365 Reflections

The first event after Jeremiah's commission is a conversation about visions given to him by God. The Lord asks him two questions. Here is the first.  Jeremiah 1:11–12 (ESV) And the word of the LORD came to me, saying, “Jeremiah, what do you see?” And I said, “I see an almond branch.” 12 Then the LORD said to me, “You have seen well, for I am watching over my word to perform it.” A note in my Bible over the word, "almond" stipulates a wordplay at work here. The Hebrew word for almond (saqed) sounds like "watching" (saqad). God wanted Jeremiah to SEE God's word at work. God will always see that His Word goes to work as God declared it to work.  This is the fundamental requirement if one should venture to speak for God. That person must be confident that God's Word will come to pass no matter what others SAY. Those who reject such confidence will find themselves swaying in the wind of public opinion, current trends, and even age-old deceptions. God makes p...

Are you the kind of person who longs to hear from God's Word? Or are you the kind of person who kind of appreciates it? I would suggest that to the extent you long for His Word you experience His presence. Conversely, the less you long for it, the less you experience Him. God is looking for people who want to hear what He has said. This is the great testament of Scripture itself. And when we get to the climax of Elihu's speech to Job, we find a man in Elihu who LOVES and LONGS for the WORD of GOD.  Job 37:1–4 (ESV) “At this also my heart trembles and leaps out of its place. 2 Keep listening to the thunder of his voice and the rumbling that comes from his mouth. 3 Under the whole heaven he lets it go, and his lightning to the corners of the earth. 4 After it his voice roars; he thunders with his majestic voice, and he does not restrain the lightnings when his voice is heard. What does your heart leap for? Elihu's heart lept for God's voice. And he called Job to listen....

Josiah is a king like no other before him or after him in the Old Covenant. His reforms clean house in a nation utterly corrupted. His passion to obey God was unparalleled even by David and Hezekiah. He not only brought Israel to national repentance, but he also restored the sacred meal that signified who they were.  2 Kings 23:21–23 (ESV) And the king commanded all the people, “Keep the Passover to the LORD your God, as it is written in this Book of the Covenant.” 22 For no such Passover had been kept since the days of the judges who judged Israel, or during all the days of the kings of Israel or of the kings of Judah. 23 But in the eighteenth year of King Josiah this Passover was kept to the LORD in Jerusalem. The Passover for Israel was what the Lord's Supper is for us. It is the meal that God's covenant people ate with their deliverer (Jesus for us/Moses for them). Both meals were inaugurated on the night before the death of the firstborn (of God for us/of Pharoah for the...

The legacy Hezekiah leaves behind for his children is one of riches, fame, healing, and deliverance from his enemies. But his heart was proud and he never gave God the honor He deserves toward the end of his life.  The result of Hezekiah's life is extrapolated in the testimony of his son, Manasseh. But first I remind you of Hezekiah's wealth and privilege provided him by the gracious hand of the Lord. His nation was under the threat of Assyria and the Lord sent his angel to destroy 185,000 troops in the night to secure him peace. He was intended to die by illness but his earnest prayer to God yielded a miraculous recovery. On top of these things, he increased in wealth substantially. At the visit of the Babylonian emissary it says this: 2 Kings 20:13 (ESV) Hezekiah welcomed them, and he showed them all his treasure house , the silver , the gold , the spices , the precious oil , his armory , all that was found in his storehouses. You could say Hezekiah lived the good life to the...

The news for Judah seems dismal. The threats of Sennacherib loom over the land. Will Judah fall to Assyria as the Northern tribes of Israel did? The propaganda from Assyria seems certain and pulls no punches letting the people know it. Hezekiah sends messengers to Isaiah and Isaiah responds with words of assurance that the Lord will frustrate the king of Assyria yet Hezekiah sees very little in the way of victory even after the words. Instead, Rabshakeh, the minister of propaganda keeps taunting the defenders on the wall and pronouncing inevitable defeat. After all, there were many nations before Judah who called out to their “gods” and they were vanquished. What made Judah different?  The answer is found in the theme of Hezekiah’s prayer offered in 2 Kings 19.  2 Kings 19:14 (ESV) Hezekiah received the letter from the hand of the messengers and read it; and Hezekiah went up to the house of the LORD and spread it before the LORD. Hezekiah takes the taunts of the enemy and “spr...

