2 Chronicles 1:1-3:17, Romans 6:1-23, Psalms 16:1-11, Proverbs
19:20-21
Today is the 20th day of July welcome to the Daily
Audio Bible I am Brian and it is an honor and a joy to be here with you today
as we settle into this brand-new week that we’ve got before us. And in the
Scriptures yesterday we concluded the book of first Chronicles. So, that
obviously means we’ll be beginning the book of second Chronicles today.
Introduction to the book of Second Chronicles:
And as we’ve already talked about at length as we were going
through Samuel and Kings and first Chronicles, this delineation, like there’s
nothing to really describe here as far as like this is the brand-new totally
different context for where were going. It’s the same thing. We just basically
turned the page. These delineations between first and second Chronicles were
for ease of reference. But second Chronicles does begin in the same way that
second Kings does. We finished the reign of King David yesterday. And, so,
David died at a ripe old age as we concluded first Chronicles. And, so, now as
we begin second Chronicles we’re moving into the reign of Solomon and all that
comes next. And I guess I could also say what…what…what I’ve said all along as
we’ve come through this territory, first and second Kings, first and second
Chronicles, they both kind of cover the same stories in the same time period with
the same Kings and the same situations and they sound very, very familiar
because they are very familiar bur they’re just coming from a little bit of a
different perspective whereas first and second Kings is kind of coming from the
royal perspective versus second Chronicles is coming from the priestly
perspective on the same material, the same stories. And, so let’s dive into
another book. We’ll read second Chronicles chapters 1, 2 and 3 today and we’re reading
from the New English Translation this week.
Commentary:
Okay. So, we are, you know, moving into the thick of Romans,
not that Romans doesn’t kind of start out in the thick because it does, but we’ve
been kind of moving through the different arguments or persuasions Paul is
laying out in order to reveal the truth that he’s trying to communicate. And,
so, a number of really important things have happened. Paul has not redefined
the Mosaic law, but put it in a different perspective by saying, “things were
happening on this earth before the law was given and those things were
happening among our people, like our patriarchs, like Abraham, Isaac and Jacob,
whose name became Israel of which we are the children. There was no Mosaic law.
Moses was not going to be born for a long time.” And, so, Paul goes back to
Abraham, the start of it all, the beginning person for the Hebrew people and
said, “he didn’t obey a law. He was circumcised, but not before he was declared
righteous before God because he believed and followed God and trusted God. Like,
his circumcision was a sign of the covenant.” So, Paul in part is trying to
refrain the Mosaic law and saying, “like this isn’t the end all be all. This is
the pathway to righteousness, but nobody can do it. Nobody’s gonna earn their
way into righteousness before God and stand before God righteous and there’s
nothing God can say about it because they just have achieved perfection. And
all of a sudden they are almost divine in the presence of God made righteous
before Him on their own.” Ans, so then Paul argues, “the law is what revealed
our transgressions. Like it was the line in the sand, this measuring rod that
revealed how sinful we are, how rebellious we are toward God because we can’t
achieve it and it exposes that fact. But even while we were estranged, even
while we were enemies of God falling deeper and deeper into the fact that we cannot
possibly achieve a righteous life before God fully and perfected on our own,
even in our inability, even while we were estranged from Him, he wouldn’t let
us go. He came for us to rescue us.” And, so, as we move into today’s reading
then Paul is discussing sin, this essence of rebellion basically, this
interruption of the shalom that God offers and desires for the people of the
earth. I mean, these obvious questions arise then, “okay. So, I don’t have to…I
don’t have to try to become righteous by obeying these rules. These rules are
good and ethical and upright and they provide a context for my life but they
aren't…like I’m not gonna achieve perfection before God and I can’t, but God is
going to make me righteous by His grace. So, sin doesn’t have a place in my
story anymore. So, then I guess I can sin and do whatever I want because it’s
not my own attempt at righteousness that’s going to do anything. It’s God’s
grace that’s gonna do everything.” And, so, Paul’s kind of addressing this, “then
should we keep sinning so that God can show more and more grace?” Of course,
Paul’s like, “absolute not!” He says that a couple of times in our reading
today, “absolutely not, because that sinful nature, that sinful self the
separates us from God estranges us from God, that person was crucified with
Christ so that sin loses its power. We’re not slaves to it anymore”, which
actually kind of confronts us with the…with the fact that we must consider our
reality then because we’re kind of kind of in the same boat knowing when we
have willingly done what we know is wrong and interrupted relationship through
sin. And, so, like we’re constantly aware of our shortcomings. But what Paul’s
trying to reveal here is that sin really isn’t supposed to be category in our
lives anymore because we have been resurrected with Christ and have been made a
new creation. This is where things start getting mind boggling. We are not who
we were before Christ in any way according the apostle Paul. Like the
transformation at the spiritual level, at the essence of our identity, we have
been made new, a new creation. Interrupting the shalom that God offers us,
right, interrupting the relationship that God offers to us isn’t just a
foregone conclusion. For Paul, he’s like, “this all boils down to who you’re going
to obey. You’re going to be a slave or a servant of whatever you obey. So, you
have the choice, the volition to be a slave to sin, but how many more times do you
need to be told where that road goes. It leads to death and destruction. But you
