12/09/2020 DAB Transcript

Genesis 20:1-22:24, Matthew 7:15-29, Psalms 9:1-12, Proverbs 2:16-22

Today is the 9th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it is wonderful to be here with you today as we move to bring to a close the first full week of this brand-new year. And look at us we’re sailing. We’re sailing like the shore is still within sight, but it’s becoming smaller and smaller and it will be just a little line on the horizon, and we’ll sail out into the deep together for the rest of this year, letting the Bible do what the Bible does. So, let's…let’s dive in. We’re reading in the book of Genesis. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Genesis chapter 20, 21 and 22 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, I have just one thing that I want to mention today, and it comes from the book of Matthew and it comes from the lips of Jesus the Savior, God in flesh, right? The human God, God in flesh to rescue us, but to model for us and to teach us how to live said something very profound. Think about it for second, do you know who you know. I mean that’s not really a trick question. Like if you know somebody you know that you know them, right? I mean there may be people that are acquaintances or that you’ve met, and you can say, “I think…I think I know that guy. I think I know that lady.” But you know the people that you know, right? Because you have some sort of relationship with them and the people that you know well, like the people that are in your family, or whatever and you can say, “yes, I know them well. Obviously, we’re in a relationship together. We’re married. Or obviously we’re in a relationship together, these are my children, or these are my parents. And then our friends we’ve been with for years and years, yes, of course, we know that we know them. So, it’s not confusing about who we actually know because we know them. There are other people in this world, obviously billions of them that we don’t know. And there are people that we don’t know, but we know about them, right? So, there may be celebrities or famous people from years gone by or people who have passed away, or whatever that…that we’re discovering in this lifetime. And, so, we study maybe history maybe music maybe acting maybe science, maybe whatever. And, so, we can read about them and get to know them through what has been said about them. For that matter we could do a PhD on them and start becoming a lecturer about their life and their times and their choices and their decisions. We could know everything there is to know that could be known about them, but we don’t know them. We’ve never met them. So, we know who we know, and we know who we know about, and there is a difference between the two. And even if we know everything that could be known about somebody, but they’re gone, they’re a part of history or we’ve never met them, they’re a celebrity we never could get them. Because we know what could be known about them doesn’t mean we know them. And even if we go all around the world talking about them and teaching about them that does not mean we know them. So, that in mind hear again the words of Jesus, “not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name, drive out demons in your name, and do many miracles in your name? Then I will announce to them. I never knew you. Depart from me, you lawbreakers.” It can sound harsh, but it’s not. What God is saying here is, “I want to know you and I want you to know me and knowing about me isn’t the same thing as knowing me. You know when you know somebody, and you know when you know about somebody.” So, Jesus is making a profound distinction here and it’s important that we pay attention to this distinction right at the beginning of the year because it is our goal here to allow the Bible to reveal God to us that we might know Him, walk with Him. We will see examples of this molded…modeled for us. Knowing God and knowing about God are different. So, the goal of our year together, indeed, is to read every word, every verse, every chapter, every book of the Bible. But let’s understand that filling our head full of knowledge and then stopping at knowing everything we can know about God isn’t the same. And we will watch many people over many thousands of years take that leap of faith into a relationship and then tell us about it. We will see it unfold. We’ll see where all of the pathways lead. But right here, Jesus right at the beginning of this year is saying, “you can prophesy on my name, you can cast out demons in my name, you can do miracles in my name, and still not know me. And, so, let’s remember as we go forward. Knowing about God is different than knowing God. An activity for God, performance for God, doing things in the name of God, is also different than knowing God. Now, I’m not saying you can’t know God without knowing about Him and I’m not saying you cannot know God without that changing your life into action. We will see that borne out in the Scripture. It’s just that what we will see is that God wants a relationship with us. He doesn’t want robots who are studying Him like He’s a lab project. And you may be here and you’re…you’re irreligious really. You’re just trying to find out what the Bible says and see if it makes any difference. Or maybe you’re a longtime believer but have never really thought about it in these terms before. And you end up going like, “so where do I go from here?” And, you know, yes, certainly we could…we could pray a sinner’s prayer right now, but relationships usually start with “hi.” That’s usually how something starts, “hello”, right? We’re not usually…we don’t usually say hello to people we don’t believe in. It starts there. You…you believe Him, and you say hello and then you begin to realize that God has been saying hello to you your whole life waiting for you to see that and say hello back. So, as we go through the Bible learning about God let’s take the initiative to begin to have conversations with God maybe even about what we’re learning about Him. If we want to know somebody, we need to get to know them and hear from them themselves. Otherwise, all we have is hearsay. And God wants to be known.

Prayer:

Jesus as we end this week, we enter into that, enter into some of those distinctions. Makes us think about what we’ve been calling our relationship with You, makes us re-examine some things. And sometimes that can be disruptive and sometimes that can just be, “a-ha” the lights are going on. You have come for us because You loved us first even while we were Your enemies. That is what the Scriptures tell us about You. If that’s true then You didn’t just want us to acknowledge You and then obey a bunch of rules. You wanted a relationship. You wanted it bad enough to die for it. So may we pay attention to that and stop trying to study You at an arms-length trying to figure out Your will and Your ways when we have You. You are here waiting for the conversation to begin. And, so, come Holy Spirit into this we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is home base, it’s the website, it’s where you find out what’s going on around here. And there’s always something or another going on around here. So, just explore, explore.

