June 30, 2010 (I Chronicles 7-10, Psalm 102-104)

The last verse of I Chronicles 10 is pretty powerful:

¹³ So Saul died because he was unfaithful to the Lord. He failed to obey the Lord’s command, and he even consulted a medium ¹⁴ instead of asking the Lord for guidance. So the Lord killed him and turned the kingdom over to David son of Jesse.

Haunting and makes me consider my walk with God and the devotion He requires.

I have to say, I'm still in a 'funk' - and I know it's because of a lack of faith. God doesn't change. He is always the same - always faithful. But it takes us recognizing that and acknowledging that. Psalm 103 and 104 both start out with "Praise the Lord, I tell myself". I think sometimes we just have to put mind over matter and tell ourselves, "No matter how I feel, I will praise God." That's where I am today.

Then in Psalm 103 I read of the "conditions" of blessing:

¹¹ For his unfailing love toward those who fear him
is as great as the height of the heavens above the earth.

¹⁷ But the love of the Lord remains forever
with those who fear him.
His salvation extends to the children’s children
¹⁸ of those who are faithful to his covenant,
of those who obey his commandments!

It's all about perspective. We have to constantly remember we are not alone here on earth. We are not living for ourselves, nor are we 'random'. Everyone and everything needs God, whether we recognize that or not. And the only way to recognize and remember that is to be in His word and be reminded of what He says. Psalm 104 ends this way:

²⁴ O Lord, what a variety of things you have made!
In wisdom you have made them all.
The earth is full of your creatures.

²⁷ They all depend on you
to give them food as they need it.
²⁸ When you supply it, they gather it.
You open your hand to feed them,
and they are richly satisfied.
²⁹ But if you turn away from them, they panic.
When you take away their breath,
they die and turn again to dust.
³⁰ When you give them your breath, life is created,
and you renew the face of the earth.

³¹ May the glory of the Lord continue forever!
The Lord takes pleasure in all he has made!
³² The earth trembles at his glance;
the mountains smoke at his touch.

³³ I will sing to the Lord as long as I live.
I will praise my God to my last breath!
³⁴ May all my thoughts be pleasing to him,
for I rejoice in the Lord.
³⁵ Let all sinners vanish from the face of the earth;
let the wicked disappear forever.

Let all that I am praise the Lord.

Praise the Lord!

June 28, 2010 (Various Psalms)

Well, it's been a while since blogging. I've been in CA, and although while there I don't think I missed a day of reading, I missed about every day of blogging. So I won't go back, but will go on from here. I love vacations, but I hate vacations. I'm a 'creature of habit'. I need my 'routines'. I am glad to be home. I am glad to be back at church. I am glad to be back into the routine. I also realize how easy it is to get 'sucked into the ways of the world'. I feel like I'm still coming out of a 'funk' that I got into. I wanted to go to CA and be a witness for Christ. But I think I went into the trip being tired with a loss of focus, and the trip never materialized into me being the example for Christ that I wanted to be. I seemed to be 'just like everyone else'. I know that riches and prosperity in the material world account for nothing, and yet it was so easy to 'partake' of that life. I found it interesting that today's reading encompassed those two dynamics. The first part pertains to 'worldly riches', while the last part pertains to having an eternal perspective with 'eternal riches':

The Fate of Those Without Christ:

^{Psalm 49:10} Those who are wise must finally die,
just like the foolish and senseless,
leaving all their wealth behind.
¹¹ The grave is their eternal home,
where they will stay forever.
They may name their estates after themselves,
¹² but their fame will not last.
They will die, just like animals.
¹³ This is the fate of fools,
though they are remembered as being wise.

¹⁴ Like sheep, they are led to the grave,
where death will be their shepherd.
In the morning the godly will rule over them.
Their bodies will rot in the grave,
far from their grand estates.
¹⁵ But as for me, God will redeem my life.
He will snatch me from the power of the grave.

¹⁶ So don’t be dismayed when the wicked grow rich
and their homes become ever more splendid.
¹⁷ For when they die, they take nothing with them.
Their wealth will not follow them into the grave.
¹⁸ In this life they consider themselves fortunate
and are applauded for their success.
¹⁹ But they will die like all before them
and never again see the light of day.
²⁰ People who boast of their wealth don’t understand;
they will die, just like animals.

Reflecting Upon the True Meaning of Life

^{Psalm 73:16 So I tried to understand why the wicked prosper.}

^{But what a difficult task it is!}

¹⁷ Then I went into your sanctuary, O God,
and I finally understood the destiny of the wicked.
¹⁸ Truly, you put them on a slippery path
and send them sliding over the cliff to destruction.
¹⁹ In an instant they are destroyed,
completely swept away by terrors.
²⁰ When you arise, O Lord,
you will laugh at their silly ideas
as a person laughs at dreams in the morning.

