Genesis 8:1-10:32 ~ Matthew 4:12-25 ~ Psalm 4:1-8 ~ Proverbs 1:20-23
Today is January 4th. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you today as we kind of move our way past the halfway point of week #1. We have covered some serious ground already in just a few days of being in the Bible each day, and today will be no different. No day will be any different. But today we’ll pick up the story of Noah and the flood of the earth in the book of Genesis chapter 8, verse 1 through 10, verse 32 and we’re reading from the New Living Translation this week.
Introduction of a New Book (Proverbs)
This brings us to our Proverbs reading for the day and like I’ve been saying for the last three days, we introduced one of the books we’ve begun at the beginning of the year so when we launch into a new year, we are starting four books simultaneously – Genesis, Matthew, Psalms and Proverbs, so we spend the first four days just kind of flying over them and then every time we come to a new book it will be the same. It will just be a little bit more spread out.
Proverbs is an invaluable book of practical, applicable wisdom to our lives now. It’s not esoteric or conceptual in any way. It’s not allegorical. It’s actual and it applies to the human heart. It exposes the motivations. It makes us think. This is the wisdom that has stood the test of time.
In the structure of the Old Testament, Proverbs is the main book of in what is called the collection of wisdom literature, so the other books in the wisdom literature would be the book of Ecclesiastes, the book of Job and then part of the Psalms. These portions of scripture are called wisdom literature because they are more intended to speak a direct lesson rather than be narrative where the reader follows a story and then gleans meaning from it. The wisdom literature speaks directly to what it is trying to teach.
Most of the proverbs are attributed to the great wise man Solomon although there are a couple of other characters involved that lend their wisdom to the Proverbs. It seems that the Proverbs may have been collected all along, but were not really put into a collection until the time of around King Hezekiah. And most scholars think that some of the proverbs could predate Solomon and were a series of oral traditions and oral wisdom that had been handed down from generation to generation, family to family and finally placed into the collection of Proverbs.
So Proverbs obviously is in the Bible, so it has obviously religious connotations in everything that it says. The first part of the book is the wisdom of God speaking in first person directly to the reader. So wisdom is speaking and the Proverbs all address the human experience and it transfers direct wisdom to what we as people as experience, both interpersonally, with God, inside ourselves, and it gives us the ultimate road map to life. It is the ultimate quintessential book of wisdom, the greatest collection of wisdom that mankind has, and it encourages us. Whatever you do, get wisdom because wisdom is more valuable than anything else. If you have wisdom, everything else can be achieved. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. This is why we spend some time in the Proverbs every day, which is what we’ll do now. Proverbs chapter 1, verses 20 through 23.
Commentary
Okay, so every year that we go through the Bible we have kind of a word that we’re focusing on that becomes kind of like a North Star, a way to approach life and find it in the scriptures. This year the word is margin. Those of you who were here last year will remember the word was healthy, and we were looking at health, spiritual, physical, emotional in the scriptures. This year the word is margin, that space that insulates us where we can stay balanced and whole because when we live our lives basically stressed out and turned all the way up all the time, well, there is no room to live in that. There is no margin in that and we end up living reactionary. Everything is a reaction to something that happens to us rather than that we have the margin in our lives to process and adapt and live into what is happening and invite Jesus into what is happening.
We see some glimpses of that in the book of Psalms today:
Don’t sin by letting anger control you. Think about it overnight and remain silent.
There is some good wisdom from the Psalms in one sentence that says create that margin. Don’t react in anger. Build the margin by remaining silent, thinking about it overnight, which gives us the space to invite Jesus into it all, allow our emotions to not run away with us, consider the paths that we may choose and what their outcomes may be rather than just blasting into the heat of the moment and causing harm, whether that be emotional harm or physical harm or spiritual harm.
So may we heed this and understand that you don’t just have to go to war every time something gets said to you that seems sideways. There are times for just silence, to move away from the situation, allow the night to pass, invite God into it, have a fresh perspective, have some margin in the reaction so that it is appropriate.
Prayer
Father, we invite you into this. Oh, this is a big one. We need this because if we’re honest and we’re examining our lives, we begin to realize that we live reactionary a lot of the time. We immediately want to go after something when, if we don’t walk with you, we’re just walking blind. We have plenty of examples in our own lives of messes that we’ve made because we didn’t have any margin, we didn’t take the beat to invite your Holy Spirit into the situation and here you are encouraging us from your word to do exactly that. So come, Holy Spirit, into this day, into the readings that we’ve just read. Plant these words deep in our lives, changing our habits, changing our motivations and the postures of our heart. Come, Holy Spirit, we pray. In the name of Jesus we ask. Amen.
