Tristan reminds me so much of myself 30 years ago. I’m so thankful God sent Bill into my life and Ray into Tristan’s that we might hear the good news and be saved.
Who does God want you to share this good news with?
Will you pray with me?
Heavenly Father, I am a walking, taking, living, breathing testimony of Your Grace. Send me where You will, to speak to whomever You will. Give me the words to speak and the courage to speak them. For Your Glory and for the love of my neighbor I pray, Amen.
Read through the Bible in 2 Years: 1 Peter 2.
Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.
1 Peter 2:16 ESV
The Christian faith is full of impossibilities. One God in three persons. A man who is God. An omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient God.
Likewise, the Christian life is full of impossibilities. Walking by faith in a God you cannot see. Dying that you may live. And here, living as a free slave.
God is my master. He owns me. He bought me, not with temporary things like silver or gold, but with the most precious blood of the Lamb of God. (1 Peter 1:18-19)
Yet, He invites me to walk in the joy and power of freedom, with my head held high and the shackles of sin that once held me captive forever broken and cast into the sea.
Free at last. Free at last. Thank God Almighty. I’m free at last!
Oh, but I’m still a slave, slave to the Most High, Most Holy Ruler of the Universe, slave to Almighty God who tells me to die to myself that I might live for Him.
I’ve tasted and seen that the Lord is Good, and I want to be His slave. I have willingly given my life to Him and again and again I say, “Take my life and let it be, consecrated, Lord, for Thee.”
Take my life and let it be
Consecrated, Lord, to Thee.
Take my moments and my days,
Let them flow in endless praise.
Take my hands and let them move
At the impulse of Thy love.
Take my feet and let them be
Swift and beautiful for Thee.
Take my voice and let me sing,
Always, only for my King.
Take my lips and let them be
Filled with messages from Thee.
Take my silver and my gold,
Not a mite would I withhold.
Take my intellect and use
Every pow’r as Thou shalt choose.
Take my will and make it Thine,
It shall be no longer mine.
Take my heart, it is Thine own,
It shall be Thy royal throne.
Take my love, my Lord, I pour
At Thy feet its treasure store.
Take myself and I will be
Ever, only, all for Thee.
Read through the Bible in 2 Years: Mark 16
When Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome arrive at Jesus’s tomb, they were alarmed to see the stone rolled away and the tomb empty. They discovered an angel sitting in the tomb who said to them,
“Do not be alarmed. You seek Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen; he is not here. See the place where they laid him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.”
Mark 16:6-7 ESV
This week in my study of Joshua for Community Bible Study, I’ve been thinking a lot about telling the truth. That led me to thinking about God and His Word being 100% true and trustworthy. And like my March 17 post, here we have it again, Jesus tells the truth. He is trustworthy. He isn’t like Lucy with Charlie Brown and a football, saying one thing, only to change His mind a minute later. If God said it, you can believe it.
“Every word of God proves true.” (Proverbs 30:5a)
If you want to have your faith strengthened, take a little time today to watch this video titled “Jericho Unearthed” from Expedition Bible about the archaeological findings at Jericho.
Heavenly Father, You have told us what is true. You have given us Your Word that we might know You and follow You by faith, being fully convinced of what we cannot see. You are trustworthy and Your Word is true. Strengthen us to believe You and obey You, even when it’s hard and even when it’s scary. We pray in the Name of Jesus Christ who is the truth, the life, and the only way to You. Amen.
Read through the Bible in 2 Years: Joshua 10
In Numbers we read about when the Israelites were afraid to go into the Promised Land because the spies had brought them reports of the people already living there. And, now, in Joshua 10, here it is. They are facing these cities and kingdoms and armies. And it’s scary.
Friends, there are lots of scary things in life. Things like cancer and job loss, hurricanes and forest fires, wayward children and wayward husbands. But there is no situation – no matter how terrifying – that is beyond God’s reach.
There is nothing too hard for our God. There is no person beyond His reach. There is no crisis on earth that God does not hold in the palm of His Almighty hand. Fear not. He is still on His throne.
