Nehemiah 5:14-7:60 , 1 Corinthians 8:1-13 , Psalms 33:1-12 , Proverbs 21:8-10
Today is the 14th day of August. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is great to be here with you today. I mean, what fun would this be if I had to be here by myself and we couldn’t be in this together, making the next step forward? So it’s great to be here with you today. And the next step forward will take us back into the book of Nehemiah and we’ll pick up where we left off yesterday. Nehemiah 7:73-9:21. We’re reading from the Good News Translation this week.
Commentary:
Okay. In our reading from 1 Corinthians today, Paul defended himself against people who were essentially claiming that Paul was exploiting people for his own advantage. And so in his own words and in his own defense he said, don’t I have the right to be given food and drink for my work? Don’t I have the right to follow the example of other apostles and the Lord’s brothers and Peter by taking a Christian wife with me on my trips? Or are Barnabas and I the only ones who have to work for our living? What soldiers ever have to pay their own expenses in the army? What farmers do not eat the grapes from their own vineyard? What shepherds do not use the milk from their own sheep? So, Paul is being accused of exploiting people. He’s defending himself that that is for sure not what he’s doing because he’s not taking anything. But at the same time he’s saying he should be able to. Everyone who works for God and cares for your souls should be able to. So, Paul’s explaining that those in spiritual service because of God’s call deserve to be able to support themselves through their hard work on behalf of others. But even though this was completely normal, Paul didn’t do that. He hadn’t exploited anyone for anything. The accusations against Paul were false. And they exasperated him as we can tell from his language. And he says as much. What’s my pay? It’s the chance to preach the good news without charging anyone. So, I don’t demand my rights when I preach the good news. So, we can be like, Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatever. This doesn’t apply to me, but assumptions about spiritual and political and creative leaders are commonplace in our society. We feast on these people. But this is not a new invention. The Bible’s full of examples, right? Joseph faced false assumptions. So, did Moses. Many of the Psalms of David were written because of the assumptions made about him that were false, right? The story of Saul and David is full of false assumptions. The prophets regularly faced these false assumptions and accusations. Jesus faced them and now we see Paul dealing with them. The realities we are willing to invent about people that we have never even met or only know of through some kind of brief hello or sound bite, that’s not helpful. And it’s often devastating. Think of what it would be like to have your life story told through fragments of conversation taken out of context, filled in from different seasons of your life that don’t represent who you are anymore. I mean, it would be incomplete at best. And it can be terribly harmful to your heart. So, this whole passage that we’re reading from this letter, Paul is defending himself against false assumptions about himself. And we do this kind of stuff. So, let’s be vigilant in this area that we might follow the path of Jesus. And, I mean, I know that’s a cliche too. But when we watch Jesus navigating in the gospels, we don’t see Jesus making a bunch of assumptions about people. We see Jesus walking into a situation and assessing the situation and observing what is really going on. The story that is behind the story. The plot behind what seems to be going on. And if we’ll follow in that path, we’ll slow down and look and we’ll assume a lot less. We’ll make up a lot less about a lot of people. Which means we will better truly understand one another and we will better truly understand God.
Prayer:
And, so, Father, we bring this before You and we offer it to You. We offer the gaps that we fill in about people, the stories that we make up, whether spoken or unspoken, the assumptions that we are willing to leap to about people and their heart and their character and their motives. We want to see people as You see people. And we can. You live within us. We are told this over and over and over in the scriptures. And so we open ourselves to You. We want to see through Your eyes. Maybe they’re our eyes connected to the tissues of our body, but we want to see through Your eyes with Your heart. Come Holy Spirit we pray. In Jesus name we ask. Amen.
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And that’s it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here tomorrow.
