Author: Daily Audio Bible Transcripts

Genesis 35:1-36:43, Matthew 12:1-21, Psalms 15:1-5, Proverbs 3:21-26

Today is the 17^th day of January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is my pleasure, and a true honor to be here with you today. And I say that because, if you didn’t show up, what would be the point. I could just read this to myself, silently. So, I’m thankful and grateful that we have this time together to take the next step forward as we move our way further into the month of January, but further into the year in the Bible that we’re spending. So, we’re reading from the New Living Translation this week. And today we’ll read Genesis chapter 35 and chapter 36.

Commentary:

Okay. So, Jesus has himself in a bit of hot water with the Pharisees. And it’s kind of unfolding exactly like Jesus was telling His disciples when He sent them out. Jesus is going out into the countryside and doing good, doing God’s work, announcing the kingdom, and even demonstrating the effects of the kingdom. But in the process of doing all of that He’s also, in some ways, breaking with tradition. And He’s also being suspected of blasphemy, which is a capital offense. They think He’s doing this because He’s announcing that He can forgive sins. But He’s breaking with other traditions as well. And in today’s reading we see that He’s breaking tradition with the Sabbath. So, His disciples were walking through a field and they’re getting some grain and there eating the grain and this is work. This is what the religious establishment has decided is work. And, so, they’re breaking the Sabbath. And Jesus defends this by simply opening the Scriptures to them. But then He’s put in a situation where He may heal on the Sabbath and this has also been determined to be work. And, so He does heal this man’s hand after He opens the Scriptures again and shows, like, He’s showing them why He’s doing what He’s doing. He’s reinterpreting the tradition that they have been bound to. He’s bringing light and life and health and healing, and all that’s happening is that they’re getting mad because He did it on the Sabbath. And Jesus declares Himself Lord over the Sabbath. And they decide then, in response, to try to figure out a way to kill Him, which invites us to consider our response when God begins to move counterintuitively in our lives, in a way that breaks with our tradition, in a way that we may not understand. Do we go back to the box and say oh well, God can’t or would not be involved in that, because that does, that just works against my little tidy box of understanding? When we think about it in those terms, we understand just how much like the Pharisees we can become. But why do we do that? I mean, why do we protect the box? It’s because we don’t want to get it wrong, like we’re actually coming from a good place. We don’t want to get it wrong. And, so, the question becomes, well, what does a person look like who’s getting it right? What does that look like?

Thankfully, we have the writings of the ancient King David in Psalm chapter 15 today, where we get that definition. Who may worship in Your sanctuary, Lord? Who may enter Your presence on Your holy hill? Right? What does the person who is getting this right look like? We have an answer. Those who lead blameless lives and do what is right, speaking the truth from sincere hearts. Those who refuse to gossip or harm their neighbors or speak evil of their friends. Those who despise flagrant sinners in honor of the faithful followers of the Lord and keep their promises, even when it hurts. Those who lend money without charging interest. Right? In other words, those who don’t take advantage. And those who cannot be bribed to lie about the innocent. Such people will stand firm forever.

Prayer:

Father, we invite You into this. We can see clearly that You will shake us up and disrupt us in whatever way that You want to in Your word and cause us to think more deeply about things that we had set in concrete. And, so, that’s disruptive in and of itself because it makes us ask questions that we weren’t anticipating. And this is good. And we invite You into all of it. We invite You to churn inside of us, bringing up things inside of us, reframing what we think that we know, because we can’t know You by knowing about You and we can’t know You by following recipes or traditions. We can only know You by knowing You. And we see in the Psalms what that looks like. So, we invite you into these things. Come, Holy Spirit, draw us ever closer in relationship to You. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

I’ve been mentioning for a couple of days now, looking forward to February 7^th. That is three weeks from today. And I’ll be speaking in Bakersfield California at New Life Church and I hope you can come, especially if you’re in the area. So, this will be on a Wednesday night. And you can get all the details at dailyaudiobible.com in the Events section -  websites, phone numbers, times, maps, all that kind of stuff. So, check that out. Hope to see you there.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible in the mission that we share in common, to bring God’s spoken word to whoever will listen to it, wherever they might be on planet earth, whatever time zone, or whatever time it might be. The global campfire is always burning. There is always someone listening…you can never listen alone. You might be by yourself and you might feel that way, but you can’t listen to the Daily Audio Bible at a time when someone else isn’t. So, if that mission resonates with you, then thank you for your partnership. There’s a link on the homepage of dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

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:

Hi. This is Gloria in New York. It is January 12^th, Friday. And…I’m actually…I just heard a message, I don’t think you left your name, but I really appreciated the message. A thick British accent, very nice, about being backed in a corner and just God just wanting us to trust Him to get us out. And thank you for that prayer and that message. I am going back to Nevada on Monday. My mom has gotten worse. I wanted to give everyone an update because I know that there are people who are praying and I ask you to continue to pray. The reason I want to keep updating on the situations - my brother, my brother, my husband, and that pending divorce. Everything is so in limbo. Like everything, everything is in limbo. I wanted to give the update because I feel like when something breaks that we can rejoice together, like when you guys call up and give praise reports. It’s just…it’s so nice. It’s interesting when you’re listening to the podcast, it’s like you’re, oh, that was good, and then, awe, you know, you’re just…we’re going through all of our motions together as a family, everybody out there across the world. But anyway, I feel like, you know, it’s so bad right now. Tying this altogether, the message that you left, young lady, it was, yeah, I don’t know what I’m going do, I’m still so lost in all this legal stuff with my mom and she’s really not doing well. I’ve got a trust God with everything. But I feel like something…just…something has to break on some end soon, because I can’t break. So, yeah, just please continue to pray for us, for my family. Thank you. God bless you all.

All is well. I am Daniel and I share this prayer with all of my brothers and sisters listening. Father, we praise You and thank You for our Daily Audio Bible family and all those You bring onto our paths that You have already made best for us. All according to Your purpose. Father, thank You for making each one of us a masterpiece, one-of-a-kind by Your hand. Father, You have us at the right place at the right time according to Your perfect will, not our will, in Your timetable, Father, not our timetable. You are the living word and we give praise to You living inside of us. In all ways, we seek You this moment. Thank You Father that You said we are vessels, a vessel of gold used in Your highest purpose. Praise You for shaping making and molding us into the example of whose we are, a child of the most high God and You are our Father. We pray to the everlasting God. Father, You said, we have made in Your image. You said to us in Your word, I am that I am. We are blessed indeed. Father, You said, I shall lend to not borrow, that all things work together for good to those who love You for those who are called according to Your purpose, and that the wonders shall not cease, and that You will not, will not, will not fail us. Father we thank You for this day and all the long days You have promised according to Your perfect will. We are fully armored moving forward on the path You have made best for us, overflowing with the promise of Your word, more than enough abundant good, more than we can think and imagine already on our path, moving forward Father preparing us to reach that point You have in place on our paths, lifting us higher, fulfilling our purpose, reaching the destiny You framed our lives in, while we choose Your perfect will, not our will, glorifying Your name and furthering Your kingdom. In Jesus name. Amen.

Hi my Daily Audio Bible family. It’s God’s Girl in East Texas. I was listening to the January 13^th podcast and a lady called in requesting prayer for her son who committed suicide on December 10^th. And I just thought, oh my gosh, you know, there’s just so much pain in this life and our God, our God is there with us. I was married to a minister at one time and he nearly strangled me to death and he used to beat me a lot and then get in the pulpit and preach. I’m not telling you that for pity, but if I could write a book my book would be entitled ‘No Fear.’ And God has brought me oh mighty long way. I’m the lady with the son who’s had 7 brain surgeries. Why do these things happen? You know, God has the answers. All we can do is pray. And that’s what I do for each of you. My heart goes out to you ma’am, the lady whose son took his life. And I don’t know, I don’t have the answers, but Jesus does. And when we’re going through these things…we seem…we feel so isolated and alone, but were not. It’s just that lie of the enemy trying to make us feel like nobody cares. And Eunice, Eunice, are you’re listening to me honey, I am praying for you, I rebuke cancer in the name of Jesus. I love my Daily Audio Bible family. The Lord bless each and every one of you, and remember that Jesus is as close as the mention of His name. Take care and happy new year guys. Okay. I love you. Bye-bye.

