1 Chronicles 24:1-26:11, Romans 4:1-13 , Psalms 13:1-6, Proverbs 19:15-16
Today is the 17th day of July. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is a pleasure and an honor to be with you today. I’m glad we can come in out of whatever is going on, all of the cares of the world and life’s distractions. We step away from that, kind of move into another atmosphere. All that stuff will wait. We center ourselves in God’s word, allowing it to come washing into our lives and re-calibrating. So we’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week and we’ll pick up where we left off yesterday. 1 Chronicles 24:1-26:11 today.
Commentary:
Okay. So in the book of Romans, I think I look forward to this day each year, although I hadn’t realized that until just now. And it’s because I get to say circumcision so many times in one sitting. Of course, circumcision…come on, this is always a trending topic. I mean, I think about it all the time. Don’t you? As funny as that might be, the people that Paul’s talking to they do think a lot about it. Because for them, at least for the males obviously, it was a sign of the covenant. Something that made them exclusive. Now, Hebrews weren’t the only ones practicing circumcision at this time. But this had been a long-standing sign of the covenant with God. What we’re watching Paul do is deconstruct and re-imagine the faith of his fellow Hebrews. And what he begins to lay out today is something that we will see over and over and over throughout Paul’s letters. So here’s the problem: Paul, a devout Pharisee, had realized and spoken out loud what everyone knew- no one could ever obey the law perfectly. Therefore, no one could ever achieve righteousness before God by their good works, by obeying that law. Because no matter how good they were, they were going to fail at some point. So Paul, being a devout Hebrew Pharisee, reasoned it out. We can’t get there from here. And what Paul wanted is to be righteous before God. That was his entire mission of his life as a Pharisee. So he goes back to the beginning of the story. And the story of the Hebrew people begins with a man named Abram who becomes Abraham, who enters into the first covenant with God. It is Abraham’s offspring who become the people of God - the Hebrew people. This is their origin story. It is the animating story that propels their culture. So no one was going to argue with Paul about that. Abraham started it all. They all knew that. But they may have not considered and what Paul was inviting them to consider was the fact that Abraham wasn’t circumcised. There was no covenant at that point. Once the covenant happened, than Abraham was circumcised. But that didn’t make him righteous before God. It was something else that made Abraham righteous. Abraham, and I’m quoting Paul, Abraham believed God and it was credited to him for righteousness. Paul was simply quoting the book of Genesis. That right there is foundational, fundamental to what Paul was teaching. It was Abraham’s faith in God and belief in what God had promised that mattered. God considered him righteous because of that. So Paul is saying, hang on. We got a law, we gotta lot of rituals, we gotta lot of culture, we gotta lot of custom. We got all this stuff going on, but we’ve forgotten how this whole thing started. We keep trying to worship in a way this law that we cannot live up to. And that is not what started our story. Our story began with a man and his faith. Abraham. And he wasn’t circumcised when he put his faith in God. He wasn’t obeying a law because there wasn’t one to obey. So we have to consider what happened at the beginning. We’ll watch Paul lay this out over and over and over again. And it’s important because it is also a central thing to our faith obviously. Our faith is the bridge that all of our hope in Jesus drives on. And Paul will continue to pound this point home, like I said, over and over, as we’ll see.
Prayer:
Father, we thank You for Your word. We thank You for the gift. We thank You for the community that we get to share each and every day no matter where we are on the earth, we come together each and every day to allow Your word to minister and speak, direct and comfort us. So we thank You. Father, in light of our reading today we put our faith in You. We believe Your promises and we ask that You lead us on the path of righteousness today by the power of Your Holy Spirit. Come Jesus, we pray. In Your precious name we ask. Amen.
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Community Prayer and Praise:
Hi. If this is Amy from Texas. This is the first time that I’ve called, although I’ve been listening for four years. I just have a prayer request for my husband David. He finished, recently, a year’s treatment for cancer and at our last scan of his chest, his tumor site, a couple of spots showed up in his lungs. The doctor did tell us that she was not worried about them because they were so small but the likelihood of his kind of cancer spreading would go to his lungs. He has another scan in three months just to check for if they’ve grown. So, I would just ask that you would pray that there is no cancer anywhere, that the spot’s would be nothing, that they will not even be visible on the next scan. 95% of people have spots on their lungs. So, she said the likelihood of that happening is high also. So, but of course the fear is always there for me even though I’ve seen God’s faithfulness through these last years. So, please just pray that it’s nothing and that we can put this chapter in our lives behind us. Thank you so much.
