March 2017 – Page 2 – A Walk Through The Word

March 26, 2017

The Daily Audio Bible Reading for Sunday March 26, 2017 (NIV)

Deuteronomy 5-6

Ten Commandments

5 Moses called out to all Israel, saying to them: “Israel! Listen to the regulations and the case laws that I’m recounting in your hearing right now. Learn them and carefully do them. ²The Lord our God made a covenant with us at Mount Horeb. ³The Lord didn’t make this covenant with our ancestors but with us—all of us who are here and alive right now. ⁴The Lord spoke with you face-to-face on the mountain from the very fire itself. ⁵At that time, I was standing between the Lord and you, declaring to you the Lord’s word, because you were terrified of the fire and didn’t go up on the mountain.”

The Lord said:

⁶I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

⁷You must have no other gods before^[a] me. ⁸Do not make an idol for yourself—no form whatsoever—of anything in the sky above or on the earth below or in the waters under the earth. ⁹Do not bow down to them or worship them because I, the Lord your God, am a passionate God. I punish children for their parents’ sins—even to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me. ¹⁰But I am loyal and gracious to the thousandth generation^[b] of those who love me and keep my commandments.

¹¹Do not use the Lord your God’s name as if it were of no significance; the Lord won’t forgive anyone who uses his name that way.

¹²Keep the Sabbath day and treat it as holy, exactly as the Lord your God commanded: ¹³Six days you may work and do all your tasks, ¹⁴but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. Don’t do any work on it—not you, your sons or daughters, your male or female servants, your oxen or donkeys or any of your animals, or the immigrant who is living among you—so that your male and female servants can rest just like you. ¹⁵Remember that you were a slave in Egypt, but the Lord your God brought you out of there with a strong hand and an outstretched arm. That’s why the Lord your God commands you to keep the Sabbath day.

¹⁶Honor your father and your mother, exactly as the Lord your God requires, so that your life will be long and so that things will go well for you on the fertile land that the Lord your God is giving you.

¹⁷Do not kill.^[c]

¹⁸Do not commit adultery.

¹⁹Do not steal.

²⁰Do not testify falsely against your neighbor.

²¹Do not desire and try to take your neighbor’s wife.

Do not crave your neighbor’s house, field, male or female servant, ox, donkey, or anything else that belongs to your neighbor.

²²Those are the words the Lord spoke to your entire assembly with a loud voice while on the mountain, from the midst of the fire, the cloud, and the thick smoke. He added no more. God wrote them on two stone tablets, then gave them to me.

Moses’ intercessory role

²³Now once you heard the voice from the darkness while the mountain was blazing with fire, you came to me—more specifically, all the chiefs of your tribes and your elders came— ²⁴and you said: “Look here! The Lord our God has shown us his glory and greatness. We’ve heard his voice come out of the very fire itself. We’ve seen firsthand that God can speak to a human being and they can survive! ²⁵But why should we die? Surely this massive fire will consume us! If we hear any more of the Lord our God’s voice, we will die. ²⁶Is there anyone who has heard the living God’s voice speaking out of the very fire itself, like we have, and survived? ²⁷You go and listen to all that the Lord our God says. Then tell us all that the Lord our God speaks to you. We’ll listen and we’ll do it.”

²⁸The Lord heard what you said, when you said this to me. The Lord then told me: I heard what the people said when they spoke with you. Everything they suggest is good. ²⁹If only their minds were like this: always fearing me and keeping all my commandments so that things would go well for them and their children forever! ³⁰Go and tell them: You may go back to your tents. ³¹But you, Moses, must stay here with me. I will tell you all the commandments,^[d] the regulations, and the case laws that you must teach the Israelites to do in the land that I am giving them to possess.

³²So you must carefully do exactly what the Lord your God commands you. Don’t deviate even a bit! ³³You must walk the precise path that the Lord your God indicates for you so that you will live, and so that things will go well for you, and so you will extend your time on the land that you will possess.

The great commandment

6 Now these are the commandments, the regulations, and the case laws that the Lord your God commanded me to teach you to follow in the land you are entering to possess, ²so that you will fear the Lord your God by keeping all his regulations and his commandments that I am commanding you—both you and your sons and daughters—all the days of your life and so that you will lengthen your life. ³Listen to them, Israel! Follow them carefully so that things will go well for you and so that you will continue to multiply exactly as the Lord, your ancestors’ God, promised you, in a land full of milk and honey.

⁴Israel, listen! Our God is the Lord! Only the Lord!^[e]

⁵Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your being, and all your strength. ⁶These words that I am commanding you today must always be on your minds. ⁷Recite them to your children. Talk about them when you are sitting around your house and when you are out and about, when you are lying down and when you are getting up. ⁸Tie them on your hand as a sign. They should be on your forehead as a symbol.^[f] ⁹Write them on your house’s doorframes and on your city’s gates.

¹⁰Now once the Lord your God has brought you into the land that he swore to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to give to you—a land that will be full of large and wonderful towns that you didn’t build, ¹¹houses stocked with all kinds of goods that you didn’t stock, cisterns that you didn’t make, vineyards and olive trees that you didn’t plant—and you eat and get stuffed, ¹²watch yourself! Don’t forget the Lord, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. ¹³Revere the Lord your God, serve him, and take your solemn pledges in his name! ¹⁴Don’t follow other gods, those gods of the people around you— ¹⁵because the Lord your God, who is with you and among you, is a passionate God. The Lord your God’s anger will burn against you, and he will wipe you off the fertile land. ¹⁶Don’t test the Lord your God the way you frustrated him at Massah. ¹⁷You must carefully follow the Lord your God’s commands along with the laws and regulations he has given you. ¹⁸Do what is right and good in the Lord’s sight so that things will go well for you and so you will enter and take possession of the wonderful land that the Lord swore to your ancestors, ¹⁹and so the Lord will drive out all your enemies from before you, just as he promised.

The next generation

²⁰In the future, your children will ask you, “What is the meaning of the laws,^[g] the regulations, and the case laws that the Lord our God commanded you?” ²¹tell them: We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt. But the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. ²²Before our own eyes, the Lord performed great and awesome deeds of power^[h] against Egypt, Pharaoh, and his entire dynasty. ²³But the Lord brought us out from there so that he could bring us in, giving us the land that he swore to our ancestors. ²⁴Then the Lord commanded us to perform all these regulations, revering the Lord our God, so that things go well for us always and so we continue to live, as we’re doing right now. ²⁵What’s more, we will be considered righteous if we are careful to do all this commandment before the Lord our God, just as he commanded us.

Footnotes:

Deuteronomy 5:7 Or besides
Deuteronomy 5:10 Or to thousands
Deuteronomy 5:17 Or murder
Deuteronomy 5:31 Heb is singular, commandment (see 6:1).
Deuteronomy 6:4 Or The Lord is our God, the Lord only; or The Lord is our God, the Lord alone; or The Lord our God is one Lord; or The Lord our God, the Lord is one; or The Lord is our God, the Lord is one.
Deuteronomy 6:8 Heb uncertain; cf Exod 13:16; Syr sign or mark; Tg phylacteries
Deuteronomy 6:20 Or What are the laws…?
Deuteronomy 6:22 Or signs and wonders

Common English Bible (CEB)

Luke 7:11-35

Jesus raises a widow’s son

¹¹A little later Jesus went to a city called Nain. His disciples and a great crowd traveled with him. ¹²As he approached the city gate, a dead man was being carried out. He was his mother’s only son, and she was a widow. A large crowd from the city was with her. ¹³When he saw her, the Lord had compassion for her and said, “Don’t cry.” ¹⁴He stepped forward and touched the stretcher on which the dead man was being carried. Those carrying him stood still. Jesus said, “Young man, I say to you, get up.” ¹⁵The dead man sat up and began to speak, and Jesus gave him to his mother.

¹⁶Awestruck, everyone praised God. “A great prophet has appeared among us,” they said. “God has come to help his people.” ¹⁷This news about Jesus spread throughout Judea and the surrounding region.

John the Baptist and Jesus

¹⁸John’s disciples informed him about all these things. John called two of his disciples ¹⁹and sent them to the Lord. They were to ask him, “Are you the one who is coming, or should we look for someone else?”

²⁰When they reached Jesus, they said, “John the Baptist sent us to you. He asks, ‘Are you the one who is coming, or should we look for someone else?’”

²¹Right then, Jesus healed many of their diseases, illnesses, and evil spirits, and he gave sight to a number of blind people. ²²Then he replied to John’s disciples, “Go, report to John what you have seen and heard. Those who were blind are able to see. Those who were crippled now walk. People with skin diseases are cleansed. Those who were deaf now hear. Those who were dead are raised up. And good news is preached to the poor.^[a] ²³ Happy is anyone who doesn’t stumble along the way because of me.”

²⁴After John’s messengers were gone, Jesus spoke to the crowds about John. “What did you go out into the wilderness to see? A stalk blowing in the wind? ²⁵ What did you go out to see? A man dressed up in refined clothes? Look, those who dress in fashionable clothes and live in luxury are in royal palaces. ²⁶ What did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. ²⁷ He is the one of whom it’s written: Look, I’m sending my messenger before you, who will prepare your way before you.^[b] ²⁸ I tell you that no greater human being has ever been born than John. Yet whoever is least in God’s kingdom is greater than he.” ²⁹Everyone who heard this, including the tax collectors, acknowledged God’s justice because they had been baptized by John. ³⁰But the Pharisees and legal experts rejected God’s will for themselves because they hadn’t been baptized by John.

³¹“To what will I compare the people of this generation?” Jesus asked. “What are they like? ³² They are like children sitting in the marketplace calling out to each other, ‘We played the flute for you and you didn’t dance. We sang a funeral song and you didn’t cry.’ ³³ John the Baptist came neither eating bread nor drinking wine, and you say, ‘He has a demon.’ ³⁴ Yet the Human One^[c] came eating and drinking, and you say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunk, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ ³⁵ But wisdom is proved to be right by all her descendants.”

Footnotes:

Common English Bible (CEB)

Psalm 68:19-35

¹⁹Bless the Lord!
The God of our salvation
supports us day after day! Selah
²⁰Our God is the God of salvation,
and escape from certain death comes through God my Lord.

²¹Yes, God will shatter the heads of his enemies—
the very skulls of those who walk in guilt.
²²My Lord has spoken:
“From Bashan I will bring those people back.
I will bring them back from the ocean’s depths
²³so that you can wash your feet in their blood,
so that your dogs’ tongues
can lap up their share of your enemies.”

²⁴They saw your procession, God—
the procession of my God,
my king, into the sanctuary.
²⁵First came the singers,
then the musicians;
between them the young women
were playing hand drums:
²⁶“Bless God in the great congregation;
bless the Lord from Israel’s fountain!”
²⁷There’s Benjamin leading them,
though he’s little;
then the princes of Judah,
their speaker;
then the princes of Zebulun
and the princes of Naphtali.

²⁸Summon your strength, God!
Show how strong you are, God,
just as you’ve done for us before,
²⁹from your temple above Jerusalem,
where kings bring you gifts.
³⁰Rebuke the wild animals of the marshland,
the herd of bulls among the calves of the peoples.
Trample those who delight in money;
scatter the peoples who take pleasure in battles.
³¹Let ambassadors come from Egypt;
let Cush stretch out its hands to God.

³²Sing to God, all kingdoms of the earth!
Sing praises to my Lord. Selah
³³Sing to the one who rides through heaven,
the most ancient heaven.
Look! God sends forth his voice,
his mighty voice.
³⁴Recognize how strong God is!
His majesty extends over Israel;
his strength is in the clouds.
³⁵You are awesome, God, in your sanctuaries—
the God of Israel who gives strength and power to his people!

Bless God!

Common English Bible (CEB)

Proverbs 11:29-31

²⁹Those who trouble their family will inherit the wind.
The fool will be servant to the wise.
³⁰The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life,
and the wise gather lives.^[a]
³¹If the righteous receive their due on earth,
how much more the wicked and sinners?

Footnotes:

Proverbs 11:30 Or LXX, Syr violence takes lives away

Common English Bible (CEB)

March 25, 2017

03/25/2017 DAB Transcript

Deuteronomy 4:1-49 ~ Luke 6:39-7:10 ~ Psalm 68:1-18 ~ Proverbs 11:28

Today is the 25^th day of March. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s good to be here with you today, end of another week, and so we’ve been reading from the New Living Translation this week. Deuteronomy chapter 4, verses 1 through 49 today.

Prayer

We thank you, Father, for another week in your word. We hear you say, “Why do you keep calling me Lord when you don’t do what I say?” We hear you. We invite your Holy Spirit into that. We want to be people built on a foundation of solid rock so that no matter what comes our way, we stand firm. So we invite you into that. Holy Spirit, come, show us the places that have cracked in our foundation. We ask this in your precious and holy name, amen.

Announcements

Www.DailyAudioBible.com is the website. It’s home base. It’s where you find out what is going on around here, resources that are available, events that are coming, so be sure to check it out. The Prayer Wall is at www.DailyAudioBible.com where you can always post a prayer request, read other people’s struggles and victories and comment and send encouragement their way even as you receive it for yourself, so check that out.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at www.DailyAudioBible.com. There is a link on the home page. Thank you for clicking that link. If you use the Daily Audio Bible App, you can press 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, (877) 942-4253 is the number to dial.

