for just that small amount. It is the same with horoscopes and other things like that. Let me ask you a question. If you met a guy who knew which stocks were going to go up, and which were going to go down, would you listen to him about where to invest your money? If he was right 100% of the time would you entrust him with everything you had? God knows 100% of the time what is going to happen to us ultimately. Yet we choose to follow our own path, try to manipulate what is going on in our lives and do what we feel like doing. Is that smart? I came the realization that even though I don’t always feel good about what God is doing in my life at the moment, not once has he not brought me through that to something better. Not once. My life has not been easy. I have had a lot of awful things happen to me but he has always brought me through it to something amazing when I chose to follow his ways. That is what he expects, and if we do that, we will find blessings. Not part of the time, or most of the time, but all of the time.
Chapter 8 is about remembering who God is, what he does, and obeying him, and in chapter 9, Moses goes on to remind them that by recalling our past mistakes without allowing that to drag us down will help us to stay focused on why we are following God. Then in chapter 10, Moses talks about how our obedience is an expression of grateful Love for God. Are we seeing a theme here? We are to Obey God. That is much easier when we remember a few things. Moses pointed out the things Israel should remember. We can apply these same things to our lives as well. First, God provided every need they had in the desert. Food, water, their clothes didn’t give out, anything they needed was there. We are the same. I cannot count how many times I’ve wondered how I got all the bills paid and had plenty of food to feed my family. We were sick last September, my entire family including some visitors we had. I wasn’t sure how I was going to feed everyone and get medicine for everyone. I was making due fixing food, but things were starting to run out. Then out of the blue, Esther Garcia called me and asked if we needed anything. I asked her if she could grab some medicine for me and bring it over. Not only did she do that, but she brought dinner. It was exactly the type of food our guests liked and everyone enjoyed it. I hadn’t told Esther I needed that, or that we were almost out of kid’s medicine as well. Yet, I believe because she was listening to God, she allowed him to use her to meet my needs. She didn’t know what they were, but God did. Secondly, Moses told them to remember that they are naturally rebellious. We have a sin nature that makes us that way. None of us are going to follow God by our own ability. Our human nature will always call us to be rebellious. We don’t deserve good things because of what we do, or because we are good people. No one is a good person. People can’t be good on their own. It is Christ living in us that makes us good. Finally, God has given us a system for bringing us back into fellowship with him. It isn’t because we’re awesome, or fun or anything else about us. It is because he is merciful and loves us. That’s it. If we remember these things daily and talk about them together, we will be focusing on God and his ability to help us, and find it easier to obey God.
Chapters 11 through 17 are focusing on the special guidelines God expected Israel to follow. We are free of many of these now through Jesus. As I have mentioned before, the old covenant was really to point out to man that we cannot solve the sin issue ourselves. We can never follow the rules completely, do everything that is required or even make up for the things we don’t do. We have to allow God to do that for us. He gave us the opportunity to allow him to do it; we just have to choose to accept that. If we do, he will cleanse us and give us the righteousness we need to be with him. These laws were to make sure that Israel didn’t behave as the other people around them. We are to avoid appearing to be like those that don’t follow God. This is something we should be thinking about today. Jim talked about it on Wednesday night. Do we behave in a way that others see Jesus in us? Do we show in our behavior and lifestyle that God is the Lord of our lives? The Bible tells us that the road to salvation is in choosing Jesus as our LORD and savior. The two go together.
I am going to tackle the readings in Mark separately from the readings in Luke. Let’s start with finishing out Mark. It takes us through the trial of Jesus all the way to his rising from the dead. Mark is very quick and clinical about it. I love how Mark points out that Pilate even recognizes that Jesus is God in a way. Though I’m not sure he grasps exactly what that meant. He knew that Jesus was not claiming to be an earthly King but that it went beyond that. Yet, even that was not enough to cause him to go against his human self interest to pacify the crowd. Pilate was more concerned with pacifying the crowd than he was with doing what was right. We can be grateful that God is not a judge like that. God is a just and fair judge. He doesn’t allow himself to be swayed by what people think.
I am also amazed at the way Mark describes Jesus’ behavior. Through all of it, Jesus did not act in fear. He is the only one through the entire account that doesn’t, yet he is the one that had the most reason to in a human sense. Yet, we see the peace of God in him even as he goes through the horror he does. We also see a beautiful picture of exactly what Jesus did for us in the story. Barabbas was guilty of his crime, Jesus was not. Yet, Barabbas is released and Jesus is crucified in his place. That is exactly what Christ has done for all of us.
I also want to focus on who was there when Jesus died. First, we see Joseph of Arimethea. He was a very prominent person. He had power, privilege and esteem. Yet, Jesus had touched him. He knew the truth and he did what he could even though it would probably hurt him. He didn’t deny Christ, he embraced him. He didn’t worry about whether he’d be mocked, or punished for following Christ; he stepped out and gave what he had to Christ when it was needed. We also see Mary and Mary. The disciples were gone. It was the women who loved Jesus who stood faithfully at the foot of the cross and made sure they knew where he had been laid. We see them then come to the tomb to prepare Jesus for burial. It was because of this faithfulness that they were the first to learn about Christ’s resurrection. They were the ones given the joy of hearing it from the angel and taking the news to the disciples.
Several other things jump out at the end of Mark. First of all, God doesn’t leave them to wonder about the empty tomb. He clearly announces that Jesus has risen from the dead and that everyone who follows him will be restored to fellowship with him. Jesus appeared to many people and blessed them with the knowledge that he had risen from the dead.
Luke is my favorite Gospel. Technically, it is written anonymously. Yet, scholars general agree that it was written by Luke, a doctor who traveled with Paul. He is also believed to be the author of The Acts. They are both dedicated to the same person, acts picks up chronologically where this book leaves off, they use similar passages, and in both the disciples are declared witnesses of what Jesus did. There are many “we” passages where Luke is the obvious companion due to his being left out of the list of who was there. There is not much known about Luke the person from the New Testament. He was a gentile, a doctor, and he traveled closely with Paul, even when Paul was imprisoned. Luke wrote for the common person. He didn’t write to those with knowledge of who God was before being exposed to Jesus. He even tended to substitute Greek expressions where Hebrew ones had been used before and uses less of the Old Testament in his writings. He is also the only gentile author in the New Testament.
The focus is on Jesus dying not only for the Jews, but for the world. Luke wants to give an orderly account of the life of Jesus. It is intended to be an account that progresses from beginning to end in as complete and accurate way as possible. The entirety of Jesus’ life on earth from birth to ascension is described, which is more inclusive than the other gospels. He writes to expose those who are unfamiliar with this sort of God to exactly who Jesus is and what he did. He wrote to those who had gotten an idea of this in order to give them certainty of it, to give them knowledge to back up their faith. This is something that speaks directly to my soul. Luke speaks in very scientific ways at times, and shares things about Jesus that increases our faith and reduces our doubt. His goal is to illustrate what Jesus did to back up what he says.
We start with Luke’s greeting. This is a very Greek way to begin an account. He addresses this to “Theophilus” which means friend of God. Luke tells us that he is not the first to write about Jesus, and that he was not a personal witness to these things. He states that his information comes from first hand sources that were present for these events, which means that they are accurate and true.
Luke gives us a beautiful story about the people surrounding Jesus and John the Baptist. I love the way he shows the faith of those who raised them. He shows that while they were considered blameless in God’s eyes because of their faith, they still made mistakes. God still used them to bring about his will. I also find it interesting that while God chose to force Zechariah to be silent, he didn’t silence Elizabeth, she kept quiet on her own. I won’t touch that one, but think about why that might be. I don’t think it only had to do with gender either.
Next, we see Mary visited as well. I am continually amazed at the faith of Mary. It isn’t hard to see why some would be led to worship her as well, not that I’m condoning that. Only God should be worshipped. I do however, pray that I would have the faith and strength of character that Mary shows in the Bible. She was only as old as many of you. Mary was a young teenage woman living in a world that didn’t value women very much. She was chosen to be the vessel that brought salvation into the world physically. This would on the outside make her look like she was impure. The result of that impurity according to the law was death. It could mean her losing the man she loved, her family, her future, her reputation. It would mean losing everything that she had spent her entire life building up. She gave it all up in an instant just because God asked her to. She trusted him to lead her and take care of her even if she couldn’t see how it would possibly turn out well. I can imagine the insults, the gossip, and possibly the physical blows that she had to suffer.
The angel also tells Mary why Jesus will be great. He will be the son of God. God himself is coming to be with us on earth. Mary will get to be the person physically closest to him. I can’t imagine the fellowship she experienced by being Christ’s mother. I always wonder if as a child when Mary felt overwhelmed if Jesus comforted her directly as God would. She will always be known as the mother of a King who will reign forever. These are great pictures of what will come. Yet, I can still imagine her weighing out whether her personal suffering will be worth all of that. Or maybe God took into account that she was a teenager and wouldn’t consider the consequences as much as what she was being promised. Regardless, Mary faced a lot of pain and suffering by being obedient to God.
She goes to visit Elizabeth. It says she went with haste. This implies that she was running away in my mind. Maybe not running away from home, but getting away from judging eyes. It is obvious that Elizabeth was a comfort and support to Mary. I have been blessed to have an awesome relationship with my niece. I had the same relationship with my sister when I was a teenager. No matter how bad it was, or how ashamed I was, I knew I could go to my sister and she would comfort me even if she had to give me a few choice words to go with it. I believe that my niece has that same relationship with me. That is the kind of relationship I see between Elizabeth and Mary. I also see that as soon as Mary entered the house, Elizabeth knew that what might appear to be sin on the outside was actually the blessing of God. I can imagine that even though she believed that Elizabeth would love her regardless, the pronouncement by Elizabeth that she understood the entire situation must have been a relief to Mary. This is evident in the spontaneous song Mary bursts into. She praises God. She celebrates God’s holiness, his mercy and his power. He is merciful to those who fear him, who are humble, and those that are in need. She contrasts these with their opposites. He has done amazing things for all of us if we just take the time to realize them. God is not a god of the few, but a god of all. We all can find miracles in our lives. Chief of which is that he sent his son to pay for our sins and make a personal relationship with him possible. How awesome is that?
Our reading tomorrow is Deuteronomy 18-20 and Luke 1:57-80. I am leaving for San Francisco tomorrow but I will take my laptop and do my best to blog each day. Please pray for our safety and that God will lead us while we’re there.

