Month: January 2021

Genesis 18:16-19:38, Matthew 6:25-7:14, Psalms 8:1-9, Proverbs 2:6-15

Today is the 8^th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it is a delight to be here with you today as we approach the close of the first full week of our brand-new sparkly new year. And we are getting off to quiet a beautiful start to this new year and the Bible is speaking loud and clear as we move forward and it’s just gonna keep getting better, even when it gets more challenging, even when we’re facing challenges, even when the Bible is confronting some of the things that are…that need to be shifted, that need to be transformed. It’s a beautiful thing. For example, we listened to Jesus telling us that forgiveness is the way forward basically yesterday because forgiveness…forgiveness ultimately sets us free. And that is a beautiful thing. So, gratitude to you what the Bible is speaking to us already and gratitude for the way this year’s beginning. So, let’s dive in. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Genesis chapter 18 verse 16 through 19 verse 38.

Commentary:

Okay. We need to talk about both what we read in the Old Testament and in the New Testament today. Again, you know, like yesterday Jesus said something very profound that explains a lot of things about life itself. And, so, we need to touch on that. But first we need to look at the story that we read in the book of Genesis because this is the first time that we come to a place in the story in the book of Genesis in the Old Testament and go, “what is going on here? Exactly what is happening here?” Because this is a strange kind of messed up story, this story of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.

So, we know that at first God came to Abraham and there was a meal and there was a discussion and God revealed his heart to Abraham, right out of the gate by…by showing Abraham essentially, if there are righteous people down there then I won’t destroy the place. But all that I’m hearing is that the wickedness is off the charts. So, I’m gonna go have a look. So, that’s when Abraham’s like, “so if 50 people, You surely wouldn’t for 50, right? Surely you wouldn’t for 40, surely all the way down to 10.” And basically, what God is saying is, “that’s not…that’s not what’s going on here. Like I didn’t come down here just because I just was in the mood to destroy people today and…and things that they had made and cities and stuff.” The wickedness, the trajectory…and we…we got to listen to this because we’re gonna hear this so often through the prophets…the trajectory is only evil. This can’t go on. The path is only evil. And, so, God goes down to verify this and, in the process, gets Lot out of the city, which it would seem that that would be Abraham’s chief concern, the concern for his own family. Probably he doesn’t know a bunch of other people down in Sodom and Gomorrah. So, God gets Lot out of the city. They are running for their lives. His wife, Lot’s wife turns back, and is turned into a pillar of salt. This is a very famous passage of Scripture. But if we just pause there for a second, take a step back, look behind the story, what are we seeing? When we are moving directly and intentionally away from what is evil, things that we may have participated in, things that we may have just been associated with, but when we discover this is only evil, I have to get out of here right now then don’t ever look back again. That path leads to only evil and only destruction. But the story does go on. They flee to Zoar. Now, there is just the father, Lot and his two daughters because the mom…the mother is gone. How shocking would that be? And then they can’t live in Zoar so they flee to the mountains and the next scene we see them in a cave, they’re living in a cave, they’re hiding in a cave. And you just imagine the grief and the shock of it all. Their mom is gone. All they are…they have is their father. Their father is a foreigner in a foreign land. Everything that he had, any…we remember this from just a little earlier in Genesis…Abraham and Lot had to part company because they were basically too rich to be together. They had too much to be together. And, so, they had to part company. So, Lot parted from Abraham rich. Now he’s hiding in a cave with his two daughters. Everything is lost. All is destroyed. There is no one to protect them. And the irony in the story is that at no time did any of them think we should go back to Abraham, like we should go back and find Abraham. There hiding in this cave with nothing and no one and this is the part of the story the gets really, really, you know, kind of complicated and hard to process because the daughters decide that the best move is…is to get their father drunk and to have sex with their father and see if they can’t get pregnant to continue the father’s family line. Yeah, that's…you go, “why is that in the Bible? Like what is going on here? That’s such a troubling scene.” But if we try to put ourselves contextually several many thousands of years ago in a very tribal time then we would understand that the daughters really did have a bleak outlook. This is a very patriarchal time. They are foreign girls. Their father is now destroyed. All of the wealth and possessions and status destroyed. The only person that could claim them, the only person that could protect them would be to continue that family line and have a son, a son that could one day speak and protect them, otherwise Lot’s getting older and they can stay with their father, but once their father passes away…and now things are pretty precarious because they don’t have any protection…then there’s really no good options. I mean, they can try to flee back to their homeland, but they are well over a thousand miles from their homeland on foot no cars no highways no planes and somewhere along the way they may be taken. And the prospects at that point would be dire. So, we can read a story like this and because it’s found in the pages of the Bible, then we can subtly take our hearts into a place that seems as if God condones or wanted this to happen because this is in the Bible, that He approved of this, that this was the desire. That is not the case. And every time you come…every time we come to a story that we consider troubling we have to…the first thing we need to do is ask ourselves where our hearts are toward God. Does this turn us sideways? Because when we look at this story God had revealed His heart to Abraham that He had no intention of destroying any righteous people at all. As it turned out there was no righteous people down there. For the sake of Abraham Lot and his kids and his wife were sent out of the city to be spared. But in the end, they didn’t turn to God and they didn’t run back to Abraham. They ran to the mountains in a cave. They analyzed the situation in their own strength and made a judgment call, a very difficult one, and proceeded with a plan that they made for themselves. And as it turns out the girls had boys. So, their plan essentially worked, and the Moabites and the Ammonites were created. But is this how God wanted it to go down? God would’ve liked to find righteous people in the valley. The reason that He was going to check it out in the first place that was that He heard there was only wickedness. That is about the entirety of the involvement. There were no instructions about daughters and fathers getting together to create offspring. These were not things intended or compounded or instructed by God. They were choices that people made without running toward God. And we will see plenty of that. But could we step back and just look at our own lives? Because we have made plenty of pivotal choices in our lives without God, and those choices grew up to be things that mattered in our lives. And we carry some of that around with us today. The story indeed is a disruptive story. But when we look at our own stories, our own lives, we see plenty of disruptive decisions that we’ve made. So, the point of this is that we will encounter stories in the Bible, and we will encounter stories in life that we scratch our head and go like, “how did you arrive at that decision” or scratch our head and wonder, “how it all worked out to be this way so horrible.” But when we start backtracking at the systematic choices that were made to arrive at that conclusion then we realize we’re doing the same thing. We’re just wearing different clothes and we have different customs, but the heart, the motivator, the reason becomes the same. And we can’t blame God for what we do. That’s not fair. He’s given us a will and we can choose to fear the Lord and become wise and walk with Him on the narrow path that leads to life, that Jesus was talking about that few ever find. We can by will make the choice that is the desire of our hearts or we can do what we do and make our choices and follow the paths that those choices lead to. But we can’t blame God when we get there and it’s not what we wanted. And in so many ways this is the heart of this particular story that we are reading right now in the Old Testament.