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 Daily Audio Bible family. This is Joyce calling from California. Let’s pray. O Heavenly Father, Lord, we praise you so much. Father God, you are so good to us. Lord, we praise you because you have healed us, Lord, and we will be healed. Save us, Lord, and we will be saved for you are the one that we praise. O Lord, blessed is the one who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in him. Lord, for we will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes. It’s leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and it never fails to bear fruit. O Lord Jesus, we just praise you. Heavenly Father, we just praise you and we lift up every single member of our beautiful family and our community. Lord, just as you have spoken through Arjen to tell us, Lord, that the blood that binds us together in this eternal family is far more precious and far more binding, Lord, than the blood that binds us to our biological family. Lord, we praise you. We bless you. We love you. And we pray your protection over every single member of our community. We pray your healing. And Lord, I pray that you rise up in each of us, Lord, in our community and we bless this world. That we’ll be the salt and the light, Father God. We pray that your will be done through our lives. We thank you for the words of encouragement that Brian spoke today, Lord, that you will rise up with courage to face the temptations and the trials and everything you have given to us with great confidence because we know that you live in us and you’re the one doing this. We praise your holy name. In your precious name we pray, amen.

Hi, this is Cindy from Columbia, SC, calling back with an update on fasting for Hannah Joy. She has been praying and fasting, this is day three, for her healing, and I am her mom and I called in and told everybody about it a few days ago and just asking for everyone’s prayer that she will be healed of her type 1 diabetes that we hope will no longer be hers. I joined her in her fasting today and will continue with her for the next three days and just thank you guys for your prayers. I just want to read and declare Acts 3:16 and changing Hannah’s name out for the man that was healed. By faith, in the name of Jesus, this woman, Hannah Joy, whom you see and know is made strong. It is Jesus’ name and the faith that comes through him that has given this complete healing to her as you can all see. We’re looking so forward to this beautiful testimony. Thank you Jill and Brian for this forum. Love you all and have a great day.

Hey family. This is Jordan from Michigan. Wanted to call in for prayer for my best friend’s mother. As many of you know, back in June my best friend passed away in a tragic motorcycle accident and his mother has not been talking to me much. I’ve been calling her and just hasn’t been answering. I made a promise to my best friend that I would call her and talk to her frequently. Well, she ended up calling me last week for the first time in about five months and it was excellent to hear from her, just to hear her voice, but she is not doing too well. She wasn’t talking much and she told me that she emotionally she is doing worse than she was doing when she first found out and at the funeral and so she needs prayer. She is so low right now and I know that the Lord has so much work for her to do to minister to people who are going through painful circumstances but she can’t lift up others until she is lifted up herself. So that is where you come in. Please intercede on her behalf and say a prayer for Ellie. Thank you and I love you. Have a wonderful day.

Hi, this is my first time calling. I love you guys. You guys are awesome. I do have a prayer request. My daughter has been fighting illnesses all her life and now there is one that is becoming very tricky. Please pray for her. I won’t give out her name, but she is almost 33 years old and she really needs prayer. She has come a long way in the last few years, but medically it sucks. So she has a lot of medical issues. So please pray for her. And I appreciate all that you guys do. Thank you so much and God bless you. Bye-bye.

Hi, this is Victorious Soldier. I’m just calling tonight to pray for Candace in the loss of her husband and to pray for her family. My beautiful sister Candy, I pray for you right now, in the name of Jesus. Lord, you touch my beautiful sister Candace from the crown of her head to the soles of her feet. Lord, you hold her. You caress her. You touch her. You let her know and comfort her and let her know you’re with her, Lord. O Lord, you touch every one of her children, Lord. O Lord, you touch them and let them see the Lord like never before. Lord, give them a hunger and thirst after righteousness, Lord, that their father can look down and see them doing the will of the Lord, knowing that one day they will soon be together and they will be rejoicing with him. O Lord, this is not our home. This is our visiting station. Our home is a permanent home of eternity and peace and love. Lord, we thank you, Lord, for allowing us to be here and allowing us to have the relationship with the Dabbers and the people of God. We want you to continue to comfort those who have lost their loved one and let them know that our joy is in being with God and being with the Savior, knowing that he is with us now. He never leaves us or forsakes us, but we have no interruption when we are there with him. Lord, you have your way. Encourage them on, Lord. O God, you rain on Candy with your mighty rain. Give her the desires of her heart. You encourage her, Lord. You strengthen her, Lord. O God, you have your way. In the mighty name of Jesus, I lift you up and I give you the praise. In the mighty name of Jesus we pray, amen. Have a good day, Dabbers. And my sister Candace, I love you and still praying with you and the family, looking to see greater things.

Good morning to my Daily Audio Bible family. Good morning Jill and Brian and just glad to be on just to give my warm regards to everyone. It’s been a long time. This is Pamela. I am a pastor’s wife/teacher from Huntington, NY. I’ve been listening and I’ve been extremely busy but all is well. I do have the desire __________, still continuing to pray for everyone although I don’t call in often. I just want you to know I’m still listening in, loving the word of God, loving the teaching that is coming from Brian. I do have a prayer request. I’m requesting that you pray for my husband. His name is Gary, Pastor Gary. He is struggling in his life and I need for you to lift him up in prayer, Pastor Gary. Okay? And I’m lifting up everyone in prayer. God bless everybody. Have a wonderful day.

March 25, 2017

03/24/2017 DAB Transcript

Deuteronomy 2:1-3:29 ~ Luke 6:12-38 ~ Psalm 67:1-7 ~ Proverbs 11:27

Today is March 24^th. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian and it’s great to be here with you today. Every once in a while I hit the record button while I’m in the middle of a sip of Windfarm coffee. Sorry about that. So, we’re all set. Here we go. We began the book of Deuteronomy yesterday, which is basically three different discourses from Moses that happened to be the last things that he says in his life to the children of Israel. And it’s kind of moving back through the history that we’ve covered with them in a review. And it’s beautiful to kind of contextualize where we’ve been over the last little while, ever since we met Moses, which buttons this section of the Bible up nicely because we’ll be moving into completely new territory from this point forward. So today, from the New Living Translation, Deuteronomy chapter 2, verse 1 through 3, verse 29.

Commentary

As we travel along with Jesus, we’re on a little hill, a little rise, moving away from the Sea of Galilee. The Sea of Galilee is the backdrop. It’s beautiful. It’s a beautiful, beautiful place. And Jesus is laying out this message known as the Sermon on the Mount, this central teaching. And we’ve covered this before in the book of Matthew, but in the book of Luke, as we hear the retelling of what Jesus said, we see so clearly that the kingdom of God that Jesus is talking about and the way that it operates, the way that you operate within it is basically completely opposite of the way we live most of our lives or our initial reaction to things. Jesus just contrasts everything. And what he says to do looks the opposite of what we normally react or do, right? I mean, love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you. Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you. If somebody hits you on a cheek, turn the other cheek. If someone demands your coat, offer your shirt. Give to anyone who asks. And when things are taken away from you, don’t try to get them back. Do to others as you would like them to do to you. Love your enemies. Do good to them. Lend to them without expecting to be repaid then your reward from heaven will be very great and you’ll be truly acting as children of the Most High. Don’t judge others and you won’t be judged. Don’t condemn others or it will all come back against you. Forgive others and you will be forgiven. Give and you will receive.

You see, it’s like the opposite of what we normally do. If we’ll take the time to kind of examine this today, overlay it with our own hearts and invite the Holy Spirit, we’ll see that Jesus is outlining the fabric of the kingdom and how we do or do not operate in it, because if we read all this stuff backward, we would find ourselves in some of these things. For example, the opposite of what Jesus said to do would be don’t love your enemies. Don’t do good to those who hate you. Do bad to them. Curse those who curse you. Cut off your prayers for those who hurt you. If somebody slaps you on the cheek, slap them back. If anyone asks you for anything, don’t give it to them. Especially don’t love your enemies. Don’t do good to them. Don’t lend to anybody without expecting to be repaid. Judge others all the time so that you too will be judged. Condemn others so that you too can be condemned. Be unforgiving so that you can in turn be unforgiven. Don’t give so that you don’t receive.

I mean, if we look at our lives, we’ll see that some of these postures, they crop up. Jesus is inviting us to live backward to the way that we’re living a lot of the time. But backward to the way that we’re living a lot of the time is actually how the kingdom works. So may we give the postures of our heart some thought today.

Prayer

We invite you, Holy Spirit, into that. Come Jesus. These are your words. This is your picture of humanity. This is how you lived and this is your description of the kingdom of heaven. And we can find places quite easily that we are contrary to that. We invite you into that. We release those things, those postures, those attitudes, those reactions, those words, the things that we say that are contrary. We release all this. It’s all rooted in other places of our identity that only you can reach and so come. Come Holy Spirit. Change us from within and help us to live and represent and steward your kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. We ask this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements

Www.DailyAudioBible.com is the website. It’s home base. It’s where you find out what is going on around here, so check it out. There is always something or another. There are resources that are available in the Daily Audio Bible Shop, some things for your journey, some things to help you journey. Just resources. Check them out.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at www.DailyAudioBible.com. There is a link on the home page. Thank you. Thank you for your partnership. If you’re using the app, you can press 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, (877) 942-4253 is the number to dial.

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 family. This is Salvation is Mine in San Leandro, CA. Today is Saturday, March 18^th. I wanted to say thank you to everyone on the DAB that has reached out to me or has sent me a card or has sent me CDs or books or gifts. It was so unexpected and I so appreciate each and every one of you for embracing me with the love of Christianity that I have never seen before in my entire life. I just am so grateful for this family, for the love, for the genuine heart that everyone has for Jesus in this community. I really don’t even have the correct words to tell you how grateful I am that you guys care for me and that you love me, even though we’ve never met, but we are all brothers and sisters in Christ. And we will all be together one day in his glorious presence. So thank you. I will be posting more pictures of the items I have received in the next few days, but I just wanted you to know that I have so much gratitude in my heart for you and I will never, ever, ever forget how you’ve made me feel, that I am truly a part of a family because I don’t feel that way about my own family and I don’t think they feel that way about me, but the Daily Audio Bible people have truly made me feel that I belong. So thank you so much. God bless you. Have a good evening. Bye-bye.

Stanley in Maryland, this is John from Bethlehem, PA. It’s Sunday, March 19^th and I just heard your prayer request after listening to today’s podcast and I wanted to share with you that it is no coincidence that yesterday, the 18^th of March, I was in an Alpha program at my church here in Nazareth, PA and there was a story that was told during that service that was absolutely put there for me to hear to be able to tell you. And it goes like this. There were two soldiers. They were fighting in war together. They were in a foxhole together. One of the soldiers was dying. He said to his counterpart and his friend, “I’m dying. There is a certain man at a certain address back home that I need you to go see when this war is over because what he taught me is what I’m thinking about right now and I love him for that.” That war ended. That soldier that lived went back home. He sought out that person at that certain address and he knocked on his door and that person answered and he told him what his friend told him, that what he taught him as a young child was what he was thinking about right then just before his death. The person that answered the door broke down in tears. And the soldier said to him, “What is it?” And he said, “Oh my God, I don’t know why I ever stopped teaching.” What happened was somebody was impacted by what he had done and he had never realized the impact of it. Stanley, the work that you’re doing is impactful. It’s making a difference. You may not ever be able to reap the harvest, to see the growth, but the soil that you’re tilling is…

Hi, my name is Michael. I’m a first-time caller, calling from London, UK. I’ve been battling with anxiety more recently, anger in the form of self-attacking. It’s pretty much a daily occurrence, and I know I need to let go of my thought life and take responsibility because that is where it kind of lies, but I just need prayer for help in that capacity because it is not doing very well for my wellbeing. Thank you.

Good morning Daily Audio Bible. This is Janelli from New Jersey. I am so excited to be calling in. This is my first time and I’m just so blessed by the Daily Audio Bible and I’m really calling in for prayer. I’m newly engaged to my wonderful fiancé Janeen and he’s just amazing and this God-filled man that God has really placed into my life. And we’re just looking forward to having a Christ-centered marriage as we have a Christ-centered relationship and I’m calling on behalf of prayer and guidance that I can be the excellent wife that I know God has called me to be. I don’t have a lot of examples of biblical marriages so there are some fears there that I can do all that God has called me to do even though I know I’m strengthened by him. But I’m calling for my DAB family to really pray and wrap this around in prayer. And also there are feelings of doubt from the enemy that I can’t do this and that I don’t have examples, and I know that is from the enemy, but just prayer on how to stay strong against those doubts when they come in and battling them with scripture. Really looking forward to hearing and praying and moving forward. Thank you so much for this resource in my life. It really has taken off and changed my whole year. Thank you so much. Bye-bye.

Hi Daily Audio Bible family. This is James, the teacher in LA, and actually responding to the prayer request from March 19^th by Stanley teaching out in Washington, D.C. And I guess I’m responding to Stanley, but I want to talk to you and I want to talk to Jordan in Detroit and any other teachers out there, especially new teachers. I can understand all too well the feeling of am I doing the right thing? Am I doing a good job? Being exhausted from staying up late regularly lesson planning and being challenged by your students all the time. Guys, and especially I’m talking to the male teachers in particular, you don’t understand the value that you have. Just statistically, especially if you teach in the city, this country is full of fatherless children. You might be one of the very few men who has ever cared for any of these kids and showed them what a man of integrity looks like, a man of God. And even if they have church in their lives, that is never a guarantee. You’re being challenged because __________ doesn’t like the Spirit, but at the same time they need it. And I’ve seen these kids grow up over the years and they come out the other side and they need an example of what it is to be an adult who loves God. So keep going. You’re doing the right thing. Love you guys. Bye.

