Leviticus 4:1-5:19, Mark 2:13-3:6, Psalm 36:1-12, Proverbs 10:1-2
Today is the 17th day of February, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It is wonderful to be here with you today, greetings once again, from the holy city of Jerusalem. We spent our day in and around Jerusalem yesterday. Today, we will be heading into the lowlands, but ending up back here in Jerusalem tonight. This has been a whirlwind; this is our second to the last day of the tour. So, tomorrow a big day, long day, but it concludes our tour and that has kind of flown by, as it does; feels like we’ve been here for a good six weeks but we don’t want to miss anything. And so, it’s drinking from a fire hose and packing it all in, but it is wonderful to be here with you today and we’ll talk about all that in a little bit. But we are here around the Global Campfire, all over the world together, to take the next step forward. We began the book of Leviticus yesterday and then we read the first three chapters of Leviticus. Today, Leviticus 4 and 5.
Commentary:
Okay, so, we talked quite a bit about sin today in the book of Leviticus. And one thing that we can notice right off the bat, is that God was being extraordinarily intentional about keeping the cost of sin clear, that it had a cost. And so, we went through the tedium of how a sacrifice had to be given, where blood had to be sprinkled, and what fingers had to be dipped, and what horns of the altar and all of this stuff. We can kind of like just tune out, like thank God we’re not doing that anymore because…because we claim the blood of Christ over our sin. So, it’s almost easy to get to Leviticus and go, man, I do not relate and that’s where the journey ends, like I was saying at the beginning. But that would really be missing the point; sin against God has always been what estranges us from God. Like, that’s been the story since the second day we started reading the Bible this year, since we’re back in the garden of Eden. And that truth, which is still true today, is being woven into the fabric of this new culture that is being formed in the wilderness among the children of Israel. So, sin required a sacrifice and going through that process was tedious. So, we can wonder like, seriously, God, the Almighty God is this bloodthirsty, He needs all this blood from all these animals, He needs to smell it? Like, is He really like that? I would have to say no, He’s not. Sin destroys people and so, in this context, sin would destroy God’s chosen people, that has not changed, sin, like look around you. Sin leads to death and destruction, in this culture that is being formed in the wilderness that is being baked in, like impossible to miss because it’s so much of the ritual and procedure of any given day. We, like we don’t have to do that. And so, it’s easy for us to not even pay a attention to what we’re doing and the impact that it’s having on us and those around us. For them, at the inauguration of this people, it is embedded as a foundational truth and view of who they are and how to live. We read it as instructions in the book of Leviticus but if we step back and think about the practicality that is, like going to your flock, and I know some of us have flocks, but most of us probably don’t have flocks, but we choose the spotless one, the perfect one, the one you’ve raised, maybe since it was born. And you lead the sheep, or this animal and you walk with it and you get to the place of sacrifice, and you put your hands upon its head and a blade is unsheathed and its blood is spilled, and you realize that this is happening because of your own transgression. That’s, that’s more stark and it’s supposed to be that stark, because sin is deadly. This is one of the things that the Bible repeatedly teaches us. And we can still have our, kinda our arms folded and be like yeah, I don’t know, like that’s pretty harsh. And then we find ourselves immediately going, I don’t like this procedure and then we realize we’re judging what God laid out to teach the people and we forget that there is no need for a sin offering if there isn’t sin. Like, if the people were transgressing, then there would be no sacrifice. So, it’s not the sacrifice that God’s all interested in, its holy people, set apart from sin, and holy unto Him, to reveal Him, that He’s after. Now we claim Jesus to be the sacrifice once and for all, destroying the claims of sin in our lives and that’s a beautiful thing, but it’s easy enough for us to forget that that cost something and we just moved through that story, as we were concluding the book of Matthew, just days ago. So, it should be fresh in our minds. The thing that destroys the bond of fellowship between us and God, is sin. It’s deadly, it can tear our world apart and not put it back together. So, let’s keep that in mind, not only to meditate upon in our own lives, but also, as we continue to take steps forward in the book of Leviticus.
Prayer:
So, Father, we…we thank You for Your word and this stark reminder today, that the decisions that we make, and the actions that we take have impact, impact on our own lives and souls, and impact on those around us. And You have invited us into Your story to be a holy people, that we might reveal You and Your kingdom and Your holiness to the world. Help us to remember, we ask, Jesus name. Amen.