Heavenly Father, sometimes life here is awfully scary. Like a child imagining what might be hiding under the bed or in the closet, sometimes I let my mind wander to all those unsettling, scary what-ifs. Please, Father, help me to cast all my anxiety on You and trust that You care for me. You care about me, and You take care of me. You are cradling me in the palm of Your Almighty hand, sheltering me under the wings of Your Steadfast, Omniscient Love. You know all things. You are in control of all things. You are wise. You are good. Help me to trust You right now, in this moment, and in all the moments still to come. In the Name of Jesus Christ who triumphed over sin and the grave, I pray. Amen.
Read through the Bible in 2 Years: Deuteronomy 31:14-32:52
And the LORD said to Moses, “Behold, you are about to lie down with your fathers. Then this people will rise and whore after the foreign gods among them in the land that they are entering, and they will forsake me and break my covenant that I have made with them. Then my anger will be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them and hide my face from them, and they will be devoured. And many evils and troubles will come upon them, so that they will say in that day, ‘Have not these evils come upon us because our God is not among us?’ And I will surely hide my face in that day because of all the evil that they have done, because they have turned to other gods.
“Now therefore write this song and teach it to the people of Israel. Put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for me against the people of Israel. For when I have brought them into the land flowing with milk and honey, which I swore to give to their fathers, and they have eaten and are full and grown fat, they will turn to other gods and serve them, and despise me and break my covenant. And when many evils and troubles have come upon them, this song shall confront them as a witness (for it will live unforgotten in the mouths of their offspring). For I know what they are inclined to do even today, before I have brought them into the land that I swore to give.”
So Moses wrote this song the same day and taught it to the people of Israel.
Deuteronomy 31:16-22 ESV
In reading Deuteronomy 32, the song of Moses, don’t forget these words from Deuteronomy 32. This song has purpose, as all songs do. Songs have the power to drill words deep into hearts. I can recite word for word songs from my childhood and my teenage years even though I haven’t heard them for years. How about you?
What songs are your kids listening to?
What songs are you listening to?
What music is playing in your car? In your home? In your mind?
What songs do you sing at church on Sunday mornings? Are they rich? Are they lovely? Do they draw your heart to worship the Lord and do they teach timeless truths?
If you’ve been reading my blog regularly, you’ll know how often I share a song to go with the scripture for that day. I’m so very thankful that the Lord gave us the gift of music – that we can give it back to Him, but also that we can have a song reverberating in our own hearts and minds as we go throughout our day.
Heavenly Father, Thank You for giving us the gift of music. We want to give it back to You. We want to worship You in song. With words and with musical instruments, we pour out our praise and our griefs before You. Help us pay careful watch to the music that we’re putting in our mouths and our minds. We want to memorize whatever is true and lovely and good and excellent and praiseworthy. We don’t want ugly songs stuck inside our heads. Please, Lord, prick our hearts with these words from Your Scriptures today and help us to be careful how we walk. In the Name of Jesus we pray. Amen.
If you don’t have a hymnal at home, try this one – Then Sings My Soul: 150 of the World’s Greatest Hymn Stories
1
There is a fountain filled with blood
Drawn from Immanuel’s veins;
And sinners, plunged beneath that flood,
Lose all their guilty stains:
Lose all their guilty stains,
Lose all their guilty stains;
And sinners, plunged beneath that flood,
Lose all their guilty stains.
2
The dying thief rejoiced to see
That fountain in his day;
And there may I, though vile as he,
Wash all my sins away:
Wash all my sins away,
Wash all my sins away;
And there may I, though vile as he,
Wash all my sins away.
3
Dear dying Lamb, Thy precious blood
Shall never lose its power,
Till all the ransomed ones of God
Be saved, to sin no more:
Be saved, to sin no more,
Be saved, to sin no more;
Till all the ransomed ones of God,
Be saved to sin no more.
4
E’er since by faith I saw the stream
Thy flowing wounds supply,
Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be till I die:
And shall be till I die,
And shall be till I die;
Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be till I die.
5
When this poor lisping, stammering tongue
Lies silent in the grave,
Then in a nobler, sweeter song,
I’ll sing Thy power to save:
I’ll sing Thy power to save,
I’ll sing Thy power to save;
Then in a nobler, sweeter song,
I’ll sing Thy power to save.