But then we get into the New Testament into the book of Matthew and we sit down at the feet of Jesus again as we’re going to the Gospels and treasuring our time with Him. And yesterday He said that if we were not willing to forgive then we would not be forgiven. And that needs to be continually processed. And He said today…and…and buckle up for this because it is equally as disruptive as yesterday, “do not judge so that you won’t be judged for you will be judged by the same standard with which you judge others, and you will be measured by the same measure you use.” Yeah, can that sink in for a second? We all have some type of awareness that at some point we will stand before God and account for our lives. And we consider that to be judgment, the time of judgment, that we will stand before God. And some of us are completely fine with that because God’s grace will cover a multitude of sins and when we move into it that way. Some of us are terrified that just…well…I mean…gosh how…how do you even think about standing before the Almighty God and answering for yourself? What Jesus is saying is, “you get to set the standard. Like, you get to pick the way you will be judged on that day. You will be judged the way you judged others.” Oh, my goodness…because we are such a judgmental people that we better…we better latch onto this and understand the way of God’s kingdom is grace, is forgiveness, is merc. We don’t have to judge or shame people into becoming what we need them to represent in our lives. We don’t need this kind of control over each other. We have plenty to pay attention to inside of our own hearts and minds. We’re setting the standard here. Let me just read it again. This is Jesus talking. “You will be judged by the same standard with which you judge others, and you will be measured by the same measure you use.” That’s pretty stark. It’s pretty clear and we better pay attention. And again, it’s not because God is laying down all these rules we cannot possibly abide by because that’s what He wants to do is to set us up to fail every day so that all we ever feel spiritually is a failure. That is not the goal. Freedom the goal, that we would be set free from the world, that we would be set free to be who we were created to be. And, so, we have to understand that forgiveness flows through God’s kingdom and we indeed can be judgmental, if that’s what we want, but we are setting the standard for our own judgment.

Prayer:

Jesus, we invite Your Holy Spirit into that. These are stark things, really foundational things because the idea of forgiveness or the idea of making a judgment, especially a negative judgment when things are not going our way, this is every day. This is an everyday…You are speaking about things that we deal with every single day of our lives. And, so, we are at the beginning of the year and we are starting to practice what You are instructing so that we might become like You, Christ like in the way that we live in this world. And, so, come Holy Spirit, again help us to live in forgiveness, quick rapid forgiveness before things have festered and become bitterness and poison to us. And Father, this judgmentalism that we carry around we’re just have…we have something to say about everything. This kind comes from those places of bitterness. We’re not able to look at other people as created in the image of God. Every time that we go to those dark places and just judge we are judging what is created in Your image. We are judging somebody else’s story, a story, a life that we aren’t living, that isn’t ours, that isn’t our story to tell. Help us to focus on the story that we are telling because this is the story of the adventure of life with us and You. Come Holy Spirit and help us to live that way, that we are in the adventure of a life with You, and that everything that we do is in collaboration with You that we get to be the salt of the earth, that we get to be the light of the world, that we have the opportunity to love one another as we love ourselves. Come Holy Spirit we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

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Community Prayer and Praise:

Good morning DAB family this is Linda from Alberta Canada calling. I have not called in in six months or so I would say or maybe it’s been a year. I just wanted to wish everybody a happy new year and to just touch base and to say that we’re all doing fine. And I realized today that I have been listening since June of 2015. So, that’s quite some time now and I was remembering when I first called in how broken I was. Actually, when I first started listening and my daughter was having many many challenges of different types and so many of you pray for her and I just wanted to say thank you to everybody and I really really appreciate it. She still lives in another city. Some of you may recall that she moved away for basically our safety. And she’s doing exceptionally well and she’s having a fantastic life and the Lord has turned so much of her ashes I’ll say into beauty. I wanted to leave this verse for anyone who’s struggling today, and it was one that’s ministered to me quite a bit and it is this, he has showed you o man what is good and what does the Lord require of you to act justly to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8. Have a lovely day everyone. Bye now.

Good morning DAB family this is Stephen from Alabama January 4^th 21. Happy new year and if you’re new here welcome to the journey. I’m on my 10^th year. One thing I could tell you to describe this ministry, once you hang around here for a little while I would tell you it’s excellent. Everything they do, everything that we put out, the way they continue to improve this app and the products they have are always excellent. Now some of the products that I have used, and this may lend me to call about this this morning, God of Your Story, excellent, Brian’s other books, excellent the music Heart, the Christmas album, all those things they’re just excellent. One thing I used this morning that we’ve been using is we have…have had a rodent issue. This time of the year, wintertime they start coming inside. So, we have one apparently that took some of our mouse, you know, rat killer and has died in a wall. And if you’ve ever had that you know what that smells like, right? It’s not good enough and it lasts for a long time. So, right in our bathroom when you go in there, especially when the doors been closed for a while it’s awful. So, I have been using the Global Campfire candle and burning it in there and it just almost immediately takes away the odor. It’s such a great smell. God of Your Story, excellent books. All the of the book…books are excellent as well. And one of my favorite things is when you do in order from them you get these little cards, these little giveaway cards and I use that as one of my main evang…ways of evangelizing to people to share the Daily Audio Bible card.

Hello, hello Brian, hello brothers hello sisters my name is Gavin I’m from Indiana. I have just heard a message from one of my sisters in Arizona and I wrote down a few verse…a few…not verses…excuse me…I wrote down just a couple of quotes that she mentioned. She says, “just because I’m having a bad day does not mean I’m having a bad life.” Ongoing. “I’m just scared, overwhelmed. And I’m just tired.” And then she says, “thank you in advance for your prayers.” My thing I want to say today is I just want to encourage any other brother and sisters who are having these moments where they’re in a hole, where they can’t see the light. And I pray fervently that they would lift their eyes to God. It’s not that God can’t see you it’s that you might not just be looking for God. Don’t let that come as a burden or like an attack. Let that come as encouragement to seek God throughout the day. I thank you God. I thank you Brian for providing us with this daily. Thank you for being faithful. This is my first time calling and I just really lift up any other brothers and sisters along with my sister in Arizona and May she feel well. Thanks guys and have a beautiful day. God bless you. In Jesus’ name.

My name is Whitney and I’m calling from Florida I and I’m here with my three kids their names are Finley, Levin, and little Wenna. I started listening to daily audio Bible a few months ago and it’s been amazing and a huge just awesome thing for my life and I wanted to share that with my kids. And, so, they started listening to Ezekiel 4 days ago and we’re living it, right guys? Yeah. Yeah. It’s so special to be able to sit around the dinner table or lunch table and listen to God’s word with them. So, we just wanted to thank Brian and Jill and Ezekiel for everything they do. And we have a really special prayer request for our daddy. His name is Russell. What did we want to pray for our daddy for, that He, that God goes in daddy’s heart. Yes. We want to pray for daddy…for…his name is Russell…that he accepts Jesus into his heart. Thank you, Daily Audio Bible.