Hi. My name is Sherry. I’m from Colorado. There’s so much going on in my mind and in my life right now. I am on a 10 day fast and it seems like the devil is just purely attacking everything, my thoughts. I work a job as a social worker that has been challenging. I am into the 24^th year of my career and it is so difficult to display love and to let my life shine as a child of God, because it seems like I’m just daily, being attacked daily, when I walk into that door until sometimes I just feel like I don’t even want to go. And I pray to God all the time, in March 2019 to please release me from his job, because I can’t do it anymore. It is affected by health and each time I get up I’m thinking of how much I don’t want to go to that job. So I just ask for prayer and guidance. I ask for clarity during my fast. This is my first time I’ve done a 10 day fast. So, it is a struggle, but I know that God is able and I know that I am able to get through this with his help. It’s 2 o’clock in the morning and I can’t sleep. And, so, I know when you can sleep it’s time to talk to God. Daily Audio Bible this is my first time calling and I feel such relief. I listen to the prayers all the time. I have made a commitment that this time, the third time, I will try and listen to the whole thing. I often fall behind and miss out all the way to Revelation, but I’m determined this year. Love you all. Bye.

Hello Daily Audio Bible family. This is John calling from Bethlehem Pennsylvania. It is the 13^th of January, and I just got through listening to this day’s program. I wanted to call in to say hi to Vicki, who called in and left a prayer request for her family, Vicki, over the tragic death of your son, who took his life back on December 10^th. Family let’s pray together for Vicki. Father God, we ask You to provide comfort and strength and healing during this time of excruciating pain and grief for Vicki and her family, Father God. Lord God we ask You to have mercy on her sons soul, who took his life Father God. These are things that we just can’t get our arms around Father and we just can understand but we have complete faith and we have complete trust in You. We trust You father God. In everything that we do we ask you to bring strength and courage and peace to Vicki and her family and all those impacted by this tragedy, Father God. We ask you to bring this community together in love around Vicki, so that she knows that this family is there for her in her time of need and that we will be there for her as we continue. Father God, help her to grow in faith and to be strong in this and to keep looking at You Jesus. We ask this in your mighty and precious name. Amen.

Genesis 32:13-34:31, Matthew 11:7-30, Psalms 14:1-7, Proverbs 3:19-20

Today is the 16^th day of January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you around the global Fire that is our community. And we’ve come to take the next step forward in the Scriptures as…well…here we are at the 16^th day. Man…see…it goes pretty fast. I’m telling you, it’s going to be June before we know it, but there is some ground to cover between here and there and we’ll cover some of that ground today. We’re reading from the New Living Translation this week. Genesis chapter 32 verse 13 through 34 verse 31 today.

Commentary:

Alright. So, we have some pretty significant drama happening in the book of Genesis in Jacob’s life. He has had to leave his uncle Laban’s household after a couple of decades, secretly, because he fears Laban won’t let them leave with his household anyway, with his wives and children, and all that he is gained. So, they leave. Right? And then Laban chases him down. So, he’s got problems behind him, but he’s also heading right into problems, his brother Esau. So, he’s kind of between a rock and a hard place. He’s got problems behind him, he’s got problems in front of him. And we have probably all walked through seasons like that. So, Laban catches up and there’s all that drama that we already read and a covenant is established between the two, that they won’t cross the boundary line to attack each other. So, that’s dealt with. But he’s still got his brother, who he fled from because the last thing his brother Esau promised was that he was going to kill his brother Jacob. So, Jacob has his entire household intact, but he’s headed right into that and he doesn’t know what it’s going to be like, and it brings him a tremendous amount of anxiety and planning. And he gets everyone safe in a couple of different camps and then he’s by himself spending the night, and he has this massive wrestling match. And it’s been debated who Jacob’s actually wrestling with here. On the one hand, it seems to be that the Jacob’s wrestling with God. But then there are others would say, no, he was wrestling with his brother, Esau. And the reason for this is that when Jacob and Esau do meet, Jacob says, what a relief to see your friendly smile. It is like seeing the face of God. But Jacob does have this all-night wrestling match, and in the end he is given a blessing and he is given a name change. And his name changes to Israel, which means one who wrestles with God. And now that Jacob’s name has been changed to Israel, we understand that his children are the children of Israel. And they will live up to their name. They will wrestle with God most of their existence. And as we’ll see over time, the things that they wrestle with God about are largely the same kinds of things that we do. But Jacob and Esau make peace with one another. Esau wants Jacob to come back right away. Jacob needs to take a slower route because of the kids and the young inside of this livestock. And, so they make an encampment near Shechem.

Now, Shechem is a city that we hear many times in the Bible, but we don’t always recognize its significance. Shechem is near where Abraham first received the promise of the land. Shechem is obviously the place where Israel’s daughter, Dinah, was raped, which subsequently led to the inhabitant’s destruction. But Shechem is situated between two mountains, not giant mountains, two big hills. One called Mount Ebal and the other called Mount Gerizim. So, this location will have significance later. As we continue into the story those mountains will be known as the mountains of blessing and cursing. And many other things happen in Shechem. And, so, I’m pointing it out now. I don’t want to give a bunch of spoiler alerts. I just want you to pay attention to Shechem. As we encounter Shechem you’ll see that it has great significance. Many things happen there. And Shechem is located right between the Sea of Galilee and the city of Jerusalem. So, it’s like halfway between the two. So, its modern name is Nablus. And it is situated in what many refer to as the West Bank that at this point. So, modern Israeli citizens are forbidden from going there. But we’ve gone in there before and filmed because there are ruins in Nablus that are contemporary with the story that we read today, Canaanite Shechem, so one year. So, one year, myself and a small team, we went in and were given permission to do some filming. And the people were very, very kind to us, very gracious. So, besides the Canaanite ruins, Jacob’s well is there, which is referenced in the New Testament when Jesus meets a Samaritan woman. So, a lot happens there geographically. And almost no one who makes a pilgrimage to the land of the Bible, to Israel, would visit Shechem. It would not be a safe place to take a group to. But we’ve been able to get in and film, which leads me to talk about a resource that’s available, that we’ve had available for a while, that I haven’t mentioned at all this year yet. And that is the Promised Land films.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

So, here’s the deal. I, I mean, I’ve been to the land of the Bible many times, but there was a first time. And even the first time, it wasn’t like a bucket list thing. I didn’t necessarily need or want to go there, but I was invited, and I did. And that subsequently kind of rocked my world in terms of just understanding the geography of where the Bible happened, where this stuff that we’re reading about actually happened, because we read it and we kind of picture it in our imagination. We hear a number of locations referred to and so we kind of situate them in our mind just trying to imagine things but we don’t really know. It’s mostly in our imagination. And yet, these places are real places. And, so, we’ve taken several pilgrimages with the Daily Audio Bible and we’ll be taking one next month. But in the process of being there, like, you can stand in a place like this and, you know, when you are somewhere you can look wherever you want. So, you can spin in 360°, and you can look up and down, and you can smell the smells, and hear the crunch of the earth beneath your feet. Your there. And I began thinking, how can we bring this closer? Like, how, because when you search these places you can find pictures, but pictures are kind of static views and most of the pictures are of piles of rocks that you don’t really understand the significance of. And, so, we began and for, I think it’s been four seasons, we’ve been continuing to film in the land of the Bible in order to let these places that we’re reading about be seen for what they are. And, so, over time, we’ve pretty much been everywhere that has been archaeologically identified. I mean, that’s a moving target, that’s constantly changing. But every major site that’s been identified as biblical, we’ve been there and we have filmed.

