01/16/2017 DAB Transcript

Genesis 32:13-34:31 ~ Matthew 11:7-30 ~ Psalm 14:1-7 ~ Proverbs 3:19-20

Today is January 16th.  Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible.  I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you.  I am in the rolling hills of Tennessee and you are wherever you are in the world, but because of the time that we live in and the technology that we have, here we are together around this global campfire that is the Daily Audio Bible.  So we all come in and warm ourselves and enjoy God speaking to us through his word. I’m glad we can do this at all, but I’m especially glad we can do this today.  

We’ve been following this story of Jacob and he has been moving back toward his homeland where his family was.  He left a couple decades ago.  He needed to because his brother Esau was going to do away with him, so now he is returning a couple of decades later to find out if Esau is around, alive, what is going on.  Yesterday we discovered that Esau is certainly alive and has come racing toward him with 400 men.  We pick up today, reading from the New International Version, Genesis chapter 32, verse 13 through 34, verse 31.  

Commentary

Yesterday we were talking about margin and we were talking about wisdom from the reading in Proverbs yesterday.  Today in the Proverbs we find that God, the God of all is wise and uses wisdom to do the things that he does.  

By wisdom the Lord laid the earth’s foundations.  By understanding he set the heavens in place.  By his knowledge the watery depths were divided and the clouds let drop the dew.  

We are being invited to conduct our lives using the same resource, wisdom, that God uses.  So imagine if we lived wise lives because we walk with God and invite his Holy Spirit within us to guide every decision in our lives and then we use the wisdom of God to conduct ourselves, then we would be using the same thing God used to create all things in heaven and on earth.  That is available to us if we will only slow down enough to pay attention to it.  We all have a lot of experiences in our lives and if we would slow down enough to weigh those things out, we would find that we already have a measure of wisdom, and for the things that we absolutely do not understand or know, we have the Holy Spirit.  And if we want to know what that practically looks like in a human life, we have Jesus who gives us a beautiful picture of margin in our lives when he says:

Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and humble in heart and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Isn’t that how it goes?  If we get up in the morning and go through a day and the day becomes chaos right from the get-go,  right from the breakfast table it’s chaos, and then you move into the work day and it’s a mess and having to do all this stuff and backtrack and try to find ways to make progress, and then everything else falls apart and then it’s a mess at home at night, what do we do?  We fall into bed exhausted.  But we also know what those days are like when we’re walking with God and when we’re walking with Jesus, when we’ve come to him because we are weary and burdened and he gives us rest.  There is a wholeness, a peace in our activities.  Things still happen.  It can still be total chaos, but it is not all our burden to carry and it does not define our identity.  All of a sudden we find we can systematically deal with all of these things correctly because we are using wisdom and we are walking with God as we were made to be.  May we choose to come to Jesus just like he says:

Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest.

May we believe him.  

Prayer

Jesus, we do believe you.  It is just often we are like sheep who have just kind of wandered around.  We’re just not even paying attention.  We’re just looking at whatever is right in front of us. Sometimes we don’t even realize we’ve wandered astray.  But that is not what today’s going to look like and that is not what tomorrow is going to look like.  We come to you.  We invite your Holy Spirit.  Holy Spirit, come.  We need you. We need you active in our lives and so we open ourselves fully in heart, mind and will to you and your ways.  Show us the path of today in every thought, word, and deed.  Come Jesus, we pray in your name.  Amen.  

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And that’s it for today.  I’m Brian. I love you.  I’ll be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer Requests and Praise Reports

Hi, this is Judy in Utah, the other half of Steve from Salt Lake.  Anyway, Happy New Year everybody.  I called for a couple of people.  Candace, I was listening to the Family Community Prayers and your song, oh my goodness, it just brought tears to my eyes and moved me so much.  I’m praying for your son.  I just want you to know don’t give up.  This is for all parents with children that have addiction problems.  Don’t give up.  Don’t give up.  Don’t give up.  I have a son who is now just over 50 and I have been praying for years and he has only been clean and sober for the last five or six years.  Don’t give up.  There is a light at the end of the tunnel.  God is good.  For the woman that has a grandchild, they are concerned about schizophrenia, I have a daughter that is schizophrenic.  She is in treatment now, but they didn’t diagnose her until she was 30.  She is 55 now.  You’ve got to get that child treated.  Don’t worry about medication.  Prayer is awesome.  It works. But God provides us with doctors and medicines for a reason.  If our daughter had been able to get the medication she needed when she was a child, her life would have been so different.  She would not have lost her children to adoption.  Long story.  A lot of things happened in our lives.  I just want you to know don’t give up, all of you that are battling with different issues. Lana, shout-out to you.  The lady with the sadness who works in the salon, have your people write down their prayer requests.  Pray for them when you get home.  Keep them in your prayers at night.  When you go back, ask them if they’ve had any answers to prayers.  