Hi, my name is Scott Owens I need prayer for my wife and my kids. Our family right now I’ve been away from my family for three months because of work. I’ve been trying to say money for a __ so my wife and daughter can join me. My sons are 18 __ on their own. But since I’ve been gone my wife’s only been to church one time and my kids go sporadically. It’s a real struggle to keep my family together. I know that God opened the door for this job and He’s the one that directed me to do this. I’ve been praying for healing for my marriage for over 12 years. I’m asking the Lord to do a new thing to put a new love in my wife’s heart for me and a new passion but first and foremost a desire to love to love the Lord and to serve him with all our heart. Also, to teach me to love her with His love and for her to love me with His love. Thank you everybody for your prayers that you’re gonna be giving and I’ll continue to pray as I listen to the prayer requests as well. Thank you.

Philippians 4:6 says do not be anxious about anything but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And, so, father I come this morning reaching out Lord to…to those so many Lord that have lost loved ones to this virus Lord to some that are in the hospital father that just need a healing touch from you Lord. You are Jehovah Raffa, the God that heals. And, so, father I ask that you touch them this morning. Give them comfort, give them peace Lord but most of all heal their bodies, heal the ones who are…that are just waiting for a new life and just waiting Lord that for you to just touch them. And I ask this Father that You would just reach out and touch everyone that’s listening this morning, that they can hear this…my word speaking for them who are in the hospitals Lord or at home with this virus. I just pray that You would just move in a mighty way and that a vaccine would come sooner for the ones that are still waiting for it Father and more vaccine would come and so the ones that are in the hospital will be healed and they would be able to get the vaccine. But I pray that they would just have confident peace during this time. It’s in Your son holy and precious name Lord I ask this prayer. Thank You, Lord. We love You and we need to right now today we need You. It’s in Jesus mighty name I pray. Amen.

Genesis 16:1-18:15, Matthew 6:1-24, Psalms 7:1-17, Proverbs 2:1-5

Today is the 7^th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it’s great to be here with you today. This is day seven of the New Year. So, we’ve technically we are…or we are technically accomplishing our first week together in the Scriptures, even though we’re kind of in the middle of the first full week of this year. And look at how much ground we have covered in that amount of time. You see…you see now the Bible…the Bible is very relevant when we start looking behind the stories behind the customs behind the clothes that they were wearing behind how the world was thousands of years ago. When we look behind that we realize the human hearts longs for God and we have been longing for God and reaching for God and we have this chronicling of God over time, revealing Himself to us and that is timeless. We long for the same sense of union with our Creator and a context for what this life is all about just as our ancestors did over the last thousands of years. And the Bible is timeless as it deals with and pokes and prods and comforts and nourishes and cares for our hearts. So, congratulations…even though we’re in the middle of the week…congratulations on making it through a week of this new year. And let’s dive in. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Genesis chapter 16 verse 1 through 18 verse 15.

Commentary:

Okay. So, in our reading from the book of Genesis today we have this situation where Abraham now does have a son. His name is Ishmael it’s just not by his wife Sarah. And it was Sarah and Abraham who were given the promise of offspring. And, so, there’s obvious tensions that have arisen inside the family and those tensions…those tensions still exist in the world until this very day. And, so, Abraham’s waiting and he’s 99 years old. So, the Lord comes and reaffirms the promise, “this time next year your wife is going to be holding a baby boy.” And she’s laughing at that because although it may be a promise from God it is also impossible. It’s an impossible promise. She has moved beyond the age of bearing children, well beyond the age of bearing children. Abraham’s 99 years old. So, yeah, it doesn’t look like that’s a promise that can be fulfilled. And, so, she’s, you know, maybe just to protect her own heart and her own hope just kind of dismissing it. And yet God won’t let it be dismissed and he presses in on it and confronts the laughter and essentially asks a very very important question for all of us, “is anything impossible for the Lord?” That question might seem like, “well…we would all…of course we would answer ‘no, nothing is impossible for the Lord. The Lord can do whatever he wants’”. But we don’t really functionally live as if He will, and we certainly don’t function and live as if He will for us on our behalf. And, so, it might as well just to be impossible, right? his is where the mirror comes up. This is what we were talking about a few minutes ago. This is where we look behind the story of the Bible and realize this is a hard issue, as are all of these stories. Where is my faith? Do I believe that? Because that’s what we’re supposed to wrestle with. We’re looking at Abraham and Sarah. And believe me when I tell you this, had they chosen differently there would be no Bible. There may be some kind of Bible it might be called something different, but it would be full of completely different people. Right now Abraham and Sarah, we’re looking at them and going, yeah they’re famous Old Testament characters”, but I’m telling you they…they color everything that happens from here. And this trust, this faith that we are seeing come from Abraham toward God, that is fundamental, foundational Christian theology that will be unpacked very meticulously when we find our way into the letters of Paul.