So, the Promised Land films are these small little vignettes, you know, some a couple minutes long, most of them no more than five minutes long, to give you a more comprehensive picture of the geography of these places and what happened in them. So, if that interests you as we move our way through the Bible, if you want to be able to refer back to these places and see them with your own eyes and begin to get a sense of their significance, then Promised Land would be great. The Promised Land films are available in the Daily Audio Bible shop. It’s about four hours of content. We cover a lot of ground in the films, so it comes as a double DVD set. And we’ll get that in the mail to you promptly, but you also get immediate access to downloading the films in high definition. Notice that I said download. They won’t stream. You have to download them and then you can play them on your computer or transfer them to your phone or tablet and watch them whenever you want. But those are available at the Daily Audio Bible shop. We created them specifically for this purpose, as all of our resources are created, to help you move through this year in a very meaningful way and to establish this rhythm with the Scriptures as a part of our lives in community every day. So, Promised Land was created with that in mind. So, you can check that out and in the Daily Audio Bible shop.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that dailyaudiobible.com. There’s a link right on the homepage. Thank you, humbly and profoundly for your partnership. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

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:

Hello. Good morning Daily Audio Bible family. This is Jay calling from New Jersey. I haven’t called in in a while. I want to talk to you this morning about 2018. You know, for 31 years I have done things my way. I’ve dated who I wanted to date. I’ve married who I wanted to marry. I’ve had sex with who I wanted to have sex with. I have bought what I wanted to buy and lived where I wanted to live, and went where I wanted to go, and said what I wanted to say. Out of all that, of all these years, I’ve gotten myself nothing but rejection, heartache, pain, disappointment, anger, frustration, all the feelings that I don’t want. And I was praying today and looking at some scriptures and realizing that all this time God has been giving me what I thought…well…not what I thought…but what I wanted, or at least what I thought I wanted in my own human understanding. So, I’ve come to the realization that this year I’m going to try my best, one day at a time, one moment at a time, to listen and do the will of God. Heavenly father, in the name of Jesus Christ, I pray now Father that You will give me the strength through Your word, through Your Holy Spirit to do Your will. Father, I pray that Your Angels and Your Holy Spirit will convict me in those times where I’m not listening to do what You want me to do because it’s uncomfortable and I pray this in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

Good morning DAB family. This is Joyful Noise from Southern California. I’m calling because I’ve been holding onto this for a few days. And I was so excited about it. I journaled in the new journaling option on the DAB player online and…I just…I’m loving this. Thank you so much Brian. So, the concept comes from Matthew 6. And it’s the concept of forgiveness. And Brian took a little time to review it. But here’s the Scripture. Matthew 6:14. ‘For if you forgive others their offenses Your heavenly Father will forgive you as well. But if you don’t forgive others Your Father will not forgive your offenses.’ And I was just so struck by that and struck by Brian’s words afterwards. I posted it on my Facebook page along with the song that he played at the end. Thank you so much Brian. Matthew West, forgiveness. And here’s the words that Brian said. So, hopefully if you didn’t hear the first time, hopefully this resonates with you. And it’s definitely a focus for me in this new year 2018. How much unforgiveness are you carrying around in your life? If you had to imagine it, what would it look like? A nice flower patch or more like a polluted pond? Hold on to unforgiveness. Holding onto unforgiveness is like drinking from a polluted pond. It’s a poison in our life, a cancer for our souls. Jesus isn’t threatening us but bringing us by telling us to forgive. Jesus died for us he forgave us. He forgave us. Forgiveness is a very important thing to God and looks like this. We take those things that are polluted inside of us and we let them go. We drain the pond. What are you holding onto? Release those events and those people to God. And I think, if those of you are sort of motivated by hashtags, my hashtag is #drainthepond. You know, I took these words and I prayed over them and ,although I’ve heard them year after year after year, this is my seventh year through the Bible with the daily audio Bible family, this is not the first time I heard this, of course. It really struck out chord in me, drain that pond. So, for those of you that are holding onto grudges, and I know him definitely one of them, I’m just really praying over it, praying over my heart, praying over those people, praying for the people that have hurt me, whether it was 20 years ago…

Hello Daily Audio Bible family. This is Nathan from Littleton Illinois. Hey, I wanted to share something that happened at church. This was the first service of the year. So, I guess ___ it probably was a week ago. Anyway, so, they start out with a special number, which isn’t so uncommon, and the music was fading out, and the pastor gets up the stage, and says he’s been praying how to start this year off, so we’re starting off with communion. I’m pretty sure that __ people were moved because we get so stuck in a pattern of what happens. We do these ___ songs, then this happens, then the sermon, and then the this and then that. And we put God in a little box and well this is how it should be because it always has been. Ain’t so. So, we started out with communion and he explained it. So we’re in a sermon series about victory and he says and we’re going to celebrate what already happened in 2018. And I know it’s now, but that’s what he said. 2018. And, so, he went on and said, you know, here’s what, how we’re celebrating it. If you think about it, you know, the slaves had silver before they were free. The Last Supper happened before Jesus died on the cross for our sins. So, why should we not celebrate victory before it happens. I thought, woe! I wanted to share that with you guys. We need to be celebrating victories that Jesus has already won. We just need to grab that victory and run with it. Something to think about. Have a great day. Make it a great day.

Good morning Daily Audio Bible family. This is Brooke calling from lovely Fort Collins Colorado. I am a two-year listener and it might be my second or third call in. But I have a prayer request. It’s for my mom. She was the one who brought the Daily Audio Bible to me and is just an amazing person and…you can see that I’m getting choked up…but…anyway…she is just an amazing person, an amazing daughter of God, a huge heart for Jesus, and just an amazing person. She, we discovered, by a miracle, thank you Jesus for this, she has a mass in her trachea blocking 50% of her windpipe. And she is going in for a very high risk surgery due to the location of the mass, the size of the mass, on Wednesday, January 17^th in the afternoon. I just ask that you lift her up. Her doctor is very skilled but we’re not leaning on her physician because we know that God is the great physician. And we have been praying that when her physician goes in there that the mass will be resolved and there is no other answer except for that Jesus healed her. We’ve been praying desperately for about the past month, since we found the mass. She’ll be hospitalized for a couple of days just depending on how the surgery goes. So, I just appreciate your prayers. Her name is Terry and, yeah, I just appreciate that. Thank you, guys. Have a great day. Bye.

Good morning family, good evening, good afternoon, good middle of the night. This call, this is Andrew from the Bay Area. Many of you know me as Drew because you are my family and we’ve been doing this for so long. But this call is for the new listeners. God woke me up just a few minutes ago with an astounding revelation that I don’t even understand. But he asked me to call you. And maybe you haven’t called the Daily Audio Bible yet, maybe you haven’t even prayed yet, maybe you haven’t even really believed yet, but God wants me to share with you that your every thought, your every word, everything you do matters. There’s a story about a woman who came into the temple and she gave less than two pennies. And Jesus said, she gave more than all of you because she gave everything she had, she gave so much. So, what I’m telling you is, you’re not going to understand now, I don’t understand now, but everything we do matters. Can you imagine what God hears every day when He hears our prayers, when He moves powers and principalities in action? Of course, you can’t imagine that because your mind can wrap yourself around it. But we’re glad you’re here as a new listener and we pray for you every day, believe it or not. Even though you don’t call in we are praying for you. We are asking you to tell your friends about this and share the secret with them and ask them to tell their friends and send a million more because what’s your witnessing is not an old dusty book. What you’re witnessing is a foundation of what God has built, what He is building, and what’s about to happen. We live in exciting times and if you trust God, you don’t have to trust us, but if you trust God, He will show you step-by-step. He’ll let you see as much as you can possibly handle and He will build up your faith and make you a mighty warrior in His army. So, trust Him. And trust Him, that when you pray, He moves. He does. About giving and praying for Brian and Jill, give everything you can, but when you give, ask God to send a million more. When you give a dollar, ask God to send a million more. When you say a prayer, ask God to send a million more. When you ask for favor for somebody who’s hurting, ask God to send a million more answers to prayer. I love you guys. Were taking this journey together. You are not alone.