Hola DAB family. God bless you Brian, Jill, and all who are working behind the scenes. This is Viv from Canada and it’s been so long that I’m getting called out by my brother Sean 316. It is always been a pleasure to hear you call in Sean. I remember how much I laughed when you called in that little imitation piece of our fellow DABbers. Anyway, thank you for the shout out. That was very sweet. I too have been wondering about our sister Sherry. I hope she’s doing well. I miss her sweet voice singing for us. Ut it does get busy. You know, so, I hope she’s really doing well. And here’s my request today. Whenever you are wondering about a regular caller who has not called in for a while, just say a prayer for them because you never know what’s going on in their lives. Thanks to everyone who prayed for me and my friend Darla and the loss of her brother. We definitely felt your prayers. So, thanks. And Asia, thank you so much for the sweet message. It is truly appreciated. What an awesome community this is. The love and care that we all show for each other is amazing and can only be from God. So, Father God, thank You for the vision that you gave to Brian and Jill so many years ago and the wisdom that You have bestowed upon them, enabling them to continue Your work. We pray Father for Your continued blessings of provision, for health and super strength for Brian. And as he reads every day the Lord, as he reads the word fresh every day, I pray that Yo will continue to anoint him with Your Holy Spirit. We pray that You continue to bless all who give financially to this ministry, that Your store baskets may never be empty. We pray this all in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. And family, if you remember when you pray, I’m learning a new language, Spanish. It is a lot of fun but it’s taking a bit of effort to grasp. So, I just might have to call Pastor Gene for some lessons. Anyways, thanks for listening and praying with me.
Hi family. This is Melody Faith from Canada. I want to thank all of you, including Victoria Soldier, Pastor Gene, and Lee from New Jersey for praying for Jared regarding addiction, his court date, and needing a haircut. He did get a haircut and the court appearance resulted in a reasonable sentence. Regarding the addiction, well, let’s just say my husband and I can certainly feel out little boat rocking the storm. I will call in with another request when I figure out just how to word it. As I join with each of you in your everyday, I find myself praying for each of your needs and applying the word of God. Many of you are in crisis and I hear the desperation in your voices. I ran across a quote today that caught my attention and I’d like to share it with you. “Next time you’re walking through something and you’re not sure what to do, do this. Never doubt in the dark what God has shown you in the light. Have faith in God. Don’t believe the lie that God doesn’t see you there. So often we take our cues was going on around us. Instead, grab a hold of the word of God. God is on the throne. He hasn’t changed.” I need to remind thyself of that too. Often, I have to remind myself of that. Hebrews 6 verse 19 says, we have this hope for an anchor for our soul, firm and secure. So, if your boat is rocking, throw down the anchor of faith and trust Him today. I hope these words encourage you. I love family. Thank you DAB. Have a great day.
Good morning Daily Audio Bible family. This is Dan from Arkansas. I just wanted to call in and let Scott know that we’re praying for his family and his son Joel. It’s a horrible time they’ve been going through and it just weighed super heavy on my heart and I just wanted to call in and let him know that we are all with you brother and, you know, we may not understand what you’re going through but all of us have felt loss and felt pain and we’re just praying for Joel and we just pray that the Lord just takes that issue that’s going on with the water on his brain away and just heals him completely. And so, I’d like to pray for you now. Dear Lord, I thank You for this day Lord. I think You for my Daily Audio Bible family Lord. I thank You for Scott and his calling in and letting us know was going on in his life Lord. And I pray for his son Joel Lord. I pray that You put Your hands upon him Lord and that You heal this boy and let him just be well Lord. I thank all the rest of the Daily Audio Bible family for always being so uplifting. And I love you guys and I pray for you guys every day and I hope everyone has a wonderful day.