We don’t want to get ahead of ourselves because we’re in the Gospels and we’re sitting at the feet of Jesus and we want to do that, we want to do that as long as we can this year and just listen to what He is saying. And what we see Him saying is a continuation that we’re living a backward life. We’re living a life that is not going to lead to life. And what He says today is it…it…it is largely about prayer and largely about caring for the less fortunate and the most vulnerable in our cultures. And yes, indeed we are supposed to step into that and be a part of the solution. But Jesus is saying, “the thing is just do it. Don’t do it so that you will be praised. Do it because it’s right. Do it because it’s in your heart to do. Do it because it’s what God would have you do not so that you can be seen doing it otherwise you have your reward. You did it to achieve praise and to continue to construct this image that you are presenting to the world called your personality. You did it to embellish that construct that you are presenting to the world.” So, you got what you wanted. People clapped their hands and praised you and thought you were super spiritual and awesome. There is no other reward. You got your reward. But if you want to do this true, if you want to stop living false wearing a mask feeling naked and ashamed and hiding then you have to live true. Do it because it’s what God would have you do. It’s in your heart to do. Don’t let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, then you’re doing it for the right and true reasons.” But Jesus also said something today that is so profound and so black-and-white and so completely ignored that if we would pay attention and it would finally lock into place then so much of the rest of our lives would make sense. Jesus said, “if you forgive others their offenses, your heavenly Father will forgive you as well. But if you don’t forgive others your Father will not forgive your offenses”, right? And that’s coming right on the heels of the Lord’s prayer, “forgive us our debts or our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” In other words, the Lord’s prayer is asking God to forgive us as we forgive others. I know we’re just getting going, we’re just getting unpacked on this voyage, we’re just moving in, we’re just getting our bearings and then this comes along and it’s like, “wait. What? I never really…what? I have to forgive in order to find forgiveness?” That’s the way of God’s kingdom according to Jesus, who is God made flesh. And it’s really easy. We’ve just come through the holiday season. Maybe there’s brand-new offenses that we’re licking our wounds over. But maybe there’s this long-running stuff in our lives. Everybody…everybody has been broken at some point. We have been the offender many times and have had our hearts broken but we have been the offender as well. Like we are broken people who break things. And the thing that we break the best is other people. And it’s not true and it’s not right. And it’s not God’s kingdom. And, so, here’s Jesus inserting this idea, this truth into our lives, “forgive and you will be forgiven.” And we can just be like, “that’s not fair. The things that have happened to me I can’t even hardly…I can’t even say out loud.” And we can confront it with things like this, we’re in the Bible, we’re like, “gosh…I just don’t like that. I just don't…I don’t even know how to move in that direction, like the direction of forgiveness, which is so booby-trapped and so complicated, and so full of so many moving parts. We can become frustrated and feel as if what God is trying to do is box us in with a bunch of rules that are really really difficult sometimes to live into. That’s not the goal here. Like, that…that…that’s not the God of the Bible. Like that’s not what’s happening here. There are plenty of directives and rules and commandments in the Bible. Things that we are to obey, things that we are to be, and things that we are to live. Indeed, that’s true. Is the point because the Almighty sovereign God, the most-high God who not only created this lush and beautiful planet that we live on that…but has created the universe as far as we can know and as far as we can know is only the beginning. You think he’s so uptight that He needs to just keep creating rules for humanity on this little spec, this little ball in the middle of his creation? He just needs to jack with us all the time to show us that were failures? I think probably He’s more-high than we can possibly comprehend, more powerful than we could ever know, well beyond what we could ever think. And yet He still loves us and still came in person to show us how to be true and how to actually live life as it was intended to be lived in union, in covenant with God. And we’re seeing this covenantal language begin to materialize in the Old Testament. It will carry its way forward all the way to the end of the Bible. God’s goal is our restoration so that we might be who we were created to be. Living in unforgiveness makes that impossible. All things are possible with God. But when we shut it down and say this is my will and then God is a gentleman and says, “you can have what you want but it’s not going to go anywhere and it’s not going to lead you to life.” Forgiveness is essential in God’s kingdom because forgiveness then removes things, entanglements between us and other people. And imagine for a moment what it might be like to live with nothing between you and anyone else, right? There are no offenses. You are true and you are disentangled. But the only way for that to happen is to live in forgiveness, rapid forgiveness, which obviously isn’t easy, which obviously is a practice, something that we practice, something that we master over time. And, so, we begin by just opening our hands and releasing things to God understanding that forgiveness isn't…isn’t affirming anybody’s actions. By us letting somebody go, by us setting someone free, by us for giving we’re not saying it was okay, we’re not denying that it happened, we’re just saying I’m not staying in these chains anymore, I’m not staying chained to that person anymore, they’re not even in my life and yet I’m still chained to them because I won’t…because I won’t let it go…because I won’t let go. When we let go, we release these people and these events to God. God is the judge. We release them to God so that we don’t have to carry it around anymore. So, what Jesus is doing is perhaps telling us something very difficult but He is telling us something essential if we actually want to live, to live free and true.

Prayer:

Jesus, we enter into that. It is a tricky difficult subject. It is also a topic that will be a recurring theme in the Bible because we cannot let this go. You didn’t just mention it one time and think that we wouldn’t forget. This is something constant. It’s something that You modeled with Your very life when You said Father forgive them because they don’t know what they’re doing as You were being killed. So, Holy Spirit, come and let that sink in. We are to follow the path of the Savior. We are to become Christ like by being like Christ. Help us with that Lord. That’s not…that’s not possible in our own strength. This is one of these situations where we do have to open our hands and surrender to You so the impossible becomes possible. Help us learn how to forgive. It starts right here. Seven days in the year. Now we can start practicing this because by the end of the year we will be a master at this if we continue to press in to what might be like to be true, to be the hands and feet of Jesus, to be the Jesus with skin on in this world, to be Your ambassadors, to be Your representatives in this world. We can’t do that without forgiveness. So, come Holy Spirit teach us how to forgive we pray. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Song:

Matthew West - Forgiveness

Genesis 13:5-15:21, Matthew 5:27-48, Psalms 6:1-10, Proverbs 1:29-33

Today is the 6^th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it is a joy and a privilege and an honor to be here with you today as we move through…well this is the first hump day of the year isn’t it. So, we move through the center of our first full week together and I don’t know if you feel like you’re getting moved in, but I feel like I’m starting to feel that rhythm of a new year begin to get established and kinda get moved through the holiday season and feel like now we’re starting to move into building what this year is going to look like and build it through our thoughts, our words and our deeds because that’s how life…that’s how life shapes up. But to become aware of God’s presence in all of it and our utter dependence upon him in it will indeed be the path toward freedom. So, let’s dive in. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Genesis chapter 13 verse 5 through 15 verse 21.

Commentary:

Okay. Let’s do what we did yesterday and kind of work our way backwards because wisdom is still introducing herself and what we are hearing…well…what we are hearing is what we probably desire. Like, who among us does not want to live securely and be undisturbed by the dread of danger? Can we like all say yeah? Yeah, like so much of the energy of life is spent to arrange for that. Wisdom is saying, that’s kind of a byproduct of being wise. So, once again we are reminded to pay close attention to the voice of wisdom. And once again right here at the beginning of the year I remind you of the Daily Audio Proverb and the Daily Audio Psalm. This is the Daily Audio Bible and we’re going through the whole thing, but the Daily Audio Proverb lets you go through the entire book of Proverbs in a month and it takes less than five minutes a day. So, it’s like unfiltered wisdom is available and you poor that into your life over and over and over and over and you start remembering it and it starts seeping down inside of you and then you start remembering it when you need it and then you start becoming aware that you’re listening to the voice of wisdom and you’re becoming wise. And, so, let’s make it a point of the year to become wise. What would it look like if our wisdom increases exponentially throughout this year? That could be a game changer for the rest of our lives. It could be a game changer for future generations because we begin building foundations. So. well, all we can do here is to state the obvious. We should listen to wisdom. Whether or not we do, that’s one of those choices that we make. And the choices that we make end up telling the story of our lives over this year. We can choose to seek wisdom, or we can choose to ignore it. But I think it’s already become abundantly clear what happens either way.

And then we move into the Psalms that we read today and what we heard…what we heard was honesty, right? Honesty. “Be gracious to me Lord I’m weak. Heal me, my bones are shaking. My whole being is shaking with terror. Are you there? How long? Turn, rescue me, save me.” This should be talking our language. We should be reading in the Bible things that we have thought and said, and we should understand then the Bible isn’t this book that is God’s grand attempt to shame humanity for every failure that happens. What we’re seeing in the Bible is the heart cry to God, “I need you I’ve lost the plot again. I’ve lost the story again. I’ve forgotten who I am again. I’m lost again. I went into my own desires again. I ran into a brick wall again. I need you.” And the Bible affirms that that heart cry prayer is okay because we’re gonna hear it for the rest of the year at times in different books, especially in the Psalms. So, can we just state here, God is not looking for your dishonesty, doesn’t care about it at all. The stuff that we say to each other, right? We’re having a conversation we’re catching up and we’re giving a curated version of a story or a curated version of the last couple months or whatever and it’s all just nice and tidy how we want to tell the story but so much is skipped and it’s not…it’s true but is not the complete truth. The Bible is giving us permission. God desires complete honesty. How else do you base a foundation for any kind of relationship without honesty? And, so, let’s carry that with us as we move forward - honesty, being true.