Genesis 31:17-32:12, Matthew 10:27-11:6, Psalms 13:1-6, Proverbs 3:16-18

Today is the 15^th day of January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you, wherever you might be and whatever you might be doing. I’m glad we can take a few minutes here just to center ourselves. So, we’re diving into a new work week and we’ll pick up where we left off yesterday. We’re reading from the New Living Translation. And we have, sort of, the drama that is percolating in and around Jacob and his life and his wives and his children. So, we’ll pick up that story. Genesis chapter 31 verse 17 through 32 verse 12 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, Jesus is sending His disciples out to go and do the kind of work that He is doing and he’s instructing them and counseling them, but a number of things that He’s saying are kind of disruptive. Like families will betray each other. Right? Children will betray their parents, parents will betray their children, in-laws, will betray their sons and daughters-in-law. Or things like, don’t imagine that I came to bring peace to the earth. I came not to bring peace but a sword. And, so, to bring some context of this, we have to talk about something that affects everything that we do, but we don’t really know that it’s affecting us because we don’t know how to name it. And that is the apocalyptic worldview. When we can name it and understand it and understand how deeply rooted it is and how it effects most things in our lives, we begin to understand Jesus teachings more clearly. But as with all things that affect a lot of people, there are tons and tons of nuances and reasons and all kinds of circumstances. So, I mean, there’s no way to cover that all, but I think we spend a few minutes and cover enough so that we understand what we’re talking about because I’m pretty sure you’re confused right now. I’m telling you there’s something in your life that’s affecting everything that you do but you don’t know about it, which should at least be intriguing.

So, let’s go back, let’s go back in the Bible. We’re just getting to know the first generation of the children of Israel and who they are in the book of Genesis. But these people, over the next centuries, are going to become a people, a nation. And, eventually, this promise of this land that was made to Abraham will be fulfilled. These people will inhabit the promise land and eventually their capital city will become Jerusalem and eventually God’s temple will be built in Jerusalem. So, this temple in this holy city became the most important thing in their culture. This is where God dwells and this is where He interacts with people. So, it’s the most important thing to them. So, they don’t have a lot of thoughts about end times, the world coming to an end, a rebirth of something new. For them everything is situated around the temple and Jerusalem. So, basically, as long as that can be protected, then they’re good. And the documents that they hold onto as Scripture is the Torah. It’s the books that were reading now: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, because it’s the story of how their people came to be, it’s the story of how God forms them and shows them, and it contains the law, what God expects of them. But everything is centered around the temple. So, for them, the Scriptures don’t make sense without the temple. This is the place that God has chosen to touch the earth. Unfortunately, that doesn’t last forever. And, although it takes some time, all of the tribes, right, so all of these little kids that we’re reading about now, as they grow up, and they marry and they have kids and grandchildren and so on and so forth, and become a great nation, eventually they’re all gone, they’re dispersed, they’re carried away in exile in a couple of different exiles. So, they’re ripped from their homeland and the temple gets destroyed and Jerusalem gets destroyed. So, these people are in a foreign land being forcibly assimilated into a foreign culture, but they have no Jerusalem and they have no temple. All they have is the Torah. And, so, they become people of the Scriptures. That’s all they have. Leading up to all that, God had sent many prophets. And we have many of those books of prophecy in the Bible and we’ll go through them as we move forward. But normally, what happened with a prophet is that, they were rejected initially. So, as the prophecies are being given, people are not paying attention. But later, when they’re facing the repercussions of not listening and find themselves in exile and forced assimilation in all of this, those words of prophecy become important. And, so, then we have the law and the prophets. And they begin to pour over this. In part, to figure out all the ways that they’ve gone wrong, and in part, to try to discern what might be happening in the future. So, since they’ve seen the temple destroyed, they long for it to be rebuilt. And even though it does get rebuilt, it does get destroyed again. And, as books like Daniel are written in coming out of the exile, the idea that the world is heading somewhere and will reach a conclusion and a rebirth begin to take hold.

So, in the centuries leading up to Jesus birth there was a lot of upheaval in this patch of land that was the land of promise. After the exile, the Hebrew people never really regained the land under their exclusive control except in fits and starts and that was from uprisings, revolts, rebellions. And there were all kinds of reasons for this, but there was a spiritual component, the idea that the world was eminently going to end. And, so, this kind of language was a part of the culture in Jesus time. Many rabbis and teachers had an apocalyptic message. And it could be stirred up among the people because they were feeling the weight of oppression and estrangement from the culture and marginalization and all kinds of things that we’ve talked about and will continue to talk about. So, when John the Baptist shows up at the Jordan River baptizing people, inviting them to repent for the kingdom of God is at hand, he’s speaking into that worldview, that apocalyptic worldview, which is essentially, something big is about to happen and it’s going to conclude with the end of all things as we know it and the rebirth of something new. And that worldview carries through the rest of the New Testament. And as I’m pointing this out you’ll begin to see it. You’ll begin to see it everywhere in the New Testament. And when we move our way through the Gospels and start getting into letters, like Paul’s letters, we’ll see it even more clearly and its implications affect us until today.

So, basically, if you live your life today, if you order your life today, at least in part because of how you think the future will unfold, then this is an apocalyptic worldview. Now I’m not talking about planning or cause-and-effect, like, I’m planning this for next week and, so, I envision that this is going to happen next week. That’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about ultimate reality, cosmic reality. So, if you are today is influenced by what you believe God is doing and is going to do to bring the end of injustice or evil in the world, and this will happen in a place that we, kind of, nebulously call the end times, God will bring an end to things as we know it and a rebirthing of something new will happen, and that’s a part of how you see things, and that has an effect on how you’re living right now, then you have an apocalyptic worldview.

And we could say that people like John the Baptist certainly had this. He had an awareness that he was preparing the way and that God was doing a new thing. And he thought this was all about to go down. And because of the culture that he lived in, he had an idea of what that might look like if it were good going to go down now. So, even after he’s arrested, even after Jesus has taken center stage and is doing ministry, he sends his own disciples to Jesus to say, are you really the one or should we be looking for someone else? Because they’re looking for an uprising, a great uprising that would ultimately defeat the Roman empire, but was going to be a part of this endgame. So, this is swirling and swimming as a part of the unspoken culture that Jesus is speaking to and He affirms it. He’s just reinterpreting it. He’s saying, it’s coming, it’s just going to be different than your thinking, then you’re expecting. So, the apocalyptic worldview can be found in the teachings of Jesus, which would lead many secular scholars, who study biblical history, and who study ancient cultures, to label Jesus as an apocalyptic profit. Of course, I think that’s a gross underestimation of who Jesus is, but you can see how they get there. And you can find these things in Jesus teachings when you know what you’re looking for. So, if Jesus were to say something like, ‘He who endures until the end’, this is that kind of language. And perseverance, and endurance are things that are repeatedly taught throughout the entire New Testament. In fact, I would even wager that the book of Revelation itself, its primary theme is enduring until the end, staying true until the end, whenever the end is, however the end is.

Okay. So, back to what we read today. Jesus is giving instructions and counsel to those He is sending out into the world. And He’s been going around the countryside, saying, ‘the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Seek first the kingdom of God and all His righteousness and all these things will be added to you.’ So, He’s speaking into this apocalyptic worldview in a way that everyone is understanding. It’s simmering inside of their culture. So, He’s telling His disciples, ‘since I, the master of the household have been called the prince of demons, well then the members of my household will be called even worse names.’ So, He’s saying, as you go out and announce the coming of God’s kingdom people are going to reject that. But He goes on to say, ‘don’t be afraid of those who threaten you for the time is coming when everything that is covered will be revealed, and all that is secret will be made known to all.’ Right? So, you are a part of something right now that is designed to unveil something greater that is propelling us forward toward an end and a new beginning. So, if you’re a zealot or a mercenary and you’re ready to go to battle and you want this uprising to begin and Jesus says something like, ‘don’t be afraid of those who want to kill your body. They cannot touch your soul. Fear only God who can destroy both soul and body in hell’. You can interpret that as, okay, if I’m killed in battle, God will still receive me. And what Jesus is actually doing is what He continually did, He flipped the paradigm upside down. He is most definitely announcing the coming of the kingdom. In fact, He’s announcing that the kingdom is already begun. But it’s not going to come in any of the ways that they are thinking. So, when Jesus says in today’s reading things like, ‘don’t imagine that I came to bring peace to the earth. I came not to bring peace but a sword.’ He’s not calling people to arms. He’s simply stating what a prophetic message always does. It disrupts. He’s simply talking about a coming kingdom that has already begun and one kingdom does not overthrow another kingdom without a fight. The coming of God’s kingdom doesn’t happen without conflict. And Jesus sends His disciples out into the thick of it and you and I have been commissioned in the same way and we should have the same expectations.