²¹ Then I realized that my heart was bitter,
and I was all torn up inside.
²² I was so foolish and ignorant—
I must have seemed like a senseless animal to you.
²³ Yet I still belong to you;
you hold my right hand.
²⁴ You guide me with your counsel,
leading me to a glorious destiny.
²⁵ Whom have I in heaven but you?
I desire you more than anything on earth.
²⁶ My health may fail, and my spirit may grow weak,
but God remains the strength of my heart;
he is mine forever.

²⁷ Those who desert him will perish,
for you destroy those who abandon you.
²⁸ But as for me, how good it is to be near God!
I have made the Sovereign Lord my shelter,
and I will tell everyone about the wonderful things you do.

June 19, 2010 (I Samuel 1-8)

The thing that strikes me in the first chapter of I Samuel is that God is in control of things. Hannah was barren, and year after year she would worship the Lord in spite of her barrenness, but finally she was so distraught about it that she prayed out of deep anguish of soul, and God heard her. We see this over and over in the Bible, that God answers the prayers of the earnest, and yet we approach Him so 'casually' and wonder why we don't receive answers to our prayers. Perhaps it's because we are not 'earnest' in our requests.

Eli was the priest and he had two sons that 'had no respect for the Lord'. The were 'assistant priests' and failed to faithfully perform their duties. Eli heard of it, and confronted them about it, but they wouldn't listen to him. It seems as if after that, Eli let them continue 'doing what they were doing' instead of dealing with them. And because of that, God accused Eli of honoring his sons more than he honored God. Here was God's response to all this:

^2:29 So why do you scorn my sacrifices and offerings? Why do you give your sons more honor than you give me—for you and they have become fat from the best offerings of my people Israel!

³⁰ “Therefore, the Lord, the God of Israel, says: I promised that your branch of the tribe of Levi would always be my priests. But I will honor those who honor me, and I will despise those who think lightly of me. ³¹ The time is coming when I will put an end to your family, so it will no longer serve as my priests. All the members of your family will die before their time. None will reach old age. ³² You will watch with envy as I pour out prosperity on the people of Israel. But no members of your family will ever live out their days. ³³ Those who survive will live in sadness and grief, and their children will die a violent death. ³⁴ And to prove that what I have said will come true, I will cause your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, to die on the same day!

³⁵ “Then I will raise up a faithful priest who will serve me and do what I desire. I will establish his family, and they will be priests to my anointed kings forever. ³⁶ Then all of your surviving family will bow before him, begging for money and food. ‘Please,’ they will say, ‘give us jobs among the priests so we will have enough to eat.’”

Honoring and obeying God - again and again we see that is the path of blessing.

The Philistines attacked Israel and captured the Ark of the Lord. Long story short, Israel got it back, but also kept foreign gods. And because of that "it seemed that the Lord had abandoned them". Then Samuel said:

7:3 “If you are really serious about wanting to return to the Lord, get rid of your foreign gods and your images of Ashtoreth. Determine to obey only the Lord; then he will rescue you from the Philistines.” ⁴ So the Israelites got rid of their images of Baal and Ashtoreth and worshiped only the Lord.

This section ends with the people demanding a king, like the other nations have. God warned them through Samuel that a king would be greedy and self serving, but the people demanded it anyway. So God told Samuel "Do as they say and give them a king". Sometimes God gives us what we ask for, even to our own hurt. Why don't we always seek what He wants?

June 17, 2010 (Judges 16-21, Ruth 1-4)

The last verse of the book of Judges pretty much sums up the whole thing:

²⁵ In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes.

That's what happens with us, if we don't make Jesus our king - we do whatever seems right in our own eyes.

I love the book of Ruth. This time as I read it, I was struck by the overwhelming sense of God's name being mentioned all the time by all parties - Naomi saying "May the Lord bless you", Ruth saying "Your God will be my God", Boaz greeting the harvesters with "The Lord be with you", the harvesters replying "The Lord bless you", Boaz telling Ruth ”May the Lord, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge, reward you fully for what you have done.”, Naomi responding to Ruth "May the Lord bless the one who helped you", etc. etc.

I think Ruth was struck by her mother-in-law's faith - and she wanted a part of it. This is total speculation, but I don't think she wanted to go back to her Moabite people after her husband died because she got a "glimpse of God" through Naomi's life. And God rewarded her richly for seeking Him.

June 14, 2010 (Judges 10-15)

This section has a very weird passage - it talks of Jephthah, who makes a vow to the Lord and says "If you give me victory over the Ammonites, I will give You the first thing coming out of my house to greet me when I return in triumph." I can only imagine that he thought it would be his wife and he didn't like her, so that was his way to be rid of her. But what happened was his daughter - his only child - came out to greet him, playing on a tambourine and dancing for joy! So, she convinced him to let her go into the hills with her friends and weep for two months because she would die a virgin. So that's what happened. Very, very strange.....