Because when we go back to Matthew and Jesus is continuing the sermon on the Mount what we’re beginning to see here is an invitation to live true without pretense, that this is actually the way human beings were created to be - true. Falseness is the mask that we wear. You remember that story we read a couple days ago in Genesis 3, the serpent in the garden, tree of the knowledge of good and evil, all of this. They ate, right? And then they were ashamed, and they hid and what we begin to find in the message of Jesus is you don’t have to hide anymore ever again. You have permission to be true. In fact, that’s the trajectory, that’s the transformation that happens within us, that there is no falseness in us, that we are not hiding and ashamed, that we are not wearing a false mask, that we are children of the most-high God, we have already as a gift received the highest thing that is possible. We’re children of God and God made this world for us and we are upon it because we are created in His image. The falseness isn’t doing anything but keeping everybody on earth hiding from each other in big and small ways. So, to step towards truth, though, we realize pretty quickly…yeah, this is not the…how do you…it’s almost impossible to operate this…this way in our culture. This is the process of sanctification and transformation that is happening within us. It doesn’t have to happen today. We need to learn the ways of truth and the Holy Spirit will lead us into all truth. That’s what the Bible promises us.

Prayer:

Father we thank You. We thank You for Your word. We thank You for the way that it does what it does no matter what year it is, no matter even what century or millennia it is Your word is a mirror into our souls and it is a lamp for our feet and a light to our path showing us the way that we should go. Holy Spirit come. Help us to be aware and pay attention. What we’re going to find is that that’s what we need more than anything, is to just be paying attention. So, many of our decisions are made as reactions to something when the voice of wisdom will show us in advance so that we have chosen in advance how we will handle all the situations of life. But that’s a learned thing and we can’t do it without You. And, so, we’re asking, we’re crying out to You. Give us wisdom. Show us the way to go. Lead us on the narrow path that leads to life we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Happy new year Daily Audio Bible family this is Denise sometimes known as the Airport Missionary. I just wanted to wish you all a happy new year and I…I have been hanging around in the background listening and listening, but I wanted to let you all know and thank you for your prayers. I…the job that you prayed me into has really been a very interesting experience about the people who need me to be there for them. And, so, on behalf of those people whose identities I will keep quiet, but they thank you for sending the them because they really needed the love and the comfort that you prayed into me and that I was able to bring to them. And then also for those of you who prayed for me to my husband and I to be able to conceive. We are not pregnant today but we did find a different doctor who is really amazing and regardless of outcome I just feel like I went to the right place and he has said things that made a lot more sense and that I really believe that you all opened the door and gave me courage to sit down and talk to someone different and tell my story and that is the gift that I will never be able to truly repay until I meet you all in heaven. But in the meantime, gracious heavenly Father I just pray over my family here at the Daily Audio Bible family. I pray over Brian. I pray over the new year. I pray over Father Your Holy Spirit to go to every ear that hears this and to let this ministry expand to find more ears. And Father let this year be a year of healing and redemption and growth for Your great body of Christ through this ministry. And let all hear this message on a daily basis…

Hello, I’m not sure whether the first recording I did was sent. This is my first time, so I’m just trying things. My name Zinab Genno. I’m sending this message from London. Actually, I came to know about this Daily Audio Bible through Alan Parr. I was watching one of his videos on YouTube. So, I went along and I downloaded the app and this is my first time. I’ve never really read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. I was a Muslim converted to Christianity. So, I will really need your support and I’m hoping to go through this journey with all of you as a community and I’m…yeah…I just need you’re lifting up. I just need your support. I…I came from predominantly Muslim background. So, I would do with some support and prayer just for strength in my faith and be able to…to fellowship with you guys and…and…I will be…I really really appreciate if I get some prayers and just encouragement from you…from all of you for this journey that I am embarking on this year. So, I’m hoping to spend the rest of this 2021 getting to know you and getting to know God more, coming closer to God. So, I look forward to this. I’m excited. You know, I’m both the Chronological and the Daily Audio Bible. Thank you.

Hello, everyone I’m, Selah from Canada and I just wanted to say that I appreciated two messages from first-time callers. So, I appreciate all the messages but two especially today really just hit my heart and I wanted to say I am praying for both of you. One is the young lady from Arizona and the other is the Cross Carrier from the Bay Area. I want you to know that I’m…I’m going to carry both of you in my heart as we go forward. I’m praying for you. Thank you for opening up the way you did. Your vulnerability is beautiful. I love it when people are real, and I think it gives others the opportunity to be real as well. So, thank you. I appreciate you. And Brian I appreciate you and your ministry very much. I’m a first-time caller but I have listened through the Daily Audio Bible before and this is my desire this year as well. So, thanks again. Love to all of you from Selah.

Hi folks this is James from the UK and just wanted to say a really happy new year to all the DABbers. I know that’s a little late, but it is so nice to be able to share with you and to be part of this community. Massive massive encouragement. I started listening now back in…we were living in Switzerland back in 2009, 2010. So, it’s been a long journey and it’s just so great to start another year and listen to people getting so excited about the Daily Audio Bible. And I just wanted to…I just wanted to pray for the long term listener for Arizona. She left a request for support and encouragement. She was tearful and I just felt I just want to pray. Lord, will you bless her, will you bless in a way this year that makes her feel your strength, your love, and your support around her, that she would know that you are there to take the burdens, that your yoke is light, and she’s yoked with you. I just pray that she would really experience your peace and she experience Holy Spirit you revealing yourself through helping her to solve and move through some of the challenges that she faces right now. In Your name, in Your holy name Jesus. Amen.

Hi, my name is Renzo from Maryland. I just want to pray for the one girl in Arizona on the other line. Father God I just pray that her faith is just…becomes stronger and for her to get closer to You every day and just thank You for bringing us here thank You for the Daily Audio Bible and thank You for them having encouragement every day and just thank You for the platform Jesus that You provide. Just please help that girl to just get closer to God and have faith in You. And we all fall short. We all fall down. __ for her faith to become strong in Jesus’ name we pray. Amen. God bless you guys. Thank you for your ministry.