So, all the sudden the gospel becomes more than just the promise of eternal life or some sort of method to get what we want out of life and engages us in a much bigger story than that. And what we’ll find in Jesus teachings is that He is most definitely talking about cosmic revolution, a battle between evil and good, darkness and light, the kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of darkness. And He’s trying to pull people into that view by speaking to them in the language they totally understand. It’s just that the enemy isn’t Rome or the Greeks or the Babylonians or the Assyrians. The evil is the deception and dark powers of the evil one. So then, understanding that the battle isn’t against flesh and blood, but rather against the dark forces of the evil one trying to deceive humanity, which is the story we read last week in Genesis chapter 3. Then we realize that the things that we are railing against, trying to set the stage so that we can move ourselves forward so that God can complete this whole thing and start it over again may be misguided. What we begin to realize is that we are in a battle for our own hearts and the hearts of our brothers and sisters all around us. So, evil will not be eradicated from the world if we could just blow up the people that we don’t agree with. Rather, evil will be eradicated from the world when the hearts of men are restored to God. So, it’s no less of a battle. In fact, it’s more of a battle. It’s just a different one and we will see this throughout all of Jesus teachings. And if we will understand that our apocalyptic worldview isn’t dissimilar to the people that Jesus was talking about. Right? We want Jesus to ride in on a white horse and beat up the bad guys, when the battle is inside of us. We need Christ within and nothing else. As Jesus has been teaching us, our connection, our relationship with God is a gift that could not have been accomplished were it not for God’s love and kindness and patience and mercy and grace. We are equipped for the battle, but the battle isn’t against each other. The battle is to be true and endure until the end. The battle is to love our enemies. The battle is to be the light of the world. The battle is to be the salt of the earth. And light exposes darkness, even inside of ourselves. And salt preserves things. We are invited into something away bigger than maybe we ever realized.

Prayer:

Jesus, we invite Your Holy Spirit to continue this work of shaking and awakening us, of resetting our perspectives. We have been swirling around in all of the busyness, just trying to keep the plates spinning, when there’s something far bigger going on, and were invited to participate. And, so, we re-center ourselves in You and You alone right now. We give ourselves to you completely, heart, mind, and will, in everything that we do, and say, and think. Nothing is more important than our connection to You. And we invite Your Holy Spirit to continually remind us of this, because it’s something that we forget so easily. We are so easily distracted. Come, Holy Spirit, show us our place in the advancement of Your kingdom. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

Looking at the calendar, next up is the 7^th of February, and that’s a Wednesday, Wednesday evening. And I will be speaking in Bakersfield California at New Life Church. And I’m excited to be with the brothers and sisters in Bakersfield. And if you are in the area I hope you can come out and say hello. You can get the details at dailyaudiobible.com in the Events section. So, maps, phone numbers, websites, all the stuff you would want to know, you can find there.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible. If what’s happening here in the global campfire community, if what we do every day is bringing life and light and good news into your life, then thank you for your partnership. There’s a link that lives on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

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:

Hello Daily Audio Bible. My name is Sophie. This is my first time calling, but I am an avid listener, and I’m very grateful for the ministry that you have given to me. And I hold many of the people and the requests that I’ve heard in prayer myself. I just…I just need a breakthrough. I feel like I’m very much under attack in terms of my mental health. And I also feel like this is a feeling among…like…a great deal of both Christians and non-Christians, but specifically within the kingdom itself. The level of depression and anxiety is extreme and I know it’s not God, it’s not, but it’s…right now for me it’s intense in terms of, you know, ideation, in terms of all of that. So, I just…I just need prayer to stay strong in that respect. And I also pray for strength for my work situation. Things have been, like, beyond stressful. I’m operating in a location where I don’t have a whole lot of support at all and I just pray that He would give me the grace to continue to persevere because they know that I’m called to be there, but I also know they I’m not called to be there and carry it all. And I know feel like right now…

Hi. This is Victoria S. Happy New Year’s. I just wanted to say happy New Year to everybody and wanted to pray for some of the DABber’s who are having challenges. I know one gentleman, he was having…he had lost his job and he needed a job and I want to pray that God gives him a wonderful job, because he’s wonderful, and he’s waiting on God, and he’s just believing God, and is just getting a little nervous, but God says, God may not come when he calls but he’s always on time. I want to pray for my brother. Lord, in the name of Jesus, You bless him in a mighty and special way. Lord, you open doors that no man can close and You close those that no man can open. Lord, You bless him in Your mighty and special way. Lord, you said that, David said in his word that he’s young and now is old but he’s never seen the righteous forsaken or as seen begging for bread. Lord, You bless him like the father Abraham, in the name of Jesus. Lord, You bless Brian and Jill. You bless Your people Lord. You touch the lady who has stage IV cancer, the one that is going through and is hurting. Lord ,You bless her Lord, You heal her Lord. You’re a doctor that never lost a case. You are and Almighty God and You can do anything but fail. Lord I thank You for blessing your people. I thank You for giving them a wonderful new year. Open up doors, Lord. Bless them indeed, increase the territories of your people, Lord. Oh Lord, that the Daily Audio Bible can grow and grow like a __ in __, Lord. Just bless it tremendously. Just bless Brian and continue to use him, Lord, in such the wonderful way that You did. Lord, we thank you for your people. We thank you for this community. We thank you for people who love God and love to pray for the people of God. Continue to pray, continue to keep us Lord, continue to strengthen us, continue to let Your will be done in our life, and Lord, we’ll continue to give you the glory, we’ll give You the honor, we will give You the praise. In the mighty name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. Have a…

Hello Daily Audio Bible family. This is Dan and I just wanted to call in. Because it’s a new year, I just wanted to call in and say thank you for being there, each and every one of you. It’s just a blessing. This platform that Brian’s is put together, it’s amazing. And thank you Brian for all of the hard work that you do. Thank you for just always improving, trying to improve our lives…just…I mean…by reading the Bible…and you do it so well…so thank you Brian. It’s really touched my heart and my life. So, thank you. And also everyone who calls in, it’s just great to hear everyone. Whatever were going through. It really helps us bond and connect with our own humanity, with each other, and it’s just wonderful, wonderful community. So, keep calling in. I love hearing from you and I pray for those who touch my heart. I pray for those who I can. And I also want to put out a prayer request real quick if I can. I just started a new job. Thank God I have this job. It’s a blessing and I really like it and enjoy it, but I’m struggling because it’s a new job. It’s new. So, just pray for me to overcome any challenges and just pray that, you know, God continues to bless me with this job, that I can succeed and become successful at it. And I love you all. Take care. God, bless. Happy new year. And I hope to hear from you all soon.

Hi DAB family. It’s MK. I’m actually new to this community and I was just wondering if you guys could pray for my friend. They’re best friends and they’ve both gone through really hard times in life and one of them has actually ___ and wants to get saved by the Lord and I can feel the enemy trying to take the __ away from him. I pray that he will officially get saved and that his best friend will get saved, that they will come to God. And, if you could, could you please also pray for my mother who’s just been going through an ongoing sickness? And we’re believing for God’s healing and restoration, but it would really mean a lot if you could pray for my family. Thank you, family. Bye.

Hi. This is Sonja calling from Tampa. First of all, I just want to thank you Brian, Jill, and China for everything that you do and all these workers behind the scenes. You’ve been a blessing to me for many, many years. I believe I’ve already been listening to you for 10 years. I’ve been an intercessor all my life, but today I just realized that I do have an extended family, and I normally don’t ask for prayer, but I’m asking that you pray for my son, Nathan. He suffers from anxiety and depression. I have a beautiful home and, unfortunately, it’s not so beautiful anymore. I’m asking God for direction. Do I sell my home? Do I find another place for my son to live at? What are the ramifications if he’s moved out of his surroundings? And I’m just asking for direction and asking for you to pray for Nathan and pray for God’s will in my life, because I don’t want to walk out of the will of God. I thank you so much for everything you do.