now have a choice as a child of God choose to serve God which leads to
righteousness and eternal life.” And the point is that we don’t have…like we
live our lives, certainly feeling regret and guilt for the transgressions of
our lives. We understand that we are forgiven. We embrace that forgiveness and
step into a relationship with God but then we fall down and then we get up and
we fall down and we get up and over time can accumulate until we have so much
condemnation upon ourselves that we can’t even find the sky anymore. And then
we feel the crush of God’s mercy when we don’t deserve it and we realize how
much He loves us and then we are restored only to maybe repeat the same pattern
over and over and over, like we have one foot in one world and one foot in
another world. And what Paul’s saying like, “you don’t have to do that. Like, it
doesn’t have to be that way. There is a story and it’s called good news and
it’s called the gospel. You are a new creature. You aren’t enslaved to the
darkness in any way. It’s not mandatory that you’re going to just fall down and
have to get up again, you’ve been lifted up as a new creation made righteous
before God. There’s nothing you can ever do to earn this and when you choose to
enslave yourself to the darkness it’s almost like you’re trying to go back and
live within a corpse that is already dead and gone. It’s almost like you are trying
to be a zombie in the darkness. When you do that you are a new creature.” The
picture more fleshed out of what this actually…like the repercussions of this or
the implications of this are fleshed out a lot in the letter to the Ephesians,
which we will get to. And it’s so good. It’s like too good to be true. The good
news is way better news than we may think or have thought. But even when we kind
of see the vista and it comes crashing in and we see it for a second, it still
does become, “how do I practically live this in my everyday life because I sin
every day and it’s not on accident. I do things I know I shouldn’t do. I say
things I know I shouldn’t say. And the Scriptures bear the truth that when I do…like
when I say something I shouldn’t have said to my spouse or to my child or to my
coworker or whoever, I see that that brings darkness that leads to death and
destruction in some way. How do I escape this pattern?” We escape this pattern
like we escape every other pattern, we stop doing the pattern. Like we…I have
been married a long time and I have still found myself unsuccessful on many,
many occasions where I find coming out of my mouth things I should not be
saying and they are not fully things that I mean and they are in the heat of
the moment and I regret them. What do we do with that or any other kind of
transgression? What we do? And we can say, “well I asked God to forgive me. He
forgives me and I move on.” But over time, like these things accumulate and you
just start feeling like you’re a failure in every sort of way. So, what is…what
is the antidote? It’s understanding that God is a God of radical reconciliation.
When we trespass against our brother or sister, we seek reconciliation and
forgiveness. When we have sinned against our neighbor, we restore it, we seek
it out. God, while we were still sinners, while we were the enemies of God,
desired reconciliation and provided it. We’re supposed to do the same thing
every time. And over time, these things accumulate until we are living in the
light with nothing between us or anyone else. We are living in the truth. We
aren’t trying to be right. We aren’t trying to even demand our rights. We are
trying to be the light of the world. It’s a bigger story that we have been
swept into. And may we begin to see that. And may we begin to allow the Holy
Spirit to flesh out, in a very literal way, flesh out within our own flesh what
that’s gonna look like according to our own individual stories and
relationships and locations.
Prayer:
Holy Spirit we invite You. Come Holy Spirit and help us
understand that our failures are not the end of the story. We are moving toward
the light. We are leaving into the fact that we have been created anew at the
most deep level, at the spiritual level. We are new creations. And our mission
is to infect this world with the knowledge of the good news, that we can all be
new creations. There is a totally different way of being upon the earth, one
that is reconciled and made righteous before You our Creator allowing us to
become aware that we are Your children and all of the polarization of the world
that tries to deceive and crush us can’t change the reality that we have been
made new. And we don’t have to live as servants to anyone but You. Come Holy
Spirit. Lead us into all truth we ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.
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And that’s it for today on Brian I love you and I’ll be
waiting for you here tomorrow.
Community Prayer and Praise:
Hi DAB family this is Joe from Pennsylvania. Just calling in
to encourage the brothers and sisters that have been struggling with not
feeling worthy. I’ve heard a lot of prayer requests come in about that and we
just speak to that in Jesus’ name. And I just want to encourage everybody that…that
I struggled with this for a long time. None of us are worthy on our own but
through the power and the blood of Jesus we all become worthy. And that took me
a long time to…to realize and to understand but there’s so many promises in the
word of God. If we are…if we confess our sin, He’s faithful and just to forgive
us and cleanse us or from all unrighteousness. And just…I just want to
encourage everyone that’s struggling with that just to think about the
faithfulness of God. God is not a man that He can lie. And the Bible says to
come boldly to the throne of grace. And we don’t do that on our own. We come
boldly through His son who gave His life for us. So, I just want to encourage
everybody to stand…that’s struggling with that to stand in humility and to
resist the devil when he tells you that you’re not worthy because you are
worthy through the blood of Jesus. And Father I just pray that you would lift
up those thoughts in the minds of people that are struggling in Jesus’ name.