Genesis 11:1-13:4, Matthew 5:1-26, Psalms 5:1-12, Proverbs 1:24-28

Today is the 5^th day of January, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it is wonderful to be here with you today as we continue to get moved into the year and moving out away from the shoreline of the new year and into the year. And, so, we…we’ve moved into all the books that we’re reading, the four different books - Genesis, Matthew, Psalms and Proverbs right now. So, we have some orientation. So, let’s get into the Scriptures together. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Genesis chapter 11 verse 1 through 13 verse 4 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, there’s so much that we could talk about today from…from our reading. Let’s start with the Proverbs. Let’s remember that this voice is the voice of wisdom. This feminine voice of wisdom who introduced herself to us, In fact, she’s continuing to introduce herself to us in today’s reading. And we read today that, you know, if you don't…if you neglect the counsel of wisdom and don’t accept correction then wisdom will mock and laugh at you when your calamity comes upon you like a whirlwind and stress overtakes you. And can we look at that and go, “well, that’s not very nice of wisdom.” But here’s the key. Seeking wisdom after the fact, after you’ve already destroyed something in your life that wisdom could’ve counseled you around, but instead you ignored wisdom and went straight into this thing because it’s what you desired more than wisdom, then yes it can feel like wisdom is laughing. The voice of wisdom says basically after that happens, they’ll call me, but I won’t answer, they’ll search for me but won’t find me, right? When you’re in the middle of something that is destructive, and you have ignored the voice of wisdom and the counsel of the Holy Spirit and maybe even the counsel of friends and community and you’ve walked right into it then you can’t blame wisdom for where you are. You are where you are because that’s where you went when the voice of wisdom was always there, counseling you away from that series of decisions that made whatever it made. So let’s remember, retroactive wisdom may indeed give us wisdom for the future but we should be consulting wisdom about all of the choices that we make because they all matter and wisdom is always available.

Okay, let’s move back to the book of Matthew, because now we have been introduced to Jesus. We’ve seen His baptism. We’ve kinda got the lay of the land, but now He opens His mouth to teach. And, so, just like wisdom, the voice of Jesus is something we…we should be paying attention to the things that gets said here and tilling them into the soil of our lives because in a few months we would like them to yield of the fruit of the Spirit in our lives. We would like transformation to happen because we’re spending this time around the Global Campfire letting God’s words speak into our lives. We want that…like the reason that we’re doing this is to be transformed. And, so, Jesus begins today what we famously know of as the sermon on the Mount. And this is Jesus central teaching, no question about it. And it’d lengthy. We’ll be spending a couple of days in it. But He begins to speak today with what is known as the Beatitudes, right? Blessed are the poor in spirit, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are the humble. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. Blessed are the merciful. Blessed are the pure in heart. Blessed are the peacemakers. Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness. Jesus is laying out, like the…it…as soon as He opens His mouth in the Bible to teach this is the first thing that He teaches. And what He is essentially saying is all of the things that…that you think are the way to go aren’t. You are living an almost backward life to the way that life was intended to be lived. And what we are beginning to see Jesus lay out is an argument for freedom through surrender. In other words, if you aren’t grasping on to things and defending your lines and your circles and your territories. If you understand that it’s all a gift and it’s all yours and it’s all from the hand of your Almighty Father, then you can let go of everything and be utterly dependent upon God. It’s just that our lives and our culture is so backward that. Very similar to what Jesus is saying in the Beatitudes, that to truly raise our hands in utter surrender and fall into complete trust in God, yeah, I mean we’ll do that as long as things are working right but the second that our expectations aren’t met, right, the second that things are not going the way we thought they should go then we simply expose that we are the ones that want to be sovereign over ourselves and we don’t fully trust God unless…unless we can predict the outcome, unless it’s really really clear and we can telegraph what’s gonna happen, which is a backward way of being a human being. And this is in part what Jesus is laying out today by calling out the truth. “You are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world.” So, Jesus describes these two things. “If the salt loses its taste, how can it be salty again. You can’t hide a city on a hill. Nobody lights a lamp and puts it under a basket. You put the lamp on the lampstand so that it can light the room.” And then He says, “in the same way let your light shine before others so they may see your good works and give glory to your father in heaven.” So, we see is that Jesus is very kind and very compassionate but has zero tolerance for the deception that has fogged and clouded the world. And, so, that He cuts right through and just like wisdom, we should pay attention. And we heard a term today for the first time a term that Jesus will use over and over, a term that will follow us through the rest of the year and that we will be considering for the rest of the year, “the kingdom of heaven”. Jesus is announcing things, revealing things, exposing that things that we are waiting for are already here among us. And we’ll see that begin to unfold in the next couple of days.

And then going back to Genesis we’re starting to fall into the rhythm there as well and we met some people, some people, desert dweller nomadic people who were moving around, but who ultimately hear God’s invitation into the…into the land of Canaan where we will find that God will promise this land. And the people that we met were Abram and Sarai and Lot. We will be traveling with them for a while and Abram will have a name change to Abraham and Sarai will have a name change to Sarah. I don’t think that’s too much of a spoiler, but that’s who we’re talking about. And we’ve probably all heard the names Abraham and Sarah before. This is who we’re talking about right here in the book of Genesis and the covenantal relationship between Abraham and God is also something that is going to permeate the rest of the Bible. So, it’s important that we pay attention to the details of their story as we go through it because that story is a fundamental part of the rest of the story of the Bible including the story of the Christian faith. So, we’re getting taught and we’re getting context, and that is a beautiful thing as we continue to sail out into the deep because we’re gonna need both as we move our way through the Bible and seek the transformation that the Scriptures bring as it counsels and corrects and comforts us.

Prayer:

Father we are so thankful. We are so grateful to be here today to be on this planet that you have created breathing oxygen that sustains our life, reminding us that each inhale is inspiration each exhale is an expiration. We have to trust you. It’s baked into who we are. We draw in that breath as a gift and then we have to let it go. We can’t hold it. We’ll die. We have to let it go in faith and utter dependence that the next one will come. So, at the baseline of our existence You are there, and we are grateful and when we feel lost, when we feel like you’re gone or we can’t find what to do or things have gotten confusing, we can come back and remember that we are breathing. We can come back to our breath and understand the breath of life is within us. You are here. And, so, come Holy Spirit into all that we’ve read and all that’s being presented and laid out for us as we move into this year. We ask that you would lead us into all truth. This is what we find as a promise in the Scriptures. We ask that you lead us on the narrow path that leads to life. And we began to get in the habit of being aware of your presence in the moment so that we might hear the voice of wisdom instead of just blasting through and causing mayhem and some sector of our lives. We are learning and we will continue to learn of our utter dependence upon you and how that this is the most freeing thing that we can ever realize, is that we must trust you and that there is no other place to place our hope. Come Holy Spirit into all of this we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, it’s where you find out it’s what’s going on around here and it’s where you get connected and stay connected. So, check it out.

Check out the Community section. That is where the Prayer Wall lives and that is…it’s just always happening. So, what we learn is that a year of life has its ups and downs and sometimes we’re in an up and sometimes were in a down and sometimes, you know, we need to reach out for prayer and sometimes we need to offer. And it would seem like, “okay I’ll offer prayer when I’m feeling good and I’ll ask for prayer when I’m, you know, in a down…down time. But it’s really interesting how this community works like the Bible says. Like sometimes when we stop focusing on what’s going on, even when we’re down and begin to focus on others and pray for others because they’re down too, we realize we’re not in this alone, we’re in this together and that when we’re praying for somebody somebody’s praying for us somewhere. And, so, the prayer wall is a beautiful example of that. So, check it out.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if the mission that we share together is meaningful to you, to bring the spoken word of God read fresh every day and to create a rhythm around that that builds community so that we know that we’re not alone, if that brings life to you then thank you for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or the mailing address if you prefer, is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement you can dial 877-942-4253 or you can hit the Hotline button in the app no matter where you are.