Hi DAB family. This is Daphne P. calling from Roswell, NM. I would like for you guys to pray if you can for our mission trip to Tokyo and __________ coming March 24 to April 2. We have 12 people going and we are just praying that God would do a mighty work among Japanese people. Japanese are the second largest unreached people group on the planet, people here in America kind of don’t ever see. Japan is a solid mission field because it is so modern and so beautiful, yet the people’s hearts are so far from God, so many of them. And I’m just wondering if you would pray for them? I’ve been listening for, I think this is my eighth year. I have never called in before, so thank you guys for being my family and thank you for getting me through so much in the past. Just pray for us as we’re working with churches and doing street evangelism and prayer walking through Tokyo and __________. You can reach out to me on Facebook. Daphne P. so Facebook.com/Daphne P. I believe. But thank you so much for everything you guys do, Brian and this whole team. We just thank you and praise you for all that you’ve done for this community. God bless.

March 25, 2017

The Daily Audio Bible Reading for Saturday March 25, 2017 (NIV)

Deuteronomy 4

Moses Urges Israel to Obey

4 “And now, Israel, listen carefully to these decrees and regulations that I am about to teach you. Obey them so that you may live, so you may enter and occupy the land that the Lord, the God of your ancestors, is giving you. ²Do not add to or subtract from these commands I am giving you. Just obey the commands of the Lord your God that I am giving you.

³“You saw for yourself what the Lord did to you at Baal-peor. There the Lord your God destroyed everyone who had worshiped Baal, the god of Peor. ⁴But all of you who were faithful to the Lord your God are still alive today—every one of you.

⁵“Look, I now teach you these decrees and regulations just as the Lord my God commanded me, so that you may obey them in the land you are about to enter and occupy. ⁶Obey them completely, and you will display your wisdom and intelligence among the surrounding nations. When they hear all these decrees, they will exclaim, ‘How wise and prudent are the people of this great nation!’ ⁷For what great nation has a god as near to them as the Lord our God is near to us whenever we call on him? ⁸And what great nation has decrees and regulations as righteous and fair as this body of instructions that I am giving you today?

⁹“But watch out! Be careful never to forget what you yourself have seen. Do not let these memories escape from your mind as long as you live! And be sure to pass them on to your children and grandchildren. ¹⁰Never forget the day when you stood before the Lord your God at Mount Sinai,^[a] where he told me, ‘Summon the people before me, and I will personally instruct them. Then they will learn to fear me as long as they live, and they will teach their children to fear me also.’

¹¹“You came near and stood at the foot of the mountain, while flames from the mountain shot into the sky. The mountain was shrouded in black clouds and deep darkness. ¹²And the Lord spoke to you from the heart of the fire. You heard the sound of his words but didn’t see his form; there was only a voice. ¹³He proclaimed his covenant—the Ten Commandments^[b]—which he commanded you to keep, and which he wrote on two stone tablets. ¹⁴It was at that time that the Lord commanded me to teach you his decrees and regulations so you would obey them in the land you are about to enter and occupy.

A Warning against Idolatry

¹⁵“But be very careful! You did not see the Lord’s form on the day he spoke to you from the heart of the fire at Mount Sinai. ¹⁶So do not corrupt yourselves by making an idol in any form—whether of a man or a woman, ¹⁷an animal on the ground, a bird in the sky, ¹⁸a small animal that scurries along the ground, or a fish in the deepest sea. ¹⁹And when you look up into the sky and see the sun, moon, and stars—all the forces of heaven—don’t be seduced into worshiping them. The Lord your God gave them to all the peoples of the earth. ²⁰Remember that the Lord rescued you from the iron-smelting furnace of Egypt in order to make you his very own people and his special possession, which is what you are today.

²¹“But the Lord was angry with me because of you. He vowed that I would not cross the Jordan River into the good land the Lord your God is giving you as your special possession. ²²You will cross the Jordan to occupy the land, but I will not. Instead, I will die here on the east side of the river. ²³So be careful not to break the covenant the Lord your God has made with you. Do not make idols of any shape or form, for the Lord your God has forbidden this. ²⁴The Lord your God is a devouring fire; he is a jealous God.

²⁵“In the future, when you have children and grandchildren and have lived in the land a long time, do not corrupt yourselves by making idols of any kind. This is evil in the sight of the Lord your God and will arouse his anger.

²⁶“Today I call on heaven and earth as witnesses against you. If you break my covenant, you will quickly disappear from the land you are crossing the Jordan to occupy. You will live there only a short time; then you will be utterly destroyed. ²⁷For the Lord will scatter you among the nations, where only a few of you will survive. ²⁸There, in a foreign land, you will worship idols made from wood and stone—gods that neither see nor hear nor eat nor smell. ²⁹But from there you will search again for the Lord your God. And if you search for him with all your heart and soul, you will find him.

³⁰“In the distant future, when you are suffering all these things, you will finally return to the Lord your God and listen to what he tells you. ³¹For the Lord your God is a merciful God; he will not abandon you or destroy you or forget the solemn covenant he made with your ancestors.

There Is Only One God

³²“Now search all of history, from the time God created people on the earth until now, and search from one end of the heavens to the other. Has anything as great as this ever been seen or heard before? ³³Has any nation ever heard the voice of God^[c] speaking from fire—as you did—and survived? ³⁴Has any other god dared to take a nation for himself out of another nation by means of trials, miraculous signs, wonders, war, a strong hand, a powerful arm, and terrifying acts? Yet that is what the Lord your God did for you in Egypt, right before your eyes.

³⁵“He showed you these things so you would know that the Lord is God and there is no other. ³⁶He let you hear his voice from heaven so he could instruct you. He let you see his great fire here on earth so he could speak to you from it. ³⁷Because he loved your ancestors, he chose to bless their descendants, and he personally brought you out of Egypt with a great display of power. ³⁸He drove out nations far greater than you, so he could bring you in and give you their land as your special possession, as it is today.

³⁹“So remember this and keep it firmly in mind: The Lord is God both in heaven and on earth, and there is no other. ⁴⁰If you obey all the decrees and commands I am giving you today, all will be well with you and your children. I am giving you these instructions so you will enjoy a long life in the land the Lord your God is giving you for all time.”

Eastern Cities of Refuge

⁴¹Then Moses set apart three cities of refuge east of the Jordan River. ⁴²Anyone who killed another person unintentionally, without previous hostility, could flee there to live in safety. ⁴³These were the cities: Bezer on the wilderness plateau for the tribe of Reuben; Ramoth in Gilead for the tribe of Gad; Golan in Bashan for the tribe of Manasseh.

Introduction to Moses’ Second Address

⁴⁴This is the body of instruction that Moses presented to the Israelites. ⁴⁵These are the laws, decrees, and regulations that Moses gave to the people of Israel when they left Egypt, ⁴⁶and as they camped in the valley near Beth-peor east of the Jordan River. (This land was formerly occupied by the Amorites under King Sihon, who ruled from Heshbon. But Moses and the Israelites destroyed him and his people when they came up from Egypt. ⁴⁷Israel took possession of his land and that of King Og of Bashan—the two Amorite kings east of the Jordan. ⁴⁸So Israel conquered the entire area from Aroer at the edge of the Arnon Gorge all the way to Mount Sirion,^[d] also called Mount Hermon. ⁴⁹And they conquered the eastern bank of the Jordan River as far south as the Dead Sea,^[e] below the slopes of Pisgah.)

Footnotes:

4:10 Hebrew Horeb, another name for Sinai; also in 4:15.
4:13 Hebrew the ten words.
4:33 Or voice of a god.
4:48 As in Syriac version (see also 3:9); Hebrew reads Mount Sion.
4:49 Hebrew took the Arabah on the east side of the Jordan as far as the sea of the Arabah.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Luke 6:39-7:10

³⁹Then Jesus gave the following illustration: “Can one blind person lead another? Won’t they both fall into a ditch? ⁴⁰Students^[a] are not greater than their teacher. But the student who is fully trained will become like the teacher.

⁴¹“And why worry about a speck in your friend’s eye^[b] when you have a log in your own? ⁴²How can you think of saying, ‘Friend,^[c] let me help you get rid of that speck in your eye,’ when you can’t see past the log in your own eye? Hypocrite! First get rid of the log in your own eye; then you will see well enough to deal with the speck in your friend’s eye.

The Tree and Its Fruit

⁴³“A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. ⁴⁴A tree is identified by its fruit. Figs are never gathered from thornbushes, and grapes are not picked from bramble bushes. ⁴⁵A good person produces good things from the treasury of a good heart, and an evil person produces evil things from the treasury of an evil heart. What you say flows from what is in your heart.

Building on a Solid Foundation

⁴⁶“So why do you keep calling me ‘Lord, Lord!’ when you don’t do what I say? ⁴⁷I will show you what it’s like when someone comes to me, listens to my teaching, and then follows it. ⁴⁸It is like a person building a house who digs deep and lays the foundation on solid rock. When the floodwaters rise and break against that house, it stands firm because it is well built. ⁴⁹But anyone who hears and doesn’t obey is like a person who builds a house right on the ground, without a foundation. When the floods sweep down against that house, it will collapse into a heap of ruins.”

The Faith of a Roman Officer

7 When Jesus had finished saying all this to the people, he returned to Capernaum. ²At that time the highly valued slave of a Roman officer^[d] was sick and near death. ³When the officer heard about Jesus, he sent some respected Jewish elders to ask him to come and heal his slave. ⁴So they earnestly begged Jesus to help the man. “If anyone deserves your help, he does,” they said, ⁵“for he loves the Jewish people and even built a synagogue for us.”

⁶So Jesus went with them. But just before they arrived at the house, the officer sent some friends to say, “Lord, don’t trouble yourself by coming to my home, for I am not worthy of such an honor. ⁷I am not even worthy to come and meet you. Just say the word from where you are, and my servant will be healed. ⁸I know this because I am under the authority of my superior officers, and I have authority over my soldiers. I only need to say, ‘Go,’ and they go, or ‘Come,’ and they come. And if I say to my slaves, ‘Do this,’ they do it.”

⁹When Jesus heard this, he was amazed. Turning to the crowd that was following him, he said, “I tell you, I haven’t seen faith like this in all Israel!” ¹⁰And when the officer’s friends returned to his house, they found the slave completely healed.

Footnotes:

6:40 Or Disciples.
6:41 Greek your brother’s eye; also in 6:42.
6:42 Greek Brother.
7:2 Greek a centurion; similarly in 7:6.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Psalm 68:1-18

Psalm 68

For the choir director: A song. A psalm of David.

¹Rise up, O God, and scatter your enemies.
Let those who hate God run for their lives.
²Blow them away like smoke.
Melt them like wax in a fire.
Let the wicked perish in the presence of God.
³But let the godly rejoice.
Let them be glad in God’s presence.
Let them be filled with joy.
⁴Sing praises to God and to his name!
Sing loud praises to him who rides the clouds.^[a]
His name is the Lord—
rejoice in his presence!

⁵Father to the fatherless, defender of widows—
this is God, whose dwelling is holy.
⁶God places the lonely in families;
he sets the prisoners free and gives them joy.
But he makes the rebellious live in a sun-scorched land.

⁷O God, when you led your people out from Egypt,
when you marched through the dry wasteland, Interlude
⁸the earth trembled, and the heavens poured down rain
before you, the God of Sinai,
before God, the God of Israel.
⁹You sent abundant rain, O God,
to refresh the weary land.
¹⁰There your people finally settled,
and with a bountiful harvest, O God,
you provided for your needy people.

¹¹The Lord gives the word,
and a great army^[b] brings the good news.
¹²Enemy kings and their armies flee,
while the women of Israel divide the plunder.
¹³Even those who lived among the sheepfolds found treasures—
doves with wings of silver
and feathers of gold.
¹⁴The Almighty scattered the enemy kings
like a blowing snowstorm on Mount Zalmon.

¹⁵The mountains of Bashan are majestic,
with many peaks stretching high into the sky.
¹⁶Why do you look with envy, O rugged mountains,
at Mount Zion, where God has chosen to live,
where the Lord himself will live forever?

¹⁷Surrounded by unnumbered thousands of chariots,
the Lord came from Mount Sinai into his sanctuary.
¹⁸When you ascended to the heights,
you led a crowd of captives.
You received gifts from the people,
even from those who rebelled against you.
Now the Lord God will live among us there.

Footnotes:

68:4 Or rides through the deserts.
68:11 Or a host of women.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Proverbs 11:28

²⁸Trust in your money and down you go!
But the godly flourish like leaves in spring.

New Living Translation (NLT)

March 24, 2017

The Daily Audio Bible Reading for Friday March 24, 2017 (NIV)

Deuteronomy 2-3

Remembering Israel’s Wanderings

2 “Then we turned around and headed back across the wilderness toward the Red Sea,^[a] just as the Lord had instructed me, and we wandered around in the region of Mount Seir for a long time.

²“Then at last the Lord said to me, ³‘You have been wandering around in this hill country long enough; turn to the north. ⁴Give these orders to the people: “You will pass through the country belonging to your relatives the Edomites, the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir. The Edomites will feel threatened, so be careful. ⁵Do not bother them, for I have given them all the hill country around Mount Seir as their property, and I will not give you even one square foot of their land. ⁶If you need food to eat or water to drink, pay them for it. ⁷For the Lord your God has blessed you in everything you have done. He has watched your every step through this great wilderness. During these forty years, the Lord your God has been with you, and you have lacked nothing.”’

⁸“So we bypassed the territory of our relatives, the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir. We avoided the road through the Arabah Valley that comes up from Elath and Ezion-geber.

“Then as we turned north along the desert route through Moab, ⁹the Lord warned us, ‘Do not bother the Moabites, the descendants of Lot, or start a war with them. I have given them Ar as their property, and I will not give you any of their land.’”

