August 17, 2012

"They Have Obeyed Their Father’s Command" (8/17)

Thought from today’s Bible reading from Jeremiah 35-37.

The Lord told Jeremiah to go to the Rechabites, bring them to the house of the Lord, and give them wine to drink (Jeremiah 35:2). This was not an endorsement of the consumption of alcohol, but there was a point to this. Notice the response of these men to the offering of wine:

“We have obeyed the voice of Jonadab the son of Rechab, our father, in all that he commanded us, not to drink wine all our days, we, our wives, our sons or daughters, nor to build ourselves houses to dwell in; and we do not have vineyard or field or seed. We have only dwelt in tents, and have obeyed and have done according to all that Jonadab our father commanded us” (Jeremiah 35:8-10).

These were grown men (evidenced by the fact that they had wives and children). They were free to make their own choices about drinking wine, dwelling in houses, and tending to fields or vineyards. But their continued obedience to the will of the earthly father indicates a deep respect for him, especially since following these instructions would mean living a very different lifestyle than their fellow countrymen.
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August 16, 2012

Faith in Vain

Man on tracks

Faith is absolutely essential if one wants to be saved. The Hebrew writer said, “And without faith it is impossible to please Him” (Hebrews 11:6). Paul wrote about being “justified by faith” (Romans 5:1). But while faith is essential, it is important to understand that we must have the right kind of faith as it is described in the New Testament. If we do not, then whatever faith we do have will be worthless or in vain. How can faith become of no value to us?
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August 15, 2012

A New Covenant (8/15)

Thought from today’s Bible reading from Jeremiah 30-31.

Many Jewish Christians in the first century had a hard time giving up the Old Law in favor of wholehearted devotion to the gospel of Christ. Similarly, there are some Christians today who desire to hold onto parts of the Old Law that have not been carried over into the New Testament. Yet the following prophecy from Jeremiah makes it clear that a change was coming in which the Old Law/covenant would be taken out of the way.

“‘Behold, days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not like the first covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,’ declares the Lord. ‘But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,’ declares the Lord, ‘I will put My law within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. They will not teach again, each man his neighbor and each man his brother, saying, “Know the Lord,” for they will all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them,’ declares the Lord, ‘for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more’ “(Jeremiah 31:31-34).

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August 13, 2012

Nebuchadnezzar, My Servant (8/13)

Thought from today’s Bible reading from Jeremiah 23-25.

“Therefore thus says the Lord of hosts, ‘Because you have not obeyed My words, behold, I will send and take all the families of the north,’ declares the Lord, ‘and I will send to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, My servant, and will bring them against this land and against its inhabitants and against all these nations round about; and I will utterly destroy them and make them a horror and a hissing, and an everlasting desolation’” (Jeremiah 25:8-9).

Divine judgment was coming against the Lord’s people by means of Nebuchadnezzar and the nation of Babylon. God refers to Nebuchadnezzar as His servant, meaning that the king was doing the work of God in punishing the people of Judah.
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August 8, 2012

They Do Not Say, "Let Us Now Fear the Lord" (8/8)

Thought from today’s Bible reading from Jeremiah 4-6.

“But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart; they have turned aside and departed. They do not say in their heart, ‘Let us now fear the Lord our God, who gives rain in its season, both the autumn rain and the spring rain, who keeps for us the appointed weeks of the harvest’” (Jeremiah 5:23-24).

As Jeremiah warned the people of the coming judgment from God, they were uninterested and saw no need to repent. They wanted to go their own way, so they departed from the Lord. They did not fear divine punishment for their actions.
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August 2, 2012

Turning Grace into a License to Sin

Grace - Sin

Jude said that we must “contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints” (Jude 3). There are many ways in which the faith may come under attack, requiring us to contend for it.

  • There could be officials who give “strict orders not to continue teaching,” in which case we “must obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:28-29) and continue to teach anyway.
  • There may be false teachers, making it necessary to engage in “great dissension and debate with them” (Acts 15:2). Such debate is necessary “so that the truth of the gospel would remain” with those who had previously been taught it (Galatians 2:5).
  • There could be idolatry that exists all around us, and as Paul’s “spirit was…provoked within him,” leading him to speak out against the idols (Acts 17:16), we may be compelled to speak out as well.

But there is another threat to the faith that requires us to contend for it. This threat was mentioned by Jude in the next verse:

“For certain persons have crept in unnoticed, those who were long beforehand marked out for this condemnation, ungodly persons who turn the grace of our God into licentiousness and deny our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ” (Jude 4).

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August 2, 2012

"Set Your House in Order" (8/2)

Thought from today’s Bible reading from 2 Kings 20-21.

“In  those days Hezekiah became mortally ill. And Isaiah the prophet the son of Amoz came to him and said to him, ‘Thus says the Lord, “Set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.”‘ Then he turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, saying, ‘Remember now, O Lord, I beseech You, how I have walked before You in truth and with a whole heart and have done what is good in Your sight.’ And Hezekiah wept bitterly” (2 Kings 20:1-3).

If you continue reading in this chapter, you will see God answering Hezekiah’s prayer and granting him an additional fifteen years of life (v. 5-6). But before we get to God’s response, there are a few lessons from this passage that we need to learn.
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