Leviticus 22:17-23:44, Mark 9:30-10:12, Psalms 44:1-8, Proverbs 10:19
Today is the 28th day of February welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian It’s great to be here with you today. You know what this is? The last day of the second month of our journey. So, we are…we are out in the deep, and we will continue to sail across the year, but we’re two months in, and that is amazing. Well done. If you’ve made it this far, you’re probably gonna make it and what a joy it’s gonna be to uncover all of the different landmarks that we get to see along the way. So, let’s dive in and take the next step forward. We’re reading from the Evangelical Heritage Version this week and picking up in the book of Leviticus. Today chapter 22 verse 17 through 23 verse 44.
Commentary:
Alright. A couple of things for us to consider today. Let’s start in the gospel of Mark. We encountered a story that we saw also in the Gospel of Matthew and that was, “who’s the greatest?” Like the disciples are walking along and “who is the greatest?” And in the gospel of Mark, they’re kind of debating among themselves who’s the greatest. And let’s face it, we think about these kinds of things in our modern culture and era. Who’s the greatest? And it’s something that we are kind of pushed to aspire, to be the best that we can be and maybe that could be the greatest. And although by our cultural standards that may be true that does not seem to be the criteria of the kingdom of heaven. So, Jesus answers the question and let’s let it be the answer. “If anyone” …and I’m quoting Jesus…if anyone wants to be first, you will be the last of all, and the servant of all.” And we could interpret that a couple of ways. We could say the person that wants to be the greatest, the first is the person who humbles themselves and becomes the servant of his brothers and sisters around him. A humble posture willing to serve and help in any way possible. That would be a posture that was represented and demonstrated by Jesus. We could also look at it and say if anyone wants to be first, he will be the last of all and the servant of all. In other words, if your aspiration and your goal is to drive yourself into first above all, so that you are looking down upon others, well then where that ends up is that you will be humbled, right? And, so, we get the idea here that we can humble ourselves, or we can be humbled, and it won’t be the last time that we…we touch on this. And then Jesus after saying that, He brings some children near Him and says, “whoever welcomes one of these little children in My name welcomes Me, and whoever welcomes Me welcomes not just Me but also Him who sent Me.” And, so, again we saw this in the Gospel of Matthew. It’s important for us to understand that faith requires trust. And the picture, the example used for us is the way that a child trusts. And that is really a wonder. I mean, those of you that are parents and have raised children it really is a wonder. And it’s a really really hard to thing actually to begin to teach your children that not everybody can be trusted, and that this world has challenges and…and see them interacting and begin…beginning to learn these things. It’s really profound. Yes, they need to know these things to exist in this world, but it’s so backward to the way things are supposed to be. So, think of your own childhood. Some of you have done really big deep dives with years of therapy and some of you have…rarely really think about it…it’s in the past, but it formed us, and we came into this world with trust and somewhere along the line, whether very early or later on in our childhood we began to understand that not everybody’s trustworthy. And when we look back at it, we know something was lost along the way. Like, can you imagine if we didn’t have those kinds of traumas in our lives? If trusting was the normal way of things not taking things suspiciously, but actually everything is trustworthy? Everything is true? Everyone is true? That would be like the kingdom. And, so, we are given this example to remind ourselves that as we walk this faith journey, we must trust God like a little child.
And then lastly, let’s move the Proverbs because…well…so often there’s a sentence which is the case today, a sentence that says an awful lot and it’s an awful lot that’s said at a good time. This being the last day of the second month we’re about to turn the page move into a brand-new month in a brand-new reset and these words can carry us through. “When there are many words, sin never stops, but a person who restrains his lips acts wisely.” And we’ve doing what we can to make wisdom a category as we seek from the Scriptures the truths that we need for our lives. These words that we read here from Proverbs are such truths that we need for our lives, and it really applies because we are in a culture now, especially the era, the age of social media where it seems that everybody needs to share words on what they think about every single possible thing that happens in their lives all of the time out without stop. It’s constant. But maybe what wisdom is telling us is to restrain our lips, seek wisdom, and say what needs to be said and love and respect, reflecting the master.
Prayer:
Father, we thank You for Your word. We thank You for the counsel and instruction. We thank You for the examples that we can carry with us into the new month, and we must trust in You as a little child would. If we want to be great, we need to learn how to be a servant and humble. And if we want to veer away from things that are not wise and away from sin, then we need to pay attention to what’s coming out of our mouth. Very very valuable insight and wisdom planted in our lives today. And, so, Holy Spirit come into all of this as we move forward and allow these things to stick with us. Bring them up when we’re about to take and make a misstep. We pray this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.
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And that is it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here tomorrow.
