Exodus 12:14-13:16, Matthew 20:29-21:22, Psalms 25:16-22, Proverbs 6:12-15
Today is the 31st day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian it’s great to be here with you today. It’s kind of a little mini celebration day, right? Because here we are about to complete the first of 12 months. And there has never been a January 31st…well…I shouldn’t say ever cause I can’t remember every January 31st but in the last long while many many many years we get to January 31st and I’m like, “how did we get here so fast. We just…it was just Christmas.” And the funny thing, at least for me in this rhythm is that we get to December and I’m like, “how did we get here so fast?” Where did the year go? It’s almost Christmas.” And time…sometimes it feels less linear and more porous…like it’s sometimes moving fast and sometimes moving slow but however it is we got here. Here we are, the last day of the first month of the year. And as we approach the last day of this first month of the year, we are reaching the conclusion of one of the episodes in this long story of the children of Israel. There’s been this showdown because the children of Israel have been enslaved in Egypt for 400 years, for four centuries. There’s nobody alive there that has any other identity than that of a slave. And God has decided to set His people free and continue forward the story of the promise of a land for His chosen people. And, so, we’re reading from the Common English Bible this week. Exodus chapter 12 verse 14 through 13 verse 16.
Commentary:
Okay. So, as we end our first month together of this year let’s just kind of look back at where we’ve come from, especially in the book of Genesis and Exodus. And we’ve kind of recapped all along the way because it’s so important, as I’ve said the number of times, to remember this is the same story, the story of a family of people. And, so, we know that that begins with Abraham. And then we know Isaac and Jacob and we’ll probably recall that Jacob’s name was changed to Israel, and Israel had children. The children of Israel. And then went all the way through the story of Joseph with a lot for us to consider about our own lives and we followed all the way through Joseph’s life until his death. And then we flip the page out of Genesis and into Exodus, but we flipped the page a couple hundred years into the future. Now this is a massive amount of people. They’ve been in one place for centuries and they have procreated. They have replicated. They have grown in numbers tremendously until the Egyptians were afraid. They enslaved the children of Israel, and they were slaves. So, when Moses shows up on the scene, a little baby in the Nile River, and is raised up and educated as a royal but then has to flee for killing an Egyptian and he meets God in a burning bush, it’s a different chapter, but it’s the same story of the same people. And we watched Moses try to get out of his assignment, but he has obeyed and he has confronted Pharaoh and things only got worse before they got better, which is often a recurring theme in the stories found in the Scriptures. We, in a time in the world and in cultures where instant gratification is like pounded down our throats as something that’s a right, something that we deserve, often miss the fact that there is a long view, there is a lot going on, there is much going on that we don’t understand. And, so, we are compelled to trust, to humble ourselves and follow. And, so, we have watched the showdown between Pharaoh and God, and we have watched Pharaoh be very obstinate. “Who is the Lord? I don’t know the Lord. I’m not listening to you.” And even once he knows who the Lord is he’s constantly going back on his promise to let the people go or he’s trying to change the terms of how they’re go, or when they’re gonna, or how long they’re gonna be gone because Pharaoh’s in an awkward position. Pharaoh has been raised to believe that he is a son of the gods, that he is a deity to be worshiped himself. And although Egypt may have many gods, the God of the Hebrews isn’t one of the gods of Egypt. So, there is no foreign lesser God coming into Egypt and demanding things. And this hardens Pharaoh’s heart in the same way that our hearts can grow hard when somebody comes in and tells us what we’re going to do, somebody we don’t know, somebody we may not have any respect for and they demand we’re going to do something a certain way, our hearts can become hard, like resistant. “No. you’re not going to tell me what to do.” And, so, Pharaoh carries that out all the way until the end, until final plaque and the firstborn of Egypt die. And then they throw this family, the Israelites, the children of Israel, they throw them out, of Egypt. And as they’re leaving, they ask for things and they are loaded down with the riches as they pillage Egypt on their way out the door. And that is the ground that we have covered in the Old Testament in the first month of the year. And as I’ve said we’re paying close attention to this so that we can understand, this is the same family, this is the same story.