Community Prayer and Praise:
Hello. This is Striving to be Humble. I just listened to the 6th of August and heard, I think it was, Lydia from Maryland about your daughter who has tried to commit suicide three times. And I just want to pray for your daughter and you. So, let us pray. God, I just come before You for Lydia’s daughter Father. God, You love her so much, we want to ask Father that You let her know this Father, that this therapy Father, that You would provide every single time that there’s a payment due Father that this would help but go beyond that Father, that this will change her life and the way that she views herself Father. I ask Lord that You will teach Lydia’s daughter that she is loved and her life is important, that she’s solving a temporary problem with a permanent solution Father God and You are God and You get decide when we die, not us Father. God I just ask that she would acknowledge You with that authority over her own life Lord and that she would trust You, trust You to love her, trust You to take care of her Father, that You would solve the pain that she has in her heart Father no matter where it is or what is coming from Lord. I ask that You would show up so big Lord and just lift her up in Your arms. In Jesus’ name I pray amen. Thank you so much Brian, Jill…
Hello everyone, this is my first time calling and my name is Kia. I like to be called Butterfly. I’m calling from South Florida out here in West Palm Beach. I have been out of work for a year and half. I have been saved for 21 years. I have a 21-year-old. And for the first time in my life I’ll be 40 in October. I was unemployed. I had to move in, basically, with my boyfriend, who is my ex-husband of almost 2 years. And I am asking that each of you pray for me for God to reestablish me and I feel His presence as I have come to recommit my life back to Him and walk in a more upright relationship with Him. I am praying that God just comes to restore my finances and give me ideas to create my design company. I want to design T-shirts and things of that nature and greeting cards and everything I can do in regards to print and graphics. I love each of you. I think that this DAB community is awesome. And again, this is my first time calling. I’ve been listening for maybe six months and Brian you are incredible. So, God bless everyone. And also my children. Pray for Enessia Martin, she’s 21. She has cerebral palsy. She goes to Valencia College and my twins, Cameron and Brea who live in Georgia this year until they come back next summer hoping that I am completely on my feet to take care of my children and pay my mortgage and my car payment and you know the whole spiel…but…
Hi. This is Sonja calling from Tampa and I’d like to pray for our children. There is so much going on. In the name of Jesus I bind low self-esteem, low self-worth, fear, anger, frustration, anxiety, laziness, nerves, disappointment, discouragement, paranoia, suicide, sexual perversion, witchcraft, peer pressure, depression, rejection, jealousy, envy, loneliness, worry, stress, alcohol, drugs, deception, __ , sickness, obesity, disease, and generation curses out of the lives of our children. I declare that our children are Spirit filled, anointed, that they walk in obedience and that they are led by the Holy Spirit. I declare that they are highly motivated with high self-esteem, compassionate, kind and gentle. I declare that they have the mind and wisdom of Christ and that shalom peace surrounds them, that joy that surpasses all understanding is with them, and that they prosper financially in every area of their life. I declare that they are focused, goal oriented, respected and loved by others. I declare that their footsteps are ordered by God and that they will have divine health and a long life. I declare that they are blessed with a Christian home, Christian partners, Christian children as they journey on an intimate walk with You. May they always trust You Lord and walk in obedience. This is my declaration for our DAB children. Amen.
Let’s pray family. Father God, we come before Your throne of grace and of mercy Lord. We just want to honor You and glorify You, give You all praise and glory Father. We pray Your kingdom come Lord into our lives today, into this prayer right now Lord. Father, we come, we beg, and we __ agreement with Angel from California who called in as she’s going in for exploratory surgery Lord. And like she proclaimed and like she said, we agree Father God that the surgeons will find nothing, that the doctors will find nothing, that Your hand and Your healing would have taken care of everything in the name of Jesus Christ. We also pray Lord that You would forgive us Lord for anything that might hinder Your work Lord. We offer forgiveness and we ask for forgiveness Father God. We Release all things that might hinder this prayer Lord to You. We pray Father Your protection over us, Your whole armor as we pray for Angel in agreement that they will find nothing. We pray this in Jesus name. Shout out to all my friends out there in Daily Audio Bible land. Shout out to Blind Tony. Thank you for calling me out every now and again. This is Delta Alpha Foxtrot calling from the southern Texas front.