Announcements
Www.DailyAudioBible.com is the website. That is home base. It’s where you find out what is going on around here. And we spend the first few days of every year just unpacking how it all works. So we’ve talked about the different programs. We’ve talked about how to stay connected through the website, through social media. How to connect with each other as we move through this year. We’ve talked about the Daily Audio Bible website. That is where you find out what is going on around here. The Daily Audio Bible Shop is there. We don’t just have a shop for the sake of selling stuff. We’ve tried to find things that are complimentary to the journey through the year, like journaling your way through the scriptures.
Another thing that is kind of like that is coffee and tea. That might sound odd, but I am a minor league coffee snob, maybe even a little more than minor league, so several years ago, all the way back to the first few years of the Daily Audio Bible, we started roasting our own coffee under our own brand called Windfarm. When you hear the Windfarm name or hear me saying that, that just comes from Ezekiel chapter 37, when the Lord invites the prophet Ezekiel to call to the four winds the breath of life. That is one of the things we feel like we’re doing here every day – calling the breath of life from the four winds of the earth, that that which has died might live again inside of us.
So anyway, coffee and tea, these are things that most people, not everybody, but most people consume either first thing in the morning or throughout the day or at tea time if you’re in a part of the world that has that tradition. Here in America, it is usually coffee and we’re usually kind of going through some drive-thru to get a cup of good coffee. Several years ago, just being really a coffee connoisseur, loving coffee, I went in search for how we could do this, how we could bring fresher coffee, because that’s the trick with coffee. Coffee actually kind of gets old and gets stale like other food products. How can we roast fresh and deliver fresh a product that is going to be consumed anyway and use the margin, which is our word for the year, to help with the Daily Audio Bible? Thus, Windfarm Coffee and Tea was born. You can see that at the Daily Audio Bible Shop as well. But we also have a coffee club and you can try out all of the different varietals of coffee and tea that we have. We send however much you want per month, however much you consume per month shows up fresh roasted. We roast this at altitude in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado and then send it directly to you each month.
So when you sign up for the coffee club, we ship at the beginning of every month. So if you were to sign up say today, it would be the first of February that we would ship. We roast right at the end of every month and ship right at the first of every month so that it arrives fresh and when you open it up and that aroma comes out fresh roasted, it’s quite different than say like a chain coffee shop that you might go through the drive-thru or whatever. That is a little bit older coffee. And tea is no different. We have sourced in the best teas we can find and there is a great selection there as well. Or you can have it sent every month and just kind of rotate through. So check that all out at www.DailyAudioBible.com in the Initiatives. It’s easy to find. You’ll find it. So check that out.
If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible in the mission that we share commonly here to bring the spoken word of God to whoever will listen, wherever you may be on this planet, whatever time it may be, day or night, that is what we do. We bring God’s spoken word to anyone who will listen and build community around it so that no one has to shoulder all of the weight and burden of life alone. If that is life-giving to you, then thank you for your partnership. There is a link on the home page of www.DailyAudioBible.com. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible App, you can push 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, we are a community and we pray for each other. If you are shouldering something that you shouldn’t carry alone, well then there is a number you can call. (877) 942-4253 is the number to dial.
And that is 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 there. This is __________. My heart goes out to James from Atlanta who has been a 10-year listener of DAB. He was asking for reconciliation with his ex-wife. I wish that when I had left my ex-husband back a decade and a half ago, that he would have had the desire that you have, James, in wanting her back. I myself was shrouded in the dark and evil lies of deception, unforgiveness and hurt. I was led to believe that I would be better off if I was out of this marriage, while leaving my children confused, hurt and with the feeling of abandonment. I wish I could tell your ex-wife what it does to her heart even this many years after a divorce. James, I pray against any of these evil lies that your ex-wife might be feeling and I ask that the Lord would restore her heart with the love and passion that she once had for you. I ask that whatever the circumstances for this divorce, that you both would be made new in mind, will, emotion and spirit. James, I believe in miracles and I hear of them every day through Daily Audio Bible. I am grateful that my brothers and sisters in this community of believers will do the same and believe and pray with me, that they will be able to see this miracle come to pass. We love you, James, and look forward to the good news that the Lord will give us about your restoration. I pray through the blood of my Savior, Jesus Christ. I love you guys. Thank you.
Hey Daily Audio Bible community. I just wanted to ask you to pray for my granddad. He’s 102. He hardened his heart to God at a young age and he’s got pneumonia and I know all things are possible for God. I pray that he would soften his heart and __________ to God before he dies. Thanks guys.
Hello Daily Audio Bible family. This is Stanley from Maryland. This is my first year listening to the Daily Audio Bible almost every day. It fills my life with so much wisdom and like you say, Brian, it has given me the rhythm of the scriptures. Even if I don’t understand everything all the way, just listening and just praying along and just hearing the rhythm of the scriptures has helped in my walk with Christ and it’s been able to give me a thankful heart and ultimately helped me to grow closer to God. I just want to thank you for everything, Brian and all the team. Thank you for all the prayer requests that have been sent in. I appreciate all you guys’ love and all you guys’ prayers and I’m looking forward to next year, 2017 being an amazing experience as well, just like this year. Thank you and have a great new year. Bye.