Deuteronomy 4-5, Mark 14:53-72

Good morning! I woke up in darkness and had the pleasure of watching the sunrise. What a beautiful world God gave us to live in. Today we’re covering the Ten Commandments being given a last time before Moses leaves them. In chapter 4, he reminds them about how they came into covenant with God. Israel was special, they were different from other nations. No other nation was in a covenant relationship with God the way they were, and there was a definite difference between them and every other people on Earth. God was not close to anyone else. Only Israel had such a close personal relationship with their deity. Those that follow and obey are chosen, those that don’t are destroyed as we see in the passage about Moab. I love how Moses points out in verse 6 that no one obeys God by accident or naturally. We have to choose to follow him and obey his commands. The Law is there to spell out the content and character that God wants in our lives, we have to choose to accept that as a way of life.
Moses goes on to remind them that they cannot forget what the covenant is. If they do, they are just like all the others. Part of keeping the covenant is remembering what God has done for them. If they remember it, it will be easier to obey him. I think this is true for us as well. Yesterday, I taught my 4-6 graders about how to pray. We need to start with Praise and Thanksgiving. When we do that, it is easier to remember why we love God and why we choose to follow him. It is when we focus on what we want, what others are doing and what is going on around us that isn’t of God, that we fail to obey him. The focus being on God helps us to keep the covenant we have with him. Moses warns Israel about that same thing.
What I love about the scene Moses paints of what happened at Sinai is the sensory interaction God gave the Israelites. He didn’t just send the information quietly or in a demure way. He displayed himself for them and gave them aspects of himself when he did. There was a visual and auditory interaction. He did this so that they would recognize him through their experience.
Moses also touches on the fact that God will not share us with anyone. We are either his, or we are not. There is no middle ground. He won’t suffer a rival for our affections. We either give our all to him, or we don’t. If we choose to give our affections to something or someone other than God, we cannot expect to enjoy the blessings of the covenant. Yet, in His mercy, God allows us to return to a relationship with him. The problems we face in this world are not for any purpose other than our restoration to a relationship with God. They are our wake up call. We either pay attention or we don’t. God wants us to be in relationship with him, but he doesn’t want anyone that isn’t willing to give all of their self to him. When we forget, we fall into the ways of the ungodly. Yet we see in verse 29 that those who honestly seek God will find him. Verse 30 goes on to say that honestly seeking him means that we obey him. There is no way to follow God without living a holy lifestyle.
I want to address what is often a difficult passage for people to deal with. In 5:9-10 God talks about judging children for the sins of their parents. First of all, we need to notice that this is stated directly in relation to idolatry. When parents worship things other than God, the children suffer. They don’t learn the truth, or how to obey God. It takes time to fix this and bring the family back to God. Also, when God judged individuals it was often a physical thing. When a parent chooses to make the wrong decisions and suffers physically, the children automatically receive part of the aftermath. These children have a choice. They can either continue in their parent’s sin or they can begin to live for God. They will only be judged on their own choices. Things can be turned around if someone begins to make the right choices, but this is not easy. We can also remember that while sometimes the results of a family choosing sin can last for several generations, God’s love lasts much longer. When we make the right choices and bring our children up in God’s ways, the blessings go on for many more generations than that. This is added encouragement to parents that they should obey God in order to bring blessings and not harm to their children.
In Mark we begin to read the part of Jesus’ life that always makes me cringe. We are so lucky that God gave his Son for us. Jesus never did anything against God. Yet, he had to take the treatment that the rest of us deserved. Everything that I read here in these pages are things I have deserved. Yet Jesus took them for me. He didn’t have to do that. Yet, he loved me so much that he humbled himself to be mistreated just so that I wouldn’t be. Never have I met a person that would do that for me. I thank God every day that he chose to reveal himself to me and allow me to see the truth of what He has done in my life.
This passage in Mark is interesting because of the way he lays things out. He pairs contrasting themes. Jesus confesses himself to the priests, Peter denies him. The council acts out of fear, Jesus acts out of confidence. The Jewish leaders seek false statements and Jesus is all about truth. The council had limited power and were trying to manipulate it to benefit themselves, Jesus is all powerful and chose to not wield it in order that we would benefit. As they were mocking Jesus’ claim to prophecy, the one about Peter’s denial was being fulfilled. Jesus was condemned to death so that we could have life. We see the full purpose and truth when for the first time Jesus clearly and openly says he is the Christ. This was not what condemned him though, it was his statement, “I am.” He was claiming deity as the son of God.
This passage is also difficult because I totally identify with Peter. I always have. He wanted to badly to follow Jesus in the beginning and to please him. Yet, he didn’t really truly understand what that meant and he didn’t really grasp who Jesus really was. He wanted to defend Jesus, but he was rebuked for doing it the way he thought he should. He refused to believe the truth for awhile and then slowly came to a realization. He didn’t see how he could be redeemed from his behavior, but Jesus came and intimately brought him back into relationship with Him. Here we see Peter deny Jesus. Jesus told him he would do this, but Peter slept instead of preparing himself through prayer and ended up doing just what Jesus had warned him of despite Peter’s protests that it would never happen. He first denied that he understood what the girl was accusing him of in verse 68. Then he directly lied outright saying he was not a follower of Jesus in verse 70. Finally, he swore an oath that he was not a disciple of Christ in verse 71. We just went over what a serious statement an oath is. He acted in his fear and tried to protect himself. He wasn’t thinking about anything but protecting himself. When the rooster crowed the second time, he finally realized the truth of what he’d done in his fear. He was instantly sorry and wept. Yet, the only one who could help him was currently being beaten and sentenced to death. Can you imagine the feeling of hopelessness that would have come over Peter at this point? It would have been crippling.
Tomorrow’s reading is Deuteronomy 6:1-9:6 and Mark 15:1-41.