¹⁰(A race of giants called the Emites had once lived in the area of Ar. They were as strong and numerous and tall as the Anakites, another race of giants. ¹¹Both the Emites and the Anakites are also known as the Rephaites, though the Moabites call them Emites. ¹²In earlier times the Horites had lived in Seir, but they were driven out and displaced by the descendants of Esau, just as Israel drove out the people of Canaan when the Lord gave Israel their land.)

¹³Moses continued, “Then the Lord said to us, ‘Get moving. Cross the Zered Brook.’ So we crossed the brook.

¹⁴“Thirty-eight years passed from the time we first left Kadesh-barnea until we finally crossed the Zered Brook! By then, all the men old enough to fight in battle had died in the wilderness, as the Lord had vowed would happen. ¹⁵The Lord struck them down until they had all been eliminated from the community.

¹⁶“When all the men of fighting age had died, ¹⁷the Lord said to me, ¹⁸‘Today you will cross the border of Moab at Ar ¹⁹and enter the land of the Ammonites, the descendants of Lot. But do not bother them or start a war with them. I have given the land of Ammon to them as their property, and I will not give you any of their land.’”

²⁰(That area was once considered the land of the Rephaites, who had lived there, though the Ammonites call them Zamzummites. ²¹They were also as strong and numerous and tall as the Anakites. But the Lord destroyed them so the Ammonites could occupy their land. ²²He had done the same for the descendants of Esau who lived in Seir, for he destroyed the Horites so they could settle there in their place. The descendants of Esau live there to this day. ²³A similar thing happened when the Caphtorites from Crete^[b] invaded and destroyed the Avvites, who had lived in villages in the area of Gaza.)

²⁴Moses continued, “Then the Lord said, ‘Now get moving! Cross the Arnon Gorge. Look, I will hand over to you Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and I will give you his land. Attack him and begin to occupy the land. ²⁵Beginning today I will make people throughout the earth terrified because of you. When they hear reports about you, they will tremble with dread and fear.’”

Victory over Sihon of Heshbon

²⁶Moses continued, “From the wilderness of Kedemoth I sent ambassadors to King Sihon of Heshbon with this proposal of peace:

²⁷‘Let us travel through your land. We will stay on the main road and won’t turn off into the fields on either side. ²⁸Sell us food to eat and water to drink, and we will pay for it. All we want is permission to pass through your land. ²⁹The descendants of Esau who live in Seir allowed us to go through their country, and so did the Moabites, who live in Ar. Let us pass through until we cross the Jordan into the land the Lord our God is giving us.’

³⁰“But King Sihon of Heshbon refused to allow us to pass through, because the Lord your God made Sihon stubborn and defiant so he could help you defeat him, as he has now done.

³¹“Then the Lord said to me, ‘Look, I have begun to hand King Sihon and his land over to you. Begin now to conquer and occupy his land.’

³²“Then King Sihon declared war on us and mobilized his forces at Jahaz. ³³But the Lord our God handed him over to us, and we crushed him, his sons, and all his people. ³⁴We conquered all his towns and completely destroyed^[c] everyone—men, women, and children. Not a single person was spared. ³⁵We took all the livestock as plunder for ourselves, along with anything of value from the towns we ransacked.

³⁶“The Lord our God also helped us conquer Aroer on the edge of the Arnon Gorge, and the town in the gorge, and the whole area as far as Gilead. No town had walls too strong for us. ³⁷However, we avoided the land of the Ammonites all along the Jabbok River and the towns in the hill country—all the places the Lord our God had commanded us to leave alone.

Victory over Og of Bashan

3 “Next we turned and headed for the land of Bashan, where King Og and his entire army attacked us at Edrei. ²But the Lord told me, ‘Do not be afraid of him, for I have given you victory over Og and his entire army, and I will give you all his land. Treat him just as you treated King Sihon of the Amorites, who ruled in Heshbon.’

³“So the Lord our God handed King Og and all his people over to us, and we killed them all. Not a single person survived. ⁴We conquered all sixty of his towns—the entire Argob region in his kingdom of Bashan. Not a single town escaped our conquest. ⁵These towns were all fortified with high walls and barred gates. We also took many unwalled villages at the same time. ⁶We completely destroyed^[d] the kingdom of Bashan, just as we had destroyed King Sihon of Heshbon. We destroyed all the people in every town we conquered—men, women, and children alike. ⁷But we kept all the livestock for ourselves and took plunder from all the towns.

⁸“So we took the land of the two Amorite kings east of the Jordan River—all the way from the Arnon Gorge to Mount Hermon. ⁹(Mount Hermon is called Sirion by the Sidonians, and the Amorites call it Senir.) ¹⁰We had now conquered all the cities on the plateau and all Gilead and Bashan, as far as the towns of Salecah and Edrei, which were part of Og’s kingdom in Bashan. ¹¹(King Og of Bashan was the last survivor of the giant Rephaites. His bed was made of iron and was more than thirteen feet long and six feet wide.^[e] It can still be seen in the Ammonite city of Rabbah.)

Land Division East of the Jordan

¹²“When we took possession of this land, I gave to the tribes of Reuben and Gad the territory beyond Aroer along the Arnon Gorge, plus half of the hill country of Gilead with its towns. ¹³Then I gave the rest of Gilead and all of Bashan—Og’s former kingdom—to the half-tribe of Manasseh. (This entire Argob region of Bashan used to be known as the land of the Rephaites. ¹⁴Jair, a leader from the tribe of Manasseh, conquered the whole Argob region in Bashan, all the way to the border of the Geshurites and Maacathites. Jair renamed this region after himself, calling it the Towns of Jair,^[f] as it is still known today.) ¹⁵I gave Gilead to the clan of Makir. ¹⁶But I also gave part of Gilead to the tribes of Reuben and Gad. The area I gave them extended from the middle of the Arnon Gorge in the south to the Jabbok River on the Ammonite frontier. ¹⁷They also received the Jordan Valley, all the way from the Sea of Galilee down to the Dead Sea,^[g] with the Jordan River serving as the western boundary. To the east were the slopes of Pisgah.

¹⁸“At that time I gave this command to the tribes that would live east of the Jordan: ‘Although the Lord your God has given you this land as your property, all your fighting men must cross the Jordan ahead of your Israelite relatives, armed and ready to assist them. ¹⁹Your wives, children, and numerous livestock, however, may stay behind in the towns I have given you. ²⁰When the Lord has given security to the rest of the Israelites, as he has to you, and when they occupy the land the Lord your God is giving them across the Jordan River, then you may all return here to the land I have given you.’

Moses Forbidden to Enter the Land

²¹“At that time I gave Joshua this charge: ‘You have seen for yourself everything the Lord your God has done to these two kings. He will do the same to all the kingdoms on the west side of the Jordan. ²²Do not be afraid of the nations there, for the Lord your God will fight for you.’

²³“At that time I pleaded with the Lord and said, ²⁴‘O Sovereign Lord, you have only begun to show your greatness and the strength of your hand to me, your servant. Is there any god in heaven or on earth who can perform such great and mighty deeds as you do? ²⁵Please let me cross the Jordan to see the wonderful land on the other side, the beautiful hill country and the Lebanon mountains.’

²⁶“But the Lord was angry with me because of you, and he would not listen to me. ‘That’s enough!’ he declared. ‘Speak of it no more. ²⁷But go up to Pisgah Peak, and look over the land in every direction. Take a good look, but you may not cross the Jordan River. ²⁸Instead, commission Joshua and encourage and strengthen him, for he will lead the people across the Jordan. He will give them all the land you now see before you as their possession.’ ²⁹So we stayed in the valley near Beth-peor.

Footnotes:

2:1 Hebrew sea of reeds.
2:23 Hebrew from Caphtor.
2:34 The Hebrew term used here refers to the complete consecration of things or people to the Lord, either by destroying them or by giving them as an offering.
3:6 The Hebrew term used here refers to the complete consecration of things or people to the Lord, either by destroying them or by giving them as an offering; also in 3:6b.
3:11 Hebrew 9 cubits [4.1 meters] long and 4 cubits [1.8 meters] wide.
3:14 Hebrew Havvoth-jair.
3:17 Hebrew from Kinnereth to the Sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Luke 6:12-38

Jesus Chooses the Twelve Apostles

¹²One day soon afterward Jesus went up on a mountain to pray, and he prayed to God all night. ¹³At daybreak he called together all of his disciples and chose twelve of them to be apostles. Here are their names:

¹⁴Simon (whom he named Peter),
Andrew (Peter’s brother),
James,
John,
Philip,
Bartholomew,
¹⁵Matthew,
Thomas,
James (son of Alphaeus),
Simon (who was called the zealot),
¹⁶Judas (son of James),
Judas Iscariot (who later betrayed him).

Crowds Follow Jesus

¹⁷When they came down from the mountain, the disciples stood with Jesus on a large, level area, surrounded by many of his followers and by the crowds. There were people from all over Judea and from Jerusalem and from as far north as the seacoasts of Tyre and Sidon. ¹⁸They had come to hear him and to be healed of their diseases; and those troubled by evil^[a] spirits were healed. ¹⁹Everyone tried to touch him, because healing power went out from him, and he healed everyone.

The Beatitudes

²⁰Then Jesus turned to his disciples and said,

“God blesses you who are poor,
for the Kingdom of God is yours.
²¹God blesses you who are hungry now,
for you will be satisfied.
God blesses you who weep now,
for in due time you will laugh.

²²What blessings await you when people hate you and exclude you and mock you and curse you as evil because you follow the Son of Man. ²³When that happens, be happy! Yes, leap for joy! For a great reward awaits you in heaven. And remember, their ancestors treated the ancient prophets that same way.

Sorrows Foretold

²⁴“What sorrow awaits you who are rich,
for you have your only happiness now.
²⁵What sorrow awaits you who are fat and prosperous now,
for a time of awful hunger awaits you.
What sorrow awaits you who laugh now,
for your laughing will turn to mourning and sorrow.
²⁶What sorrow awaits you who are praised by the crowds,
for their ancestors also praised false prophets.

Love for Enemies

²⁷“But to you who are willing to listen, I say, love your enemies! Do good to those who hate you. ²⁸Bless those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you. ²⁹If someone slaps you on one cheek, offer the other cheek also. If someone demands your coat, offer your shirt also. ³⁰Give to anyone who asks; and when things are taken away from you, don’t try to get them back. ³¹Do to others as you would like them to do to you.

³²“If you love only those who love you, why should you get credit for that? Even sinners love those who love them! ³³And if you do good only to those who do good to you, why should you get credit? Even sinners do that much! ³⁴And if you lend money only to those who can repay you, why should you get credit? Even sinners will lend to other sinners for a full return.

³⁵“Love your enemies! Do good to them. Lend to them without expecting to be repaid. Then your reward from heaven will be very great, and you will truly be acting as children of the Most High, for he is kind to those who are unthankful and wicked. ³⁶You must be compassionate, just as your Father is compassionate.

Do Not Judge Others

³⁷“Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn others, or it will all come back against you. Forgive others, and you will be forgiven. ³⁸Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full—pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back.^[b]”

Footnotes:

6:18 Greek unclean.
6:38 Or The measure you give will be the measure you get back.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Psalm 67

For the choir director: A song. A psalm, to be accompanied by stringed instruments.

¹May God be merciful and bless us.
May his face smile with favor on us. Interlude

²May your ways be known throughout the earth,
your saving power among people everywhere.
³May the nations praise you, O God.
Yes, may all the nations praise you.
⁴Let the whole world sing for joy,
because you govern the nations with justice
and guide the people of the whole world. Interlude

⁵May the nations praise you, O God.
Yes, may all the nations praise you.
⁶Then the earth will yield its harvests,
and God, our God, will richly bless us.
⁷Yes, God will bless us,
and people all over the world will fear him.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Proverbs 11:27

²⁷If you search for good, you will find favor;
but if you search for evil, it will find you!

New Living Translation (NLT)

March 24, 2017

03/23/2017 DAB Transcript

Numbers 36:1-Deuteronomy 1:46 ~ Luke 5:29-6:11 ~ Psalm 66:1-20 ~ Proverbs 11:24-26

Today is the 23^rd day of March. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you today as we take the next step forward through the scriptures this year and we will complete the book of Numbers today and begin the book of Deuteronomy. So we’ll talk about Deuteronomy when we get there, but first Numbers chapter 36, verse 1 through the end of Numbers and then Deuteronomy chapter 1, verse 1 through 46.

Introduction of a New Book (Old Testament)

The final book in the Pentateuch or the Torah, everything that we’ve read in the Old Testament up to this point, the final book in that grouping of books is the book of Deuteronomy, which literally means second law. It is really much deeper than that because this book contains the final words of Moses.

Under Moses’ leadership we’ve seen God move in miraculous ways and rescue his children and assemble them as a people and establish a culture and this happened under the careful leadership of Moses and these are Moses’ last words. Moses is about to die. We’re about to cover some ground we’ve covered before, but we should sense the more passionate version of the telling, because Moses knows this is the end of his life, he knows he is passing this great responsibility of leadership on to Joshua. Moses is reminding the people where they’ve come from and where they are and why they are there and where they are going. In doing this, he pleads with them to obey the words of the Lord. If they will just obey, the promises of God will be fulfilled.

Deuteronomy is laid out in three final messages from Moses. The first one is the retelling of what happened at Mount Sinai when God came down on the mountain and met with the people and the Ten Commandments were given from that point, all the way to where they are there in Moab, across the Jordan from the promised land, and he appeals urgently that they be faithful to God.