Even when we go into the book of Matthew and go millennia into the future, it’s still the same people. It’s still the same family. Jesus has come to this family, the children of Israel. And their religious leaders are opposed to the very one who set them free from slavery.
As we continue into our second month we will see these children of Israel move into the wilderness. And the wilderness is such a stark thing but it’s also a major backdrop for so many of the pivotal and developmental things that happen in the Bible. And, so, as we go forward we’ll be heading to the wilderness.
Prayer:
Father, we thank You for this first month of the year and that we’ve been able to be here every day and that we’ve been able to take steps forward together. And just looking back over this month You have spoken so much. So much has been challenged. So much has been comforted. So much in one month. And, so, we are eager. We are hungry and thirsty for more and we ask that You lead and guide us into all truth and we ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.
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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:
Hey, God’s awesome warriors it’s Sparky. I wanted to call in a praise report in a…in a weird way. I’d called in about not going and helping across the alley and I got a phone call last night and it was pretty late, and it was my friend that I’d grown up with my entire life. We’re from Texas and we were…we used to ride bulls together and we just grew up together. But when my life kind of went South we…we didn’t talk much after that. And it’s been probably a good four or five years since I’ve spoken to him. And he had an electrical problem. And, so, went out and got he and his wife fixed up and their new baby. And the heater wasn’t running. And he just thought the world of that. But I’ll tell you what, I thought the world of getting to see my friend. And we sat there and caught up and he talked about how I’d kind of gotten myself into mess. And I said, yeah, I can take that now. And I tell him, it’s God’s blessings. Sometimes things just happen that are really cool and it’s not a “praise me”, it’s “praise him” to get to see a friend.
Hi Daily Audio Bible I am really struggling today. My father passed away Friday a few days ago. Today’s Tuesday and we’re burying him on Saturday, and I have school all week. And my mom passed away two years ago. And I’m just feeling so alone and overwhelmed. I’ve got an important test on Friday before his visitation and funeral this following weekend and work and I just ask for your prayers. I’m just feeling like I don’t know what I’m supposed to do and that really questioning my life that I’ve done anything close to what God had for me. So, just pray that I can find the path for what God has for me to do next and that I will end this will life well myself. Thank you.
Hi Daily Audio Bible chronological family I’m calling from Oregon and I would like to get prayer for a trailer that I need to have sold. I cosigned for someone for a camp trailer and a family member that passed away. So now the responsibility has fallen on me. And I’m retired on a limited income and I’m believing the Lord to help me get this sold. It's…it’s in an RV place on consignment. So, I would appreciate prayer for that. This is my first time of evert calling in and my first time of following this group. So, thank you and God bless you. Bye-bye.
Hello DAB family DABalonians it is doctor John from Jordan New York. I just want to put a word out to all the new DABbers and welcome you and tell you great job getting here. This is a fantastic journey. For those of you that are new Christians, this is the best place to be. There’s nothing better in your Christian walk than learning the Bible. So, back in the day, way way way way way back when, when we were young DABalonians and Brian was talking a lot about the process, he called it, “the journey is the destination.” So, that as we go through the Bible, and…and those of you who’ve been through it know, that the destination is not December 31st and just getting through the Bible. The destination is the journey of going through the whole Bible. So, stay with it. Stick with it. You will not be the same. I am not the same as I was when I started in this 15 years ago. So, you love you DAB. Love you family. Make it a great day. Keep it real y'all. Bye-bye.
Hey DAB family I’m just calling to say praise the Lord. I just feel so alive and happy, and the Spirit has just filled me full of happiness. I have no idea why. I’m just feeling like life is just full of whatever you want it to be. Just stepping outside breathing in the negative 14 degree weather here in Minnesota just makes you smile. God bless you all. This is Faith from Minnesota.