Hosea 10:1-14:9 ~ Jude 1:1-25 ~ Psalm 127:1-5 ~ Proverbs 29:15-17
Today is the 8th day of December. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is great to be here with you, day 4 of jet lag recovery. Feeling pretty good, probably won’t mention it anymore and bore you with the jet lag stories. I’m feeling pretty good. Some of the hours are a little off still, but excited for God’s word today because, man, I need it in my life just like we all do. It is such an honor that we get to do this together. It is crazy to think about sometimes. So rather than thinking about it, let’s do it. Let’s dive into God’s word.
We’re reading from The Message this week and we’re reading through the book of Hosea right now in the Old Testament. When we get to the New Testament we’re going to read the book of Jude, so we’ll talk about it and we’ll read it in its entirety which will then set us up tomorrow to begin the book of Revelation which is the final book of the Bible, so we will walk our way through that up until the end of the year as we round out the Old Testament, the Psalms and the Proverbs. But that is tomorrow. Today Hosea chapter 10 verse 1 through 14 verse 9.
Introduction of a New Book (New Testament)
This brings us to the epistle or letter of Jude. It is a mere 25 verses and yet it packs a very direct and succinct punch. We don’t know a whole lot about Jude’s background and his life. We do know that he was the half-brother of Jesus and the brother of James, neither of whom believed that Jesus was the Christ, the son of God, during his earthly ministry, but his resurrection from the dead seemed to change their viewpoints considerably and understandably.
We don’t know exactly who Jude wrote this letter to other than we know that he wrote it to believers. He wrote to vigorously combat a false doctrine that was going through the church that basically said the grace of God through Jesus gives us license to do whatever we want to do. So some people were misbehaving in all sorts of inappropriate ways. Jude hits this head-on and directly as a false doctrine and challenges believers to contend for their faith.
These are very good words as we turn the corner and head into the final chapters of the Bible, for the life of faith is something we must contend for. This faith journey, this relationship with God is something that we have to be overwhelmingly committed to and fighting for.
So we begin and we will read in its entirety the letter of Jude today.
Prayer
Father, it is true what the psalms say: If you don’t build the house, it is a waste of time. If you don’t guard the city, no matter what we do, it is not going to work. And we have human history to show us this and we have our own lives that tell us this is absolutely true. So we call upon you, even mimicking the words of Jude. You’re the only one that can keep us on our feet standing tall in your presence, fresh and celebrating. You are the only one, the only Savior. You are the only master and we give all glory, majesty, strength and rule, from before all time until now and to the end of all time, to you. We love you. We worship you. We ask you to build the house that is our home and the city that is where we dwell and we ask that you show us how to collaborate with you in that so that our lives have a purpose that is beyond all of the nonsense that we wander into. Come Holy Spirit, in the name of Jesus we ask. Amen.
Announcements
Www.DailyAudioBible.com is the website. It’s home base. It is where you find out what is going on around here. So a few things, three things:
1. It is time to call in your holiday greetings for the Daily Audio Bible Virtual Family Christmas Party that we have each year. So we compile all that and do a reading of the nativity story, the Christmas story and intersperse that with our calls. It is just a beautiful, beautiful time that we have together. So the number that you call is the same as the prayer request line: (877) 942-4253. The only rule really about this is that you don’t combine holiday wishes with a prayer request in the same call. So if you have a prayer request or something like that, keep that separate from your Christmas wishes to your brothers and sisters that are in the Daily Audio Bible community. And that is the rule about that. So for the next few days we’ll be taking those calls, so call in your Christmas wishes.
2. The Daily Audio Bible Christmas Box is available now for Christmas and we’ve packed it full of resources that we’ve created for our community here. So the Promised Land Films double DVD is included. Bible Stories About Jesus, the double CD is included. Family Christmas, the CD project is included. Jill’s latest album that we released this year is included. And that would be enough, but wait! There’s more. So my latest book Reframe is in there, From the God We’ve Made to God With Us, a deep exploration of what it actually means to be in a relationship with God. We say it all the time, but what does that actually mean? This book explores that. And then the corresponding films that we created to go along with the book are included in DVD form. This is the last time those will be available. So get it while you can. And then your choice of either our Windfarm coffee or our Windfarm tea, so our house blend of coffee or English Breakfast tea, your choice, as well as the Daily Audio Bible Christmas cards and then the Daily Audio Bible Christmas Bulb that is available each year in the Christmas Box. This time it has the word for the year which was healthy on it. It is beautiful. I love having those on my tree. I love it very much. It is my personal way of kind of bringing everybody into my house for Christmas. I look at them, literally. I actually do. I have them kind of front and center on my tree and so when I’m sitting on my couch at night with the lights on and just kind of chilling out and winding down for the day I can see them and think of all that we’ve been through over the years together. So that is included in the Daily Audio Bible Christmas Box as well. Like I’ve been saying, we sell out of them, so grab them while you can. There will be things in there that you want. There will be things in there you may want to give away. It’s perfect for that. So check it out at www.DailyAudioBible.com in the Shop.