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:

Well happy New Year Daily Audio Bible family this is Jeff from Scepter and I just finished up listening to day one of my ninth year and also my wife Lita just finished up her very first of ever here at the Daily Audio Bible. So, that’s really cool. And I just wanted to share that. So, everybody just pray for us. If you don’t mind pray for us to gather wisdom and for Lita, my wife to get something out of this. And hopefully she’ll enjoy this as much as I have throughout the years. Looking forward to hearing everybody talking and over…over the next few weeks as always. And it’s good to be back. And love you all. And…

Happy New Year family this is your sister Julie in Idaho. Please pray with me. Father, our Father may this new year You set before us being dedicated to You Lord in advance. Bless us God. We ask in deep gratitude and we know that You go before us preparing our hearts and minds to see and hear You supernaturally more than we can ever ask or imagine. Please forgive us of all our brokenness and aspirations and shortcomings but being more like Jesus and throw them away as far as the east is from the west. Mend us Lord. Start something new in our lives and our hearts this year, today even. May we not look behind us at our failures but focus forward on each new day as it comes knowing full well that You are good, and You’ve created us in Your image Lord. Make us good. Fill us with Your Holy Spirit that we might fill others around us. Mend us and make us whole this year Lord. Abba bless us that we might be a blessing to all those You put in our lives. Please make Your presence known in every aspect of our lives. May we reflect Your glory onto this world as You mend us. To You Abba Father be all glory honor and praise. In the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. Happy New Year family. And I hope that all of our original family is still here and that we’re welcoming all of our new family that is coming aboard. Welcome aboard this most beautiful platform that the Hardin family has provided for us. Thank you, Brian and may God bless you as you lead us and shepherd us this year into 2021 and may we all grow stronger in our faith and as a family. Welcome and well done. In Jesus’ name.

Happy new year DABbers it’s Grace Filled DeCastro here. It’s the 2^nd of January and I just want to say thank you Brian and the Hardin family for a wonderful, beautiful start to the new year. Yesterday was amazing and today doubly amazing. It’s just…it’s just so insightful how you could go through the year Bible year after year and always learn something new. That’s was so beautiful about this. I just want to say thank you to all of the prayer warriors that come on here and pray for everybody. And, you know, they’re just so fantastic, may God bless you all and may you continue to grow in what you do. I just want to ask for prayer for myself as I go back to work on Monday. I’m a high-level teaching assistant and basically most of our little babies…I work in a primary school, small children…and most of them will be at home but for a lot of us teaching assistants, you know, we will have to go in looking after groups of vulnerable children or key workers. So, just pray for covering over us and protection over us and also pray for the amazing doctors and nurses out there that are really being bombarded with lots of new cases of patients who aren’t able to breath. There lacking oxygen, you know. Just pray that God sends a miracle for strength for the hospital teams and just a recovery, a miraculous recovery for the patients that are in there. Thank you all. I love you. God bless you. Have a wonderful, wonderful day. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Hello, my beautiful DAB family Happy New Year this is Hope from the Heartland. Let’s lean into what God is doing in our lives. I just wanted to call and say thank you so much to each one of you. I love listening to the Christmas party. It was so fun. Like Rebecca in Michigan, I have started driving for intsacart. And, so, to drive around and shop with all of you along with me was so much fun and it just warmed my heart. I especially loved hearing everyone’s voice but when Carla called in it just brought this ministry into focus for me and kind of what it has done in my life when she said, you know, “this happened and you prayed for me and then this happened” and I remember like individually her calls and then just to look back and see the hindsight of where God brought her and how we were championing her and coming around her, that just I don’t even know how to express it…it just meant so much to me. And then when Victoria soldier called, I was feeling a little lonely and I just had this picture of when she said I am with you and I was like she is so dear to me and just I imagined having a cup of tea with her and it just really warmed my heart. So, happiest of new year greetings to each of you. I pray the Lord’s favor and blessing on you and I’m so excited to set sail with you this year in the Daily Audio Bible. Love you guys. Bye.

Hello wonderful DAB family this is Hope from the Heartland again. Immediately after I sent in my last message my dad called to tell me that my mom had just passed away just a couple hours ago now. And I just wanted you to know that as I was thinking about her and praying for her, she had been suffering with Alzheimer’s for…early onset Alzheimer’s for a few years and just to grieve each thing as it was happening it was hard, and it was sad at the end because her whole wing came down with the virus. And, so, no visitors were allowed and just to see her not looking peaceful just looking very much in pain was so hard on my heart. I just wanted to go scoop her up and be with her and pray with her and just tell her she was loved, and I wasn’t able to do that. And it was really weighing heavily on my heart. And when I thought about just calling that prayer request in to you and praying for all the people around the world that are in that situation both the people that are alone in passing and their family members who can’t get to them I was just reminded because of the discipline of and the community of listening to the Bible every day and hearing your prayers that God was able to be with her, that He is sovereign, that He has ordained her days, that He has promised to be with each of us and never forsake us. And, so, I pray that He would send people and His Spirit, and He would take her home to be with Him in peace and with style. So, I love you family. Bye.

Genesis 8:1-10:32, Matthew 4:12-25, Psalms 4:1-8, Proverbs 1:20-23

Today is the 4^th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it is great to be here with you today as we launch forward into our first…well…workweek…workweek of the new year. For some of us this is the first day back in this brand-new year. And, so, you know, we’re settling back into the rhythm of things with a hope a great hope that this will be a year where we will mend. Last year was one for the books. And mending doesn’t necessarily mean returning to any kind of status quo, it just means a time to heal, a time to pursue the way forward by pursuing the narrow path that leads to life that Jesus will illuminate, will teach us about as we journey through the Gospels. So, it is a fantastic, it is a joy to be here with you today as we move forward. So, let’s get to it. We are reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. We have already talked about Genesis. We’ve talked about Matthew. We’ve talked about Psalms. Now this is the fourth day of the year. When we get to the Proverbs we’ll talk about the Proverbs and then we’ll be kind of moved into the books that we’re reading. But first, Genesis chapters 8, 9, and 10 today.