Psalms 34 & 35

Happy Sunday! I am so blessed by the time change. I think this is the first time I’ve actually been glad for it. lol I love the long evenings and the time change always starts those. I went to bed at a decent hour as well and that helped! Lol I hope that you find the blessings in the time change as I did. It is amazing to me how when I’m in God’s word, I am so much more positive. I pray I remember that when I face those times where I just don’t feel like doing it.
The first Psalm today is about how God cares. This is a really uplifting subject to me. Often I feel like I don’t matter. I’ve felt like I was either an afterthought or on the outside a lot of my life. That isn’t a fun feeling. I still struggle with it now. I try not to take things personally when I am not included but it is hard to do that. The thing is that I’m never left out where God is concerned. He may put me through some pretty crazy things and sometimes it’s not even directly for my benefit but for someone else’s, but he always cares about how I feel. I am always in his close circle and won’t ever be left out if I do my part to be there.
This psalm actually piggy backs on what I wrote in the first part of this blog. We should bless the Lord, which means praise him, all the time no matter what is happening. That is a difficult thing to do in our humanity. Yet, if you’ve ever tried it, you know that praising the Lord can make things seem much better and lift your spirits. In the very beginning it says that his praise will always be in my mouth. I don’t do that very well a lot of the time. We need to be constantly telling the world what God IS doing for us, not bemoaning what he is not. We see that in verse two. When we focus on what God is NOT doing for us, we tend to give a bad picture of who he is. Next time I am worrying about what God is not doing in my life, I am going to think of something he is doing so that I can focus on that. Maybe then I will walk around praising him constantly. We also see in the next verse that we should praise him together. That is my favorite part of worship on Sunday morning, when we are all singing our hearts out for the Lord in our own way. I can just see him up there on his throne smiling and moving to it just like we would to the radio in our car. This is our main purpose in life, to praise God and bring him glory. How well have you been fulfilling your purpose?
I want to focus on one verse because it really speaks to me. Verse 4 says that the author went to the Lord. He didn’t sit around and whine, he didn’t wait for God to come find him, he went and found the Lord himself. How do we do that? We go where we know he is very present. We go to our Bible, to prayer or to church. Yes, I know God is everywhere, but if you are talking to him, its prayer, doesn’t matter where you are physically. The verse goes on to say that God heard him. God always hears us, even when we don’t get the answer we want and feel like he’s ignoring us. We don’t spend a lot of time in prayer for the most part. I have gotten back to a habit I started at Biola of talking to God whenever I am alone. Even if I’m walking around the house doing things, I talk to God. It has done amazing things for my attitude. I don’t always get answers I want, and sometimes he is chastising me for something but I have relationship with him and it lifts my heart. Now, the next part is the most important and it gave me an “A-HA!” moment. It doesn’t say God will destroy my enemies, or take away my troubles, or change what is going on around me. It says that “delivered me from all my fears.” Wow, that is amazing. We may not get an answer where things are all better outside of us. We may have to stay in a bad situation, deal with people who treat us badly, or do something we wouldn’t normally do. God doesn’t take away those things; he takes away our fear of them. We can trust him to heal our hearts and make them brave and strong to get us through the things that challenge us. So what are you asking God remove that you really should be asking him to strengthen you through? It goes on to say that if we fear God, making him Lord of our lives, we have nothing else to fear. God has it. Later in this psalm, we see David touch on the fact that the righteous have a lot of troubles. Being a follower of God does not make you immune to that in a physical sense, but if you let him, he can make it bearable inside.
What does David say the way to fear the Lord is? He puts it right out there in verse 13. Don’t speak evil or lie. Don’t talk negatively, gossip, yell, cuss, or anything else that is negative. That is the main impression we give to others. How we speak. For some people, that may be the only thing they ever see of you. That is your witness much of the time. I used to have a really bad habit of cussing. I picked it up because I hung out with a lot of people who thought it was part of expression. It is actually a lack of expression. It shows ignorance of vocabulary. The words are place holders because you can’t find a better word to express yourself. It is not expression, it is a lack thereof. I see kids at the park cussing and yelling and being mean to other children and I get concerned that my kids will begin that sort of behavior. I don’t think very highly of those other children and try to keep my kids away from them. I don’t know if they would care or not, but if someone felt that way about me, I wouldn’t like it. Yet it is due to the actions they choose for themselves. How do you look to other people? What does what is coming out of your mouth say about you?
Okay, on to Psalm 35. This is a prayer for help. The feeling of persecution brings the author to God for help. Have you ever felt like everyone was ganging up on you? Have you ever felt hat you couldn’t do anything without someone punishing you for it? Is there a time you’ve felt like nothing was going your way and everyone hated you? Or that following Jesus brought you nothing but ridicule and shame? When I became a Christian, a lot of my friends turned from me. My boyfriend, who I was supposed to be marrying when I graduated, rejected the changes in my life as well. It isn’t easy to feel like people are persecuting you. The author begins to complain about all of the bad things happening. This may seem to be contradictory to what I was saying before about being positive, but there is a difference here. The author is not lamenting to everyone around him. He is taking his tears to God. He is telling God all the sucky things going on in his life. God is the one we need to be telling because he is the only one that can really do anything about it.
The author pleads for God to help him. We see hope in the last sections saying that God has done it many times, and he will continue to do it for those who are faithful to God. He asks for trouble to those that are trying to harm him and that God would keep them from getting him. He totally expects it because in verse 9 we see him already thanking God for helping him. He has no doubt that God will come through. I wish I could have that attitude all the time. I tell myself that it is people I don’t trust, but God is in control so I need to not worry about what other people are doing, he will come through.
Our reading tomorrow is Deuteronomy 4-5 and Mark 14:53-72.