Chapter 13 begins with the story of Samson - an angel of the Lord came to Manoah's wife (her name is never mentioned) who was unable to have children and told her she would give birth to a son who was to be dedicated to God as a Nazarite from birth. She told her husband who prayed and asked for the angel to return to give more instructions, and God answered his prayer. So in a land where the Israelites were again doing evil, it seems as if this couple believed in God. So Samsom was born and 'God blessed him as he grew up'.

Chapter 14 is a good example of us not really being able to look at current circumstances and knowing with certainty what God is up to. What I mean is, sometimes God is 'in' the things that seem contrary to His word. Samson saw a Philistine woman that he wanted to marry and told his parents about it. They were furious, and asked him why he couldn't marry someone within the Israelites but had to go to the pagan Philistines. But Samson said "Get her for me. She is the one I want". And then here's the verse -

^14:4 His father and mother didn’t realize the Lordwas at work in this, creating an opportunity to disrupt the Philistines, who ruled over Israel at that time.

It seems Samson was somewhat of a spoiled brat - bossing his parents around and then paying people back for what they did to him.

³ Samson said, “This time I cannot be blamed for everything I am going to do to you Philistines.” ⁴ Then he went out and caught 300 foxes. He tied their tails together in pairs, and he fastened a torch to each pair of tails. ⁵ Then he lit the torches and let the foxes run through the grain fields of the Philistines. He burned all their grain to the ground, including the sheaves and the uncut grain. He also destroyed their vineyards and olive groves.

⁶ “Who did this?” the Philistines demanded.

“Samson,” was the reply, “because his father-in-law from Timnah gave Samson’s wife to be married to his best man.” So the Philistines went and got the woman and her father and burned them to death.

⁷ “Because you did this,” Samson vowed, “I won’t rest until I take my revenge on you!” ⁸ So he attacked the Philistines with great fury and killed many of them. Then he went to live in a cave in the rock of Etam.

And then here is how this story and chapter ends:

⁹ The Philistines retaliated by setting up camp in Judah and spreading out near the town of Lehi. ¹⁰ The men of Judah asked the Philistines, “Why are you attacking us?”

The Philistines replied, “We’ve come to capture Samson. We’ve come to pay him back for what he did to us.”

¹¹ So 3,000 men of Judah went down to get Samson at the cave in the rock of Etam. They said to Samson, “Don’t you realize the Philistines rule over us? What are you doing to us?”

But Samson replied, “I only did to them what they did to me.”

¹² But the men of Judah told him, “We have come to tie you up and hand you over to the Philistines.”

“All right,” Samson said. “But promise that you won’t kill me yourselves.”

¹³ “We will only tie you up and hand you over to the Philistines,” they replied. “We won’t kill you.” So they tied him up with two new ropes and brought him up from the rock.

¹⁴ As Samson arrived at Lehi, the Philistines came shouting in triumph. But the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon Samson, and he snapped the ropes on his arms as if they were burnt strands of flax, and they fell from his wrists. ¹⁵ Then he found the jawbone of a recently killed donkey. He picked it up and killed 1,000 Philistines with it. ¹⁶ Then Samson said,

“With the jawbone of a donkey,
I’ve piled them in heaps!
With the jawbone of a donkey,
I’ve killed a thousand men!”

¹⁷ When he finished his boasting, he threw away the jawbone; and the place was named Jawbone Hill.

And finally we see that God truly was with him, to the point of doing a miracle for him. I guess it shows that God will fulfill His purposes through whomever He chooses.

¹⁸ Samson was now very thirsty, and he cried out to the Lord, “You have accomplished this great victory by the strength of your servant. Must I now die of thirst and fall into the hands of these pagans?” ¹⁹ So God caused water to gush out of a hollow in the ground at Lehi, and Samson was revived as he drank. Then he named that place “The Spring of the One Who Cried Out,” and it is still in Lehi to this day.

²⁰ Samson judged Israel for twenty years during the period when the Philistines dominated the land.

June 13, 2010 (Judges 6-9)

Chapter 6 starts with the tale of Gideon, but before I even got to that I noticed that it wasn't until the Israelites were at the point of starvation that they cried out to God.

^6:5 These enemy hordes, coming with their livestock and tents, were as thick as locusts; they arrived on droves of camels too numerous to count. And they stayed until the land was stripped bare. ⁶ So Israel was reduced to starvation by the Midianites. Then the Israelites cried out to the Lord for help.

