Jeremiah 2:31-4:18, Colossians 1:1-17, Psalm 76:1-12, Proverbs 24:21-22
Today is October 4th, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible, I am Brian, it is great to be here with you today, it’s great to be with you every day. But today is today and it’s great to be here with you today. As we come around the Global Campfire and let it all go, whatever that thing is that snagging at us that are those things, these pressures, these obligations and responsibilities. These fears, these uncertainties, we are allowed to carry them around as much as we want. That’s not necessarily a healthy thing to do and we are also given permission to not carry them around. But let’s at least give ourselves permission to not carry them around right now, like we’re around the Global Campfire now, we’re safe right now. And, what’s gonna happen now is we’re just going to read the Scriptures and let them wash into our lives and so often something that we need is there and so often when we leave this place, the things that we have to pick up and carry, they don’t have the same weight. Things shift and so let’s just let it all go as we move forward in our journey and take the next step forward. Which leads us back into the book of Jeremiah, which we just began yesterday. So, we’re just getting going in Jeremiah. When we get to the New Testament, we have new territory there as well. But first Jeremiah chapter 2, verse 31 through 4, verse 18.
Introduction to the Book of Colossians:
Okay, so we concluded the letter. Paul’s letter to the Philippians yesterday. Which brings us to the 12th book in the New Testament, which is another letter from the apostle Paul, this one to the Colossians and the Colossians were people who lived in the city of Colossae which was not a place unfamiliar to Paul. It’s about 100 miles from where he spent a lot of his time in Ephesus and Colossae is, I don’t know that it’s an archaeological ruins or site, at this point it’s been identified, but not really excavated. It sits in modern-day Turkey. But during Paul’s life, Colossae wasn’t an archaeological ruin at all. It was a bustling city and it had everything that you can imagine that bustling city in the Roman Empire would have, a lot of mingling of culture, a lot of mingling of philosophical ideas, a lot of mingling of spirituality and some of this mingling had made its way into the Colossian church. And so, Paul writes this letter as a response and similar to Ephesians and Philippians, Colossians is generally considered to be a prison epistle, so another letter that Paul wrote while he was awaiting trial before the emperor and the letter generally has two sections, to two themes. The first is a doctrinal issue. There had been people coming into the church and we’ve seen this before. This is a little different though, people would come into the church, they were fellowshipping in the church, but also teaching things like Angel worship, and some just other rituals that were not part of what Paul was teaching. And so, Paul addresses this in this letter by showing us once again this high, high Christology, this awareness that Christ is supreme over all creation, over all angelic beings, over everything. He writes in his letter that the universe, the very universe is created by and through Jesus and is…is sustained through the Lordship of Christ. And then Paul also addresses something we’ve seen before this, circumcised versus uncircumcised controversy that was dominant in the early church. We’ve seen it in other letters where people come in and I like no you got obey the Jewish customs, you’ve got to essentially become Jewish, then follow the Jewish Messiah, follow those customs, which Paul was very, very much against. We’ve had lots of conversations about that, in Colossians Paul is still against that teaching and so we’ll once again hear him make corrections and once again we have a letter that was sent to actual people in an actual congregation giving us insight into what was happening in their congregation. And since we have a collection of letters from Paul, we see the themes, the commonalities, the different things that the early churches were facing and for that matter, their distinctions and the different cities. But we get a really good glimpse at the struggles that were going on among our brothers and sisters that are our spiritual ancestors. And as we read these letters, we find that maybe context changes a little. The cities definitely change, the regions definitely change but the things that we find ourselves wrestling with, in dealing with, within ourselves and with…with in our fellowships, within our communities of faith, we still have this kind of stuff going on and so these letters, Colossians being the one that were about to read, serve as opportunities to be corrected, to find a path again, to get our NorthStar back and walk in a direction that is profitable for the kingdom of God. And so, we begin Colossians chapter 1 verses 1 through 17 today.
Prayer:
Father, we thank You for Your word. We thank You for this new territory into this letter to the Colossians that we are entering into, we ask that You lead and guide our hearts and we might understand what we need to understand, plant the seeds of the Scriptures in our lives. And may they yield the fruit of the Spirit, that we may have a bountiful harvest not only for our own hearts, may it spill out into our marriages and our families, may it spill over into our faith communities, may it spill out into this world that we may be that city on a hill, that we may be a light in the darkness, that we may illuminate the narrow path that leads to life. Come, Holy Spirit into all of this we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.
Announcements:
dailyaudiobible.com is home base and that’s the website, it’s where you can find out what’s going on around here, how to get connected around here, how to pray for one another. I mean there’s all kinds of resources in the Daily Audio Bible website. You can access all this using the Daily Audio Bible app as well. There is little drawer icon in the upper left-hand corner. So, things like the Daily Audio Bible Shop where there are resources for the journey that we find ourselves on. Now that we’re moving into the final quarter of the year there are a number of resources there in the Daily Audio Bible Shop. Also, the Community section, that is, that is how to get connected. The different social media channels that you can follow Daily Audio Bible on and that is that’s, if you taking the journey, that’s a good thing to do because that allows us to make announcements, etc. etc. and so check that out. The links are all in the Community section.
