Zechariah 2:1-3:10, Revelation 13:1-18, Psalms 141:1-10, Proverbs 30:18-20
Today is the 22nd day of December welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it is awesome to be here with you today it’s awesome to be here with you Christmas week. And, yeah, a couple days and we’ll be at Christmas day. So, we’re pressing into it, pressing into the season. I’m sure you are as well. And I pray that you are experiencing moments of Christmas joy, something that’s been in a little short supply, maybe a lot short supply this year. But anyway, we have come to center ourselves in the Scriptures, to exhale all that’s going on around us and just warm ourselves at the Global Campfire as we take the next step forward in the Scriptures. And we began the book of Zechariah yesterday and I mentioned then that Zechariah will take us all the way until a couple of days before the end of the year. Zechariah is the second to the last book in the Old Testament. And yesterday when we began Zechariah, we just gave some context and one of the pieces of context was that Zechariah contains eight different night visions and we will begin with the third one today. Zechariah chapters 2 and 2. And we’re reading from the New English Translation this week.
Commentary:
Okay, we were talking about this being Christmas week at the beginning today before we read the Scriptures. And, yeah, this is Christmas week. The day after tomorrow is Christmas eve if you can believe it. And, so, we’re in it and we’re trying to finalize and get everything together and figure out how we’re gonna do everything and…and we’re also likely to be around family, whether that is immediate family or we have extended family, whether we’re getting in a car and traveling, whether we’re gonna get on a plane and travel or whether that’s gonna happen where people are traveling toward us. Likely, whether we’re having a very very large family gathering or whether it’s going to be really intimate we’re going to be together with…with our family and when that happens all kinds of really really wonderful, joyous things can happen. Hearts can be united…just the love for our family and the people that we grew up with or the people that we’ve known our whole lives, it just emerges and we…we feel that warm cozy spirit of Christmas but, you know, in that situation, it…it’s just warm and cozy and dry and one match thrown into the middle of that can just…it can just blow the whole thing up. Like one person who decides that they need to vent about their political views in the middle of all that or one person bringing up some kind of scorn or something from earlier years, any little thing can make a volatile situation explode. And it wasn’t that long ago that we read the book of James or the letter of James, in which he talked about how we can bless people and curse people out of the same mouth and surely that’s not right. And, so, right now is a good time to kind of put some of this that we’ve learned about our mouths and how powerful they are into our pocket and carry it around because usually when the volatile things happen they just…they happen randomly. I mean we know…we may know who’s the likely one to start something. Maybe we’re the likely one to start something. And maybe this year it should be a break for everybody. Maybe we should bite down on our tongue instead of waggin’ it. I mean because we can be the giver of joy. I mean, when we think about Christmas spirit and Christmas joy and we think about how it’s affecting us, like are we feeling it? But the thing is, we can give it, we can build each other up instead of tearing each other down. And, so, we turn to the Psalms then today and we read these words, “O Lord place a guard on my mouth. Protect the opening of my lips. Do not let me have evil desires or participate in the sinful activities with men who behave wickedly.” We should put that in our pocket too as we go into these next few days and determine in advance, if somebody lights the match and throws it into the middle of everything that doesn’t mean that it’s compulsory that we participate. It can be a situation where our…our unwillingness to participate and amp things up is saying a lot without saying anything. If we find that our words that we have determined that we will only build up and not tear down, well that would be quite a Christmas gift to give and it would change the atmosphere. And we may not be able to stop the kinds of things that happened from happening, but we do have control over ourselves. And, so, let’s just remember, yeah, it’s family, yeah, it’s presents and gifts and festivities and Christmas music and lights and it’s just wonderful but what we are honoring is the arrival of the presence of peace. And, so, if we’re not going to actively participate in peace on earth, especially at Christmas…well…there’s a disconnect somewhere. Let’s put our faith into action in these coming days because these are days of great joy.
Prayer:
Father, we invite You into that. Joy…joy flows from You. And when we experience joy, we are becoming aware of Your presence. And this is a joyful time in the midst of a very trying season. And, so, may we experience Your joy and then in turn give Your joy, build one another up, not tear one another down. We pray the Psalm, “Lord place a guard on our mouths. Protect the opening of our lips. Don’t let us have evil desires or participate in sinful activities.” Come Holy Spirit we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.
Announcements:
dailyaudiobible.com is home base, it’s the website, its where you find out what’s going on around here. You can find out what’s going on around here using the Daily Audio Bible app just as well by pressing the Drawer icon in the upper left-hand corner.
Of course, we’re days away from Christmas. So, that’s what’s going on around here. So, check out the Christmas resources that are available, especially the musical ones. The Family Christmas album, which is an instrumental…just a beautifully contemplative album for the Christmas season, the kind of…it’s the kind of one that you want when you…when you’re trying to wind down. You gotta a cup of cocoa or whatever, you got the lights on, maybe the Christmas lights and nothing else, maybe a fire in the fireplace. It’s that kind of record. So, check that out. You can stream it on Spotify or Apple music or YouTube music or Google play, whatever, You can buy it there at the iTunes Store or wherever you get your music.
And the other…the other Christmas thing is “O Holy Night” that Jill and I put together a couple weeks ago in preparation…she’s gonna sing virtually at a Christmas eve service this year. And, so, we’ll put links up to that on Christmas eve on our social media channels in case you don’t have a candlelight service that you can attend. But she sang it with such heart and passion, and we were just…we were like wow, we should release this. And, so, we did, and you can stream that on Spotify or Apple music or wherever or buy that as well. Just look for Jill Parr and O Holy Night and you will find it. So, check those…check those out.