Deuteronomy 1-3, Mark 14:1-52

Okay, so I slacked and today we are doing Deuteronomy 1-3 and Mark 14:1-52. No more if I miss a blog will we just skip that section in my writing. I need to do both the reading and the writing.
Okay, so we start the book of Deuteronomy today. Yesterday I touched a little on it. Tradition in the Jewish faith is that Moses wrote the book. Some scholars now believe that it was written about 600 B.C. and was basically an editorial work. The writing style fits that period and that it pretty much sums up what was in the first books of the Pentateuch with some things removed to make the Jewish culture of the time appear to be complete. This is countered by traditional views that Moses was the author, including Jesus’ view. He quotes Moses over and over again. The structure of the book is also in line with Mosaic writings.
This book is a preparatory for entering the Promised Land. Moses will not be joining them so he must prepare them to obey God without him there. He motivates them by reminding them that they were chosen and that God redeems them because he loves them, not because of who they are personally. Love, Obedience and remembrance are the main themes.
Today we focus on remembering what God did for the people of Israel. Moses spoke directly to the people. He told them the story once more of where they came from and what God had done for them. The author points out that a journey of 11 days took Israel 40 years because of their lack of faith and obedience. How long will your journey take? I have been a Christian since I was 15. I am now 35. Only in the last couple years do I feel like I spend less time in the wilderness and more in the Promised Land, though my years at Biola were probably mostly spent in the Promised Land as well. We too have a choice as to how we respond to God. Do we obey and follow him where he says to go even if it is difficult and scary? Or do we do what we want to do and justify ourselves with every step? One path leads to the Promised Land of living in the freedom of God’s love. The other takes us in circles of slavery to our flesh. Which journey do you want to take? I may have only taken half the time Israel did but it was still too long. God wants us to accept his Lordship and be obedient. Then we will see the blessings that brings.
Moses was doing more than telling a story here. He was explaining why the law was given to them and why they should obey it. When the Israelites obeyed, they were rewarded. It may not have always been the way they’d hoped but they were rewarded. When they didn’t obey, there were negative consequences. Those consequences didn’t always come right away. Some consequences took awhile to come about. God gives us the law to show us how to live in relationship with him. He doesn’t do it to limit us. He does it because he wants a relationship with him, but it can’t be on just any terms because of his holy nature. We choose whether we want to be in that relationship or not. When we obey and trust him, we show that we want a relationship with him and it becomes real. When we don’t, he has no choice but to be separate from us. He doesn’t choose that, we do. God has given us every opportunity to be with him. We have rejected him at every turn.
Moses also tackles another problem. Change in leadership. This is not an easy thing. Especially when a leader has been as integral to the life of the people as Moses had. He was turning over leadership not only to Joshua but to the family leaders. Many people who had less responsibility were starting to have quite a bit more. They had always been able to depend on Moses and his walk with God. Now they had to do it for themselves. Moses took time in verse 9 to remind them that from the beginning his authority had been delegated out. It was only in their habit and insecurity that he had maintained much of it. We are the same way. We are to listen to our pastors and teachers. We are to respect their authority, but ultimately we are responsible for our own walk with God. Jim can’t do it for you. Pastor Wayne can’t live out your relationship with God for you either. We have to do it for ourselves.
I also think that over and over Moses points out that even though they had been miraculously saved over and over, they still struggled with trusting God. I have heard many people say that the Israelites had it easy. So did the disciples. They got to see everything face to face. Miracles happened in their midst on a daily basis. Yet they didn’t get it. “If I were there, I’d have gotten it.” How do you know that? We have miracles happen on a daily basis here as well. When I think of how often I’ve done something stupid and should have had some pretty severe consequences, I am amazed at how God came through. It is only as I look back that I can’t believe that after each of those things happening, I went right back to my sins. I rejected God in the face of my miraculous rescues each and every time. The trick is to recognize when they happen and see them for what they are. We all have our “aha” moments. It is making sure that we learn from them and turn them to God’s glory that is the key.
Moses also touches on the attitude that kept Israel out of the Promised Land for the 40 years. As soon as they heard the punishment, they wanted to turn from their sin and get the reward. God told them it was too late. They had missed the boat. This has happened to me several times in my life. I realized that I was not walking God’s path and changed it. Yet, I still had to suffer the consequences of my earlier behaviors. Many times I think that we think God will just fix everything for us. I especially think that many times because that is how I have worked in my flesh. I run around trying to fix it all. Many times, I steal a lesson from someone by doing so. God allows things to happen to us after we repent not because he is angry with us. He does it because that is how we learn and grow. If he doesn’t allow us to learn the consequences of our actions, how are we supposed to value the choices we have? I have been working on letting people make mistakes and not trying to “guide” them so much. We all have our own journeys and only by allowing those journeys to take place can we allow them to grow into the person they truly are.
We also see a lesson in humility to the Israelites. They were the chosen ones. That didn’t mean they were the only ones God loved. God gave blessings to the descendants of Abraham as well as Jacob. His blessings extend to more than just the chosen people. The Israelites were not allowed to possess anything and they were nomadic, yet God blessed them with everything they needed. They may have wanted more, but they were not lacking in what they needed. Many times we look at those around us and we covet what they have. We wonder why we can’t have it too. There is always a reason that God gives us what he does. Maybe there is a lesson for us to learn, or something waiting that is better for us coming along, maybe what we will receive isn’t ready yet, and unfortunately sometimes we suffer because of a lesson someone else needs to learn. Yet in all these things we can be joyful because we are being used by God in all of this. His glory will come about because of whatever is happening in our lives as long as we remain obedient and allow him to mold us.
Moses takes the story from Israel’s failures to their successes. The battle won, the land already given out, and even more victories. God did all of that. We are only the tools. God is the one who wins the victories. We can only let him use us to do it. When you are sharing with people, serving in a ministry, or even just being a light to your friends, it is God who does the work. What happens because of that work will be what God wills, so don’t be discouraged if it doesn’t go the way you wished it would. God will make sure the glory part happens in his timing.
Finally, we see the humanity of Moses. He knew he had sinned. He knew he was going to face those consequences. He had already turned over the authority to Joshua. Yet he probably still had some hope that God would change his mind. He faithfully served God and did it knowing that he had to pay the piper eventually. I still think he always had in the back of his mind that if he just served God well enough, God would change his mind. God isn’t like us. He doesn’t rationalize, change or do anything flighty. He is a God of purpose. Moses knew that, but in his humanity he still had hoped he would get to see the Promised Land. Moses was still trying to bargain with God even after all he’d seen. The thing is that I bet once he got up to Heaven and saw what honor there had been in dying alone with God and being buried by God himself, to be in direct communion with him, that is far better than any earthly promised land. Sometimes, we think our punishments are just to torture us, until we realize that the results of those trials are actually the greatest blessings we’ve ever known. Those are the moments I find myself praising God the loudest.
Okay, now our reading in Mark. Again we see the Jewish leaders wanting to take Jesus and kill him but they didn’t want to do it during the festival because they were afraid it would cause a riot and get them in trouble with the Romans. They wanted to do evil but they didn’t want to get caught.
The next section shows a lot about how people respond to Jesus. They are all enjoying a meal with Jesus. A woman comes in and anoints Jesus with very expensive oil. The scripture says it was expensive enough for a years wage for a family. She wanted to honor Jesus with all she had and more. She had probably understood what he’d been teaching lately of his leaving them. Some of them were not pleased at this though. They thought the money should be used differently and were angry that it hadn’t been used as they thought it should be. They criticized her. Jesus rebukes not the woman, but those attacking her. She did something good for Jesus. It was her choice. The poor are there and should be helped, but we should have choice over what we do. No one should tell us where we have to serve or what we have to do except for God. If someone doesn’t like the ministry you want to be involved in, or how you give your offerings (tithes are a different matter we will talk about another time) they need to realize that your stewardship is according to how God tells you it is. This is the passage I most think of when I hear people say that Jesus was a communist. To me, it clearly states right from the savior’s mouth that we are to choose how we serve God with our money. No one should dictate that for us or judge it either. We are all responsible for our own actions and choices.
At the end of this passage we see Judas make his choice. He was very concerned about the money and was unhappy about how it was being handled obviously. The way Jesus was talking, things were going to be much different than Judas had planned on. Now he was messing with the coffers that Judas had control of. He made a choice to betray Jesus because he didn’t like what was happening. My Bible posed an interesting question in the notes and I wanted to share it with you. “Do we respond to Jesus with outright rejection as did the leaders (v1, 2); with calculated self-interest as did Judas (v10, 11); or with an outpouring of our love as did the woman (v3-9)?” Where do you fall most of the time? Do you reject what Jesus wants for you and do whatever you want? Do you use your faith to get what you want when it is convenient, but really focus on what your desires are? Or do you show how much you love Jesus in everything you do? I think we all fall into each of this once in awhile. My prayer is that I can spend the majority of my time following in the footsteps of the woman.
Maundy Thursday is coming up. It is actually my favorite day of the year next to Christmas Eve. I became a Christian at a Maundy Thursday service in the dirt of a cleared cabbage field outside of Mexicali. I always enjoyed Maundy Thursday service as a child because to me, it was the most intimate time the disciples had with Jesus. They actually got to worship with him by conducting the highest ritual there was to the Jewish people. How amazing is that. Not only that, but they were present for the beginning of the new covenant between God and his creation. All that had gone before was now changed according to Christ’s new covenant with us. My family usually holds our own personal Passover Seder on this night to remember how Jesus changed the covenant. It reminds us of where Jesus was coming from and where he was taking us.
We have all heard about the communion story over and over I’m sure. But have we truly looked at what Jesus is saying? Jesus told them how to prepare everything and where to get it. He came and sat and ate with them. He was in complete control. He knew who was going to do what, where he was headed personally and what the result was going to be. Yet, he sat and had fellowship with them. He didn’t whine and cry, he didn’t sit there being depressed. He merely enjoyed his time of fellowship with them and took this time to teach them the last of what they needed to know. If they weren’t prepared at this point, which they weren’t, it wasn’t because Jesus hadn’t shared with them. This gives me hope. My whole life I grew up in the church hearing about Jesus, but I didn’t get it. I shared him with a lot of people over the years who didn’t get it either. Yet, I got it when I was supposed to. The disciples didn’t get it at the Last Supper either. My hero, Peter, even took one last chance to run his mouth and debate with Jesus. Lol Yet eventually, they got it. It took a lot of pain and heartache, but in joy they finally got it.
Can you imagine sitting there eating food with a friend and teacher and having him start talking the way Jesus did? Would you be listening intently or thinking “I think he had a little too much vino.”? Lol The Passover was about God delivering Israel. It was about redemption and reconnecting with God. Jesus was associating himself with that. He identified himself as the real Passover sacrifice that would completely redeem us and connect us to God perfectly. Those people who participate in this by choosing to believe in his sacrifice for our sins are part of this new covenant he speaks of. We are part of the true people of God, for eternity. Every time you take communion, you are making a statement that you want to be part of God’s family. When you leave that experience, you should remember that in how you conduct yourself. It isn’t just a light snack to fit in at church. It is a covenant between you and God. A promise you make to fulfill your end of the bargain to make him Lord of your life. He did his part. Now it is time to do yours.
This is getting really long, but I want to say one more thing about this reading. In the garden, Jesus had brought the disciples with him to the garden to pray. He took Peter, James and John with him a little further. I have been reading a book on John written by Beth Moore this week and the author said something I was really thinking about a lot. Jesus took those three with him a lot, and we take it as them being the favorites. Yet, she pointed out that teachers often bring the “troublesome” or “difficult” students to the front of the class to be able to guide them better. She is totally right. I never thought about the fact that we often hear those three getting it wrong in many stories of the Bible. They didn’t get it most of the time. Yet, Jesus knew that once they did get it, they would be unstoppable at spreading his kingdom. Here we see them missing out on some last minute time with Jesus. He asked them to pray with him, to help him prepare. Yet they slept. How awful must they have felt after the next 12 hours that they had not taken the chance to be with him when they could. How many regrets must they have had? This is a good lesson. They must have had more regrets than you and I could ever imagine. Yet, did that stop them? No. They reconciled to Christ and kept going with a renewed strength. We should take that example and run with it. When you mess up, pick yourself up, reconcile to Jesus and go at it double time. I am going to be trying to do the same.
Tomorrow’s reading is Psalm 34-35.