Read through the Bible in 2 Years Deuteronomy 31
First Moses told all Israel, “Be strong and courageous. Do not fear or be in dread of them, for it is the LORD your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.” Deuteronomy 31:6 ESV
Next, Moses immediately summoned Joshua to tell him personally, “Be strong and courageous, for you shall go with this people into the land that the LORD has sworn to their fathers to give them, and you shall put them in possession of it. It is the LORD who goes before you. He will be with you; he will not leave you or forsake you. Do not fear or be dismayed.” (Deuteronomy 31:7-8)
Several months ago I deleted my Facebook account. I don’t miss it much. I’ve gained more than I’ve lost. But one thing I do miss is reading Sunshine Meister’s beautifully written testimonies of God’s daily sustaining grace in her life after her son Nahum’s traumatic brain injury in 2021. This morning I woke up thinking about her and tried to find a way to follow her somewhere other than Facebook, and I stumbled on this testimony on YouTube.
Her words will encourage you more than mine. To God be the glory. Do not fear or be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you.
Read through the Bible in 2 Years: Deuteronomy 5-6
And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart.
You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.
You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
Deuteronomy 6:6-9 ESV
Yesterday I wrote about having a daily time in prayer and the Word with your children. Today I want to write about teaching your children as you go about your days, talking about what the Lord has taught you as you do whatever the day has for you to do.
I like to begin my days with my own time in the Word. This means early mornings, but it’s so worth it. Rising before the sun starts my day off right and helps to set my mind on heavenly things. Then, as I go throughout my day – teaching English online, vacuuming, washing dishes, doing schoolwork with my son, going for a walk in my neighborhood – my thoughts often return to what I read that morning or that week.
In praying about what to write today, I was reminded of Luke 6:45b ESV, “Out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks.” If my heart is full of grumbling, my mouth will be full of complaints, but if my heart is full of gratitude and wisdom, my mouth will be, too. I can’t speak of the Lord’s goodness, if I don’t in my heart believe that He is good. I know how much I need the Lord to renew my heart and mind daily. I know how prone to wander that I am. If I miss even one day with my Savior, I can feel it in my spirit.
She opens her mouth with wisdom,
Proverbs 31:26 ESV
and the teaching of kindness
is on her tongue.
The only way for your tongue to speak wisdom and kindness is for your heart to be full of the wisdom and kindness found in the Word of God. Start there for yourself, and let your heart overflow into your children as you rise and sit and walk and lie down day after day. Just like you would casually tell your children about what you bought that day at the store or about that friend you ran into that day at work, share with your children what you learned that day in the Word or in the circumstances of your daily life.
Your children need the wisdom that comes from living. Let your successes – and your failures – guide them to the path of life in Jesus.
Let’s pray.
Heavenly Father, help me to sit at Your feet each and every day, day after day soaking in Your Word and Your presence. Draw me close to You that my life and my mouth may overflow with love for my children. May my mouth be full of wisdom and kindness. May my eyes be gentle and bright. May my ears be attentive and compassionate. May my mind be fixed on things that are above and not on the things of this earth. Help me to remember that this earth and its tribulations are passing away, while the unseen things are eternal and weighty. Fill my heart with Your love. Fill my mouth with Your Word and Your words. Help me to live for what matters. Give me the strength to love my children as myself, to be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger. Make me Your mouthpiece, teaching truth diligently to my children – from the time they awake until they go to sleep – for the glory of Your Name and for the good of Your kingdom. In the Name of Jesus Christ, my Savior and my Lord I pray. Amen.
Read through the Bible in 2 Years: Numbers 33-36
“And the LORD spoke to Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan at Jericho, saying, “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, When you pass over the Jordan into the land of Canaan, then you shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you and destroy all their figured stones and destroy all their metal images and demolish all their high places. And you shall take possession of the land and settle in it, for I have given the land to you to possess it. You shall inherit the land by lot according to your clans. To a large tribe you shall give a large inheritance, and to a small tribe you shall give a small inheritance. Wherever the lot falls for anyone, that shall be his. According to the tribes of your fathers you shall inherit. But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then those of them whom you let remain shall be as barbs in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall trouble you in the land where you dwell. And I will do to you as I thought to do to them.”
Numbers 33:50-56 ESV
Two weeks ago I published a YouTube video based on the Aaronic Prayer of Blessing from Numbers 6:24-26. Within 24 hours, I’d received a comment from an atheist accusing God of committing genocide and demanding young virgins as war booty to serve in his temple.