Commentary:
Okay, so, I was mentioning we’re going into the lowlands today, but yesterday we spent the day around the old city of Jerusalem, and we got a lot of lessons on congestion and maneuvering and in Jerusalem itself, and it's…it’s as if one day in Jerusalem takes twice the energy of one day anywhere else, just because of the jostling and that’s just the difficulty in navigating around things. And there’s always something going on and always something to move around and so, whether it’s road construction or whatever. It’s a congested city with small streets and a lot of people and a lot of vehicles and that’s a recipe, for, for a lot of chaos in a lot of, a lot of different ways. And so, just maneuvering around it, it’s just daily life in the big city. That’s what we got to experience what that’s like, but we got to see everything we wanted to see and that was spectacular. So, we began our day going up on top of the Temple Mound. Seeing the Dome of the Rock, walking around, it’s really, it’s really something. It’s iconic, for sure. But there’s just all kinds of things to think about, certainly thinking about the temple, certainly thinking about the ancient people and how they lived and how Jerusalem developed over different periods of time in Jewish history. And…and just how the Dome of the Rock came to be. Just all of it. And so, we walked around and processed all of that and then moved out from the Temple Mound, down through the Muslim quarter and kind of circling back through the checkpoint to where the Western Wall is, and then kind of exiting back out the way we came in, so that we crossed the street over to the archaeology that is being done on the city of David, the earliest archaeology of ancient Jerusalem. Even some archaeology going back to Canaanite times, when the city would’ve been Jebus, but mostly centered around the establishment of the city of David. After King David concurred Jebus and made it the City of David and the development that happened there with the first palace and kind of the government buildings and the establishment of the city and then preparations for the temple, which David’s son Solomon built the first Temple, so that is pretty remarkable. I’ve been there before, many years ago, but much archaeology has been done and is ongoing and restoring as much of the original City of David as…as is possible. And so, that…that was really great. We ended up walking down and then through, there’s a couple of tunnels, that were waterways into ancient Jerusalem. So, the way that David concurred the city was through a waterway and that still exists, from that time. That’s got a lot of water in it, and you can do that, but we went through Hezekiah’s tunnel, which was a from the time of Hezekiah. So, maybe around 700 years before Jesus. Hezekiah was a great King, reforming King, and so, he…he established a lot of things, including water access and the strengthening of the walls, the Assyrian Empire had come and destroyed the northern kingdom. And so, they were preparing, as well as expanding, and we get to appreciate some of that. And then getting all the way to the pool of Siloam, which we…we can locate Jesus at, in the Scriptures. And that is actually become much more of an active archaeological venture. The steps going into the pool, some…some of the steps going into the pool had been found a while back. And so, that’s something that can definitely be visited, and you can…you can see how the steps went down into the pool. But now, I guess, the way that I understood it, the person who kind of owned the rest of the pool, well, wasn’t really willing to sell the land and so it was just kind of bush and trees and stuff like that. But they finally did. And so, they’ve moved into gear and digging up and restoring the archaeology of the entire pool of Siloam. So, that was really cool. But just in general, being able to archaeologically see some of the original stuff going on as Jerusalem was established as this focal capital city, with the temple of God in it, that's…that’s special. After that, we made our way back to the Western Wall. Some people call that the Wailing Wall, it’s because of the prayer that is generally always happening there. There are plenty times, I guess, when it’s empty, early in the morning, like when we were going on the Temple Mound, we could see the Western Wall, and there were definitely people praying there, but not a lot. I guess that’s just kinda comes and goes and depends on what time it is, but we were able to go in, and pray at the wall. The women and the men are segregated there, so the women pray on one side of it and the men on the other. I always enjoy going…going and praying at the wall. I really just have one prayer, like I go there like, what am I supposed to say. Like this is a place where people have been crying out to God for a long time, for a lot of things, and what words can I say. And I guess it’s a place that I go, that has had so much prayer happening there, that it’s like, do I just pray for my needs, and the needs of my family. And so, usually I have one word to say there and that is help, help, help us Lord, help us see. Help us. So, we…we prayed there and then walked up into the Jewish quarter, which is more than one flight of stairs, it’s a good climb of stairs to get up to the top there, were we found some lunch. It’s kind of cold, little bit rainy, thankfully it wasn’t like blowing wind and heavy rain, but it was a little chilly. And so, we got lunch and just kind of collected ourselves. And then