Numbers 33-36, Mark 13

Today’s reading is pretty much a synopsis of the history of Israel from Egypt to their present state of preparing to enter the Promised Land. They were in Egypt as slaves, God moved against their idols that they worshiped and showed his power to them, and then Israel walked out a free people right past those that had enslaved them. They walked away from that. They didn’t hang out in Egypt, goof around with those that had enslaved them before, or come back for a visit. Why not? Because they were slaves to that world and if they went back, they would be enslaved again. Their part in their freedom wasn’t obtaining it, or protecting their fleeing backs from it, or even maintaining it through fighting. Their part in their freedom from sin was merely to stay away from where they were enslaved. When we become Christians, we are freed from our sins. We are no longer in bondage and we can walk freely away from that because God clears the way for us. Yet we often choose to hang out near our sin, spend time interacting with those who encouraged and participated in our sin, or we revisit it every so often. Those are not the actions of free people. Those are the actions of slaves. Once you are free, enjoy that freedom, find new things to do with your time and new places to be. You are a new creation in Christ, just as Israel was a new nation.
The story of Israel’s journey to the Promised Land is amazing. Each step of the way God provided for them. He didn’t let them down once. Yet they whined and complained the entire time and even thought about going back to slavery. It sounds crazy, but think about how you are on a day to day basis. Are you complaining about not having what you want, or things not being your way? Are you day dreaming about going back to the behaviors that you had before you started to follow Christ? Are you an Israelite?
Now we see the land divided between the tribes. Levi was not given land but cities. This kept the priests from being isolated in one part of the country and being under control of any one clan. They were able to graze on free land which would help them to survive on the support of the people through their offerings.
We see the listing of cities of refuge. The Levites controlled these and they were set up to prevent blood feuds from erupting and wiping out whole families. That was a very common thing in those days. Justice would be served, but revenge could not be carried out by the families. It amazes me sometimes how well God knows us and how often he teaches us little lessons in topics that don’t appear on the outside to have anything to do with it. This entire section on murder is about intent. What are the intentions and how do you know it? Our behavior towards God is about intent as well. Why do you do the things we do? Do we do them because we have to? Or do we do them because someone told us to? Are our actions because we think we have to do something, or we’re trying to cover up other things we’re doing? Or do we truly try to do things the way God wants us to because we love him and we’re thankful for what he’s done for us?
Now we come to a section about choices. God set up the land the way he did and didn’t want there to be a lot of fighting among the tribes about it. So in terms of inheritance, there were rules. A woman who was the owner of the inheritance couldn’t switch tribes. She had to stay married within her tribe if she wanted to keep her inheritance. This may look unfair to all of you romantics out there, but I think that is a good point to make here. She was not kept from marrying who she wanted to. She merely had to make a choice between her inheritance and love. We make choices every day. You can’t have everything you want most of the time because it doesn’t fit together. We learn to make choices and put value on things. We set priorities and make those decisions based on those priorities. It isn’t unfair, it’s rational. You either choose God or you choose your own will. He will usually give you an out, but you have to take it.
With that, we come to the end of the Book of Numbers. Tomorrow we start the final book of the Pentateuch. It pretty much summarizes the entire message of the first four books of the Bible. The message is simple; God loves his people and calls them to a Holy life. That truth still stands today. Are we living a Holy life?
Our chapter in Mark is one of the farewell passages of Jesus. He is preparing his disciples for what is coming in his death, resurrection and what they will face after that. This message is as much for us as it is for them. We are now the disciples and we face the same things they did. He wants us to be prepared for it. The disciples were very upset because he had been talking about dying and the temple being destroyed. This was their entire life. They had left everything to follow Jesus and now he says it will be destroyed. They were Jews first and foremost and the temple was the center of their culture. Now he says it will be destroyed as well. They were focused on the physical and themselves, not God’s plan. How often do we do this? We freak out because God isn’t doing what looks safe and comfortable for us. Why? It is because we don’t trust him to do what is best for us. When we start to let go of control and stop thinking we know what needs to be done, when we start believing that God is doing what is best for us and solely focusing on controlling only our own behavior and building a close relationship with him, we start walking in true faith. Yes I realize that this is easier said than done. I struggle with it daily. Only now do I think that I am realizing how freeing it is to allow Christ to be the Lord of my life and not just my Savior. I don’t have to be in control, I don’t have to fix the mistakes around me, I only have to be close to God and do what he asks me to do. It’s taken me 20 years of being a Christian and my entire 35 of learning about Jesus to get here. The only thing that matters is God, he will show me how to take care of the rest or he will do it for me. I only have to follow him, and I can’t make others come with me. They have to follow their own journey. I can only love them, set an example and share him with them every chance I am given.
Jesus gives us very real signs for what will happen before he returns. Jesus speaks of false teachers. They have always been there. People want to be in power. They want others to esteem them. They want devotion. We have seen so many like this. Cults are everywhere and always have been. Our human side is always quick to try to bargain our way into what we want and justify things that our flesh tells us is good for us. Those false teachers will grow in number before he returns. We will also see an increase in political turmoil and natural disasters as well. War is inevitable and we cannot worry about it. Yes we are to do what we know is right according to God’s word, but getting worked up over it is exercising a lack of faith. We don’t need to worry, God has our back and no matter what, as believers, we will end up in heaven next to God where we belong. We as Christians will always be persecuted. Physically, mentally and socially we will pay the price for following Jesus. The world will hate us Jesus told us that.
Now we see Jesus’ warning for us to watch ourselves. He wants us to be prepared not by planning what we will say but by being connected to the Holy Spirit. We have been reading story after story of Jesus’ wise answers to his critics and those that wanted to hurt him. Not once did they get the best of him. Why? It is because he is God. We as Disciples of Christ have God in us as well. The Holy Spirit indwells us and will tell us what to say as long as we are allowing it to.
We will lose friends and family because we walk with God. I have spent a lot of years having that happen. Some of my best friends and the man I thought I was going to marry when I became a Christian rejected me. For many years as I was growing as a Christian, even my family rejected a lot of what I was learning and punished me for it. It’s painful, and it’s hard, but the blessings God has brought me through it all are amazing. Now I sit here and smile because many of those people now follow God closely as well. On the mission field, I saw many horrendous things. I have even seen a young woman I knew that had chosen to follow Christ killed by her family for it. This is all very real and the things that happen in this world to people who choose Jesus as their savior can be horrific. What Jesus is saying is that he knows this, and he is with us. We don’t have to sweat it. These things will happen but God is still in control and he is coming back for us if we don’t reach him first.
Then Jesus moves on to speak about the physical destruction of the temple. This happened in A.D. 70. The Roman army came in and totally demolished Jerusalem because they were not behaving as the Romans wished. Jesus is telling them to not be concerned and not to try to stop it. That many would claim to be Jesus returned to try to stop it but they were not. They were to flee from Jerusalem and survive to share Jesus with the world. When Christ returns it will be unmistakable. There will be natural signs and his followers will be gathered to him. That is the important part. His followers will be those gathered. That is the only thing we need to be concerned about. It will happen when it happens but we need to be sure we are following Christ when it does. Jesus points out that no one is to know when. If we did, we’d all wait until then to do what we’re supposed to. Jesus wants us to grow in faithfulness even when we’re not sure when he’ll return.
Three things he focuses on through all of this. First of all, he will return, no doubt. We can count on that. Secondly, there will be signs but we cannot figure out the exact time so we just need to be alert. Finally, since there are enough signs that are always fulfilling themselves, we should always be ready because he could be coming back any minute. So our reading falls right in with what Jim said last night. Are you prepared? If you died today, if Jesus came back today, or if someone needed you to tell them about Jesus….are you prepared? If not, and you want to be, I’m here to help.
Wow I asked a lot of questions and that was pretty heavy. I have a lot of thinking to do as well. I hope you all have a wonderful day. Tomorrow we read Deuteronomy 1 and Mark 14:1-26.

Numbers 31-32, Mark 12:28-44

Okay so a few chapters back we saw the Israelites bond with outsiders. This is basically a betrayal of God. We don’t take this very seriously anymore. We connect ourselves with those who don’t follow God as close friends, confidantes, lovers, etc. This is a recipe for disaster. Anywhere in the Bible we see those of God marrying those not of God, something bad happens. God is trying to teach Israel a lesson here. We cannot live in close relationship to those who aren’t of God. We must find a way to love them without growing too close. Our friends, family and anyone else we allow close to us emotionally and mentally have an impact on how we behave. We must choose our romantic attachments carefully and even our friends. It is shown in research that we are most like the 5 people we spend the most time with, good or bad. So who are you spending your time with? Are there changes you need to make in order to be more like God and not like the world?
Now, the tough part, God ordered the people slaughtered. We see this a lot in the Old Testament. There is a reason though. We think we can handle being around people who are awful on our own. We ease up and tell ourselves it’s no big deal because we’ll influence them. Usually, we lose focus on God and end up letting them influence us. God didn’t want Israel to give them up to the world. The ones that caused a rebellion would have to be punished. It is not pretty and killing little boys seems harsh. However, I can tell you that we see in later stories, when you leave male survivors and their mothers, the mothers create resentment and revenge. God is avoiding this. Go watch Lion King 2: Simba’s Pride and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
Next we come to dividing the loot. I love how they are very specific about it. Many people point to this sort of thing as support of communism in the Bible. I don’t think that is quite accurate. Each person had a role, they fulfilled it and they got their share based on what their role was. Everyone had to do something. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t get anything. That sounds more like Capitalism to me than it does Communism. Yes, they all shared in the spoils but it was according to what they did and God received his portion as well. I especially love when the men come to Moses with an offering to God because they’ve realized that they didn’t lose one man. How grateful is that? They could have taken the road of pride and boasted of what great fighters they were, but they chose to be humble and thank God for protecting them. I pray that I can be more like that daily, giving God the glory for ALL of my accomplishments and survivals.
The Israelites had been wandering a long time and they still had a lot of work ahead of them. Yet they were walking through land that was perfect for them. No wonder the two tribes thought to stay there. Why not? It was lush land that God had created and cleared for them. They forgot that God had commanded them to clear all the area before taking possession. Moses saw how this would discourage the plan and he pointed it out to them, reminding them of the punishment their fathers had faced because of the same thing. They then bargained with Moses and he relented. The thing is that they didn’t realize that the important part of his story was where he touched on Joshua. We may receive blessings if we follow God and do most of what he says. Yet, the biggest blessings are reserved for those who follow God full out. What would that land have been like if they had traveled with the rest of Israel and seen the rest of it? Would they have allowed the current land they wanted the chance to replenish and be even more fertile for when they returned? They bargained with God to get what they thought they wanted and didn’t hold faith in what he promised they could have. I have done this many times in my life. I have been excited about something God is doing and I stop short of following through on it. Yes, it’s been a blessing, but then I have to wonder how much greater the blessings would have been if I had just followed God all the way instead. Now I will never know.
Today in Mark we talk about the most important thing next to our Salvation through Jesus Christ. That is what we do with it after we receive it. The Jewish leaders kept trying to trip up Jesus with their Law. Jesus ends that by condensing the law into two simple things. Loving God and loving others. If we focus on behaving in love towards God and others, we will usually automatically follow the law without even trying. The important thing is not to focus on what we’re not supposed to do. We should be focusing on what we can do to bring glory to God and show our love. The best part of this section is where one of the Jewish leaders acknowledges the truth in Jesus’ words and honors him. This illustrates that everyone that is open to Jesus’ words has the opportunity to grow closer to the Truth.
Jesus then challenged their understanding of who the Christ would be. They had a picture of who he was and where he would come from that wasn’t quite right. He was not going to be a Son of David in the military sense or a human sense. David called the Messiah Lord and had him sitting next to God. Jesus was letting them know that the Messiah was going to be more than they expected.
Then we come to another of my favorite stories. They are two illustrations of what it is to love God. Love is another term we have a skewed view of and tend to twist and demean from the way God views it. Jesus starts with a negative illustration of those that judge others and are prideful of how they follow God’s rules. This is legalism at its finest. They lift themselves above others because they dot their “I” s and cross their “t”s in public. They do things so that all may see them and think they are good people or give them praise for their faithfulness. Those are not the people to follow. He sat back and watched the people come and give their offerings. One poor widow walked up and put in a small amount. Jesus said that this was true love for God and a greater offering than the large amounts they had been watching. That widow gave everything she had and probably sacrificed to do so. It isn’t a big thing to give the things that are easy to give or that we have a lot of. It is more to give what we value most, cling to most and have very little of. Through letting those things go and giving them to God, we do much greater things for him and show our love much more.
Tomorrow’s reading is Numbers 33-36 and Mark 13.