I don't know about you, but I want to stand for God when no one else does and when all hell breaks loose. I really do. But there are times it gets challenging and the temptation to compromise is real and I often take it in subtle ways.  If you feel the same way, the story of Hezekiah is for you.  Hezekiah comes to the throne of Judah after a long dark period in Israel's history. Scripture recounts the testimony of his deep trust in the Lord in spite of what his predecessor did and the neighboring nations were doing. 2 Kings 18:5–8 (ESV)  He trusted in the LORD, the God of Israel, so that there was none like him among all the kings of Judah after him, nor among those who were before him. 6 For he held fast to the LORD. He did not depart from following him, but kept the commandments that the LORD commanded Moses. 7 And the LORD was with him ; wherever he went out, he prospered . He rebelled against the king of Assyria and would not serve him. 8 He struck down the Philistin...

Jehu, king of Israel was a man on fire. The Lord appointed him to wipe out the sin of Israel and he acted with intense zeal in accomplishing that task. At one point he boasted to an associate:  “Come with me, and see my zeal for the LORD.”  2 Kings 10:16.  Yet there is a lesson for the modern church in the life of Jehu. Let us first recount his expedition of vengeance.  Once anointed Jehu unleashed a torrent of God's wrath on the unfaithful royal families of both southern and northern Israel. Joram (Ahab's son), Jezebel, and all 70 of Ahab's sons were killed. He piled the heads of Ahab's sons at the gate in a proud display of his accomplishment. Ahaziah, the king of Judah and all his relatives were slaughtered at Jehu's command. Finally, Jehu coordinated a fake Baal worship ceremony in order to bring all the Baal worshippers into one place and he commanded his men to slaughter all of them as well. You could say Jehu was the John Wick of the Bible.  Yet in spite ...

The book of 2 Kings opens with a familiar refrain. The kings of Israel are refusing to listen to the voice of the Lord through His chosen prophets. Now the name "Kings" is really ironic because the kings are not great at all. It is the prophets, those who speak for the Lord that carry Israel along through these tumultuous times. The book begins with King Ahaziah, the son of the wicked King Ahab having an accident and seeking the god of "Baal" for notice on whether he would recover. At this time the word of the Lord comes to Elijah: 2 Kings 1:3–4 (ESV) But the angel of the LORD said to Elijah the Tishbite, “Arise, go up to meet the messengers of the king of Samaria, and say to them, ‘Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going to inquire of Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron? 4 Now therefore thus says the LORD, You shall not come down from the bed to which you have gone up, but you shall surely die.’ ” So Elijah went. When Ahaziah hears that Elijah h...

Deuteronomy 4:5–8 (ESV) S ee, I have taught you statutes and rules, as the Lord my God commanded me, that you should do them in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. 6 Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people.’ 7 For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as the Lord our God is to us, whenever we call upon him? 8 And what great nation is there, that has statutes and rules so righteous as all this law that I set before you today? The Word of God created the Heavens and the Earth. The Word of the Lord brought Israel out of Egypt regardless of what Pharaoh said, decreed or did. The Word of the Lord sustained Israel through 40 years of wandering in the wilderness.  The Word of the Lord is good.  Deuteronomy calls us to hear God's word over 100 times. That says...

We all want to hear from God. But sometimes we get frustrated when we don't. I was reading Exodus 25 about God's instructions concerning the Ark of the Covenant - the item in Ancient Israel's temple that physically signified God's presence among. They are to build the ark by God's specific directions and this is how it ends: Exodus 25:22 (ESV) There I will meet with you, and from above the mercy seat, from between the two cherubim that are on the ark of the testimony, I will speak with you about all that I will give you in commandment for the people of Israel. What you have in these instructions about the Ark is a physical type or picture of how we can come to hear God's voice. Looking to God's instructions to Moses we have clear principles as to what God wants from us in order to hear Him regularly.  First God tells them: Exodus 25:11 (ESV)  You shall overlay it with pure gold, inside and outside shall you overlay it, and you shall make on ...

Exodus 6 contains a short conversation between God and Moses that seems like a rehash of what transpired at the burning bush a few chapters earlier. It has the same statements but there are contextual differences that make it plain: this is a new conversation about an old topic. Exodus 6:10–13 (ESV) So the LORD said to Moses, “Go in, tell Pharaoh king of Egypt to let the people of Israel go out of his land.” But Moses said to the LORD, “Behold, the people of Israel have not listened to me. How then shall Pharaoh listen to me, for I am of uncircumcised lips?” 13 But the LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron and gave them a charge about the people of Israel and about Pharaoh king of Egypt: to bring the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt. Moses has been in active ministry now for a few days. They have been hard days. He's been believed and rejected in a matter of moments. The words he speaks to the people are falling on deaf ears. Notice the horrible stature of their hearts in v...