moved toward our…our…our final destination for the day. The pools of Bethesda, where Jesus healed a man who had been waiting for 38 years. And He asked him do you want to be made well; do you want to be made whole. And we thought about that and thought about the journey that we’ve been through from the wilderness to the Galilee, to the coast, to Mount Carmel, to Jerusalem to Bethlehem, like all the places that we’ve been. And how so much of that boils down to that question that Jesus asked, do you want to be made whole? So, we spent some time there. We also went into St. Anne’s church, which is right there at the pools of Bethesda, this is a Crusader era church, that’s got remarkable acoustics. So, Jill sang for us, and we sang with her, feeling the heavenly reverberations of that space bouncing all around us and echoing. Before heading back, to catch our buses, which give us a little bit of a challenge, some road closures, some protests closing some roads about different political things. Same kind of stuff that we see in probably all of our countries, from time to time. And so, we had to do a little bit of walking to find a way to get picked up, but once we did, we navigated back to the hotel for the evening. So, fantastic day in Jerusalem around the old city. And we’re going to the lowlands today and I’m looking forward to that, and I’m looking forward to telling you about it, after it happens. Thank you for your continued prayers. Tomorrow is the last day of our journey, our pilgrimage together. And so, not only do we ask for your prayers over that, as we walk in the footsteps of Jesus final days, but also all of the packing and preparation and…and airports, and flights that are long and jostling around, and immigration and customs, and reentry and then reverse jet lag, trying to get back onto our home schedule and I just full hearts. All of the stuff that goes with that, just ask for your prayers, as we begin to think about those things. And we appreciate it very much.
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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.
Prayer and Encouragements:
Good morning, this is Feddie from Florida. I’m so excited to be a part of this ministry with DAB, it has really been a blessing in my life. And I want to pray for Webster, from Tennessee. He gave a request, back on January the 8th. He was a man that talked about how he understands everything analytically and does really wanting to hear from God and to know that he has faith to believe God, in the midst of all that he’s going through. So, Webster, just want to let you know that God loves you with an everlasting love. Yes, just continue just to tune in and listen and hear and He’ll speak to your heart because you are so important to Him. So, sometimes we look at this like being like rocket science, but it really isn’t. He’ll even come to you in the still of the night and just speak a word to your heart, your soul, your mind, your spirit, so that you know that the Lord is with you. So, Father, I pray Lord God, that You will just open up Webster’s understanding. God, breath on him, Lord God, let him know that You hear his cries, You hear his prayers and that You’re with him. And God, I just pray that You’ll just give him an experience with You, like never before. Move by Your power, Your might, Your Spirit, in Webster’s life. Lord God, I declare new beginnings and that he’ll understand You in such a real way, Lord God, that You’ll just make Yourself known to him, through Your word, through even dealing with him, heart, mind, body, soul, and spirit. And God, I just plead the blood of Jesus that You will cover him and keep him. In Jesus name I pray. Amen and Amen. Have a blessed and wonderful day DABers. Bye Bye.
Hello Daily Audio Bible Family, this is Michael from London. I wanna go back to the 8th of February and a request lifted up by Webster from Tennessee about faith, or he believes he has a lack of faith. And as I listened to his recording, he is showing faith by actually calling in and asking people to pray for him. So, I want to read out, Hebrews 11 verse 1 for Webster. And it says this Webster, now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. So, you have cried out to people, all around the world, people that you may never see, including myself, for faith. We’re gonna pray for you right now and that for anyone else who is struggling with their faith at this time, we know that Lord will hear our prayers and will do what He needs to do in our lives. Lord God Almighty, we give You thanks and praise for today. We give You thanks and praise for Webster, Lord God, and his request, Lord God, for more faith. Let him know, oh God, that he has more faith than he recognizes. He has faith as a mustard seed and that will grow to be the biggest of trees that will grow in his life to be something fundamental that will change, not only his life, but people around him. So, I pray Your blessing, oh God, strengthen, oh God, with Your words. Encourage him, oh God, that there are people all around the world praying for him, lifting him up. And anyone else, oh God, who is hearing this prayer, who is struggling with their faith, we pray Father, that they would just look to You, the author and finisher of their faith, oh God. That’s where their faith will come from. And their faith will increase and rise. So, we give You all the praise and glory right now, oh God, and bless us we ask. In Your wonderful and precious name. Thank you everybody, have a great day. God bless. Bye Bye.