Then his second talk is the retelling of the giving of the Ten Commandments where he gives the first commandment particular gravity. He talks about what it will be like when they go over the Jordan and the temptations that they’ll encounter and the tremendous importance of faithfulness and obedience to God. Obedience is the key to their success and their only hope for a future.

Then his third and final talk, the very final words of Moses reviews where they’ve come from, where they are, where they are going. It’s his final plea to be faithful to God and it renews the covenant with God. He warns them of disobedience and the repercussions of breaking the covenant and then it ends with Moses’ final instructions for his successor, his final instructions to the people, and his final blessing over the people.

This mighty man Moses, who as a baby was placed in a basket in the river, grew up in Pharaoh’s house, killed an Egyptian and ran away to the desert only to be called and summoned by God in a burning bush to return to Egypt to set the people free. Through the plagues, through the mistrust, the people were set free and he was their leader ever since. Moses was in so many ways responsible for saving the people of Israel because on a number of occasions God was ready to wipe them out and start over with Moses. Moses and Aaron are found on many occasions flat on their faces before God to intercede on behalf of the people.

This is the end. Moses blesses the people one final time and then he dies which is where we will find ourselves at the end of the book of Deuteronomy. But we’re only at the beginning, Deuteronomy chapter 1.

Prayer

Thank you, Father, for another day in your word and for the wisdom and for the transition into new books, new vantage points, and for all the lives that have gone before us that we can read into and walk alongside and find a mirror into our own soul. So we thank you for your word and we thank you for your word in community. We thank you for this community and pray your blessing and kindness and good favor over us each. In all, through all, for all, by all, with all, we thank you for your presence. Come Holy Spirit, we pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements

Www.DailyAudioBible.com is the website. It’s home base. It’s where you find out what is going on around here and today is the day. Today is the deadline day for the More Gathering for Women that begins two weeks from today in the mountains just outside of Atlanta, GA, in the Southern Appalachian Mountains. They are beautiful. I’m looking forward to seeing… It’s always beautiful there. It’s like new life springing forth, but Spring has kind of sprung a little early in the south so I’m eager to see what it is going to be like up there. But it will be beautiful. So this is the day. If you’ve been thinking about it, today would be the last day to check it out. So you can check it out at www.DailyAudioBible.com. Just look for the More Gathering or just go to www.MoreGathering.com and it will take you there and all the details you would want to know are right there. So we’ll see you very, very soon.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at www.DailyAudioBible.com as well. There is a link on the home page. Thank you. If you use the app, you can press 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’re a community. If you have a prayer request or comment, (877) 942-4253 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 dear family. This is Pastor Gene. Dear Candace from Oregon, I have loved you from the moment I met you on the phone line and I love you every day more. The __________ honor of your husband who is now with the Lord. I rejoice in his graduation, but I’m terribly sorry for your loss. The Lord is Candace’s shepherd. She will not be in want. He makes Candace lie down in green pastures and leads her beside quiet waters. He restores Candace’s soul. The Lord guides her in paths of righteousness for his namesake. Even when Candace walks through the valley of the shadow of death, she will fear no evil because the Lord is with her and his rod and his staff, they comfort Candace. The Lord prepares a table for Candace in the presence of her enemies. The Lord anoints Candace’s head with oil. Candace’s cup overflows. Surely goodness and love will follow Candace all the days of her life and she and her husband will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Candace, I love you so much. And many of us would like to get in touch with you beyond this hotline. If you have an opportunity, look us up in Facebook under DAB Friends where so many of us have started to post and many of us have posted our condolences and encouragement to you. I love you, Candace. Your sister in Christ, Pastor Gene from Bradenton, FL. Bye.

Hello DAB. I am Tony from Southern California. This is my first time calling to request for prayer. Though I have prayed for other listeners, but I have not asked because of the awkwardness I feel, I have to ask now and I feel there are godly people here. I’m at the end of a 20-year long marriage with my wife. We have three children, the eldest, a young woman, and two young men. I love my family deeply and have worked all my life to provide for them. I’m a good employee, but the life of a correctional officer is a hard one and has taken its toll and has only helped to enforce upon me what I learned as a child growing up in a dysfunctional family. It is a struggle. I have been doing it for as long as my marriage and now I feel I have to leave it. I offer not excuse for my actions. I’m not asking for pity because it is a hard job, but I feel that it was part of what I am today. I’m at the edge of losing my family now. I may already have. My wife is completely right. I have emotionally abused her and damaged the family extensively. She is at the edge. There is no trust anymore. We both believe in God and the lifelong commitment of marriage, but this kind of thing is extremely damaging. Now I know who Christ is and have accepted him into my heart. He is the Savior that buys back the sins of all men. Christ is the only path to God. I understand that this is only due to God’s grace, but I am a believer. I know that I can come to God in prayer and seek forgiveness and ask for a miracle and I could ask for others to pray for me also. I ask for listeners to pray for me. I am not good at prayer and my heart is not broken enough. Will you please pray that God will let the Holy Spirit enter into my heart and save me from sin? I know we have such busy lives, but please stand in the gap for me. Pray that I receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit. That is what I need the most. I need to be born again and that is what I’ve lacked. Pray for transformation of the heart. Pray that I be a humble man in Christ. Pray for healing and a broken, contrite spirit. I never really had that either. I know that God can do this as nothing is impossible for God. That God can save my marriage and I have…

Johnnie from South Alabama again. I was outside working on a project and listening to the community prayer and the Lord made me stop in the middle of working and call in to lift up brother Bill B. in prayer right now. I mean, I don’t know. Some of you newer listeners may not know, but he was a missionary I believe in Uganda, helped out a lot of boys over there. He’s a worker. Jesus said pray for the laborers. Pray to the Lord of the harvest because the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. Brother B. is a laborer. So I just pray that, Father God, you would renew him physically, renew his strength, give him new life, new vigor so that he may go and do your work which you placed in his heart to do. Lord, I just pray for all the other Dabbers at this time, especially the ones who are constantly lifting everyone up in prayer. I pray a shield of protection around the prayer warriors. We release your angels to go and protect them and to protect us all. __________ force, be a shield of force, be a rear guard behind us. Every dart that the enemy flies against us, let it be struck down immediately. The victory is already won. You are Jehovah __________. You are __________. That is your name. Our Victory. And we love you, Father God. We lift you up. We praise you and we glorify you in your mighty son’s name, Yeshuah Messiah, Jesus, the Christ, Son of the Living God.

Hello. This is a DAB listener for probably 7-8 years now. I can’t keep track because you’ve been part of my family forever. I seldom give you my name because I feel like I’m part of the people that call and also those who do not, so I hope that I am giving word to those who don’t ring. The reason why I’m calling today is that I lost a friend who was Native American and many of my Native American friends, which I have several because of where I live in the world, they may even truly believe in Jesus Christ as the Savior, but they are so __________ into their community that they have native roots that give them the spiritual belief that ties them to their Native American faith. I don’t disrespect that at all because they were here where I live long before I and knitted their community together for a long time and, of course, the whole Christ and all of that kind of _________ their native faith is first. So the thing is is that I just want to remind those who are Native Americans that Christ is not __________ your beliefs.

Thank you, God, for giving me everything I’ve asked. You’ve freed me from my demons and my true self is now __________. Time is running short now. As they say, this too shall pass. I praise and thank you constantly. There is not much that I ask. The relationship I have with you I pray will always last. Last is first. The first is last. A simple little verse. Some men go from good to bad. Some from bad to worse. Help me just be patient, God, and follow where you lead. Help me not be selfish, be consumed by lust and greed. Wherever two are gathered, I know that you’ll be there. Keep my __________ simple and strip my ego back. Make me in your image, God. I’m flesh but still I’m clay. Fill me with your spirit and renew my strength each day. One and one is usually two, but you and I are one. Finish, God, the work in me you clearly have begun. BlindTony1016@gmail.com. I’d like to give a shout-out to Alleah from Waxahachie. Haven’t heard from you in quite a while. Hope you’re still there, hanging in there. And I would like to give a shout-out to Victorious Soldier. Always love to hear your voice. Okay. And Melisa from Alabama, yeah, always love the sound of your voice too. And my special prayers go out to the Hardin family, especially Jill right around now, getting ready to do the women’s conference thing again. I pray God’s protection and blessings and he will stir up the gifts within you and make you a blessing in all that you say and do. Yeah, keep the faith you all. Keep it flowing. Alright, bye-bye.

Hello family. This is Candace from Oregon. Dawn from New York and the many others who are praying for me and my family in the sudden loss of my husband of 40 years, the dad of our three adult children and grandpa of two boys ages 11 and 16, it has been the toughest week of my life and yet also deeply blessed as so many have come to our aid. This was easily a week of 1000 graces from the hand of our Heavenly Father who mourns with us even as he welcomes this wonderful man who loves Jesus so deeply. Psalm 23 and Zephaniah 3:17 came into play again and again, the latter being truly his life verse, his eternal life verse. So I am saying thank you, Lord Jesus, and thank you to each one of you who continues in prayer for us, we will be needing and we love you.

March 23, 2017

The Daily Audio Bible Reading for Thursday March 23, 2017 (NIV)

Numbers 36 - Deuteronomy 1

Women Who Inherit Property

36 Then the heads of the clans of Gilead—descendants of Makir, son of Manasseh, son of Joseph—came to Moses and the family leaders of Israel with a petition. ²They said, “Sir, the Lord instructed you to divide the land by sacred lot among the people of Israel. You were told by the Lord to give the grant of land owned by our brother Zelophehad to his daughters. ³But if they marry men from another tribe, their grants of land will go with them to the tribe into which they marry. In this way, the total area of our tribal land will be reduced. ⁴Then when the Year of Jubilee comes, their portion of land will be added to that of the new tribe, causing it to be lost forever to our ancestral tribe.”

⁵So Moses gave the Israelites this command from the Lord: “The claim of the men of the tribe of Joseph is legitimate. ⁶This is what the Lord commands concerning the daughters of Zelophehad: Let them marry anyone they like, as long as it is within their own ancestral tribe. ⁷None of the territorial land may pass from tribe to tribe, for all the land given to each tribe must remain within the tribe to which it was first allotted. ⁸The daughters throughout the tribes of Israel who are in line to inherit property must marry within their tribe, so that all the Israelites will keep their ancestral property. ⁹No grant of land may pass from one tribe to another; each tribe of Israel must keep its allotted portion of land.”

¹⁰The daughters of Zelophehad did as the Lord commanded Moses. ¹¹Mahlah, Tirzah, Hoglah, Milcah, and Noah all married cousins on their father’s side. ¹²They married into the clans of Manasseh son of Joseph. Thus, their inheritance of land remained within their ancestral tribe.

¹³These are the commands and regulations that the Lord gave to the people of Israel through Moses while they were camped on the plains of Moab beside the Jordan River, across from Jericho.

Introduction to Moses’ First Address

1 These are the words that Moses spoke to all the people of Israel while they were in the wilderness east of the Jordan River. They were camped in the Jordan Valley^[a] near Suph, between Paran on one side and Tophel, Laban, Hazeroth, and Di-zahab on the other.

²Normally it takes only eleven days to travel from Mount Sinai^[b] to Kadesh-barnea, going by way of Mount Seir. ³But forty years after the Israelites left Egypt, on the first day of the eleventh month,^[c] Moses addressed the people of Israel, telling them everything the Lord had commanded him to say. ⁴This took place after he had defeated King Sihon of the Amorites, who ruled in Heshbon, and at Edrei had defeated King Og of Bashan, who ruled in Ashtaroth.

⁵While the Israelites were in the land of Moab east of the Jordan River, Moses carefully explained the Lord’s instructions as follows.

The Command to Leave Sinai

⁶“When we were at Mount Sinai, the Lord our God said to us, ‘You have stayed at this mountain long enough. ⁷It is time to break camp and move on. Go to the hill country of the Amorites and to all the neighboring regions—the Jordan Valley, the hill country, the western foothills,^[d] the Negev, and the coastal plain. Go to the land of the Canaanites and to Lebanon, and all the way to the great Euphrates River. ⁸Look, I am giving all this land to you! Go in and occupy it, for it is the land the Lord swore to give to your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and to all their descendants.’”

Moses Appoints Leaders from Each Tribe

⁹Moses continued, “At that time I told you, ‘You are too great a burden for me to carry all by myself. ¹⁰The Lord your God has increased your population, making you as numerous as the stars! ¹¹And may the Lord, the God of your ancestors, multiply you a thousand times more and bless you as he promised! ¹²But you are such a heavy load to carry! How can I deal with all your problems and bickering? ¹³Choose some well-respected men from each tribe who are known for their wisdom and understanding, and I will appoint them as your leaders.’

¹⁴“Then you responded, ‘Your plan is a good one.’ ¹⁵So I took the wise and respected men you had selected from your tribes and appointed them to serve as judges and officials over you. Some were responsible for a thousand people, some for a hundred, some for fifty, and some for ten.

¹⁶“At that time I instructed the judges, ‘You must hear the cases of your fellow Israelites and the foreigners living among you. Be perfectly fair in your decisions ¹⁷and impartial in your judgments. Hear the cases of those who are poor as well as those who are rich. Don’t be afraid of anyone’s anger, for the decision you make is God’s decision. Bring me any cases that are too difficult for you, and I will handle them.’

¹⁸“At that time I gave you instructions about everything you were to do.

Scouts Explore the Land

¹⁹“Then, just as the Lord our God commanded us, we left Mount Sinai and traveled through the great and terrifying wilderness, as you yourselves remember, and headed toward the hill country of the Amorites. When we arrived at Kadesh-barnea, ²⁰I said to you, ‘You have now reached the hill country of the Amorites that the Lord our God is giving us. ²¹Look! He has placed the land in front of you. Go and occupy it as the Lord, the God of your ancestors, has promised you. Don’t be afraid! Don’t be discouraged!’