Community Prayer and Praise:
Hello everybody my name is Sean from London England in the UK. I guess I’m reaching out today to ask for prayer surrounding my drinking habits. I’m not dependent as such but I can’t seem to stop bingeing on alcohol which can lead to me walking the streets and trying to get hold of drugs. Like last night I had a drink and thought I could control it. So, I kept drinking and lo and behold I ended up walking around the streets looking for drugs asking homeless people for drugs and at the same time drawing them into situations. I…I just can’t seem to find the strength to sort myself out. It’s very frustrating that I listen to the Daily Audio Bible every day, I attend my local church. And I know I must draw on the power of the Lord and His strength because my strength is not enough, but it seems like I know all the right answers, yet I don’t do what needs to be done. Just as it says in the Bible, why do I do the things that I don’t want to do, and I don’t do the things that I want to do. I can be a great person, you know, I’ve got so many great things going for me, but I guess I’m just feeling sorry for myself. It’s the old adage of poor me poor me pour me a drink. Anyway, I do listen every day and I do pray for people. I always listen to the prayers at the end. And yeah, I’ve taken a step today to reach out and ask for prayer, so I know prayer is very powerful. Anyway. Thank you, Brian. Thank you, China. Thank you, Jill. Ezekiel and yeah God bless you all appeared all the best. This is Sean from London UK. Goodbye.
Hi everyone, it’s Armand from Spain first time recording. First of all, I wanted to thank Brian and all his team for this amazing job. And I have been listening to Daily Audio Bible since one year ago more or less. I’ve been listening almost every day. I would like to pray to Jesus Christ to give us encouragement and patience to be able to live in this very godless world in a godly way. That’s something that I’ve been struggling with everyday waking up going to school teaching and seeing what we have around us. And itt is a big struggle. When you have in your mind the responsibility and the faith to live to walk in God’s way in the path that Jesus Christ has chosen for us while at the same time you have to face everything that you see around you. So, yeah. I would like to pray for that, especially when you have kids, that’s when you start to really take all of this very seriously. And I’m quite disturbed for the future of my kids. They are still very little. They’re just babies but yeah, I’m praying for…for godly future. Although everything I'm…I’m quite pessimissing…pessimistic right now regarding the world. But let’s pray for that. And yeah, thank you for…for this great community. Bye.
Hi Daily Audio Bible this is Alena from Delray Beach Jesus Worshipper originally from Ukraine. So, with all of those things happening I just wanted to ask for you to join me in prayer for my home country and for the people of Ukraine and also for the people of Russia and for my heart being healed. Heavenly Father just like Hezekiah Lord I pray that our president and all the authorities are going to pray to You and our president is actually God’s chosen. He’s also from the Jewish people. Lord I pray that You will stir up their heart and they…they gonna see like You see and they’re gonna humiliate themselves to the point of just relying toward You. We don’t have the army, we don’t have anything Lord. We don’t have anything comparing to like Assyria…Russia right now is acting toward us like Assyria did. They just came over and took over our land. So, Lord I just pray the country of Ukraine is going to be so humble that all they’re gonna rely on is You, they gonna understand where they help comes from. I don’t pray for peace Lord I pray for more Ukrainian and more Russian people are going to be saved. I know that Satan wanted to use it for evil but You’re gonna use it for good. And I pray Lord that Your will be done in Ukraine and in Russia. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
High DAB family this is Joy Bubble calling to encourage Jimmy who called in. I heard what you had to say today and I just wanted to tell you that I hear you and I know what it feels like to be in a season where you feel lonely and disconnected from your faith community and not knowing what God has next. But I just wanted to encourage you to persevere because God knows the desires of your heart. He knows you inside and out and He’s a good Father who won’t give you a stone when you ask Him for bread. And I wanted to encourage you to draw…to continue to draw near to Him and continue to fellowship and even reach out to other people and…and initiate that fellowship and draw near to God because He promises in his word that He will draw near to you. In Hebrews 10:36 it says for you have need of endurance so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised for yet a little while and the coming one will come and will not delay but my righteous one shall live by faith and if he shrinks back my soul has no pressure in him. But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed but of those who have faith and preserve their souls. So, I wanted to encourage you don’t shrink back. Persevere. God loves you and He sees you and we’re all here praying for you and reading for you, and He will be faithful to you because He is always faithful and He’s always been faithful before and He’ll be faithful again. So, I just want to pray for you. Lord I pray for Jimmy. I pray that You’ll give him Your joy in his heart and Your purpose and that You will help him press forth and be bold and that You will give him faith to fight back and persevere in Your name…
Hello, Global Campfire this is Miss Andra Southwest Florida. This prayer is for Jimmy on the East Coast. Father God, we praise You and we glorify You and we give You all thanks and glory, honor, and we lift up Jimmy from the East Coast to You. He is in a dry dry place. He feels down and out, and he feels emotionally dry and spiritually dry. And it just seems he can’t get out of it. So, Father God we lift him up to You. We ask Father God that You remove everything that is not of You, everything that sets itself against You Father God we ask that You get rid of it and we place it with Your joy, Your mercy, Your comfort, Your peace. And God I pray that You’d give him the desires of his heart, that You would give him heart for You Lord God, heart that just cannot get enough of Your word and Your song and Your mercy. And Lord God I pray that Jimmy’s angels would surround him to encourage him. And Father God I pray that You would send messengers to him that would encourage him, people who are like minded. And Lord God I pray that You would open the doors for him. So, for him to find his purpose, seek his purpose. And Lord I pray that You would use him in a mighty way as he’s going through this tough turmoil. We know that it’s going through these hard times is when we find…we find You even closer Lord God, we find the answers. So, I pray that You would open his eyes and his ears and that he would seek You and reach out to others and help them as he’s going through this. Bless him and give him peace and grace and mercy in Jesus’ name. Amen.