Genesis 30:1-31:16, Matthew 10:1-26, Psalms 12:1-8, Proverbs 3:13-15

Today is the 14^th day of January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you today in the frozen, rolling hills of Tennessee. So, we, most literally, have a shiny, sparkly, brand-new week out in front of us as we approach the center of the first month of the year. So, this week we’ll read from the New Living Translation and pick up where we left off last week. Genesis chapter 30, verse 1 through 31:16 today. And we’re picking up with the drama of Jacob and his growing family.

Commentary:

Okay. So, in the book of Genesis, more children are born between Leah and Rachel, who are Jacob’s wives. And because they’re sisters and they’re married to the same man, you know, this causes a number of issues inside of the relationships. And they each give Jacob their maidservants as wives as well and more children are born there. And we’ll notice that every single one of those names of children that are born are to become tribes of Israel. So, God gave a promise to Abraham. That promise was carried through his son Isaac. And now that promise is being carried through his son, Abraham’s grandson, Jacob. But can we notice that, although there is a promise of God, one that takes a long view, one that’s going to take many generations to fulfill. It’s not all roses. It’s full of challenges. Jacob dealt cunningly with his mother Rebekah against Jacob’s brother, Esau, which forced him to be on the run and fleeing back into a different land, the former land of his family, which is where he has spent the last couple decades. And he’s been dealt with very shrewdly by his uncle Laban. He’s made his uncle Laban rich, but he doesn’t have much for his own household. And, so, he makes a deal that does make him rich, but it’s fraught with all kinds of challenges.

And then we get into the New Testament, into the book of Matthew, and Jesus is sending his 12 disciples out without Him. He’s telling them that they have authority to go and be like He is being in the world. And, so, they go out, including Judas Iscariot, he goes out too, even though he will later betray Jesus. And they are warned of the challenges that they will face. And as we continue to take this journey through the Bible, both old and new Testaments, we will see that at every turn there are obstacles and challenges. Some of these obstacles and challenges are simply circumstantial. They’re just what’s going on that has to be overcome. And some of them are self-made and they never had to happen. But in our lives of faith, so often we think is that our faith is supposed to smooth things out to make them unchallenging. But the life of faith doesn’t remove life’s challenges, it changes how we look at them. The Bible will continually bring us back to what is true of us, our identity, what is happening in our heart. And when we are irreversibly and first connected to God in our relationship with Him, then we don’t find ourselves shaking our fist at the sky when we find obstacles in our lives, or finding ourselves turning around and walking away in anger because God didn’t come through in the way that we asked Him to. And we begin to realize that were not God in the scenario. We’re not leading the charge, we’re not leading the way in this scenario. We’re connected to God and we are following Him. He is leading us on the narrow path that leads to life, on the path of wisdom.

And we see from the book of Proverbs today, ‘joyful is the person who finds wisdom, the one who gains understanding.’ And, so, there’s work involved here, but it tells us the payoff – ‘wisdom is more profitable than silver, and her wages are better than gold. Wisdom is more precious than rubies. Nothing you desire can compare with her.’ So, wisdom has an outstretched hand saying, I will go on this journey with you and I will help guide you in all of your decisions. And sometimes being wise is simply pausing before you make an erratic decision, a decision in the moment, in the heat of the moment. Sometimes, it’s simply taking a pause, reconnecting, re-centering ourselves in our relationship with God, and allowing the next step to become apparent. Sometimes that’s the wisest thing we can do because life is going to be full of challenges. It’s full of challenges for the people in the Bible and it’s full of challenges in our own life.  

Prayer:

Father, we invite You into our interpretation of what is difficult, because as we see in the Scriptures, difficulties have been around for a very, very long time. Obstacles, challenges, dangers, things that make us anxious, things that overwhelm us, this has been going on a very, very long time. We’re not the first people to ever experience this and this certainly is in Your first time leading anyone through it. So, we invite Your Holy Spirit to remind us that we can slow down, that we can take a beat, that we can consult wisdom, and we can invite You into everything that we do and say and think, that our connection, that our relationship with You is first and foremost, the most important, primary thing in our lives. And when we re-center ourselves in You, then the chaos of the world may not go away, but it has been put into its proper perspective. We are Your children, You are our God, and You have promised to help us navigate. So, come Holy Spirit. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

And, we were supposed to be up in Kentucky right now, but we got some winter weather that passed through here. And it wouldn’t be anything to some of you up north of here. You would laugh at us. But we don’t have all the snow removal tactics down here in the South that you do. And, so, it’s icy. Sorry we’re going to reschedule that.

Looking a little further down the calendar, February 7^th, which is just a few weeks from now, I’ll be speaking at New Life Church in Bakersfield California. So, if you are in the area, mark that on your calendar. You can get all the details of dailyaudiobible.com in the Events section. And I’m very much looking forward to being back with you in California. So, see you soon.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if the mission to bring God’s spoken word to anyone who will listen anywhere on this planet any time of day or night is something that is life-giving to you, than thank you for your partnership and being life-giving to it. What we have done we continue to do together. And, so thank you humbly for your partnership. There’s a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

And that’s it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here next week, which happens to be tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Good morning DAB family. This is Dan in New Hampshire. It is early in the morning Wednesday, January 10^th. And I want to present the question that was posed to me in a group that I am involved with. They were asking, what is your morning routine loom like. And I realized that for the last four years that my routine is just so important and revolves around listening to the daily Audio Bible. And as part of my morning routine, I can’t go a day without having it and listening to it and it’s just…devouring the word. And I’m so, I was so like kind of, it just really popped out to me, like that has become so intertwined with my life. And that’s what it needs to be, that’s what it needs to be. The Bible needs to be daily in our lives and I think that was just incredible to think on that and dwell on that. I also wanted to pray for Eunice in Jersey and just reach out to you and send some love and prayers. I know that…I wanted to pass this on to you that…Eunice I’m just praying…like my father…when he was battling cancer, that he had the gift of cancer and that’s an opportunity to shine God’s love wherever he went. And I pray that God would shine for you in this moment. Praying for you and listening for updates. We love you. We support you.

Hello Daily Audio Bible family. This is Julia in Des Moines. This is my first time calling, but I’ve been listening for a couple of years. I am calling today on behalf of the little girl in Des Moines we need your prayer. Her name is Sammy and her parents are faithful believers. And they’re struggling right now because Sammy is in the hospital fighting for her life with a bacterial infection. If you could just add Sammy to your prayers and lift her up to God. We know that He has a plan for her life. We just pray that is not over yet. Thank you so much.

Hello community. This is Pastor Chris from the Live Free or Die state. Lately we’ve entrusted with several people’s confessions. I want to reach out especially to Jay from New Jersey, from Kerry, I believe you’re from Texas, and Mark S. From the land down under. What you’ve done by giving your confession is you have released the power of the sin over you. When you name the name of an enemy you have a certain degree of power over them. But going forward I would like to give you a warning, an assurance, a suggestion, and a gift. The warning, you are forgiven. If our enemy wonders about seeking who he may devour, he may try to hit you with a condemnation trip that is not yours. Don’t take it. Because your assurance is, that if you confess your sins the Lord is faithful to forgive your sins and he doesn’t throw the back in your face. He drops them into the sea of forgetfulness and remembers them no more. The suggestion is to get into accountability with other people who have suffered and are plagued by the same sins you that have been. And the gift is a verse of Scripture, which has become my life verse. Romans 8:1- there is therefore no condemnation, I do repeat, no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Brothers, I’m praying for you as you go forward. May God bless you. Bye-bye. This is Pastor Chris in the Live Free or Die state.