²²“But you all came to me and said, ‘First, let’s send out scouts to explore the land for us. They will advise us on the best route to take and which towns we should enter.’

²³“This seemed like a good idea to me, so I chose twelve scouts, one from each of your tribes. ²⁴They headed for the hill country and came to the valley of Eshcol and explored it. ²⁵They picked some of its fruit and brought it back to us. And they reported, ‘The land the Lord our God has given us is indeed a good land.’

Israel’s Rebellion against the Lord

²⁶“But you rebelled against the command of the Lord your God and refused to go in. ²⁷You complained in your tents and said, ‘The Lord must hate us. That’s why he has brought us here from Egypt—to hand us over to the Amorites to be slaughtered. ²⁸Where can we go? Our brothers have demoralized us with their report. They tell us, “The people of the land are taller and more powerful than we are, and their towns are large, with walls rising high into the sky! We even saw giants there—the descendants of Anak!”’

²⁹“But I said to you, ‘Don’t be shocked or afraid of them! ³⁰The Lord your God is going ahead of you. He will fight for you, just as you saw him do in Egypt. ³¹And you saw how the Lord your God cared for you all along the way as you traveled through the wilderness, just as a father cares for his child. Now he has brought you to this place.’

³²“But even after all he did, you refused to trust the Lord your God, ³³who goes before you looking for the best places to camp, guiding you with a pillar of fire by night and a pillar of cloud by day.

³⁴“When the Lord heard your complaining, he became very angry. So he solemnly swore, ³⁵‘Not one of you from this wicked generation will live to see the good land I swore to give your ancestors, ³⁶except Caleb son of Jephunneh. He will see this land because he has followed the Lord completely. I will give to him and his descendants some of the very land he explored during his scouting mission.’

³⁷“And the Lord was also angry with me because of you. He said to me, ‘Moses, not even you will enter the Promised Land! ³⁸Instead, your assistant, Joshua son of Nun, will lead the people into the land. Encourage him, for he will lead Israel as they take possession of it. ³⁹I will give the land to your little ones—your innocent children. You were afraid they would be captured, but they will be the ones who occupy it. ⁴⁰As for you, turn around now and go on back through the wilderness toward the Red Sea.^[e]’

⁴¹“Then you confessed, ‘We have sinned against the Lord! We will go into the land and fight for it, as the Lord our God has commanded us.’ So your men strapped on their weapons, thinking it would be easy to attack the hill country.

⁴²“But the Lord told me to tell you, ‘Do not attack, for I am not with you. If you go ahead on your own, you will be crushed by your enemies.’

⁴³“This is what I told you, but you would not listen. Instead, you again rebelled against the Lord’s command and arrogantly went into the hill country to fight. ⁴⁴But the Amorites who lived there came out against you like a swarm of bees. They chased and battered you all the way from Seir to Hormah. ⁴⁵Then you returned and wept before the Lord, but he refused to listen. ⁴⁶So you stayed there at Kadesh for a long time.

Footnotes:

1:1 Hebrew the Arabah; also in 1:7.
1:2 Hebrew Horeb, another name for Sinai; also in 1:6, 19.
1:3 Hebrew In the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month. This day in the ancient Hebrew lunar calendar occurred in January or February.
1:7 Hebrew the Shephelah.
1:40 Hebrew sea of reeds.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Luke 6:1-11

A Discussion about the Sabbath

6 One Sabbath day as Jesus was walking through some grainfields, his disciples broke off heads of grain, rubbed off the husks in their hands, and ate the grain. ²But some Pharisees said, “Why are you breaking the law by harvesting grain on the Sabbath?”

³Jesus replied, “Haven’t you read in the Scriptures what David did when he and his companions were hungry? ⁴He went into the house of God and broke the law by eating the sacred loaves of bread that only the priests can eat. He also gave some to his companions.” ⁵And Jesus added, “The Son of Man^[a] is Lord, even over the Sabbath.”

Jesus Heals on the Sabbath

⁶On another Sabbath day, a man with a deformed right hand was in the synagogue while Jesus was teaching. ⁷The teachers of religious law and the Pharisees watched Jesus closely. If he healed the man’s hand, they planned to accuse him of working on the Sabbath.

⁸But Jesus knew their thoughts. He said to the man with the deformed hand, “Come and stand in front of everyone.” So the man came forward. ⁹Then Jesus said to his critics, “I have a question for you. Does the law permit good deeds on the Sabbath, or is it a day for doing evil? Is this a day to save life or to destroy it?”

¹⁰He looked around at them one by one and then said to the man, “Hold out your hand.” So the man held out his hand, and it was restored! ¹¹At this, the enemies of Jesus were wild with rage and began to discuss what to do with him.

Footnotes:

6:5 “Son of Man” is a title Jesus used for himself.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Psalm 66

For the choir director: A song. A psalm.

¹Shout joyful praises to God, all the earth!
²Sing about the glory of his name!
Tell the world how glorious he is.
³Say to God, “How awesome are your deeds!
Your enemies cringe before your mighty power.
⁴Everything on earth will worship you;
they will sing your praises,
shouting your name in glorious songs.” Interlude

⁵Come and see what our God has done,
what awesome miracles he performs for people!
⁶He made a dry path through the Red Sea,^[a]
and his people went across on foot.
There we rejoiced in him.
⁷For by his great power he rules forever.
He watches every movement of the nations;
let no rebel rise in defiance. Interlude

⁸Let the whole world bless our God
and loudly sing his praises.
⁹Our lives are in his hands,
and he keeps our feet from stumbling.
¹⁰You have tested us, O God;
you have purified us like silver.
¹¹You captured us in your net
and laid the burden of slavery on our backs.
¹²Then you put a leader over us.^[b]
We went through fire and flood,
but you brought us to a place of great abundance.

¹³Now I come to your Temple with burnt offerings
to fulfill the vows I made to you—
¹⁴yes, the sacred vows that I made
when I was in deep trouble.
¹⁵That is why I am sacrificing burnt offerings to you—
the best of my rams as a pleasing aroma,
and a sacrifice of bulls and male goats. Interlude

¹⁶Come and listen, all you who fear God,
and I will tell you what he did for me.
¹⁷For I cried out to him for help,
praising him as I spoke.
¹⁸If I had not confessed the sin in my heart,
the Lord would not have listened.
¹⁹But God did listen!
He paid attention to my prayer.
²⁰Praise God, who did not ignore my prayer
or withdraw his unfailing love from me.

Footnotes:

66:6 Hebrew the sea.
66:12 Or You made people ride over our heads.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Proverbs 11:24-26

²⁴Give freely and become more wealthy;
be stingy and lose everything.

²⁵The generous will prosper;
those who refresh others will themselves be refreshed.

²⁶People curse those who hoard their grain,
but they bless the one who sells in time of need.

New Living Translation (NLT)

March 23, 2017

03/22/2017 DAB Transcript

Numbers 33:40-35:34 ~ Luke 5:12-28 ~ Psalm 65:1-13 ~ Proverbs 11:23

Today is March 22^nd. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s good to be here with you today and I’m glad that we’re here together. This is our last full day in the book of Numbers. Tomorrow we’ll finish it off and begin the next book, so that’s exciting. Well done! But we’re not there yet, so let’s move into today’s reading. From the New Living Translation this week, Numbers chapter 33, verse 40 through 35, verse 34.

Prayer

Father, we thank you for your word and we take this proverb deep into our hearts. We want to be godly and not wicked. The thing is, without God, without you, we can’t be godly. And so we invite you because this is the invitation you have invited us into, to become more and more like our Savior each and every day, to become more and more godly every day. So we invite you, Holy Spirit. Today may we become more godly. Today. Not as an esoteric theological concept that is out there somewhere when we mature. Today. Now. Come, Holy Spirit, and make us godly today. We ask in your mighty name and by your authority, the only way this prayer is even possible. Come, Holy Spirit, we ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements

Www.DailyAudioBible.com is the website. It’s home base. It’s where you find out what is going on around here and I’ve been talking about the More Gathering and I’m going to talk about it a little bit more because tomorrow is the last day for registration. Two weeks from tomorrow the conference starts so we’re looking very forward to it. Our intercessory team has been praying, praying and praying for you. Those of you who are coming, people have been praying for you for a long time now and the team has been interceding, just asking Jesus for the right words. So it’s going to be amazing. Tomorrow is the deadline, so you can get all the information that you would want to know at www.DailyAudioBible.com. Just look for the More Gathering or just go to www.MoreGathering.com and it will take you there as well. So we’ll look forward to seeing you, but tomorrow is the deadline, is the final day of registration, so hope you can come.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at www.DailyAudioBible.com. There is a link. It’s on the home page. Thank you for your partnership. If you’re using the app, 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, if you have a prayer request or comment, (877) 942-4253 is the number to dial.

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 family. This is Joyce from California. Today is March 16^th and I just heard Candace from Oregon calling in, letting us know about her husband. Candace, I just wanted to say that I love you and that we’re grieving with you and we’re lifting you up in prayer. I’m so sorry for your loss. And I’m just really grateful that your husband brought you to us and I wanted you to know that you are deeply loved. I always love hearing your voice, just like I love hearing the voices of all of our family members. I’m praying with you. I just hope you can feel our arms, our hearts surrounding you right now and lifting you up. We love you so much. Be comforted, okay? Alright, love you lots. Okay, bye-bye.

This is Soosie and this message is for Candace. Candace, I pray to the Lord for you. Your husband is with Jesus, but Lord, I lift Candace up to you and in her pain, Lord, in those moments, Lord, we ask that you give her peace and rest and courage and comfort each and every moment of every day and please continue to bless Candace always. Thank you, Lord. Amen. Also I have a prayer for Al who called in on the 14^th who is separated from his wife and his daughter because he has a job in one state and she has a job in another state. And I pray, Lord, that you will reunite them soon, Lord God. I pray for provision for them. Thank you, Lord. You are so good to all of us, Lord. Thank you. We praise you. Amen.

Our God, thank you. __________ thank you, Lord. Thank you for this beautiful day and for this new day and these new chances, new opportunities we have to praise and worship you and give you glory in everything we do. I pray, Lord, you help us be mindful of that today. Father God, thank you that you know what we need and thank you, Lord, so much that you provide those needs. Father God, help us to find time today and in the coming days and the coming weeks we find that time to stop and just be with you and spend time with you and let you speak to us and let you change us. Be transforming us, Lord, changing our hearts and changing our minds. Father God, thank you so much for the More Conference. Thank you, Lord, so much for those who are organizing it and those who are preparing for it and all those behind the scenes of that, Lord. I pray, Lord, that you would be blessing them, giving them ideas and that you’ll be guiding them, Lord, and you’ll be protecting them, Lord. Father God, thank you for all of those women who have signed on already. I pray, Lord, that you are preparing them for what they are going to hear and I pray, Lord, that you would get them there safely. Father God, I pray for all those who haven’t signed on yet but who are going to, Lord. You know who needs this. And I pray, Lord, that they would get there. Father God, we pray for the women, we pray for their families, pray for their friends, their wives, their __________, Lord. The enemy is trying to absolutely do everything to stop this from going on. Please be protecting them from that. Please keep them going. Please be giving them what they need to get there and get them there safely, Lord, and just be blessing them greatly.

Good morning Daily Audio Bible. This is Karrie calling from Baltimore. I am a new listener and this is my first time calling in. I just wanted to reach out to the young woman who called in last week with mycosis fungoides. I am a nurse at an oncology major institution in Baltimore and I just wanted to reach out to you and if you have any questions about your diagnosis or you just need some support, feel free to email me at KZimmer8@jhmi.edu. Please feel free to reach out to me. I also wanted to let you know that I’m lifting you up in prayer. I’m also lifting up the 73-year-old lady who called and was wishing Brian a happy birthday. Please know I’m praying for your finances and for your family’s situation and strength with your daughters. And also I’m praying for Maverick and his grandmother called in last week as well. So please know I’m praying for healing for Maverick and that his little body will just be able to withstand what is happening and will fight. I hope that he is getting better each day. Thank you so much for this program. It’s been invaluable to me and I’m so, so glad that it found me. Thank you all. Have a great day.

Hey Joyful from Tennessee, I believe that message was for me, probably a few other people, but the key word you said was pressing in and that has kind of been my motto the past week. I had a really bad year last year and this year __________ getting any better. I did it big. Sinned. I had premarital sex with a woman. I accidentally got her pregnant and now she wants to terminate the baby and its ripping me apart. I know Jesus. I repented, by the way. I was wrong for that, but I know Jesus __________ and I don’t want that kid killed, you know? I’ve even said, “Hey, have the baby and I’ll take responsibility. __________.” It’s killing me, man. I’ve been sick for days because of this. I can’t hardly eat and whatnot. So I’ve got to at least pray for the wellbeing for that child. I’ll do whatever it takes. I’ll take responsibility for that. And also pray for her salvation as well. I appreciate you all. I’m a long-time listener. Screwed up __________. Thank you.