I walk in circles around the yard.  I do this every day.  Sometimes I simply walk and think.  Sometimes I walk and pray.  And when I walk I’m not alone.  I’m walking with the Lord.  His Holy Spirit fills me up.  His peace is my reward.  He said he would keep in perfect peace the mind that is stayed on him and perfect peace is what I need when things start looking grim.  There is evil present all around.  I feel like I’m boxed in.  I know I have to walk away to not be caught in sin.  Help me, Lord, to boldly walk and know I’m not alone.  The peace your Holy Spirit gives surpasses all I’ve known. Fill me Lord.  Anoint me Lord.  I long to hear your voice.  Gently speak into my heart for making you my choice.  I’m not ashamed to lift you up.  My life is an open book.  When asked if I believe your word, you only have to look.  I try to practice what I preach, to lift my lamp up high.  So someone else can see God’s love by me just passing by.  But darkness doesn’t like the light for the clarity the light brings.  But those of us who love the light will walk like we have wings.  Because truth is light and light is love and truth will set you free.  Jesus is the light of God and all the world to me.  He said we would sometimes have to flee, we all have __________.  Do not stand and tempt yourself by trying to test yourself.  Been there, done that.  Always lost. The power of sin is too strong, but I know when I rely on him I win and don’t go wrong.  And so I walk in circles and I do this every day.  As I walk, “Lord, Lord, please walk with me and help me not to stray.” BlindTony1016@gmail.com.  Once again, my love to the Hardin family for this wonderful podcast allowing the Holy Spirit to flow throughout the earth.  Keep it flowing, y’all.  Bye-bye.

Hi Daily Audio Bible.  This is Andrew.  I just want to pray for people that are somewhere else in the world and it has been raining a lot at our house and I really want to pray for people that are in other places that might have floods and so I just pray for that.  Bye Daily Audio Bible.  

Hi, this is Caroline.  I’m a carer for Anna who can’t speak because she’s got her genetic problem with her nervous system.  I agree with Cherry Pie that this year one of her resolutions is fast from negativity and  feast on positivity and which she is very happy that other people join the call.  Thank you, Cherry Pie.  Thank you, Sister.  She would like to stand in agreement with Chantelle from Detroit and Sam from Australia in praying that our Heavenly Father __________ at the moment be it __________ or fire, relationship breakdowns or troops that are taking over or whatever hardship they are going through at this time to know that there is always God.  He is __________ anything in the world that we think can push us.  She also wants to pray especially for Lisa who lost everything in a fire recently.  God will provide and tell you what to do, Lisa.  Anna loves everyone involved in the Daily Audio Bible.  Thank you especially Victorious Soldier, Blind Tony, and Brian and family for their encouraging words.  Thank you.  Thank you on behalf of Anna in __________ Australia.

Good morning Daily Audio Bible.  My name is Bob.  I’m calling from Michigan.  I have been a listener for many years, but this is the first time that I have called. Three days ago I was diagnosed with throat cancer.  During this time, I still don’t even know what stage it is, but I’m crying out to God that he gives me strength and endurance because I know he is going to send people, divine appointments to be around me that may need Jesus.  I cry out to the community to lift me up in prayer, that I might be a bold witness for him during my trials, that I can keep my eyes on him, keep my focus on him so that I might bring some Jesus to the people around me.  Let me be a bold witness for you, Lord.  I know that I must be an ambassador for you and that you will work all things out for good. My trust is in you.  I do not know what my future holds, but I know who holds my future.  God bless you all who choose to pray.  In Jesus’ name, amen.  

Hello Daily Audio Bible family.  This is Jay from New Jersey.  Let’s pray. Mighty, precious, matchless, holy and righteous God, Father, we adore everything that is you.  God, you are everything that we need.  You’ve created everything.  You are everything.  And without you exists nothing.  Father we confess and repent of any sin that we’ve committed.  God, we thank you for this light which you’ve given us.  We thank you for this moment.  We thank you for the ability to experience it.  God, we come before you in this new year with some issues that were not able to be resolved last year, but God, as your word declares, is anything too hard for you? No!  We know there isn’t.  So God, we ask that you will send your Holy Spirit now to comfort us as we wait patiently for you to move in your perfect will and your perfect timing.  We thank you, God.  We love you, God.  We praise you, God.  In the name of Jesus Christ we pray, amen.