What’s up everybody. It’s Miguel from Santa Rosa. And I know it’s been a while since I’ve called in but listening to the January 6^th broadcast and hearing Psalm 6, I heard a word that I wanted to share in hopes that it would encourage somebody out there. I was just such in awe at Psalm 6 here. You read through the Psalm, especially verses 1 through 7 and you just see this anguish, you see this tiredness from the writer, this is David that wrote the Psalm. And you just can tell that he’s been praying against something for so long, that he’s been in the middle of something for so long and he’s tired he’s groaning. And look at what happens in verse 8. ’Away from me all you who do evil, for the Lord has heard by weeping, the Lord has heard my cry for mercy, and the Lord accepts my prayer. All my enemies will be overwhelmed with shame and anguish. They will turn back and suddenly be put to shame.’ And man, these verses, these are fighting’ words. I hope you see that, but the way this was written, these are fighting words against whatever David is praying against here. So, the way that you pray, I guess whatever you pray or are praying for something, for whatever is happening, pray fighting words because your praying to a God that lives and moves in breaths and answers prayer. And whether your prayer is going to be answered today or tomorrow or as you cross into eternity, the Lord has heard your prayer and your enemies will be put to absolute shame. So pray fighting words because your God is with you and for you and against all of your enemies, against Satan. So, may it be so. May that encourage somebody out there and may the Lord be with you.

Good morning daily audio Bible family. My name is Chuck. I live in Tennessee and I have a prayer request. My brother, John, who has had three brain surgeries over the last 15 years, this last surgery he had was in April, and it is caused him not to be able to walk very well. He can walk a little but not much. And plus there’s some other issues to that I will keep private because God is what they are. But I just wanted to put that prayer request before you today and wanted to tell you that I do enjoy the Daily Audio Bible reading. I just downloaded it Monday. And I really like the teachings that are being taught. Hope you all have a great day and may the Lord bless you throughout the year 2018. Thank you.

Genesis 28:1-29:35, Matthew 9:18-38, Psalms 11:1-7, Proverbs 3:11-12

Today is January 13^th. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you today.

I need to make an announcement. I would normally wait until the end for this kind of thing, but it’s kind of timely. Tomorrow, we were planning to be together in Louisville Kentucky, but that has been canceled. We will be rescheduling because we have a rare ice and snowstorm passing through here in the rolling hills of Tennessee and on up north into Kentucky. And as beautiful as it might be in some places, it’s also pretty dangerous to be out there. So, we were planning to be at New Song Christian Fellowship Louisville, but we’ve communicated with each other and agreed that it is the best thing to reschedule. So, just wanted you to know that. And if you been around here very long, you know I like snow. So, what a surprise.

Alright this is the conclusion of our first full week in this year. Obviously, we’re approaching the center of the month, so we’ve been in this new year for a bit, but this is the end of the first full week of the year. So, well done. We are well on our way. And there is so much drama and intrigue out in front of us and some of the stories that we have found ourselves in.

Today is also a day of remembrance for me. It was one year ago today that my mom passed away. So, the details of that day are pretty vivid still in in my mind, and I can remember not being able to do the Daily Audio Bible first thing in the morning, which is my normal custom. I do it every day. But usually its’ the first thing that I am involved in on any given day, but not one year ago today. We knew the time was near and we were literally getting ready to go to where she was in hospice when the call came. So, I just remember reading the Daily Audio Bible after all of that and just trying to think, how am I going to do this when I’m so emotionally drained? And then just thinking, the Bible has become a comfort for many. And the Bible is a comfort to me. And it certainly was in that moment. And another thing that I remember so vividly about this time last year was that I felt so loved by this community. I mean, I try to tell you I love you every day because I do, but in that time I could see very clearly, this isn’t a one-way street, we love each other. It might not be the kind of love that comes from a lifelong relationship. But we love each other as brothers and sisters and we do it well and I felt it over those coming days. So, I remember that so well. So, yes, yeah, this is the one year anniversary of my mom’s passing and I don’t know that this is an annual thing where I bring attention to it, but it feels vivid and it feels right, right now. And I thank you all for the comfort that you brought to our family by just being there for us. Thank you.

Okay. So, here we are, ready to take the next step forward as we end this week. And we’ll pick up where we left off yesterday, the story of Jacob and Esau and the family blessing, and the conflict that is afoot. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Genesis chapter 28 and 29.

Commentary:

Okay. So, keeping up with Jacob’s story. Jacob fled from his brother Esau. Right? Over the blessing of the father, Isaac. Jacob has to go back to his homeland, his family homeland. And that’s what he does. So, let’s just try to picture this. The land is fairly arid, very desert like where Jacob and Esau begin, down near Beersheba. He has to pass through the Jordan Valley, pretty desert like, past the Dead Sea, and continue forward until he gets into, what would be, modern-day Syria. And he basically has to do this by himself without a huge entourage because he’s on the run. His brother Esau has determined that he will kill his brother Jacob. So, Jacob spends the night in this place called Luz that gets renamed to Bethel. And he has a rock and he lays down and he goes to sleep and he has a vision of a stairway to heaven. And ironically, the ancient ruins of Bethel are very interesting because of the terraced stepped terrain all around that area, very much looking like a stairway on a massive scale. So, Jacob’s on the run. He doesn’t have a lot of protection. He sees this vision. He wakes up in the morning and he says, surely, God was in this place and I was unaware of it. And that has many parallels in our own lives. I mean, there are times we feel like we are absolutely on the run with no protection, nothing, and we’re just trying to get through, to get to where we need to go. But if we would slow down and become aware we might find out that we’re nowhere near as alone as we thought we were. Surely the Lord is with us and we were unaware of it. So, Jacob will come back this way and visit this same spot. And you might be noticing that lots of rocks are getting set up, lots of altars are being built, and this is their way of commemorating an event, a moment, something they don’t want to forget. And we’ll see this tradition emerge throughout many generations over a long period of time in the Bible, which is one of the reasons that we encourage you to journal your way through the Scriptures, because that’s what those words end up becoming. They become a pile of rocks. They become something that is tangible that can allow you to remember what God did. So, anyway, Jacob does get north and spends the next 14 years working for his uncle, Laban, in order to be able marry the one that he loves, Rachel. And we saw how the story went. He got Leah instead and then he got Rachel. So, he got a little bit of a taste of his own medicine. Trickery is definitely part of the family story here. But anyway, Rachel, who Jacob loves, is unable to have children at this point, but her sister, her older sister, Leah, she does have sons. And her first son is named Ruben and then she has a son named Simeon and she has a son named Levi and then she has a fourth son named Judah. These names may be familiar. And if they’re not familiar, they’re names to remember. Each of these four children are going to grow up and from them will come four different tribes of Israel. And you may say, well I thought there were 12 tribes of Israel. Yup. They just haven’t been born yet. And you could also think, well, these are the children of Jacob and Leah, like, where does Israel come in, like, how did they become the children of Israel? We’ll see that unfolding over the next several days. As we’ve seen in the Old Testament, Abram became Abraham, was given a new name. Jacob will eventually be given a new name as well. His name will become Israel. So, today we have met, for the first time, some of the children of Israel.  

Prayer:

Father, we thank You for Your word. We thank You for another week, this first full week in Your word and we’re so grateful for all that You have begun to speak to us and all that You are revealing to us from the Scriptures. And as we watch the story begin to unfold of a new people, a people that You chose, a people that you created and called to yourself, a new earthly family from which You would bless the nations, we thank You for this story. And we also realize that this now is our story. You have grafted us into this family. And these are no longer strangers but ancestors. Come, Holy Spirit, as we continue to take this journey, a journey that shows us how we got here and a journey that shows us where were going. Come Jesus. We pray in your mighty name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

Tomorrow, remember, has been canceled. We were looking forward, very much, to being at Newsong Christian Fellowship in Louisville, but we’ve got an ice and snowstorm between us and it’s happening all around us. So, it’s not safe for any of us to be coming in from all over the place. We’re going to reschedule.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at dailyaudiobible.com. There’s a link, it’s on the homepage. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

And that’s it for today. I’m Brian I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here next week, which happens to be tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hi, my name is ___. This is a letter from someone I know. Dear God, I want to thank You for what You have already done. I’m not going to wait until I see results or receive rewards. I’m thanking You right now. I’m not going to wait until I feel better or things look better. I’m thanking You right now. I’m not going to wait until people say they are sorry or until they stop talking to me. I’m thanking You right now. I’m not going to wait until the pain in my body disappears. I’m thanking right now. I’m not going to wait until my financial situation is right. I am thanking God right now. I’m not going to wait until the children are asleep and the house is quiet. I am going to thank You right now. I’m not going to wait until I get promoted at work until I get the job. Thank You God, right now. I’m not going to wait until I understand every experience in my life that is because we pain or suffering or grief. I thank You God right now. I am not going to wait until the journey gets easier or the challenges are removed. I thank You God right now. I’m thanking You because I’m alive. I’m thanking You because I made it through the day’s difficulties. I’m thanking You because I had to walk the wildest obstacles. I’m thank You because Jesus closed the gates of death and hell. Thank You. And I’m thanking You because I have the ability and the opportunity to do more and do better. I’m thanking You because Father, You haven’t given up on me. Thank You God. Thank You. God, bless.