Numbers 28-30, Mark 12:12-27

We are back to a reminder of the sacrifices, feasts and so forth of the Israelites. Now that the Lord is bringing them into the Promised Land, there is going to be time for feasting. He again lays out several holidays for them to observe. This section is obviously a reminder of what was in Leviticus. When we get into a place where our needs are taken care of, that is usually when we start to forget God. It’s easy to stay focused on him in need, but when we’re content, we forget where that contentment comes from. I think God is taking this chance to remind them that they still have him to thank for all of it and need to follow the things he laid out for them in Leviticus. By using the feasts, he makes it enjoyable, but the responsibilities are in there as well.
Now we come to an important passage in my mind. I believe that a person’s integrity is the key to who they are. If you have integrity, it is pretty possible to get through anything. God deals with making vows in this section and I think that is something we take for granted now. People say “I swear” about all sorts of things, they lie from witness stands, they make promises and don’t work hard to keep them. We are suffering from a lack of integrity. God is telling us that is not okay. If we tell God we are going to do something, we need to do it. If you tell God you are going to stay pure, you set yourself up to succeed and don’t compromise. If you tell God you are going to read through the Bible in a year and you get behind, set aside that time and crank it out to catch up. If you tell God that you are going to trust him, you stop trying to control it all and let him fill you with faith. If you tell God that you are going to serve him, figure out where you are supposed to do that and make it a priority. Take the vows you make seriously. I also want to note that this passage points out the fact that our vows impact others around us. If you are in a family situation, don’t make a vow until you’ve worked it out with your family.
Again we come to a passage in Mark where the Jewish leaders are trying to trap Jesus. They really didn’t understand who he was did they. How can you trap God? Though we often try to do it as well when we want something and do little things to control where we are going to get it. I am struggling through this right now. I want what God wants for me, but I want those things to be the things my heart wants. I pray for God to put the things he wants for me in my heart and take out the rest, but I still try to do small things to get what it is I want. To me, this shows a lack of faith and trust in God. I am learning to let go and avoid the behaviors that lead to me trying to control the situation. I can’t bargain with God, force him to do anything, or manipulate him. He is above all of that and all I do when I try to do those things is to show how sinful I am.
Okay so back to the scripture! Lol They are trying to get him to show himself to be disloyal to Israel or to Rome. Either way he would be in trouble. Yet Jesus solves the problem nicely. The answer Jesus gave left them speechless. You earn Rome’s money, you pay Rome taxes. If we owe our country something, we should do it as long as it isn’t against God. We owe God, and we should do the things he requires as well. Jesus paid us. He died for all the sins we’ve committed and those we don’t even know about yet. We owe him. The least we can do is to pay him back with our love, devotion and worship.
They tried to trap him again with a debate that they’d been having for hundreds of years. Again, they forget he is God and omniscient. Life in heaven is beyond our comprehension. Our time on this earth is fleeting and focused on us. Time in heaven is eternal and focused on God. The question they asked Jesus about who’s wife the woman would be in heaven is inconsequential. There is no point to discussing that because things don’t work like that in heaven. Marriage is part of God’s plan here on earth, but in heaven things are different. There will be no need for that. In heaven we will be perfect and in perfect relationship with God. That will be all that matters.
Tomorrow’s reading is Numbers 31-32 and Mark 12:28-44.

Numbers 26-27, Mark 11:27-12:12

Here we have yet another wonderful genealogy. Most people just check out for these, but it always amazes me what they authors think is important and why. Sometimes when you look at it, you find out a lot about their culture. This is a listing of the second census taken. I think partially it is because there had been a plague and they needed to know how many people survived it. They needed to see how God had moved in their midst so that they could be prepared to enter the Promised Land. I think it is sort of like taking a head count every week for services and Sunday school at church. By doing so, we have two choices in how to use those numbers. Either we can see them as just numbers and be happy or depressed by how many people are there, or we can see it as guidance from God as to how he is working among us. What times, styles, and age groups are moving in our church gives us an idea for what direction we are moving. It can help us tailor ministries to what God is doing in the people he brings through our doors. We would be wise to pay attention to that.
In this genealogy, each of the tribes and their clans are listed. We see the number of men 20 years or older. After totaling the numbers up, we see that almost 200 thousand people have been culled. Later in the chapter we read that not one of those who Moses had numbered at Sinai is left. They were not faithful enough to receive the reward and God purged them, all of them except Caleb and Joshua who had been faithful and trusted in God. My notes say that this is one of the saddest statements in scripture. I guess you could look at it that way, but I see it as an amazing testament as to what God will do for those who stay faithful and trust in him. Caleb and Joshua received something amazing. This is when God chose to hand out the prizes so to speak. After he purged those who weren’t after his heart, he rewarded those who were. This is a great picture of the final judgment to me. We see it often throughout the Old Testament. We are tested, our character is shown, those who reject God are punished and then those who love him are rewarded. That is the way the cycle goes. We also see that just as they were before, the tribe of Levi is counted separately. They didn’t receive any of the land. Their prize was in something else. They were first and closest to God. There can’t be a greater reward than that.
Now, we come to chapter 27. I love this chapter. So often the superiority of men in God’s eyes is lifted up. Women seem to be given a raw deal. Yet as we look at the laws closely and see what God does with the women in the Bible, we see that this is not true. That is the interpretation men have come up with. Chapter 27 tells of a group of sisters. Their father was among those counted by Moses before but their father had no sons. That meant that in this census, his family was not given any land. The daughters of this man didn’t think that was fair, so they approached Moses with this dilemma. Moses spoke to God and He vindicated the women. He gave them land and created a protection for women.
I see two things in this passage. First, that men are not higher than women in general in God’s eyes, just in a needed order of command. Each is important to God. He doesn’t think of women as just property, but those with equal rights to his blessings. I also see that the sense of God’s ownership is real here. Everything belongs to God. He merely gifts it to us. We need to remember that when we are doing things. Nothing we have would be ours if God hadn’t allowed it. That to me changes the entire perspective on when things come in and out of my life.
In the second part of chapter 27, I find it much more poiniant than the passage of those who didn’t make it out of the wilderness. Their sin was pretty big in all human reckoning. Moses’ sin was one that we might not even think about unless we nit picked. This shows part of God’s character. It doesn’t matter how big the sin is, or how small. It isn’t about whether it was visible or in the heart. Sin separates us from God and must be dealt with. God cannot have it in his presence. He is holy and just as the Word says. So we see Joshua chosen to lead Israel after all of the hard work that Moses put in getting them there. Everything good Moses did following God faithfully, yet one small thing kept him from entering to his reward. He merely gets to go onto the mountain and look at it from afar. How heartbreaking that is to me. I can imagine I would be an emotional mess. Moses doesn’t even flinch though. He merely shows concern for his flock. I don’t know that I could be so gracious. Often I have railed against God for things that I probably caused myself. I pray that I would be able to be so unselfish next time I am faced with that sort of situation.
As I sit here thinking about this and typing it I am crying. How awesome is it that we don’t have to worry about that? We don’t have to be perfect. Jesus did that for us. We will receive our reward because he took what needed to be dealt out for our sin.
One thing, and I’m not sure why I am putting this on here, but I feel led. Yesterday as I was listening to Pastor Wayne preach on how God basically took out his wrath on Jesus, his own son, I realized something. We often think that God can’t possibly understand us when we are doing things like being suicidal or cutting ourselves, or other forms of self mutilation. Yet, that is exactly what Pastor Wayne was talking about. God self mutilated. He didn’t do it because he felt bad, or because he felt alone, or because he didn’t know what else to do. He did it because he loves us. So next time you think that what you do to feel normal can’t possibly be understood by God, remember that he has experienced it all just so that he CAN.
In our reading from Mark, we see Jesus yet again questioned by the Pharisees. I love how he always turns it around on them. As believers we often go on the defensive when people question us. I am guilty of this as well. We fight scripture with scripture and try to come up with all the answers to counter the statements and questions thrown at us. Jesus didn’t do that. We should try to follow his example. He either let scripture stand on it’s own, or he asked a question back at them. He didn’t pull out his Bible and list all the places that seemed to back up his point. Here the priests ask him where his authority comes from. They are trying to goad him into committing blasphemy, which if they knew who he was, they’d know that was impossible pretty much. Lol They wanted for the crowds to THINK he was committing blasphemy though. Instead he turned it around and asked them where John’s authority had come from. They didn’t mess with John, they recognized him as a true prophet of God, so they were being given a chance to accept Jesus as well. God always gives us chances when we least deserve them. They didn’t answer, they couldn’t give their real answer without having to accept Jesus, so they had to conspire a different answer. They were trying to cover up what they realized was the truth and not admit it. How often do people do this. God is apparent in our world. In science, in humanity, in all aspects, yet people choose to ignore this and deny Him. And when they refuse to answer Jesus, he gives them the same. God is fair and just. He will give back to us what we give to Him. So if you are sitting there, in doubt or rebellion, remember that. God won’t just bless you for not praising him.
This interaction throws Jesus into a discussion of a parable. It is a direct attack on the Jewish priesthood. God had given his chosen people over to them for safekeeping and growth but they were still theirs. The priesthood time and time again went off course and were evil. They kept the glory and power for themselves. Time and time again, God sent his servants and they still didn’t turn to God. God is patient though. He gives us chance after chance to realize our sin and repent before judgment. The Lord, God, finally decided to send his son, Jesus. How could anyone not respect the son of their Lord? Instead, they would destroy him too and the Lord came and destroyed them in return. If we refuse to see the truth and reject God’s persistent attempts to love us, we will only have to face his judgment. Jesus came to love us into relationship with him, not to push us into a cage of regulations. Once we embrace that love and truly connect with him, we see that the cage is one of our own making and we are actually free.
Tomorrow’s reading is Numbers 28-30 and Mark 12:13-27.

