2 Chronicles 4:1-6:11, Romans 7:1-13, Psalms 17:1-15, Proverbs 19:22-23
Today is the 21st day of July welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian. Like every day, I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you today…well…and every day as we do what we do. We gather together and we call this the Global Campfire and we just kinda visualize and come in out of the cold, out of the dark, and just rest and let God’s word do what God’s word is so good at doing, touching us where we need to be touched, whether that’s comfortable or uncomfortable it’s what we need and it moves us forward. And, so, let’s take that next step forward. We’re reading from the New English Translation this week, the NET Bible, and we’re in the book of second Chronicles. Today we’ll read chapters 4, verse 1 through 6, verse 11.
Commentary:
Okay. So, as we continue our journey through the book or letter to the Romans we should be getting glimpses of why Paul was and is a controversial figure, because the way that he’s explaining things maybe 2000 years in the future to Gentile years, you know, this makes sense to us, but man for the people that were hearing what Paul was saying, on the one hand it was so good. Like, the news was so good and hopeful, but on the other hand, it is really, really hard to like reverse course from what you’ve been told to believe all along and embrace a new interpretation. And that is absolutely…like that is still in the world and we still wrestle with that today. But Paul is continuing as a Pharisee to unpack the law and its purpose and Abraham’s faith that preceded the law. And in today’s reading his argument is, “a person whose dead isn’t bound by a law anymore, any law.” And then he uses marriage. And like Paul’s analogy holds absolutely as true now as it did then. So, if a husband and wife are married - and in Paul’s example it’s the woman - like if she’s joined to another man…so like if she has an affair, she commits adultery then she has broken that covenant of marriage and so she’s an adulterous. But if she’s faithful to her husband and her husband dies, then the bond, the covenant, the law of their marriage, like she’s not bound to that anymore. He is no longer alive. So, we could, and they could shake their heads affirmatively, “yes, I understand. And yes, that is true.” But what his point is is that when you accept Christ, who you were without Christ dies and is no longer bound to the law. You are raised up a new creation in Christ who has fulfilled it all.” So, if you are a Hebrew listener to Paul, this is hopeful news because the weight of the law was a crushing thing. Like trying…like it was a societal thing and it was a cultural thing and it still is, but like truly trying to…by the law…by obedience, like radical obedience to the law, trying to make an attempt to be righteous before God, you could only come up short. You’re gonna mess up at some point. So, to be told that this resurrected Jesus Christ is the antidote to that, is the answer to that. Like baptism, like you go into the water and you die, and you are resurrected anew, and you come up clean and a new creation. And that that law has no claim to you anymore. Like that is really hopeful good news, but it’s also like right at the bedrock of their understanding of God and their covenantal relationship with God. And this is why Paul is arguing for Abraham, “like, look at our founder. Look at the first person in the story. Abraham didn’t have a law and yet he was righteous before God because he believed, because he put his trust completely in God and obeyed God.” So, Paul’s trying to say, “like, you don’t have to…you don’t have to rewire everything. This isn’t something new. This is something old. The faith of Abraham is the thing that ignited all of this not the law.” So, understanding how controversial this is gonna be taken as, he’s like, “so am I telling you that the…the…the law of God is a sinful thing? Absolutely not!” And Paul goes on to say that, “the law is the thing that exposed my sin. It is the thing that made me aware of…of my inability to be righteous.” And he uses covetousness as an example. Like, “if there…if there was no law to tell me that wanting what somebody else has is wrong, I wouldn’t have known that. But the law told me that. And, so, I know that. And, so, when I do that I do it in sin because I know better.” Right? So, for Paul, the law then exposes sin, and sin leads to destruction. Sin leads to death. However, because of this Jesus, who God raised from the dead, who fulfilled the law, then our faith as with Abraham, our faith in God through Jesus then obliterates the sin issue. It's…it’s not supposed to be the thing that we focus on anymore. And the thing is, like this…this idea, like what Paul said, this is not a radical idea…it was a radical idea. But for us, this is like basic Christianity. And yet, don’t we live most of our lives under some sort of cloud of accusation and condemnation. Like don’t we know our failures every single day and walk around dragging them like chains around our ankles and some kind of weight upon our shoulders and some kind of cloud just hovering above us? We like know our failures and focus upon them, and then…and then focus on everybody else’s cloud of condemnation too and we just add to the noise. And, so, we just all live in this sin mess that is, according to Paul, not really there. Like…like it’s not there. That's…only God can judge us at that level, and He doesn’t. It’s not there. It’s been removed as far as the east is from the west. So, what would it be like to just try an experiment and live into that today? Like, what is there to lose? We can go back to condemnation tomorrow if it was better for us. Like, we can go back to the chains and the weights and the cloud at any point, like, if that’s how we want to live. But what if what Paul is saying is the truth and this really isn’t the way God is looking at us? What if we try to live into that today? Because that would actually be embracing the good news of the gospel. That’s the good story we’re trying to tell. And that’s the way we’re supposed to be living as light in the darkness revealing to the rest of the world that there is a better way to be here than how we are being here. There is a way that pulls us forward as new creatures, as new creations upon this earth and we’re supposed to be showing that way because that way is good news for all of humanity. We don’t have to walk around weighted down and judging one another and judging ourselves. Christ carried it all so that we might live free.