3. The More Gathering for Women is a conference that we put on each year in the mountains of Georgia just outside of Atlanta in this beautiful location. Now, I know we’re just kind of getting into winter, but come April, at least here in the south, new life begins to spring forth. So we do this at that time when it is new life springing forth. That is what happens at the More Gathering. So we have advance pricing right now until the end of the year so that the Christmas holiday can be taken advantage of because it is a very unique Christmas gift for the woman in your life. Giving her some space to consider what the next season of life is going to look like and to process that with God without any interruptions or anything like that, it is so rare that we get that, makes for a gift that has long term benefits. So you can check that out at www.DailyAudioBible.com as well. You’ll find it in the Initiatives section and all of the details, everything about it that you would want to know, you can find that there. So take advantage of the pricing that we have right now until the end of the year.
If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible here in this final stretch of the year, thank you. Thank you profoundly. It is your partnership that lets the Daily Audio Bible be here. We are a community. That is what we are. We’ve done what we’ve done and we’ve done everything we can do to do it with excellence and commitment and daily and we do it together. So thank you for your partnership in allowing the Daily Audio Bible to continue into the new year. There is a link on the home page at www.DailyAudioBible.com. You can also find it using the app by pushing the More button in the lower right-hand corner. Or if you prefer, the mailing address is P.O. Box 1996, Spring Hill, TN 37174.
And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment or right now a holiday greeting, (877) 942-4253 is the number to call. And we have a couple of other numbers. Let me grab that sheet. I don’t have those memorized. I mean, I kind of do but I kind of don’t have them memorized. If you are in the UK, you can call 44, 20-3608-8078 and if you are in Australia or the lands down under, 61, 3-8820-5459 is the number to call.
And that’s it for today. I’m Brian. I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here tomorrow.
Community Prayer Requests and Praise Reports
Hi DAB. December 2nd was Baby G’s second birthday. I was in the kitchen making birthday cupcakes for the daycare and the doorbell rings. I went to the door and it was the postman delivering me my DAB Christmas cards and package. Thank you SarahJane, Brian, and everyone at DAB. I was so happy. I put on Christmas music, was in the mood. My son came home. We had a nice little party for him. Saturday, getting ready to go to a Christmas Advent function at my job and chewing on a piece of bread and crunch! My temporary crown broke and I thought, “Oh no. Oh my goodness. Wow.” I’ve had a horrible headache for three days and I’ve just been fighting it and pushing through and giving God the praise and the glory and now this happens. So not going to let it ruin my day. Getting dressed, we’ll still go to the Advent and afterwards we’ll go to the emergency doctor, get to the dental clinic and he tells me, “Your tooth is cracked. You can’t fly to London on Monday. It’s not good.” Gotta cancel my business trip to London. In bed thinking, “Well, do I need to cancel? Maybe I could still go.” Get up this morning, chewing a piece of toast on the right side, crunch! Crack! My permanent crown cracked in place. Through all of this, I got up with a banging headache, took heavy medication, got in the kitchen and baked cookies for my church Christmas Cookie Exchange. There is so much more of this story, but the bottom line is it was God’s __________ that I wasn’t listening to him when he told me slow down and because of that I believe God will put another stumbling block in our way and I said, “I got it! I heard you, Jesus. With a throbbing head, I’m calling you. Pain in my tooth, but I’m still rejoicing.” I love you DAB family. Cheers to you all. Asia from Munich.
Hi Sarah. This is Shannon from Oregon. I’m calling about your recent loss of your dad and the pain that you’re feeling right now. I lost my dad nearly four years ago and I understand a lot of what you’re going through right now and I want to encourage you. I found a lot of encouragement from the Psalms which I spent a lot of time in before my dad passed away and it was one of those things the Lord just totally led in, because my dad wasn’t sick or anything. He actually died in an accident, but I was able to be so much more real and honest with God, I think, because I had been in the Psalms and seeing that example that David gave us being just totally honest with God and God calling him a man after his own heart and not judging him or shaming him. So I wrote a song out of that pain called Hold Me and I would love to share that song with you. If you’ll email me I will send you a copy of that song. My email is Shannon@ReidSaunders.org. Here is a little bit of it now. It’s called Hold Me. [Singing] I thinking I’m doing okay until the waves come. It hits me like a wall, knocks me down, I can __________. Am I still free __________. It’s all that I can do. So hold me. Hold me. Hold me.