Hi DAB family. This is Sidney from Vancouver, WA. I’m Sam from Vancouver, WA’s wife. This is my first time calling in in over several years of being a listener to the DAB. I’m calling because I do really intense restorative justice work for Portland Public Schools, which is the largest school district in Portland, OR, and I just walked away from a dialogue I had with a family whose kiddo is really negatively impacting kids’ school environment and lots of students that he is hurting and harming. And he’s also got a lot of harm going on for him. Next week we’re having a dialogue with his parents and some other parents of impacted kids and I know it’s going to be really intense, so I’m reaching out to the prayer team and I’m just asking for prayer around this process. There is an evilness at work here with this young man. God has revealed it to me and he has asked me to reach out and ask for prayer support from this wonderful canopy on the DAB line. So I am. I need your prayers. The meeting is next Tuesday morning. It is going to be pretty intense and so I’m just asking for the Holy Spirit to lead and I really appreciate your prayers in casting out this ugly evil one that is present with this young man and his family. So I appreciate your prayers. Thank you guys so much. I’m always praying for you all and I love listening to this podcast and being a part of this family. Thanks so much. Bye.

March 22, 2017

The Daily Audio Bible Reading for Wednesday March 22, 2017 (NIV)

Numbers 33:40-35:34

⁴⁰At that time the Canaanite king of Arad, who lived in the Negev in the land of Canaan, heard that the people of Israel were approaching his land.

⁴¹Meanwhile, the Israelites left Mount Hor and camped at Zalmonah.

⁴²Then they left Zalmonah and camped at Punon.

⁴³They left Punon and camped at Oboth.

⁴⁴They left Oboth and camped at Iye-abarim on the border of Moab.

⁴⁵They left Iye-abarim^[a] and camped at Dibon-gad.

⁴⁶They left Dibon-gad and camped at Almon-diblathaim.

⁴⁷They left Almon-diblathaim and camped in the mountains east of the river,^[b] near Mount Nebo.

⁴⁸They left the mountains east of the river and camped on the plains of Moab beside the Jordan River, across from Jericho. ⁴⁹Along the Jordan River they camped from Beth-jeshimoth as far as the meadows of Acacia^[c] on the plains of Moab.

⁵⁰While they were camped near the Jordan River on the plains of Moab opposite Jericho, the Lord said to Moses, ⁵¹“Give the following instructions to the people of Israel: When you cross the Jordan River into the land of Canaan, ⁵²you must drive out all the people living there. You must destroy all their carved and molten images and demolish all their pagan shrines. ⁵³Take possession of the land and settle in it, because I have given it to you to occupy. ⁵⁴You must distribute the land among the clans by sacred lot and in proportion to their size. A larger portion of land will be allotted to each of the larger clans, and a smaller portion will be allotted to each of the smaller clans. The decision of the sacred lot is final. In this way, the portions of land will be divided among your ancestral tribes. ⁵⁵But if you fail to drive out the people who live in the land, those who remain will be like splinters in your eyes and thorns in your sides. They will harass you in the land where you live. ⁵⁶And I will do to you what I had planned to do to them.”

Boundaries of the Land

34 Then the Lord said to Moses, ²“Give these instructions to the Israelites: When you come into the land of Canaan, which I am giving you as your special possession, these will be the boundaries. ³The southern portion of your country will extend from the wilderness of Zin, along the edge of Edom. The southern boundary will begin on the east at the Dead Sea.^[d] ⁴It will then run south past Scorpion Pass^[e] in the direction of Zin. Its southernmost point will be Kadesh-barnea, from which it will go to Hazar-addar, and on to Azmon. ⁵From Azmon the boundary will turn toward the Brook of Egypt and end at the Mediterranean Sea.^[f]

⁶“Your western boundary will be the coastline of the Mediterranean Sea.

⁷“Your northern boundary will begin at the Mediterranean Sea and run east to Mount Hor, ⁸then to Lebo-hamath, and on through Zedad ⁹and Ziphron to Hazar-enan. This will be your northern boundary.

¹⁰“The eastern boundary will start at Hazar-enan and run south to Shepham, ¹¹then down to Riblah on the east side of Ain. From there the boundary will run down along the eastern edge of the Sea of Galilee,^[g] ¹²and then along the Jordan River to the Dead Sea. These are the boundaries of your land.”

¹³Then Moses told the Israelites, “This territory is the homeland you are to divide among yourselves by sacred lot. The Lord has commanded that the land be divided among the nine and a half remaining tribes. ¹⁴The families of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh have already received their grants of land ¹⁵on the east side of the Jordan River, across from Jericho toward the sunrise.”

Leaders to Divide the Land

¹⁶And the Lord said to Moses, ¹⁷“Eleazar the priest and Joshua son of Nun are the men designated to divide the grants of land among the people. ¹⁸Enlist one leader from each tribe to help them with the task. ¹⁹These are the tribes and the names of the leaders:

Tribe	Leader
Judah	Caleb son of Jephunneh
²⁰Simeon	Shemuel son of Ammihud
²¹Benjamin	Elidad son of Kislon
²²Dan	Bukki son of Jogli
²³Manasseh son of Joseph	Hanniel son of Ephod
²⁴Ephraim son of Joseph	Kemuel son of Shiphtan
²⁵Zebulun	Elizaphan son of Parnach
²⁶Issachar	Paltiel son of Azzan
²⁷Asher	Ahihud son of Shelomi
²⁸Naphtali	Pedahel son of Ammihud

²⁹These are the men the Lord has appointed to divide the grants of land in Canaan among the Israelites.”

Towns for the Levites

35 While Israel was camped beside the Jordan on the plains of Moab across from Jericho, the Lord said to Moses, ²“Command the people of Israel to give to the Levites from their property certain towns to live in, along with the surrounding pasturelands. ³These towns will be for the Levites to live in, and the surrounding lands will provide pasture for their cattle, flocks, and other livestock. ⁴The pastureland assigned to the Levites around these towns will extend 1,500 feet^[h] from the town walls in every direction. ⁵Measure off 3,000 feet^[i] outside the town walls in every direction—east, south, west, north—with the town at the center. This area will serve as the larger pastureland for the towns.

⁶“Six of the towns you give the Levites will be cities of refuge, where a person who has accidentally killed someone can flee for safety. In addition, give them forty-two other towns. ⁷In all, forty-eight towns with the surrounding pastureland will be given to the Levites. ⁸These towns will come from the property of the people of Israel. The larger tribes will give more towns to the Levites, while the smaller tribes will give fewer. Each tribe will give property in proportion to the size of its land.”

Cities of Refuge

⁹The Lord said to Moses, ¹⁰“Give the following instructions to the people of Israel.

“When you cross the Jordan into the land of Canaan, ¹¹designate cities of refuge to which people can flee if they have killed someone accidentally. ¹²These cities will be places of protection from a dead person’s relatives who want to avenge the death. The slayer must not be put to death before being tried by the community. ¹³Designate six cities of refuge for yourselves, ¹⁴three on the east side of the Jordan River and three on the west in the land of Canaan. ¹⁵These cities are for the protection of Israelites, foreigners living among you, and traveling merchants. Anyone who accidentally kills someone may flee there for safety.

¹⁶“But if someone strikes and kills another person with a piece of iron, it is murder, and the murderer must be executed. ¹⁷Or if someone with a stone in his hand strikes and kills another person, it is murder, and the murderer must be put to death. ¹⁸Or if someone strikes and kills another person with a wooden object, it is murder, and the murderer must be put to death. ¹⁹The victim’s nearest relative is responsible for putting the murderer to death. When they meet, the avenger must put the murderer to death. ²⁰So if someone hates another person and waits in ambush, then pushes him or throws something at him and he dies, it is murder. ²¹Or if someone hates another person and hits him with a fist and he dies, it is murder. In such cases, the avenger must put the murderer to death when they meet.

²²“But suppose someone pushes another person without having shown previous hostility, or throws something that unintentionally hits another person, ²³or accidentally drops a huge stone on someone, though they were not enemies, and the person dies. ²⁴If this should happen, the community must follow these regulations in making a judgment between the slayer and the avenger, the victim’s nearest relative: ²⁵The community must protect the slayer from the avenger and must escort the slayer back to live in the city of refuge to which he fled. There he must remain until the death of the high priest, who was anointed with the sacred oil.

²⁶“But if the slayer ever leaves the limits of the city of refuge, ²⁷and the avenger finds him outside the city and kills him, it will not be considered murder. ²⁸The slayer should have stayed inside the city of refuge until the death of the high priest. But after the death of the high priest, the slayer may return to his own property. ²⁹These are legal requirements for you to observe from generation to generation, wherever you may live.

³⁰“All murderers must be put to death, but only if evidence is presented by more than one witness. No one may be put to death on the testimony of only one witness. ³¹Also, you must never accept a ransom payment for the life of someone judged guilty of murder and subject to execution; murderers must always be put to death. ³²And never accept a ransom payment from someone who has fled to a city of refuge, allowing a slayer to return to his property before the death of the high priest. ³³This will ensure that the land where you live will not be polluted, for murder pollutes the land. And no sacrifice except the execution of the murderer can purify the land from murder.^[j] ³⁴You must not defile the land where you live, for I live there myself. I am the Lord, who lives among the people of Israel.”

Footnotes:

33:45 As in 33:44; Hebrew reads Iyim, another name for Iye-abarim.
33:47 Or the mountains of Abarim; also in 33:48.
33:49 Hebrew as far as Abel-shittim.
34:3 Hebrew Salt Sea; also in 34:12.
34:4 Or the ascent of Akrabbim.
34:5 Hebrew the sea; also in 34:6, 7.
34:11 Hebrew Sea of Kinnereth.
35:4 Hebrew 1,000 cubits [460 meters].
35:5 Hebrew 2,000 cubits [920 meters].
35:33 Or can make atonement for murder.

New Living Translation (NLT)

Luke 5:12-39

Jesus Heals a Man with Leprosy

¹²In one of the villages, Jesus met a man with an advanced case of leprosy. When the man saw Jesus, he bowed with his face to the ground, begging to be healed. “Lord,” he said, “if you are willing, you can heal me and make me clean.”

¹³Jesus reached out and touched him. “I am willing,” he said. “Be healed!” And instantly the leprosy disappeared. ¹⁴Then Jesus instructed him not to tell anyone what had happened. He said, “Go to the priest and let him examine you. Take along the offering required in the law of Moses for those who have been healed of leprosy.^[a] This will be a public testimony that you have been cleansed.”

¹⁵But despite Jesus’ instructions, the report of his power spread even faster, and vast crowds came to hear him preach and to be healed of their diseases. ¹⁶But Jesus often withdrew to the wilderness for prayer.

Jesus Heals a Paralyzed Man

¹⁷One day while Jesus was teaching, some Pharisees and teachers of religious law were sitting nearby. (It seemed that these men showed up from every village in all Galilee and Judea, as well as from Jerusalem.) And the Lord’s healing power was strongly with Jesus.

¹⁸Some men came carrying a paralyzed man on a sleeping mat. They tried to take him inside to Jesus, ¹⁹but they couldn’t reach him because of the crowd. So they went up to the roof and took off some tiles. Then they lowered the sick man on his mat down into the crowd, right in front of Jesus. ²⁰Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the man, “Young man, your sins are forgiven.”

²¹But the Pharisees and teachers of religious law said to themselves, “Who does he think he is? That’s blasphemy! Only God can forgive sins!”

²²Jesus knew what they were thinking, so he asked them, “Why do you question this in your hearts? ²³Is it easier to say ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or ‘Stand up and walk’? ²⁴So I will prove to you that the Son of Man^[b] has the authority on earth to forgive sins.” Then Jesus turned to the paralyzed man and said, “Stand up, pick up your mat, and go home!”

²⁵And immediately, as everyone watched, the man jumped up, picked up his mat, and went home praising God. ²⁶Everyone was gripped with great wonder and awe, and they praised God, exclaiming, “We have seen amazing things today!”

Jesus Calls Levi (Matthew)

²⁷Later, as Jesus left the town, he saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at his tax collector’s booth. “Follow me and be my disciple,” Jesus said to him. ²⁸So Levi got up, left everything, and followed him.

²⁹Later, Levi held a banquet in his home with Jesus as the guest of honor. Many of Levi’s fellow tax collectors and other guests also ate with them. ³⁰But the Pharisees and their teachers of religious law complained bitterly to Jesus’ disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with such scum?^[c]”

³¹Jesus answered them, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor—sick people do. ³²I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners and need to repent.”

A Discussion about Fasting

³³One day some people said to Jesus, “John the Baptist’s disciples fast and pray regularly, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees. Why are your disciples always eating and drinking?”

³⁴Jesus responded, “Do wedding guests fast while celebrating with the groom? Of course not. ³⁵But someday the groom will be taken away from them, and then they will fast.”

³⁶Then Jesus gave them this illustration: “No one tears a piece of cloth from a new garment and uses it to patch an old garment. For then the new garment would be ruined, and the new patch wouldn’t even match the old garment.

³⁷“And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. For the new wine would burst the wineskins, spilling the wine and ruining the skins. ³⁸New wine must be stored in new wineskins. ³⁹But no one who drinks the old wine seems to want the new wine. ‘The old is just fine,’ they say.”

Footnotes:

5:14 See Lev 14:2-32.
5:24 “Son of Man” is a title Jesus used for himself.
5:30 Greek with tax collectors and sinners?

New Living Translation (NLT)

Psalm 65

For the choir director: A song. A psalm of David.

¹What mighty praise, O God,
belongs to you in Zion.
We will fulfill our vows to you,
²for you answer our prayers.
All of us must come to you.
³Though we are overwhelmed by our sins,
you forgive them all.
⁴What joy for those you choose to bring near,
those who live in your holy courts.
What festivities await us
inside your holy Temple.

⁵You faithfully answer our prayers with awesome deeds,
O God our savior.
You are the hope of everyone on earth,
even those who sail on distant seas.
⁶You formed the mountains by your power
and armed yourself with mighty strength.
⁷You quieted the raging oceans
with their pounding waves
and silenced the shouting of the nations.
⁸Those who live at the ends of the earth
stand in awe of your wonders.
From where the sun rises to where it sets,
you inspire shouts of joy.