Psalm 31-33

Today I got to do my reading with someone very special to me. It was amazing how it went along with things happening in our lives. God is so good to us. When we need wisdom, comfort, guidance, whatever we need…he totally offers it to us. The problem is that we are not always paying attention to that. I pray that I can keep my heart open to what God is telling me and not allow other things get in the way.
Psalm 31 is a sad song but at the same time it is thankful. The author uses imagery of bringing the person out of a deep well. I love that. How often do we feel like we’re trapped in a hole, in the dark and alone. God is the one who can lift us up out of that. God knows us, as I said, he knows our needs. He wants to meet those needs in ways that will lift us up out of that well. Yet often, we choose to ignore those and stay in our well. When someone throws you a line, you have to grasp it. If you don’t, there is no saving you.
Psalm 32 goes on to talk about how happy feeling God’s forgiveness makes a person. When we acknowledge our sin God can relieve us of the guilt and shame that is related to that sin. The result is definitely lifting. God is the only one that can do it though.
Psalm 33 is really a hymn in the greatest sense of the word. It calls us to praise the creator God who gives us everything we have. We don’t always make plans that fit with what God wants, and we have to adjust ourselves because no one knows how the world works as well as God does. There is no one and no thing other than God that can meet the needs we have. We have to trust in him.

Numbers 20-21, Mark 10:1-31

Today we read about Moses’ sin and why he was kept out of the promised land. Now a person can read this passage and think, “Why is God punishing Moses?”. Moses went to God to solve the problem and did what he told him to. He didn’t really though. Moses took what God said to do and twisted it. Moses’ sin wasn’t really about the actual striking of the Rock, it was about his giving the appearance that it was his own power rather than God’s that brought them water. He took part of the glory away from God. If he had merely spoken to the Rock, it would have obviously all been God. I am facing a similar situation right now. I’ve been called to minister and I do what I can to do that, and I give the glory to God. The problem is that sometimes it can look like I am the one helping that person, but it’s not. God is the only one that can change lives. I can’t do it, no matter what I say or do, or how much I give to that person. God has to be the one to change the life and that person has to accept it. How often do we “do ministry” and do it without thinking about how best to bring glory to God through it. We should always do the things that bring the most glory to God and show that he is the one who’s power is being used.
Aaron was part of the water from the rock curse. He was not to enter the promised land. God took his life before they even got close. It doesn’t say exactly how, but Aaron died. When God gives us consequences for our actions, he follows through. He is a merciful God because he gave his life to give us a future in heaven, but he is also a just God, so we must pay for our actions. When you run around saying that it’s okay to do whatever because God is forgiving, you take away the glory from him. You say that you don’t have to obey him because he’ll forgive you. It’s like lying to someone who is a believer and telling yourself that it is okay because they will forgive you. Yes, they probably will forgive you, but the damage done to that relationship is real. There is more to it than forgiveness. There is reconciliation and without that, there is no relationship. It is better to avoid sinning than to deal with the consequences.
God then gave the Israelites an amazing victory and they turned around whining and crying that they had to “suffer”. Again they whined that they were better off in Egypt as slaves. This is something I see people do all the time. They accept Christ, and they start working on their walk with God. Then something happens and they lose their focus. Or they see their friends doing things they used to do that they were trying to escape from when they embraced Christ and instead of remembering how painful it was, they only remember how easy it was. We glamorize our sin, we choose to remember all of the “good” things it brought us and forget what the consequences were. Sometimes this is because we choose to not completely cut ourselves off from that sin. We stay in our old patterns and expect something to be different. We want to be accepted where we are, but we don’t realize that where we are is a trash heap. Then they start blaming the people who helped them get out of the trash in the first place. It becomes that person’s fault that they are having to actually do something to change their life. That is our immaturity. I read a great quote yesterday and added it to my page. "Maturity doesn't come with age. It begins with the acceptance of responsibility." - Ed Cole We want for change to be easy. We want God to teleport us from Egypt to the promised land just like in Star Trek. That isn’t how it works. God will do amazing things to provide for us and give us victories in the journey but he does require us to make the journey. We have to choose to continue to obey him and trust that he will help us. After all the miracles and victories God gave to the Israelites, they continued to complain and glamorize their past life. When they did it, there were fiery serpents, plague and death. What will your consequences be? Israel was saved by God over and over again. I hope that today you will start to remind yourself of the reality of your past life and begin to truly walk in the light of Christ.
I was doing okay today until I read our passage in Mark. I hope that you will truly pay attention to what it says. Believe the words of Jesus and remember that it’s not about what we want, it’s about what God wants. So often people use this verse to justify what they want to do in their selfishness. The Pharisees were trying to trap Jesus, but he used scripture and taught a real truth about God. God doesn’t want us to sin, but he knows we are human. He made us that way. That is why he had to come to die for our sins and take care of all of that. The Pharisees were trying to find out how much they could get away with. This has been a topic in youth group for a few months now. The Pharisees are asking the wrong questions. They didn’t really want to learn from him, they were testing him and trying to find out how far into sin they could delve without being outside of God’s law. The Law stated that a man could divorce a wife, but he had to write out a certificate of divorce listing his reasons for wanting that for all to see. This kept him accountable for his own actions. Jesus challenged this by pointing out that this was because man refused to obey God, not because it was okay with God. God’s plan is for two people to work together as one in a marriage, for them to put the other first and not bring hurt to the other. Most people don’t seem to be willing to do that. They want what they want, when they want it and if someone is keeping them from getting it, they push past them. The key to this is not how much can we get away with, but what will bring Glory to God. If we are walking closely to him, we will know God’s will.
Jesus called the children to himself and wanted to bless them. This brought a horde of kids running around Jesus. The disciples were trying to calm the crowd by removing the kids. That isn’t what Jesus wanted and they disciples forgot that a little chaos is good sometimes. I love when all the kids are over here playing and we can sit and watch them. My kids are my greatest blessing and I am amazed at how much joy they bring me. Jesus uses this moment to make a point. These kids were wild with glee at being able to be close to Jesus. They couldn’t contain themselves. They trusted him completely and didn’t hesitate to go into his embrace and let him touch them. It isn’t easy to have that attitude. We face things every day that wear away our trust. The thing I fail to realize a lot of the time is that it’s not God who has let me down but other people. God isn’t the one causing me pain, it is the imperfect people in my life. He doesn’t make them treat me badly, lie about me or to me. He merely comforts me when they do.
Now we are to a tricky passage. This man wants to know how to go to heaven. I don’t know about you guys but I have been asked that a million times. Jesus starts to state the case for the new covenant here. He begins by associating himself with God. Only God is good. So if Jesus is good, then Jesus is God. You’ll also notice that Jesus throws one in there for this wealthy man. “Do not defraud”. The man says he has done all of this, which means he knows inside that something besides works is needed. Jesus tells him that surrendering everything to God is necessary for salvation. The one thing he does not want to let go of must be given to God or there is something in the way of him being in communion with God. We must all give up our idols. It may be comics, sports, cigarettes or other addictions, relationships, or anything else that we put before God. You can’t play games with God. You are either all in or all out. That may seem really impossible to you, but Jesus addresses it. “But then Jesus looked at them and said, “With men it is impossible, but not with God; for with God, all things are possible.” (v27) So what are you going to give to God today?
Tomorrow’s reading is Numbers 22:1-23:26 and Mark 10:32-52.