Exodus 2:24 (ESV)   And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. The redemptive history of Israel from Egypt is summed up in this one passage. God bases all His blessings and work for Israel on His covenant with Abraham from many centuries before. Please understand this: When Israel is in bondage in Egypt and groans, it is not that God suddenly realized something had to be done for Israel. He knew when and what had to be done long before while speaking to Abraham in Genesis 15. It is also not that God felt bad for them. He heard their groaning yes, He cares, yes. But that is not what ultimately prompts His action. It is also not that Israel was doing the right things and winning God's approval. They aren't! Joshua will let us in on that little fact at the end of the book: Joshua 24:14 (ESV)   “Now therefore fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers...

Psalm 119:148 (ESV)   My eyes are awake before the watches of the night, that I may meditate on your promise. Of the 20 times the Hebrew Word for meditate shows up in the Bible, 8 of those times appear in Psalm 119. There is no doubt that when you are discouraged and downcast, the answer is always God's Word. And this is intuitive to our culture. I was having a conversation the other day about a popular TV show where one of the characters in this very gruesome post-apocalyptic world keeps turning to the Bible on occasion. Somewhere in Hollywood there is a writer that still wrestles with the reality that the Bible has the answers 2000 years later to the hardest parts of our lives. Biblical meditation is not emptying your mind but filling your mind with God's Word to such a decree that it causes you to start living differently. It's meaning in the Hebrew is to  “go over a matter in one’s mind” or "to rehearse" it. Meditation is not just reading, but re-r...

Typically when God does something special or new in our lives, the enemy is enraged and attacks. Jesus said in the parable of the soils (Matthew 13) the evil one comes in and steals the seed of the Word before it even has a chance to settle into the soil. The enemy of our souls hates the power of God's Word. It's because he (the enemy) knows the power of God's Word even more than us. It is the first thing he sought to question before the woman in the garden. The longest Psalm of the collection is dedicated to the Psalmist's love for God's Word. He commits to it and desires it... praying earnestly:  Psalm 119:18–19 (ESV)   Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law. 19 I am a sojourner on the earth; hide not your commandments from me! He wants God's Word deep in his heart because he knows his time on Earth is strange and at times unwelcome. He needs the guidance of the God of heaven. But notice that as soon as he desires God's W...

Do you want to be unafraid in life? Do what God says. I love psalm 112. It's a continuation from Psalm 111 which shows us the God who creates and sustains the ordered universe. He made it to function a certain way. By implication, He made all of US to function a certain way. The Psalm responds to Psalm 111 with a commendation to those who trust God: Psalm 112:1 (ESV) Praise the Lord ! Blessed is the man who fears the Lord , who greatly delights in his commandments! The delight of His commandments is what's important here. Fear is about trust. To fear God is to trust and love His commands because they work. The same God who created the world that works (Psalm 112), has given us laws to keep us operating in the world with blessing. consider the absence of God's law for generations from the fall to Noah. Man's wicked heart was only consumed with evil all the time. The message of God for 4 chapters in the Bible is left to our own devises, we destroy ourselves. T...

Psalm 91 is a wonderful promise of protection. Psalm 91:1–4 (ESV)   He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. 2 I will say to the Lord , “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.” 3 For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence. 4 He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. This Psalm also shows up on the lips of satan himself in the wilderness as he's tempting Jesus. He quotes the 11th and 12th verses: Psalm 91:11–12 (ESV) For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. 12 On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone. But I never saw this before: Satan left a key part of those verses out in his temptation: Matthew 4:6 (ESV)   and (the devil) said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down...

There's really is no substitute for obedience to God's word. The women who anointed Jesus' body for burial did something very interesting at the end of Luke 23. Please remember, their Lord and Master has just been brutally tortured and  executed and  all their hopes seem to have died with him. Their own people the Jews sought his arrest, trial, conviction and death. It seemed as though even their own people were against them. They prepared to anoint Jesus's body for burial as was proper and fitting according to custom.  Then here's what Luke says: Luke 23:56 Then they returned and prepared spices and ointments. On the Sabbath they rested according to the commandment . I know it's a small thing in light of what is just happened concerning Jesus, but we cannot overlook it. These women rested on the Sabbath right after they lost their precious Lord. And with the world seemingly turned against them, their hearts broken and facing great fears of what people might do...