Check out the Daily Audio Bible Shop. There are resources there that were intended and created either for the journey we are on or have come out of the journey that we are on. There are written resources, there are books in the Shop that take this journey deeper. I think of…of the book Reframe right now because we were just exploring some of those very themes out of the Scriptures. And reframe…Reframe is a book that I’ve written really to explore what we’re talking about when we say we’re in a relationship with God. Like…what does…what does that look like? How you live into that? How does it take shape in your life? What does it even really mean? And maybe even more importantly, exploring some of the things that it doesn’t mean that we’ve thought perhaps that it does mean. Same kinds of things we were talking about. Like, you’re not in a relationship with anybody just because you read their biography, right, or you read an article. You haven’t met that person and you’re not in a relationship with them and they don’t know who you are. We know what relationships look like. We are hardwired as a species for relationship. So, we know when we are in a relationship, we know when we are not. Actually, even more than that we know when we’re in a life-giving relationship and we know when we’re not. And, so, this is kind of coded into us. We know what relationships look like, but we try to be in a relationship with God in ways that wouldn’t work in a relationship with anybody. And, so, Reframe, is more of a deep dive into this subject matter that we’re talking about today. So, check that out. You can certainly get it from the Daily Audio Bible Shop but you can get it anywhere you can get a book or anywhere they get audiobooks. Check out reframe.

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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:

I just heard Hope from the Heartland and she was expressing how it had been on her heart to pray for those who are alone at…at a time as we have experienced this past year where we’re not able to have loved ones around us at…at the time of our passing. And there…there are so many out there that are going through this. And I remember my grandfather when he passed a few years ago, he was singing at the top of his lungs to Jesus just…just making up songs from his heart and I remember him looking to a corner of the room and he kept saying, “don’t you see them? Don’t you see them?” And I remember just a feeling that that’s how…how I want to be someday. And my father has come very close to death about three different times. The past four months he had Covid for about 53 days and he made it through but I remember just praying and asking the Lord that He would just give him a special dispensation that everyone who was in the room witnessing his passing would just be changed forever. And I just pray that right now Lord Jesus over every individual who knows You, who might be alone in that final hour. God I pray that You just give them something special and unique that they are passing would change the lives of those around them forever.

Hi this is Teresa from Indiana calling for Holly in the Heartland. I just want you to know that when I heard your message I just started crying because I’m a geriatric nurse and I see it every day that the families can’t see their loved ones and my residents can see their family members and…but I want you to know that I’m a Christian, I love Jesus and I’m praying for them and I’m loving hem and I’m sneaking them hugs and issues and I scooped your mama up and I loved her for you. I loved her for you. And I know that Jesus was with her. And I just want you to know that there’s a lot of good Christian nurses that are loving these little people in the time that they can’t see their daughters and their sons to get that love. And…and we’re giving them lots of prayers. Lots of prayers are going up and lots of love is being gave and I just wanted you to know that. Be blessed. Bye.

This is my first time using the app and I’m using this feature to record a prayer request. Please pray for my son who is applying to do medicine in the UK and in…in some of the universities in the UK. We’re praying for God to help us get a home free status because we are living in Hong Kong but we have regular contacts with the UK and we have some reasons to give to the universities to say that we…we could applied for home status, home free status. The difference between home fees and international fees is huge and we can’t really afford it. So, we need the Lord to give us a miracle so that the universities would allow us to pay home fees which…which…which will…which will be much much easier for us. But it would take probably a miracle. We have done all that we could. We have supplied all the documents but it’s up to the universities now. So, let’s pray please for…for my son that he can do medicine in one of the universities of his choice. In fact, one of the universities of God’s choice and that we would be able to pay home fees instead of the international fees. Thank you very much. Sorry, this is a little bit long. I…I just want to try this out. I don’t know if anyone can hear me or how is this going to be received. But yeah, just blessings to all. Thank you very much for praying and I’m trusting in God in this. Thank you. Thank you all.

Our Father in heaven hallowed be your name your kingdom come your will be done on earth as it is in heaven give us today our daily bread and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us and lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil for thine is the kingdom the power and the glory forever and ever. Father God thank You that You are our Father, that You are…that we are family and that You love us. And I pray Lord that…that in those times when we feel isolated when we feel alone, I pray Lord that we would…we would know You love. Father God I pray for all of those who are isolating who are alone or feel lonely. I pray Lord that they would reach out to You and that You would meet them and that they would be comforting presence. I pray Lord for opportunities for people to connect to each other. Father God help us to be honest with each other. Help us…help us to get through each day Lord. Thank You for each breath, thank You for every blessing. Open our eyes to see the beauty of your world. Open our eyes to appreciate everything we have. May your name be praised and glorified in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Yes, I’m calling for the first time. I’ve been listening to the Daily Audio Bible for about a dozen years but first time calling the prayer line. My name’s Paul and looking for prayer for my children. Both of my wife’s and I kids have told us of told us that they don’t like us, and they don’t want to be a part of this family. One’s aged 19 almost 20 with special needs and the other one is 15 and also identifies as trans gender which is a whole other ball of wax so to speak a burden to consider and we ask for your prayers for my children, my family, my wife and I…my wife and me as we seek wisdom, as we look for God’s Spirit to envelop our family with the love and the grace and mercy shown us in Jesus Christ, the Lord of all lords. I guess that’s about all I’m asking for. But it’s tough when you hear your kids tell you they don’t…they don’t want to be with you, they don’t like you. They’ve had every kind of opportunity and resources at their disposal and maybe that’s part of the problem, I don’t know but I thank you in advance for your prayers for…for my kids. God’s grace in Jesus be with you all.

Good morning daily audio Bible family this is Debbie in Des Moines. I listen…sorry…several years on and end and for some reason I just…I just went away for a couple years and I missed you guys so much. And God brought me back to you. I just want to let everybody know that please call in, please say your prayer requests. It’s very important. It’s important to stay connected to each other. We are family and going through life together is so much easier when you have your family and God. So, please stay connected. Shame on me for not staying connected. It made my life difficult and I’m so glad to be back. I love you guys.