Amen.
Hello, my DAB family this is Mark Street from Sydney
Australia. Today is Thursday, the 16th of July and I am calling in
for some prayer and to touch base as well but like everybody I suppose I haven’t
been in a great mental state. This year has been a challenging year. I’ve lost
20% my wage but that’s not really what I’m calling in for. I’ve decided I want
to start a business and I want to resign 15th of August. Now, I have
run a business in the past. I know what the trouble of running a business __. I
know what I’m up against, but I do want this to be kinda like God’s…what God wants
for me. So, could you please pray? Before I put my resignation in, if God does
not want me to do this that He makes it very clear to me before I put my
resignation in. I also don’t want to be scared of man because I feel a little
bit like the scouts of Moses that’s going out scanning the promised land and
seeing the big Giants and I’m feeling fearful but I don’t want that to overrule
my decision as well. I’ve done all the work but please pray for me and I’m
listening every day. Thanks family. Love you. Bye.
Hi this is Steve from Arizona I just want to call in with
prayers for John from the Sudan about the loss of his brother and also about
the gentleman from Kenya whose brother’s daughter was kidnapped. I’m glad they
found her alive, but my prayers go out to all the people in Nigeria and Kenya who
are being persecuted because of their faith. God bless you all. Bye-bye.
Hello DAB family this is Veronica. This is my second time I’m
calling, and I want…first wanted to say thank you to everybody for this
community. I wanted to say a special thanks to Victoria Soldier. I heard your
prayer calling me by name and that really blessed my heart and I thank you for
that and everybody that’s prayed for me. I really wanted to call because I…the
thing that I should have been asking for prayer is I’m in an unequally yoked
marriage. I’ve been praying for salvation from the husband for over 10 years. I
also, due to infertility and the depression that comes with that, I have been
on antidepressants and sleeping pills and I have a shopping addiction that I
really want to be delivered from. And I just want peace. I don’t want to depend
on something to wake me up in the morning and something to help me go back to
sleep and to please pray for my marriage. And my husband and I to just accept
God’s will for our lives and our marriage. Thank you DAB family. God bless all
of you. Bye-bye.
Hey DAB family I’m just calling to say that I’m so thankful
for you all. I listen every day and I look forward to hearing your voices
especially during such an alone…a lonely time with the pandemic. In general, I
just…I’m calling to bring awareness and ask for prayers for Armenia. Armenia,
if you don’t know, is a very small beautiful Christian country in Western Asia.
It is noticed Cilicia in the Bible and there’s said to be descendants of Noah,
specifically Japheth’s grandson named Hike. But why I’m calling is because
Armenia has been through a lot. They’ve been through genocide where 1.5 million
Armenians were killed for being Christian and to this day is being denied. And
right now, they are being attacked by a neighboring country and the people of
that country are asking to caution on the side of the Armenians again. I ask
that you keep Armenia in your prayers, that the war will stop. Armenians want
this war to stop. We just want peace. Please keep Armenia in your prayers.
Thank you.
Good afternoon DAB family this is Lady of victory it is
Thursday, July 16th and I am calling in for Casey Short or is it
Stacy Short, 13-year-old who says she listens with her family every evening at
8 o’clock. Such a precious young lady. She said in today’s society we can be
easily influenced. And, so, she wanted to be prayed over. God what a precious,
precious daughter that at 13 years old she recognizes that she could be
influenced God by social media, by her surroundings, by her friends, by what
she sees with her eyes God but she is recognizing Father that that stuff that
she’s with her eyes is temporal but it’s only what is in the Spirit that is
everlasting. And, so, I lift Your baby girl up to You or Your Young lady up to You
God asking that You would just show Yourself mighty and strong in her life. She
desires Lord God to be the Young lady that You have called for her to be, not
to conform to what society wants her to be or thinks she should be. And, so God
I lift up Your daughter up to You, Casey, I believe she said Casey Short. God I
am lifting her up to You. You know her intricately God. You know her because You
made her fearfully and wonderfully. And, so, I lift her up to You asking God
that she will dare to stand out God, that she will dare to not fit in, that she
would dare to even be ostracized God by standing up for what is right and not
for what is popular. So, I ask Father that You will strengthen her, that You
will give her all that she needs, surround her with friends that are going to
encourage her in the Lord and not influence her with society. In Jesus’ name we
pray. Amen.
Hi there this is Marie from Alberta Canada. And Marta
I just heard your call and I will be praying for you. Marta from Alberta Canada,
you said that your sons had just been diagnosed with autism and I have a son too
and he was diagnosed a long time ago. He’s ten now, almost eleven and it’s been
a long road. Lots of lifestyle changes but one of the things that has helped so
much with his depression and depressive thoughts is listening to the Daily Audio
Bible. He listens every morning and has been doing it for more than a year now
and just memorizing the Scripture and listening to the Daily Audio Bible every
morning and the word is just getting in him and at least those depressive
thoughts about himself have almost disappeared. So, praise the Lord I will be
praying for you because I know what you’re going through. Thank you.