Prayer:
Holy Spirit come into this, this reality. Come into the deepest places of our soul of our lives of our identities of our consciousness of all that we think and see and do. Come, permeate the atmosphere with this new reality that we are enveloped in love and we don’t have to live the way we’ve been living. That’s why it’s good news. We can repent, we can change our minds about ourselves. We can change our minds about everyone that we’re judging. We can die to ourselves and see this world through Your eyes. Come Jesus, awaken us. Give us eyes to see and ears to hear we pray in Your victorious name. Amen.
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And that is…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, Bob from Arizona listening to the 12 July podcast and heard Nelly’s cry for prayer. Poor Nelly was just distraught. She wanted to be used so badly by the Lord that she didn’t know what to do, didn’t know how to do it, didn’t have the words for it and discouraged. And her plea for help was…certainly justified that we don’t have a fear for speaking of the Lord and letting Him know…letting others know what He’s done for us but it’s so…my…my encouragement is that we can make it simple. The Lord never made it hard for us to do this. He just wants everyone to know and including you Nelly that He wants people to know how much He loves them. I would certainly first start off with your own testimony, how much He…He loved you and has cared for you and to not be timid in that, but as Paul says it’s __ we don’t have a spirit of timidity we are…we are strong in the Lord, we are given the Holy Spirit. So in that, I just ask you Nelly to rely on your own faith and your own testimony which is very known to you and that ended with how much God really does love you and how He’s shown how much He loves you and how much He wants to show His love to all who come to know Him. I pray for Nelly. We’ll be praying for you as others in this ministry. Thank you, Brian and the Hardin family. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Lord we worship You is the creator of heaven and earth. All things were made by You and everything You created is good. We praise You for all Your beautiful creation. You place the earth on its foundation so that it can never be moved. Your right hand stretched out the heavens. Thank You that You have blessed us with light and dark and sun and rain and food and water and land and sea and trees and flowers and days and seasons. The heavens are Yours. The earth also is Yours. The world in all its fullness, You have founded them and how many are Your works O Lord? In wisdom You have made them all. The earth is full of Your creatures. Be exalted O God above the heavens. Let Your glory be over all the earth. Lord I just pray You will touch all the unbelievers today. I pray that they would look up to the sky and see Your beauty and that You would take away the…the…the blinders that are in front of them God, that they would know the amazing love of Jesus. Lord I pray for my brother, my brother-in-law and all unbelievers that are part of this international prayer chain, that our families, our families and friends and neighbors, Lord help them to know the truth, help them to be set free. They are desperately needing You, especially lift up to You the two people that…that this…this Young girl that lost her Father on July 1st. Help her with Your studies God. And help her to have such peace. And Lord I pray for the granddad who lost his daughter and the child survived. Help him God. Give them peace. Only You can help these people. In Jesus’ name. Alta Lee Maxwell.
Lord Jesus Father Son and Holy Spirit we bring to You our precious, precious sister Gigi from Gainesville Florida or Gainesville and…I think it’s Florida…and we just surround her Lord and ask Your love to surround her at this time with her dad having passed into…into eternity with You Lord on July 1st. Lord we pray that You will be with GG and all of her siblings and her mother that each of them will be able to support one another and that Your Holy Spirit will surround and protect them and enfold them into a deep fellowship with You Lord. Help them with all the details that have to be addressed. And for Gigi Lord, I pray she will be able to communicate with all of her professors and get her classwork done, not perfectly but adequately and that…that she’ll get some assistance on that and that she will succeed and continue to move forward. Bless her Lord and thank You so much. We thank You with her for her dad’s time now in eternity with You. In Jesus’ name we pray. Candace from Oregon.
Good morning my name is David Benedick I want to say good morning to the DAB family. I send my love and prayers to you all. I’m calling for specific prayer from you all for my family, my in-laws because we lost my…my wife’s father this morning about 1:30. He passed away. And I just thank God for him getting to know me before he passed. He knew me…of me but he didn’t know me. But God gave us the opportunity to bring us together as a family whereas he got to know me and that I will take care of his daughter as I promised him I would. For my in-laws, I love you guys very much and I thank God for allowing you all to get to know me and I will take care your sisters. I will go to my grave to make sure that she’s happy. I love you Loree, I love my family, my in-laws. Thank you very much. You all have a blessed and safe day.
Hello Daily Audio Bible family this Alfia calling from not anymore from Delaware but from California, Central Valley California. Today I just want to call to say thank you so much for being such a faithful family for always uplifting one another and loving one another and just carrying on the commandment of God about loving your neighbor. We love one another brothers and sisters and this is such a wonderful platform. Today in a special way I am calling to say thank you to Wide Eyed with Wonder. I love your beautiful mane. Thank you so much for praying for me and I just want to say your prayer was amazing and thank you just for taking the time to pray for me. God has placed me in a new position. I had to move from the East Coast to the West Coast and it’s a little bit of an adjustment, but I pray for God’s will to be done in my life as He uses me as His vessel. So, once again Daily Audio Bible family this is Alfia calling from Central Valley California. Make it a great day. Love you guys. Bye-bye.
My name is Alviano of Chicago and I just wanted to lift up all the educators and administrators that are trying to figure out how the next school year is to look and it is to function for all of the parents who are trying to decide whether or not they are going to follow suit and for all of the children who are in the middle of all of this.