Hey, good morning. This message is for a young man named Brian. I believe it is in Nacogdochas, TX. My sister, Brian’s mother called in and said there was some problem. You know, I didn’t really listen a whole lot to the sickness because that doesn’t matter as much because we know the healer. As I began to pray for your son, Brian, in my spirit I saw some tissue in the brain that was too long. I don’t know what all this means, but Dr. Jesus does and I believe today is the day for your son’s miracle. So let’s pray over that. In Jesus’ name, I command every cell in this brain to be the way God designed it. Father, we agree and we release divine healing over this young man, Brian. His name means strong and powerful and he will stand strong and powerful for the glory of Christ. He has a promise. He has a purpose, a great purpose and we tell every principality and power that would try to derail that purpose, in Jesus’ name you have to get your hands off him and he is going to completely fulfill that purpose. He is going to walk in health, strength, and life. He will be filled with healing. And Father, I ask that you fill his mother’s heart with a shout of hope for the glory of Christ and we thank you for the testimony of this healing, in Jesus’ name.
Good morning Dabbers. I am a burning bush that will not be devoured for the glory of our Lord and King. What better word than what I heard Brian speak today. He said invest your hope in God’s unfailing love. Today is the 28th of December. This is my prayer for myself. This year is about to end. In one year I have lost my father. My mom has been diagnosed with cancer. My aunt is in hospice. I got a divorce. I am currently battling for custody of my younger son. My older son relapsed and went back into a life of addiction and finally is trying to find his way back out. All these things sound so, so negative but I believe that whatever we focus on we empower to have complete control of our lives. At the same time, I praise God that my mom was able to be here with us in the United States during this time that she is ill, that I was able to say goodbye to my aunt, that my children are healthy and alive, that I got a promotion this year, that God has blessed me with an awesome church family and an awesome Daily Audio Bible family, that I personally have very good health and that there are just so many great things that God is doing in my life. Father God, today I pray you help me to invest by helping you. I also pray for those who owe me. I currently have a list of over 12,500 US dollars that is owed to me in 2016. I believe that the Lord will replenish everything that the devil has taken. God, I thank you for the family and that you, Lord Jesus, your testimony is the Spirit of prophesy and I speak that over my life and the lives of those listening. Thank you, Jesus, that we will not be devoured. In Jesus’ name, amen.
Hey family. It’s Jordan from Michigan. One of the things that I’m thankful for today is the gift of writing and poetry, so I’m going to read to you my latest poem called To Teach. Listen to me, my son. You are called to teach. Basically I’m asking you to crawl in deep. But first, we don’t have to overhaul your speech to teach kids how to dwell in the halls of the meek. What you give the youth will be transcendental, all that wisdom you’ll attain, man, it’s mental. Plus it’s the true purpose that you’re meant for. Even the principalities of darkness can’t stop this, Bro. Oh, by the way, you’re going to have to do this blindfolded and you’re going to get all of the time scolded. I’ll give you no mentors, with a wide path assigned, posted. Administration will fight your light. Walk on a tightrope, Kid. Out of 100 first-year teachers, 99 times folded. You’re too nice, too kind and you know your kind is roasted. Detroit don’t want you cuz your light’s voltage is too turned up for this dark city. Hope you like growing. What are you saying, God? Are you talking to me? Do you want me to spend on the children because the doctrine is free? Are you aware that my depression which is toxic won’t flee? Are you prepared to do the impossible thing? Do you know that I’m scared, angry and obnoxious to teens? It feels like I just have too many problems to bring, too many. In a sea of demons will I drown and then sink? And if I’m sinking, screaming, will you pull me out from the brink? I hear you saying, God, I’m a child of little faith, that with the belief the size of a seed, lies would really break. The war in your head would stop. It would be forever great. You can bring the kingdom, shalom that was never placed. But I’m on the brink of the end of myself, I’ll call it suicide. Living for God, there really is no choice cuz it’s do or die. We will find out who cuts themselves and then who can fly. If you can free yourself from death, you will teach truth and light. Is this my fault or yours, Jordan? You can be too complacent. We even need to get new help for you. You need a new arrangement. Don’t try to suppress the love of Christ kept in a true containment. So your call to being a blessing should be more than two occasions. Halfway through the year, I know I failed you, Lord. Perceptions of love and truth have been impaled and torched. I smell like smoke. I’m dying in quick. __________ toward the middle of the crazy storm. What you made me for? Am I going to make it, Lord? Or is it simply too late to score? Jordan, you know that you are poor in spirit. You’ll be in heaven one day. Ignore the fear, kid. Chillin’ with you man to man, but before the cheer, it’s going to be hard times. Your Lord is nearest…