If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible you can do that at dailyaudiobible.com too. There is a link on the homepage or if you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or if you prefer the mail, the mailing address is P.O. Box 1996 Springhill, Tennessee 37174.
And as always if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app, 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.
Prayer and Encouragements:
Hi, Daily Audio Bible family, this is God’s Life Speaker. I am calling on behalf of my son, Joshua, who you all have prayed for, for years now. He’s 21 and at graduate school and he has been in a state if not well for quite a while and last night I was talking to him and it just broke out into prayer with him and we just need whatever is taking him down, fighting for his soul, to go, to be cast as far as the east is from the west. Family, please let’s stand together for these mental health issues these young people are having in the name of Jesus. We ask that Your mighty hand come over Joshua and anyone that is in need of being delivered from this spiritual realm that is of darkness and they feel they’re in a pit and cannot come above. But You’re there and we love You Lord and you’re allowing this to go through Your hands. In the name of Jesus, we ask that You would deliver these people, bring them up, may they long to love You. May they overcome these things, may they be refined and may they be magnifying Your name. I ask it in Your son’s precious name. Amen.
Good morning DABer family this is the Burning Bush That Will Not Be Devoured for the Glory of our God and our King. I am calling for our sister Alyssa from Montana. Sister, I am praying for you. I prayed for you when I heard your prayer request and for those that didn’t hear, she is legally blind. She had COVID recently and lost her senses of taste and smell, and that is definitely hitting her a hard. My sister, I want you to know that I prayed for you and I believe that the same God who raised the dead can restore your senses. And so, Father God, I pray Oh Lord, that you restore her senses and…and give her just divine healing of her body that she will be whole, Father. And God, I thank You Oh Lord, because you love Alyssa and I pray that you just guide her as she awaits Your miracle. Thank You God for miracle after miracle in the name of Jesus I pray, Amen. We love you, my sister. May God bless and keep you and cause His face to shine upon you and give you peace and giver you your sense of smell and give you your sense of taste. God Bless, bye.
Hello there, DAB family. I love this community. Thank you so much. This is my first time. I just wanted to reach out to my Aussie friend there, in Canada. But my Aussie friend there that just requested prayer for his, I believe it’s his brother or friend. I know about mental illness. My mother had schizophrenia so, it is very difficult to have a loved one with this illness and just pray protection over him, bring him home Lord Jesus. Bring him to his place of peace, Lord and just comfort him right now, in his grief Oh Lord. The grief, can sometimes overwhelm but you have given us peace, so bring him to that place. Lord Jesus, and I also want to pray for the mom that reached out from Wyoming. I pray for wisdom and strength for your daughter to make the right decision. That she will just know from your wisdom as a mother, that she would listen to you and open her heart to take Godly advice. I pray Father that she will make the right decision. I also would love prayer for my…my daughter in Australia and my son, who are now not talking to me. They’re just going through, they’re adult children, they’re going through hard time with this pandemic. Just please pray that God would touch their hearts and they would come back to Him. Bless you all. I love you all.
Hello Daily Audio Bible family. This is Becky in Orlando and I would like for all of our Daily Audio Bible prayer warriors to come and circle around our new sister in the Daily Audio Bible family. Her name is Myra, she’s from New Jersey and I just met her in one of our hotels. Myra has been dealing with some horrible things that have happened to her where she just got attacked while she was in New Jersey. And she’s dealing now with PTSD. And if we could just pray for Myra. Anyway, I’ll start us off, Dear God, if you could please send the Blessed Comforter, the Holy Spirit, to tend to Myra, to give her comfort that only Jesus can give to her, to mend her wounds, both psychologically and spiritually. And, we know that this can be done because You are just the most amazing God and I pray that she listens to the Daily Audio Bible everyday and that it brings her comfort. And I pray that anybody else that’s listening to this would be able to get just the word that Jesus knows and God’s knows, the Holy Spirit knows all the plans that we have that He has for our lives. Sometimes the picture, we can’t see the big picture but He has such big plans and we don’t understand what His plans are for us at the time. So, please allow God’s plans to you know to unfold in her life and I pray that she just keeps on listening. So, Myra, from New Jersey, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible family and God Bless you, my sister. Alright, thanks Daily Audio Bible prayer warriors around the world. Alright, bye.
Hello, this is Nelly. I just want to let you all know that I’m praying for you all. And it’s such an encouragement to be part of this Community. I just pray that you also pray for me as I’m struggling with very dark and depressing thoughts. It’s been such a struggle. I haven’t been able to sleep. I’m just asking for prayer, thank you. I love you all.