Why didn't they cry out to the Lord for help as soon as the enemy hordes arrived? Why did they wait until the land was stripped bare?

Chapters 6-8 tell the story of Gideon - the man who was a chicken, but whom God called a Mighty Hero. Gideon was hiding out, threshing wheat at the bottom of a winepress when God came to him and said "Mighty hero, the Lord is with you". To which Gideon replied, "Thank you for noticing how brave I am!" - Not - He basically said, "How can I rescue Israel? I'm the weakest person there is!" God told him that He would be with him, and that he would destroy the Midianites. Gideon still had a hard time believing that God had really chosen him, so he gave God some 'tests' to see if it was really true. And God obliged by answering him. So finally, Gideon got up and got his army ready, only to have God tell him he had too many warriors. He ended up with 300 instead of 32,000. The bottom line of this story is that God can/will do anything He wants to do. What He wants from us is a willingness to trust Him and to acknowledge that it is really Him that is fighting for us.

After Gideon and his army defeat the Midianites and their allied armies, Gideon makes a crucial error - I think in his heart he took the credit for what God did through him. Here's the story:

^8:22 Then the Israelites said to Gideon, “Be our ruler! You and your son and your grandson will be our rulers, for you have rescued us from Midian.”

²³ But Gideon replied, “I will not rule over you, nor will my son. The Lord will rule over you! ²⁴ However, I do have one request—that each of you give me an earring from the plunder you collected from your fallen enemies.” (The enemies, being Ishmaelites, all wore gold earrings.)

²⁵ “Gladly!” they replied. They spread out a cloak, and each one threw in a gold earring he had gathered from the plunder. ²⁶ The weight of the gold earrings was forty-three pounds, not including the royal ornaments and pendants, the purple clothing worn by the kings of Midian, or the chains around the necks of their camels.

²⁷ Gideon made a sacred ephod from the gold and put it in Ophrah, his hometown. But soon all the Israelites prostituted themselves by worshiping it, and it became a trap for Gideon and his family.

His 'one little request' became a trap for him. He didn't ask for much - just one earring from all the many objects they confiscated, but it turned out to be his downfall.

As soon as Gideon died, the people reverted to their corrupt ways:

³ As soon as Gideon died, the Israelites prostituted themselves by worshiping the images of Baal, making Baal-berith their god. ³⁴ They forgot the Lord their God, who had rescued them from all their enemies surrounding them. ³⁵ Nor did they show any loyalty to the family of Gideon, despite all the good he had done for Israel.

June 12, 2010 (Judges 1-5)

Judges begins where Joshua ended, and actually overlaps. Chapter 2 says the same thing as Chapter 24 of Joshua - 2:⁷ And the Israelites served the Lord throughout the lifetime of Joshua and the leaders who outlived him—those who had seen all the great things the Lord had done for Israel.

But it continues with more detail:

¹⁰ After that generation died, another generation grew up who did not acknowledge the Lord or remember the mighty things he had done for Israel.

¹¹ The Israelites did evil in the Lord’s sight and served the images of Baal. ¹² They abandoned the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of Egypt. They went after other gods, worshiping the gods of the people around them. And they angered the Lord. ¹³ They abandoned the Lord to serve Baal and the images of Ashtoreth. ¹⁴ This made the Lord burn with anger against Israel, so he handed them over to raiders who stole their possessions. He turned them over to their enemies all around, and they were no longer able to resist them. ¹⁵ Every time Israel went out to battle, the Lord fought against them, causing them to be defeated, just as he had warned. And the people were in great distress.

This kind of reminds me of America - God blessed our country because of it's founders and their belief in Him. But now, another generation has grown up, who does not acknowledge the Lord or remember the mighty things He has done.

Judges is a book that repeats itself over and over. Here is what happens:

¹⁶ Then the Lord raised up judges to rescue the Israelites from their attackers. ¹⁷ Yet Israel did not listen to the judges but prostituted themselves by worshiping other gods. How quickly they turned away from the path of their ancestors, who had walked in obedience to the Lord’s commands.

¹⁸ Whenever the Lord raised up a judge over Israel, he was with that judge and rescued the people from their enemies throughout the judge’s lifetime. For the Lord took pity on his people, who were burdened by oppression and suffering. ¹⁹ But when the judge died, the people returned to their corrupt ways, behaving worse than those who had lived before them. They went after other gods, serving and worshiping them. And they refused to give up their evil practices and stubborn ways.

So, over and over, the people intermarry with the people around them (they failed to follow God's commands to totally drive them out) and worship their gods. Then God allows them to be defeated by their enemies, they repent and cry out to God, He raises up a judge to deliver them, during that judge's lifetime they serve God, but after his death then they forget about God and go on their merry way, worshipping other gods and the cycle repeats itself.