Hi DAB family. This is Grandma Dorothy, formerly from Toronto but now in far west southern Ontario. Today is Sunday. I listened to the weekend prayer and praise and heard my call this past Tuesday and realized all my two minute rambling barely got me started on all the thoughts I wanted to express. All the ads about Black Friday last weekend got me thinking of its true meaning and significance. First, how blessed America is to be able to connect Thanksgiving to Christmas in their holidays, the day we thank God for all his bountiful gifts to the day God gave his greatest gift of all. God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. Our northern harvest comes too early for this connection. When I first heard of Black Friday, I thought what a strange, even morbid name for the day after Thanksgiving, but later I learned it didn’t describe the day but the color for the ink in the ledgers of all businesses worldwide as these sales launched Christmas shopping that would go on until January 6th, thus getting out of the red and into the black, recouping losses and making profits. The bottom line is this, that after more than 2000 years and the birth of Jesus Christ and all the giving that is prompted from that is the recovering of the economy of the whole world every year. How beautiful is this? How very benevolent is our loving Heavenly Father. God bless.
Hi Daily Audio Bible family. This is Homeward Bound. Alleah, I heard your call and your cry for prayer for your family. Your name must mean angel because you have a such a beautiful heart. I pray that the Lord will heal your family in Jesus’ name and pour his peace over your family, that he’ll come against enemies from attacking your family and cover your home with his presence and peace. In Jesus’ name. Please, family, if I could ask you to pray for my son’s wife. She is going through tremendous hardship in her job. She works as a personal assistant and her boss has overloaded her with 60-hour work weeks and weekend work as well. She is so worn out and overwhelmed. I just ask that you could pray that the Lord will bring her a new job and also for salvation for her boss. Lastly, if you could please pray for a young man we met today named Tyler who came to church. He is 18 years old and he is seeing demonic activity in his house, even experiencing demons touching him. Please pray for deliverance for Tyler and for God’s presence to cover his house and body and to fill him with his Spirit. He has started coming to church more regularly, so I just ask that you could all combine your prayers for Tyler. Thank you so much. God bless you all and may he hear and answer every prayer that you have. Bye-bye. This is Homeward Bound.
Hi family. This is Jacqueline, aka Salvation is Mine in San Leandro, CA. I haven’t called in a few days and the reason I haven’t called in for a few days is I didn’t feel like praying and I’m sure some of us have that feeling. So on that note I’m calling in tonight to pray for those who don’t feel like praying sometimes. So let’s do it. Let’s pray. Dear Heavenly Father, our precious Savior, Jesus Christ, the Comforter, the Holy Spirit, we come before you right now asking for your forgiveness for not feeling like we want to pray because we’re feeling so broken or feeling so down or feeling so hurt or feeling so angry at you for whatever reasons we may have that we just can’t find the words to pray. But you know the depths of our souls. You know the depths of the things that are in our heart, even when we don’t pray. So we do ask you for your forgiveness in that matter, that we have not come to you, and seek your face and seek your word and seek your guidance and seek your mercy. Help us to open up and to pray to you to let you know that we care. We love you. We know you’re there for us and that you’re just waiting for us to come to you at the throne and be there with you. Maybe we don’t have any words to say and all we can say is, “I’m coming to you, Lord” and just be silent after that, that you will know what is in our heart and you will open up everything within us so that we may be in your presence again. In the blessed name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit I pray. Amen. Goodnight.
Hi, this is Elaine from Victoria. Thank you, Jen, that is turning 50. Happy birthday to you. Thanks for your prayers. I pray for you too and all that call in. Lord, you know them all, so be with them at this time. It is a difficult time too for me. I did lose my husband September 9th but it’s okay. I pray to Jesus. I’m celebrating his birthday. I put __________ to my son-in-law’s sister’s place, but I don’t want to go because I have to witness drinking. My daughter is drinking and I’ve had enough of drinking the past at Christmases so I don’t want to go there. I may have a chance to go to have Christmas with my great-grandchildren, grandson, but it is up to the Lord where I go. My daughter, Carrie, and her teenage daughter, they are coming. Like times before, may you all just be with them, the three of us. It is time to focus on Jesus and I’ve tried to tell my grandson we don’t celebrate Santa Claus. We celebrate Jesus’ birth, not getting drunk and greed. That’s all I see. So __________ and I thank you, Brian, for this. It’s 1:20 in the morning, but I know I’m not alone. So thank you and I pray for people with __________. I pray for deliverance of __________, even in my own family. So thank you Jesus.