Numbers 18-19, Mark 9:30-50

The priesthood was to be separate. We are called a royal priesthood in 1 Peter 2:9. We are to be separate as well. Yet, we are a spiritual priesthood more so than the Aaronic priesthood I think. Thus I believe that our separateness should be a spiritual one especially. We should behave in a manner that causes people to want to know what is different about us. We no longer have a need for a physical priesthood because Christ took care of that for us. He fulfilled the law. God makes provision for those who serve him. We see this clearly throughout this reading. Those that serve him are called to depend on him. That is all of us. In chapter 18:26-29 we see that even a priest must tithe his income.
Chapter 19 moves on to discuss cleansing. There was a physical component to cleanliness for Israel. It gave them a tangible illustration of what God asked of them. The problem is that they became so entwined in the illustration that they forgot the point. We are to be clean inside.
I didn’t like the way they divided up the reading in chapter 9 of Mark so I will be starting today at verse 30. Jesus went back to Galilee and didn’t want people to know. This is not because he was scared but it sets up the importance of the following verses in being important for his disciples. Jesus needed alone time with them to teach them what they needed to know. We all need that. We need alone time with Jesus so that he can teach us what we need to know in order to walk with him closely. He tells them of his death but they wouldn’t listen. They still had the vision of him as being a military leader who would overthrow Rome. They didn’t want to ask him about it because they were scared. What were they scared of? I think that we often don’t ask questions because we are afraid that the answers will be our worst nightmare. I used to feel like that but I’ve learned that if I leave the question unasked, I am merely ignorant of the truth. I would much rather know the reality of the situation and walk in light crying than I would to remain sitting in the dark fooling myself.
They also don’t get that they don’t need to ask. He already knows their hearts, just as he knew what they were arguing about on the road. They were so concerned with worldly issues that they missed the spiritual truth Christ had shared with them. Deep down they knew this as well because they kept quiet out of their shame. This is a passage that is very misquoted. First we see Jesus sit down, this is important because this is the position of a rabbi or teacher. Then he gave them a simple lesson that has been used for things it was never intended to be used for. The basic rule of God’s Kingdom is that anyone that wants to be great has to be the most passionate in their servant attitude. He used a child to illustrate this point. Children had hardly any value at this time. The child Jesus held represented anyone who is in need, especially those in our spiritual family. When you spend your time focused on how to help other people, you show the true spirit of Christ. He served us even to dying for us. When we become believers, we become one with God. Therefore, when we help other believers, we help God. He was layering it for them so that they would understand the oneness within Christ’s Church. We are ONE with God! How amazing is that?
Now, I hear all the time about how Peter was this and that, and John was the teacher’s pet, always doing what he should. This passage in Mark always makes me smile because we see John was not perfect. Even after the lesson Jesus tells, John is still concerned with position and allegiance in a human way. Jesus explains to him that anyone working in his name will not be able to attack him at the same time. There will always be those who aren’t in our circle who are also of Christ. We are to support one another in love and not hinder people from doing good in Christ’s name. Anyone who does not curse Jesus is part of us; those that curse him will not bear fruit. Jesus went on to say that all tasks are important to God. Even the smallest kindness shown to someone that is done in Jesus’ name is noted by God. It is the loving faithfulness that counts in those situations, not the grandness of the gesture.
The final section is also often misquoted and unless you really look at what Jesus is saying can be used for all sorts of justifications. Jesus speaks about causing one another to stumble. If we do things to hurt other believers or weaken their faith or cause them to do something evil in God’s eyes, we are guilty. Jesus does not go on to promote self mutilation. He is speaking of something much different. You can’t get rid of sin by merely chopping off body parts. Yet, Jesus’ reasoning is true none the less. It would be better if crippling would keep you from sinning to be crippled than to suffer the consequences of sin. What he is truly trying to say though is figurative. If something causes us to sin, we should remove it from our influence. That may not be easy, and it may be painful, but it is better to suffer a hardship than it is to sin against God. The supreme goal is to enter the kingdom of God. Jesus shows the importance of this point by repeating it 3times. In the Hebrew culture there is no good, better, best. The greatness of something is shown by repeating it. Three times makes it the highest.
Jesus finished this out by telling us the truth about what we face on a daily basis. We all have trials, hurts and things that we feel like we won’t live through. The truth is that this is God’s way of purifying us and helping us to grow. The other day one of the youth said that the saying “whatever doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger.” was a lie. I disagree, or at least qualify it by saying, “Whatever you overcome that doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger.” We grow through trials we face and overcome victoriously. It may not be the aspect of ourselves that we wanted to be strengthened but the strength is there none the less. He also adds that we should be seasoned with salt in these trials, meaning that we should try to be Christ-like through it. If we have a loving attitude of service as he spoke of, this will make it easier to have peace with one another in all situations because we are acting as Christ would.
Tomorrow’s reading is Numbers 20-21 and Mark 10:1-31.

Numbers 16-17, Mark 9:14-32

Pride and power are very compelling things. This weekend, Pastor Rich spoke to us about what we should allow to compel us into action, Love. The people of Israel didn’t recognize that. Today we read about Korah, Eliab and Abiram allowing pride and power to entice them to go against what God was telling them. Through all the miracles and things that God showed them, they still did not get that God spoke through Moses and had chosen Aaron. They wanted the power for themselves. Neither Moses or Aaron had taken anything for themselves from the people, yet Korah and his group seemed to think they were getting extras. They missed the fact that Aaron and his group ate the same as Korah did, they had the same living as Korah did, yet they actually had more responsibilities. Often, we think that servants of the Lord have more than we do, but they really don’t. God wanted to just wipe everyone out again. Moses and Aaron prayed for them. God took care of the rebellion and no one could deny that God had spoken. Yet again, Israel only saw the punishment, not the sin that the men had committed. We are often like that as well. We feel bad for the people having to deal with the consequences, but we don’t see how their actions led to those consequences. They completely ignored God’s grace in sparing them. How often are we so focused on the trouble we go through that we forget the times that God has saved us?
God finally gives Israel a “kindergarten” sign. He sets it up to make sure that they can’t question it and makes it positive. Each head brings a stick to Moses and they set it in the tabernacle overnight. Whichever stick sprouts is who God chooses. You can’t get much more sprouted than bearing fruit. So there is a sign that they can leave there in the tabernacle to remind people that Aaron is the chosen one of God to serve in the holy of holies.
This passage in our Mark reading is very powerful if you look at what it says deep down. So often, we play at having faith. We speak of Jesus as our savior, we may even tell people about it, but we don’t really know that we believe it deep down and we doubt that he truly does anything for us. The truth is that Jesus is all powerful, yet we treat him like he can’t do much of anything anymore. The truth is that Jesus is all knowing, but we act like he doesn’t realize that we’re sinning or can’t see what we do when no human is looking or what we think in our hearts. The truth is that Jesus everywhere and we treat him like he is only present in the building we call a church. This man approached Jesus after hearing all that Jesus had been doing and he wanted for his son to be healed, but the disciples had failed. He wasn’t absolutely sure that Jesus could do it either since the disciples claimed the power through Jesus. I understand his feeling. When you have a child who has been ill or “different” their entire life, you start to just think of it as your lot in life. The hope starts to evaporate and you think that nothing will ever change. The problem becomes part of you. That is how I read this man. He has dealt with this the entire life of the child and he has tried everything he can think of to help his child, but this is just how he is. He gave up on hoping that anything would change a long time ago because it is too painful when nothing does change. What he doesn’t get is that Jesus is God. Nothing is impossible with God. When he comes to Jesus with the lack of hope emanating from him, I see Jesus speaking to him with kindness when he reminds him of hope. Jesus doesn’t give him false promises, or grand words, he simply reminds him of hope. That is the difference to this man, and suddenly his hope is rekindled.
How is that? Well first, he spoke directly to Jesus. He asked that his faith be strengthened and that led to the miracle. Jesus will always answer a prayer asking for stronger faith. He will help us to have hope when we ask for it. These things are strengthened by our prayer time with God. No one can have those things without having a close relationship with God through study and prayer.
Tomorrow’s reading is Number 18-19, Mark 9:33-50.