Introduction to the book of Proverbs:

Okay. This brings us to the book of Proverbs in our Proverbs reading today. And, so, we haven’t actually talked about the book of Proverbs yet to get moved into it, like we’re moving into this year. And, so, let’s talk about Proverbs. Proverbs is a book of wisdom. In fact, remember how we were talking about how the Bible is broken down, like we have Old Testament and New Testament, those are delineations and then within those delineations are subgroups, like the Torah or like the Gospels. So, Proverbs is the centerpiece of a section of the Scriptures known as the…the wisdom literature of the Bible. And, so, it’s, Proverbs, and then the others are Ecclesiastes and Job, and part of the Psalms. And wisdom literature is a genre. I mean there’s wisdom literature outside of the Bible. It’s a genre of literature. But this is the biblical wisdom literature at its intended to speak directly. It’s not like a narrative story where we’re kind of learning all the little twists and turns of how the story went. This is direct teaching. And although it can come in the form of a rhetorical question or a riddle or…or just a direct statement, its intended to speak directly to what it’s trying to teach. And, so, the Proverbs are invaluable, invaluable for our lives, like, truly. As we continue into the book of Proverbs wisdom will come forward and introduce herself, and she will introduce herself in the feminine voice. And she will tell us that she was with God in the beginning, that He used her. That she celebrated and danced with delight and joy at the creation of humanity and that she is here at every crossroads pointing the way if we will simply slow down and not blast through that intersection into some kind of brick wall and destroy ourselves. She’s there saying, “this is the way you should go. Not that one.” If we will simply listen to her. So, she has a valuable voice in our lives for this year and…and for the rest of our lives for that matter. And we should pay attention clearly and closely. In fact, at this point I would make you aware that this is the Daily Audio Bible, but there is the Daily Audio proverb. And it's…it’s like less than five minutes…about five minutes a day of pouring unfiltered wisdom right into your soul. If you keep that up, you’re going…and be…and heed the call…like heed her words…well…that’s the path of wisdom. That’s how we become wise. And, so, there is that resources. It’s like a vitamin…if this is the Daily Audio Bible and this is the meal then that’s the vitamin. And…and there’s also the Daily Audio Psalms, which is like just a couple minutes a day to just stay in this rhythm throughout the day because what we will see in the Bible is many many many rhythms established, because once we get into a rhythm then we have a repeatable process that is continually reminding us of who we are because it’s easy enough to forget. We get swept into other people’s conflicts, we get swept into other people’s gossip, we get swept into all kinds of things that aren’t us and we pick up offenses and carry them around and they’re not even ours. We forget our identity and yet we come here to be reminded each and every day with the rhythms of life who God is, who we are, where we are going. And, so, with that said let’s read from the Proverbs. We’ll read chapter 1 verses 20 through 23 today.

Prayer:

Father we thank You for that. We press into that. We make it a point. As we continue to sail out of the harbor and into the deep for this year, we make it a point to always pay attention and heed the voice of wisdom in our lives. We’re gonna need it and You have given it to us. It is there for us. It’s not hidden, it’s available to us. And, so, Father help us to listen to what she has to say and heed her counsel we pray. In the mighty 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. So, be familiar with it. Get connected there. The Prayer Wall is there. Yeah, just be familiar. Of course, if you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app and that is highly recommended for the year that we’re on for lots of reasons, but it helps us keep track of where we are and where we’re going. And as we move through the different sections of the Bible we receive, like achievement notifications that we’re making this progress - this is where we are, this is how far we’ve gone, this is the section we’re going through. We get these badges that show up and is just a much much more connected experience. So, check out the Daily Audio Bible app. It’s free wherever you get your apps. So, just search for Daily Audio Bible, and download the app and dive into this year.

Also reminding you that we have re-launched Daily Audio Bible kids and our son Ezekiel is in the driver seat there and doing such…such a great job. So proud of him. But it is a beautiful thing, to allow your children to experience. And this is a New Testament reading. So, it’s not long. It’s not beyond the attention span of a child. And to go through the Bible for kids with kids by kids, this is truly a beautiful thing. So, yeah, if you’ve got kids or grandkids check out the Daily Audio Bible Kids in Daily Audio Bible app and…and enjoy. It’s inspiring.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at dailyaudiobible.com. There is a link on the homepage. It lives there. Thank you. Thank you for everyone who’s ever pressed that link. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible 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 and share from there. It’s the little red button up 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:

Happy new year Daily Audio Bible family this is Catherine calling from Maryland and I just wanted to offer a prayer for you Afia. I missed that you moved from Delaware to central California. So, good luck settling into your new area. And maybe that’s part of the feelings that you have. But God please be with Afia. Help him to know You in a new way this year in 2021 and to settle into his new place and to mend his relationships with You, with himself, with…with everyone around him and grow closer to You. And I just want to tell a little story of…of the word of the year. So, I was driving in my car and trying to remember what it was and I…the word in my mind came as “mind” and then I realized quickly that, “no it’s not mind its mend” and then I thought “how funny though that mind in the sort of old style of the word is to obey, right? To listen, to heed.” And we do have to mind God and God’s word and put our minds on God word…God’s word in order to mend for 2021. So, little change of vowel but…but the two kind of go together. So, I thought that was kind of an interesting little God breeze. Anyway, I love you family and look forward to spending 2021 with you and God bless Brian and Jill and the entire Hardin family. Amen.

Hello this is Ben Kramer and we are from Fort Wayne Indiana and I really like how…how you’re doing this and I think you’re doing a great job. I also pray that we all stay safe during Covid and my mommy does too, right? Right. I hope to listen to you guys tomorrow. Thanks.

Hi this is Stu Sutton from Southern California. I just want to pray a blessing over everyone as they embark on this one-year journey with the Daily Audio Bible. It is an incredible journey; one I’ve been fortunate to take for several years now. And I can’t tell you how important it is to be focused on the words. Don’t be distracted while you’re listening. Read along if you’re able to do that and to make this an important part of your day whether it’s how you start the day or how you and the day. It’s an incredible way to allow God’s word and the truth of God to come into your life and to give you perspective on each and every day. And I can’t say how much I am in complete awe and reverence for what Brian Hardin and his whole family has done here and to see over the years how it just keeps getting better and better and better. And it’s a testament to how living authentically by the word of God can be an incredible blessing. And, so, I wish that blessing and I pray that blessing upon everybody that’s taking this journey this year through the Daily Audio Bible in 2021. Thank you all and we have an incredible day, an incredible year together.

Good morning DAB family giving all praise glory and honor to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ who is the head of my life. This is Walking in the Wilderness in Georgia. I am calling to say on January 5^th it will be my one-year DAB anniversary. I have been blessed beyond measure’s for the person who gifted this app to me and I am so thankful for Brian, Jill, China, and the rest of the family and all those who take part into keeping this Daily Audio Bible going. I will officially start putting my log on the fire. This year has already started rough. Satan has tried but I will not give him any glory. I will still continue to praise, glorify, and worship my Lord and Savior for we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against the spirits of this world. So, I love you my DAB family and happy 2021. Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Peace.

Hello Bob from Arizona I’m just calling after listening to the Christmas podcast actually even though this is New Year’s Day today. I just want to thank Brian and Jill for loving us. You have been used so mightily, so…so wonderfully by our Lord I am overwhelmed by the giving of certain people and you and your family come to mind. Brian today even in this New Year’s Day that we’re presently in, all things made new as you spoke of in your Christmas Day podcast. It was a wonderful teaching about that longing, that empty space still that we have. Yeah, it’s…it’s…it’s a wonderful thought and meditation to know that all things are becoming anew again and they will be made new by our Lord in His coming. We look forward to that. I look forward to that. I look forward so much to all evil being eliminated by the graciousness love of God. So, thank you. Thank you, Brian and Jill. And I pray that your year is prosperous, holy, blessed. In Jesus’ name. Amen.