Hi, DABer family, my name is Lori, calling from Telu, Mexico but I also go by Tipsy for Jesus and I just felt compelled to call. This is my first time. Calling, thank you Brian and the entire family and staff for your beautiful ministry. There was a woman who called in on February 8th, her name was Erica from San Francisco. And I had to call because she had lost her mother last August and we have a very similar story because my mother had been pouring into me, her entire life, basically. Because she wanted to see me saved. She wanted to see me follow God and His Son, Christ Jesus. So, I had to call in and give you encouragement and let you know that, that is my testimony. My mom went home to be with the Lord in 2015 and it was only until then that that’s what brought me out of my lukewarmness and really made me, the Lord’s used that to testify to my heart because of the pain of losing such a beautiful mother. And so, I wanna see your testimony fall in the same exact steps, because it is not a coincidence that your mother wanted the same thing for you and your seeking. And so, I don’t want to pray for you but instead I want to bath you with some scriptures. And the first one is James 1:17, every good and perfect gift if from above coming down from the Father of the heavenly lives, with whom there is no change or shifting shadows. God is giving you this beautiful gift in your mother. So, please rejoice, please know that your mother is in the a very presence of the Lord, of Christ, and of the almighty God. And she wanted the same thing for you too. 1 Peter 5:7, I found this scripture after my mom passed. She wrote it down on a little note, it’s taped to my Bible, and it says, cast your cares upon Him, for He cares for you. Our almighty sovereign God and our Lord Jesus Christ, cares for your pain. They want to comfort you, they want to be there for you. And hopefully, this pain that you’re feeling right now, is going to move you to …
Good day, Daily Audio Bible family. It’s PQ and I’m calling in response to Daniel the Whole Hearted from North Carolina, rap for Renzo. Daniel I have one word, in response to your rap and that is BARS. That was a great rap. And I totally agree, and I add my faith to yours Renzo. All you now need is a dope beat and to walk that thing out. Praise the Lord. So, Father, I lift up Renzo and I thank You for this rap that Daniel created for Renzo. And I pray, Father God, that he will continue to live up to each and every line of that rap. I pray that You would anoint him from on high, to be and to do, all that You have called him to. Father God, I thank You for Renzo’s transparency, I thank You for his passion, for his love, for You and for this community. And I pray, Father God, that You would equip him and continue to bless him with wisdom beyond his age. And that You will continue to just be a shield around him and continue to give him the wisdom, Lord God, that he needs to be the man of God, that You have called him to be in the earth. Let him continue to speak Your words to his generation and to be an example to his generation and above all, I pray, Father God, that when he speaks, that You will let them hear it. In Jesus name. Amen.
Hey DAB family, this is Byron out in Florida. I hope you guys are doing well. So, Lent is coming up soon. Which is a very interesting time. I was not raised in the Christian tradition that observed Lent, had no idea what it was all about, until I started listening to the DAB years ago. Brian, observed it, as well as other parts of what they call, the Christian calendar. And eventually, I began to embrace it myself. And tried different things from Lent, and it’s lead to some of the most impactful fuel of my life. I’ve gotten out of practice of it over the last couple years and I want to get back into it. And, over the years, I transitioned from thinking of Lent as like, me giving up something, towards me doing something. And I try to pray about it beforehand, to figure out what I should do and this year, the plan is, I’m going to listen to every single second and hour of the community prayers that are aired once a weekend, in addition to the rest of the DAB prayers and readings. With the way my life is now, it’s a fight just to have enough time to listen to the DAB readings and the daily prayers, let alone multiple hours of community prayers. I don’t work a job where I could just play it in the background. And I want to be intentional in my listening. So, I have no idea how I’m going to work this out, but it’s something that I plan on doing and I covet your guy’s prayers in that regard. So, that I can fully engage into it and I also recommend that you guys pray over it too. If the Lord wants, you to commit to something for that period leading up to Resurrection Sunday. It’s lead to some really lasting and impactful changes for me, and I hope if you try, it does for you too. Love you all, praying for you all. Take care.