I have continued thinking about this man’s comments as I’ve read chapter by chapter through Numbers. I don’t want to read the scriptures through the lenses of my own bias or preconceived notions. I want to have eyes and ears that search for the truth. So, what is it?
Friends, it’s so important to read the Bible – or any book for that matter – in context. Just like you could carefully cut one sentence from my blog and twist it to say something totally different than what I truly meant, likewise a person can take a sentence from the Bible to mean something totally different from what God is actually communicating.
Here is Numbers 33, we better understand God’s command for the Israelites to completely wipe out and drive out the inhabitants of the land. God knows the future of the men, women, and children currently living in Canaan as well as the future of the Israelites that He is bringing in to possess the land. God knows that the Canaanites will not repent. God knows they will be thorns and barbs to the Jewish people, leading them into idolatry and immorality. God always wants always for His good as well as for the good of His people.
The Lord truly is “a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation.” (Exodus 34:6-7)
The Lord’s blessings extend to the thousands. His forgiveness is boundless. But our sin does have consequences – upon our own lives and even down to our children, grandchildren, and great grand children. We see this again and again in the story of these faithless, complaining Israelites – as well as in our own modern lives.
So, you can read Numbers and decide that God is a cruel tyrant … or you can read Numbers and walk away more sure than ever that God is a just, faithful, forgiving, patient Father.
What did you decide?
Heavenly Father, I pray for those who have been hurt by the church, who have gotten glimpses of your truth but have chosen to turn away from Your grace. Please, Father, bring them back to You and have mercy on them. Just like the Israelites who tested You time and again with their complaints, for the sake of Your Glorious Name, remember Your children. In the Name of Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.
Read through the Bible in 2 Years: Numbers 21
From Mount Hor they set out by the way to the Red Sea, to go around the land of Edom. And the people became impatient on the way. And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For there is no food and no water, and we loathe this worthless food.”
Then the LORD sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, so that many people of Israel died.
And the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, for we have spoken against the LORD and against you. Pray to the LORD, that he take away the serpents from us.”
So Moses prayed for the people.
And the LORD said to Moses, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, shall live.” So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a pole.
And if a serpent bit anyone, he would look at the bronze serpent and live.
Numbers 21:4-9 ESV
Here they go again. Complaining. Complaining. Complaining. Again it’s all about the food.
“We have no food. Well, I mean, this food that You miraculously give us every morning is worthless, and we hate it. Why did you deliver us out of slavery? You’re a mean god. We want to go back home.”
I wish I could say that I can’t relate, but that would be a lie. All too often the thoughts in my head sound all too much like them.
“Father, what are you doing? Why is life so hard? Why did you lead me to this place only to abandon me here? I thought you loved me?”
When the snakes were biting (and killing) the people, the Israelites simply wanted the Lord to take the snakes away.
“Make this pain go away, God! Take it away! Get me out of this desert and put me in the promised land. Now!”
But that’s not what God does. Rather, He sends a Savior, a Rescuer.
He says, “Look up here! Look up at this bronze serpent up here on this pole. Look at it and have faith. Trust Me. Don’t look down at those snakes or that snake bite. Look up here at Me! I love you. Trust Me.”
Jesus referred to this very event when He was explaining to Nicodemus, a Pharisee who came to Him secretly by night, that he must be born again if he wants to enter the kingdom of God.
And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.
For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.
Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil.
John 3:14-19 ESV
What happened to the Israelites who didn’t gaze up at that snake on the pole that had been sent by God to save them? They died in their sins.
What happens to people today who don’t turn their eyes to Jesus, the God-Man sent by God to save them? They, too, will die in their sins.
Is that scary? Yes. Yes, it is.
But is God good to provide a way of escape for each of us who are dying in our sin? Yes! Yes, He is!
I’ll end with the words of Jesus from John 6:40, “For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”
Heavenly Father, Please draw us to turn our eyes to You. You have already provided a Savior. You have already sent Your son Jesus to pay the price for our sin. Now, Lord, give us the desire and the strength to turn to You instead of turning to ourselves, our circumstances, and other fallen men. Forgive us for our complaining. Forgive us for our lack of faith. Thank You for Your steadfast faithfulness and mercy toward us, a sinful people. We pray for those around us who are running headlong away from Jesus. Draw them to know You. Please, Father. We cry, Holy! Mercy! Save us, Lord! In the name of Jesus we pray. Amen.
Teach What is Good 
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