⁹You take care of the earth and water it,
making it rich and fertile.
The river of God has plenty of water;
it provides a bountiful harvest of grain,
for you have ordered it so.
¹⁰You drench the plowed ground with rain,
melting the clods and leveling the ridges.
You soften the earth with showers
and bless its abundant crops.
¹¹You crown the year with a bountiful harvest;
even the hard pathways overflow with abundance.
¹²The grasslands of the wilderness become a lush pasture,
and the hillsides blossom with joy.
¹³The meadows are clothed with flocks of sheep,
and the valleys are carpeted with grain.
They all shout and sing for joy!

New Living Translation (NLT)

Proverbs 11:23

²³The godly can look forward to a reward,
while the wicked can expect only judgment.

New Living Translation (NLT)

March 22, 2017

03/21/2017 DAB Transcript

Numbers 32:1-33:39 ~ Luke 3:23-38 ~ Psalm 62:1-12 ~ Proverbs 11:18-19

Today is the 21^st of March. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s good for us to be together today. It’s good that we come back around the global campfire and just spend some time together and allow God’s word to wash over us. This week we’re using the New Living Translation for that. Numbers chapter 32, verse 1 through 33, verse 39 today.

Commentary

Okay, so as we read in the book of Numbers, we can feel, we can sense that something is coming. We’re coming to the end of something. We’ve been in the wilderness a long time. For us it has been like what? Maybe a month? For them it was like a whole generation of people. Forty years. So we can sense that something is coming.

The tribes of Reuben and Gad, they are shepherds, and we know that goes back into their history all of the way, right? Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, whose name was turned to Israel and he has children and those are the first children of Israel, right? And then Joseph goes to Egypt. When they come into Egypt and the great famine, what do they say to Pharaoh? “We are shepherds.” So they get this good shepherd land to begin with. So this goes back into their history.

They have found a perfect land. They have already conquered that land. They ask to stay there and they are just kind of fleshing out what they are actually saying. What they are saying is “we want this land, but we will go across the Jordan and fight with our brothers.” So we can sense that this is coming. They now have the Law. They now have a culture. They now have an understanding between themselves. And the Lord is bringing them back to the Jordan River once again with an opportunity to cross over and that is coming for us very soon.

Then in the book of Luke there is a fascinating story. Jesus is doing what he came to do which is to proclaim the good news of the kingdom, and signs and wonders are following him everywhere he goes. So yeah, it is spreading. The word of Jesus is spreading around the countryside. People are flocking to him. And there is this interesting story today where he is at the shores, the banks of the Sea of Galilee and the people are crowding him. I can just see that, having stood on the shores of the Sea of Galilee many times. I can just see that, how this culture and these people would press in to get closer and closer. People pushing from the back or pushing people forward and Jesus is like, “My feet are wet and…” But he sees these two boats and he climbs into one. The fishermen that were out in the boats were on the shore cleaning their nets. They hadn’t really caught anything. And Jesus climbs into one of their boats.

It’s fascinating. Put yourself in that position. You’ve driven in your nice car or minivan or SUV or whatever you drive and you’re at the grocery store and you went in to pick up a couple of things and they didn’t have what you were looking for so you’re coming back out because you have to go to a different store and all around your village or town there has been this word of somebody doing something great for God. And you’ve heard about this and you haven’t really been involved, but you know kind of the stories. And you come back out to your vehicle and that guy is sitting in the passenger’s seat of your car. So, you don’t know what to do – 911? Say hello? Climb in the car? What are you supposed to do?

But he smiles at you and he’s like, “Be at peace. I’m not going to hurt you. Just need you to drive me across the parking lot to the hardware store.” Right?

So you do the battle in your mind and you’re like, “But this guy’s reputation – he’s so good.” And so you risk it and you drive him across the parking lot. And he does his business and then he tells you, “Okay, now let’s go back to that parking place we were in before and you can let me off.”

That is kind of like what these fishermen have going on here – a guy who has a reputation of being magic at least, but maybe a prophet of God, he is sitting in your boat and he is asking you to just row you out a little ways. And so they do.

Then Jesus has a little bit of distance between himself and the crowd that was pushing him into the water and he’s able to teach them from just a little ways out. Not way out, just a little ways out. And it’s beautiful because the water then becomes this natural amplification. Everybody can hear. Jesus isn’t getting crowded into the water. And he teaches them. And when the teaching is over, Jesus says, “Okay, let’s go out a little bit further. I want you to cast your nets down again.”

And of course they are like, “The thing is, Jesus, we are professional fishermen and we fished all night and we didn’t catch anything. It’s not really a good time to fish right now. But if you say so, we’ll do it.” And they do. And they cast their nets down counterintuitively and bring in the greatest haul of their fishing career. Now it is not Jesus being crowded into the water. Now it is a problem of the boat sinking because there are so many fish.

They row back to shore. Peter is blindsided. He is in contact now with someone that he doesn’t have a grid for and the goodness of this man and the power of this man contrasted with his own life brings him to his knees. It’s beautiful. Brings him to his knees. “Lord, I can’t be in your presence. I can’t. You’re too good. I’m too sinful.”

And Jesus just smiles. “Don’t be afraid. You’re going to fish for men now.” And they row back to shore.

This is so beautiful. They had just captured a haul of a lifetime. This was the windfall they had been hoping for. Maybe now they can get some new nets, fix the boat. Now they can get a little ahead finally. But that is just not what happens. They get to the shore and leave it all behind and follow Jesus.

This is such a beautiful portrait of the gospel because Jesus comes and all of a sudden we feel the truth of his presence and contrasted with our own lives it brings us to our knees. Jesus is kind and he says, “Don’t be afraid.” Don’t be afraid.” And we realize Jesus isn’t some prophet, some magic man that can do good things for us if we invoke him in our lives. And if we look at our lives, we’ll realize that is what this relationship has looked like a lot. What can you do for me in exchange for my belief in you. Right? It’s like a transaction. If you do this for me, I will do this for you. I guess we need to realize that Jesus doesn’t need us to do anything for him. He doesn’t need anything. He wants to know you. He wants intimacy. He wants fellowship, closeness. That’s it.

We have to want the same thing. It’s not about what we can do. It’s about who we are. So may we, like these first disciples, leave it all on the shore and follow Jesus into the adventure of a lifetime, a life of becoming each day, day by day becoming who we were created to be. In other words, to be sanctified, if we want this to be theological, to be set apart, to be holy, to be becoming more and more like Jesus every day. And every day we become more and more like Jesus is a day that we have become more and more who we really are.

Prayer

Jesus, we’ve done this at times for seasons, but we’ve always found ourselves kind of back, looking for something else instead of continuing forward in the journey, and most of the time this happens when we find ourselves in wilderness seasons. We get mad and misinterpret why we’re there, that these times, they come upon us all and they can have rich and deep meaning and purpose if we’ll continue to follow you through, because you use the wilderness to go after things in us that will never let us get further on the journey. So in this whole season that we’re reinterpreting everything to you, we offer everything to you. We’re sorry for the ways that we’ve used you in this relationship, the ways that we’ve thought of you as some magic person that can do magic things on our behalf if we’ll just be good boys and girls only to find out that we’re not capable of doing that on our own. If we were, we would do it. May we be as simple as the disciples and realize we have come in contact with something that we have no grid or understanding for, but it is good. And we may never get this chance again. And so this haul, this thing that we’ve been working so far and so hard on, it is not going to set us apart and make us holy. It’s just an accomplishment. We’ll leave it behind, if that is what you want. We want to be with you in the adventure of life. We want to become who we are. We want to be who we were made to be and that can’t happen if we’re not in collaboration with you. That can’t happen if we’re not intertwined. So Jesus, come. Come into all these thoughts. Come into all the emotions that this brings up, all the situations, all of the things that have happened in our lives that have led us to this point right now, right here, this very second, and in this moment we give you our hearts once again, fully, unreservedly, completely. We just want to be with you and we don’t care where we go. If we’re together, we don’t care where we are. We don’t care what it looks like. We don’t care. If we’re with you then we’re becoming who we are, and that has been the lifelong search and here is the answer finally. So we lay it down, all our struggles, all of our fears, all of our anxieties, all of our depression, all of our relational problems, all of our work problems, all of our kid problems, all of the things that have become our lives when there is something greater and bigger going on here – our liberation. So come Jesus and help us reinterpret everything. We invite your Holy Spirit to lead us forward. We don’t want to make another decision without you. We’re sorry. We do that all the time. Come Holy Spirit. Show us. Show us the path, the narrow path that leads to life. We ask this in your name, amen.

Announcements

Www.DailyAudioBible.com is the website. It’s home base. It’s where you find out what is going on around here. The More Gathering for Women is what we’ve been talking about but we’ll begin to stop talking about it because the deadline is just before us. Two days from now, the 23^rd is the cutoff date for registration. So, ladies, it’s kind of getting to that last call. If this Jesus that we’re talking about, if that is awakening in your heart and you just need to get away and step away from all that other stuff that has been going on and just have some time with him, that is the table we try to set. That is the goal. That is the purpose. So you can check it out. All the details, everything you would want to know about it is at www.DailyAudioBible.com. Just look for the More Gathering or just go to www.MoreGathering.com. And we’ll see you in a couple weeks.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at www.DailyAudioBible.com. There is a link. It’s on the home page. Thank you. This is how we’re here. We’re here because we’ve done something really beautiful together. We’ve created a community together. And so our partnership in this is what allows it to exist. Thank you. So there is a link on the home page. If you’re using the app, you can press 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, (877) 942-4253 is the number to dial.

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

Hello. This is Teri from Toledo and I just heard Candace from Oregon. Oh, my heart is just breaking for you. I’m rejoicing for your husband because I know he is with the Lord and that is what his whole life was about, but I really am praying for you, Candace, and I’m just lifting you up. And I am praying Psalm 22 for you. And Asia from Munich, right on. Right on! I was thinking that very same thing. Sometimes he wants me to call and then sometimes I just don’t get anything. And that’s okay. He lets other people call. So I just thank you and I bless you guys. You are just so much family for me. You really are. And I’m praying for the conference and I’m praying for safe travel and I am with you in spirit. God bless you all.

I haven’t been able to listen to DAB since I helped my husband go home to be with Jesus on March 11, but I need to say to the woman, because I’m just now starting to catch up now and very grateful to listen to you, Brian, and all callers. There is a woman who called about and sang “God will take care of you,” and everything you said and sang spoke directly into my heart. And there was a caller right before you as well. I love all of you and thank you for your prayers for me and for our three children. Thank you so much.

Hello Candace from Oregon. Hey, this is Annette A. My sister, I love you so very, very much. I was praying for your husband when I heard that he had had surgery and I was sure hoping that everything had gone well, everything in the Lord’s time and his will be done on earth as it is in heaven. I just wanted to express my condolences and my love for you, sister. And I hope that you will lean on us to support you during this time. I wanted to let you know how much I love you and I am holding you up and I hope that the Lord just grabs ahold of you and loves on you and reminds you of how much he absolutely loves you. I’m so thankful to your husband for pointing you to us so that we can be around you in your time of need. I love you and I will be thinking and praying about you often. This is Nette. Bye-bye.

Good morning Daily Audio Bible family. This is Wrapped in His Unfailing Love from __________ Florida or Dorothy. And I’m calling for Candace this morning. Candace, so sorry about your husband, Brad. I know that he is with Jesus and I know you know that too, but sometimes we need help in our grieving and I want to help you grieve today because I know what you feel. And God knows what you feel too. So just know that there are so many people praying for you and that God is close to you because he is close to the brokenhearted. You’ve been such a blessing to us and I know I know, and I know that you know that you will see him again. God bless you, Candace. In Jesus’ name I pray, amen.

Good morning guys. This is Jen in SoCal, aka Prayer Warrior Princess. Father, we thank you for Candace’s husband, that he recommended that she become a part of our community. We thank you for his legacy. We thank you for his love for you. We thank you that he is with you now, rejoicing in heaven. And Father, we rejoice for you and we rejoice for him, and we weep with Candace. She is walking through the valley of the shadow of death. We pray that she would fear no evil, for your rod and your staff would be her comfort. We know that you prepare a table for her in the face of the enemy right now. We thank you that you will comfort her, that you will be her guide through this valley, that you will minister to her through your Holy Spirit. We thank you that you love her. We especially pray for the difficulties that she is going to encounter with her adult children. She has expressed some issues with at least one of them, I think it is her son that I have been praying for, Lord, with regard to substance issues. Lord, this is going to be magnified. The relationship issues, the substance abuse issues are all going to be magnified in the suffering, and so I pray an extra measure of grace upon each and every member of this family. I pray that you would be in the midst of all the communication, that it would be seasoned with grace and tenderness and kindness. That you would minister in the night watch to dear Candace and keep a song on her heart and her lips even in the midst of this suffering. We love her and we love you. In Jesus’ name, amen.

Hey DAB family. This is Jocelyn in Atlanta. I’m just calling to lift Candace from Oregon up in prayer. Candace, I’m so sorry for the loss of your husband. And I’m sorry how everything went down, but I am praising God and rejoicing with you that you will be reunited with him one day in heaven and that he is resting peacefully now in the arms of our Savior and I just lift you up in prayer. Heavenly Father, I just ask that you would give Candace comfort right now, Lord. That you would wrap your arms around her, that she would feel your presence and know that you are with her every step of the way. For all of the decisions she will have to make moving forward, that you’ll give her wisdom and strength and peace and fill her heart with joy, Lord. We ask these things in your name, amen. Love you, Candace. Bye.