If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible here in the waning days of the year, thank you humbly and truly from our hearts. Thank you for your partnership. I’ve said it…feels like I’ve said it like 360 times or whatever this year. We wouldn’t be here if we weren’t in this together. That’s a fact. And, so, we are profoundly grateful that we are moving through another year. And thank you for your partnership. So, there is a link on the homepage. If you’re using the app you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner, or the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.
And as always if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app, which is the little red button at the top or you can dial 877-942-4253.
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:
Good morning Daily Audio Bible family this is June in Maryland I am calling to give a praise report. I am just praising God for bringing me through this year. This year started off really rough with some heart palpitations that had me out of work for almost 2 months and then I went back to be a Covid nurse and once I returned to my psych unit, I got Covid. All the while I was still trying to finish school which I did. I graduated with my Bachelor of Science in nursing on December 5th. So, I’m very thankful to be alive, to be able to breathe, and to have been able to complete this degree despite all of the obstacles and frustrations. So, yea God. Thank you, God. Nothing is possible without God but with God all things are possible. That’s all I have for today. I’ll call back another time. Love you all. Have a blessed day.
Hi this is Sarah from South of England this is my first prayer request and I really need prayer. How to make it brief? I have __. I’ve had a recent relapse after 20 years of…of pretty severely…being pretty severely affected and I just feel devastated because I…I’ve lost so much of what I could do, particularly…mainly with my arms and needing a lot more help. And it’s…it’s just complicated with social services and carers and things. And apart from that I…I can’t do the greater things that…that I most love, that I’ve always felt, you know, that what God made me for really. And I’m…I just really need companionship. It’s just not because of the Covid, but obviously that hasn’t helped. I’m single and I’m 52 and…and wondering if, you know, I’ll ever be able to…to find someone to share my life with. And even if I could socialize and…and have lots of friends, that would…that would…would be okay but I can’t do that. And…but I know that ultimately, I need God to be my everything…to not…to not demand that recovery is the only answer for me. But he can heal me as well. I know that. But just to find peace in him, to find my joy in him because I know he can bring joy no matter what’s happening to us and I need that, I need that desperately. I need to…to get back to that place of…of being at peace with him and trusting him no matter what my circumstances are. So, thank you.
Hi, my name is Jay I’m from Georgia from Rome Georgia. It happens that I lost my job this past Monday and I there’s an appeal process an appeal’s process that I’m undergoing and a few other things that might help but most of all I just want to come to the throne of grace, and I want to ask if all of you can help me pray that I get my job back. It’s hard. It’s a hard time because my…my husband is going to school right now and I was the one who supplied. But God supplies all my needs according to his riches in glory. And I would ask if you would stand with me in faith and ask that God would lead me and guide me. God bless you all.
Good morning DAB family this is Sally in Massachusetts. We’re in the midst of a beautiful snowstorm today. I had to chuckle Little Cherry when I heard you describe getting ready to go to the sunrise. It reminded me of the eight years I lived in Saskatchewan. Mighty cold but I loved it. I love the sunshine. And…and thankful. Lord I’m so thankful for our brothers and sisters scattered all over this world. It’s wonderful to hear from all the different states from…from places like New Zealand and Australia and Singapore and South Sudan and Germany and India and Eastern Canada and all the states that we hear from. Lord, we are so blessed to have You bring us into the family of God scattered over the world. We thank You so much for the DAB that brings us together. Lord I lift up Margo and her husband as they prepare to go back to Liberia. Please strengthen and guide them. Please provide their needs physically Lord, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, financially. Lord we just pray for the wisdom that he needs as he prepares information to be a better pilot and to care for his plane and pray for Margo Lord. Just guide her as she gains insights into being a better nurse. Oh God and we just thank You for the love for the lost, their desire Lord to make You known. We pray Jesus that You would just bless them and guide them. Thank You, once again great and holy God for all You’ve done and all You’re doing as You bless Your church around…
Hi DABbers, this is Alina Jesus Worshiper from Delray Beach. I’m actually calling with a praise report and I wanted to thank you so much for praying for me and my husband. More than a year ago my husband told me that he doesn’t want to be with me anymore and it was a mistake that we got married after like almost 10 years of marriage and it was really painful for me. All of this time we’re separated but together under one roof and I was praying for his salvation. And I’m not sure, I don’t think that salvation happened yet, but God is changing my husband’s heart. And recently my husband came back to me. He came back to be my husband and now he would like to have family and he would like to have kids and he talks about God all the time and I know that God is…God is calling him. And I’m just so excited to share this with you…this journey. God is so faithful to everybody who is struggling in their marriage. I’ve waited for one year to every relationship with my husband. It was so painful and with all this other things that people were talking and 2020 nothing was as hard as just being in the same house with somebody who says every day that he doesn’t love you anymore. But, you know, God is so faithful. God is so faithful. When I was struggling, and I was without my faith he was putting me up and Daily Audio Bible family helped me out so much being connected to the word every day. I want it or I don’t want it. It became my habit after like two years or so. So, I wanted to thank everybody for praying and I pray for you today in Jesus’ name to experience this, the same thing as I did. Amen.