Hi everyone. Hi Brian. I’m not sure who Jill is yet, I’m assuming that’s your wife. I’m the first-time caller my name is Kelly up here in Spokane Washington. My friend Mark D. from Switzerland told me about Daily Audio Bible and I’m so excited that he did, so thankful that he did. This program has been amazing and I already feel the effects of it on my life just after eight days of listening. My prayer request for everyone is, I really feel like I’m in a spirit of deliverance, a season of deliverance in my life coming up in 2018. I’m so ready. I’ve had an attack of my body and my mind and just the way that I’ve been living out my faith and I’m just ready to be delivered. I have had digestive issues for 11 years. My hair is getting really thin and falling out and I’m in my later 20s and I’ve just been feeling really worn down but I’m ready. I’m also fighting this battle knowing that Jesus is with me and he’s carrying me through and he’s going to bring me deliverance this year. So, I want people to agree with me that this is going to happen and that this rejection that I have been facing in my life will be no more and I’ll be just thoroughly understood and accepted by the Lord, finally, just feel the value and the love of the Lord in my life. So, that is my prayer and I just want to give another woo woo out to Mark D. in Switzerland for introducing me to the daily audio Bible. This is obviously my first time calling and I hope to call again. So, thank you everyone. Thank you to this community. I’m so thankful to be a part of it. Bye.

Hi. This is Vickie. I’m calling because my family needs prayer. We had a terrible tragedy and it happened December 10^th. My son took his life and it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do…the devastation is just insane. I have days when I just don’t want to get up out of bed. And I’m sure there’s people who are…who have gone through…someone they love…it’s just so pointless. And he left behind a 5-year-old daughter. So, I’m praying…I’m asking for prayers for my family for healing and just all of the things that you have to deal with that I never thought I’d have to deal with, that I had could have the strength to do it, and the strength to…just to keep moving forward. I’d also ask for prayer for my dear friend Julie. She’s going through cancer and today, January 9^th, she’s having surgery. And she needs healing and hope. She loves God, but this is such a hard thing to walk through. So, I covet all of your prayers for Vicki, that’s me, and my friend Julie. Thank you all. And I’m praying for…I’m praying you all to have a good new year. Thank you.

Happy new year everybody. This is Salvation is Mine in San Angelo California. God bless you all. I hope you had a wonderful, wonderful blessed Christmas celebrating the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. I wanted to call in and pray today because I was laying in bed last night and feeling angry. And I’m not quite sure why. And I actually think I’ve been feeling it for a while. But I wanted to call in and pray for all of us who are in anger right now and don’t really understand why. So, family, let’s pray. Dear heavenly Father we come before You right now asking for forgiveness for our anger. We don’t know exactly why we’re angry, if were angry at You, we’re angry at family, we’re angry about our job situation, we’re angry about the state of this world. We just feel so much inside and we really can’t place it on one thing, but Lord, God You know our heart and You know what makes us tick and You know what makes us angry, You know what makes us happy, You know what makes us sad. But right now, dear Father, we come before You asking You to wipe the anger from our systems, from our hearts, from our minds, and from our spirits, Lord, God, that me say clearly the love that You have for us Lord, God. And we ask for your forgiveness if we are angry with you Lord, God because of our circumstances. We have to understand and know that we do have a part in that and we have to take responsibility, but that You are always our ever present help and You will always be around us no matter what. All we have to do is ask dear Lord. So, Lord Jesus Christ, in the name of your precious Father God, please cleanse our souls, cleanse our souls, and cleanse our minds. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen. Thank you, family. Have a great day. This is Salvation is mine in San Angelo California.

Genesis 26:17-27:46, Matthew 9:1-17, Psalms 10:6-18, Proverbs 3:9-10

Today is the 12^th day of January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible, I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you in the rolling hills of Tennessee. I’m coming to you wherever it is that you are on this planet. And what a joy, what a joy that we can take the next step forward in community as we continue to take steps forward through the Bible. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Version this week. Genesis chapter 26 verse 17 through 27 verse 46.

Commentary:

Okay. So, in the book of Genesis we’ve got some family issues happening in Abraham’s family. Of course, Abraham has already passed on. Isaac is now the patriarch of the family. His sons Jacob and Esau are in conflict with one another over the family blessing. Isaac has reached old age, he’s at the end of his life. So, who will the next patriarch of the family be? And Isaac’s wife, Rebekah hatches a plan because she wants it to be Jacob and that’s what happens. Jacob will become the next family leader, but not before he has to go on the run from his brother Esau. And, so, Jacob will go all the way back. Remember the story of the servant who went to find a wife for Isaac, back to Abraham’s people, way back to the North East? That’s where Jacob is headed and there is some interesting drama waiting for him, but we’ll have to wait until we get there.

In the New Testament, Jesus has begun his ministry, and everyone’s checking Him out. But h’s just getting going. He doesn’t really have a bunch of enemies at this point. A lot of times we can just assume that the elite religious leaders were just against Jesus from the get-go, but they weren’t. They were very intrigued by Him, but we start getting clues as to why there’s going to be antagonism and, ultimately, plots against Jesus life. In today’s reading Jesus healed the paralytic man by telling him that his sins are forgiven. Okay. So, for the Jews, especially the religious Jews, this was thought of as blasphemy. Only God can forgive sins. And, So, Jesus was making a declaration about who He was and this confused many religious leaders. And then, in the next scene, Jesus finds Matthew, who is a tax collector, who is basically seen as a Jewish person who has sold the Jewish people out for their own gain. So, basically, how this worked was that the Roman Empire, so, the Roman government, collected taxes from the people. But the way that they would disperse this authority was to, essentially, offer for sale the right to collect taxes. So, only the ultra-wealthy could get in on that action. And they would get the license to collect taxes and then hire people to go and actually do the dirty work. So, these local tax collectors would collect taxes, but they would collect more and they would line their own pockets and the people just had to suck it up and pay it. They did not want to be in trouble with the Roman authorities. And in many cases people were taxed to the point that they couldn’t survive. And there was no good way for commoner to seek justice in that kind of situation. So, these local tax collectors were hated. They were looked at as cronies and crooks, corrupt. And, so, while the religious leaders would rail against them and the injustice and brand them as sinners, Jesus goes to Matthew and then has dinner in Matthew’s home. This is very confusing to the people, especially the religious leaders because they think they’re speaking out on behalf of the people and the injustice that’s being done to the people by this over taxation. And then on the face of it, it looks like this new rabbi, this Jesus, is cozying up to the system. So, Jesus is showing that His way is a bit different. He could join the ranks and just be outspoken against tax collectors and sinners and all of the injustice that is happening to the Hebrew people. And He could stir up the people and incite them to, maybe, rise up and rebel. But this had been going on for well over a century and these people had gotten crushed a number of times. They had been victorious some as well, but it has been a long hard road. Jesus is doing what Jesus always does. He’s not reacting to the situation that’s right in front of Him. He’s going behind all of that to speak into the root, the cause. And, so, He’s going after Matthew’s heart. He’s going after a tax collectors heart, essentially, revealing that to change a corrupt system you have to change the hearts of the people who run it. So, when He’s questioned about this, His response was saying, people who are well aren’t the ones who need the doctor. Sick people need a doctor. I didn’t come to call the righteous. I came to call sinners. These kinds of behaviors are the things to get Jesus on the radar with the religious leaders. And very soon we’ll encounter an instance of another thing that gets Him in trouble, and that is what He chooses to do on the Sabbath. So, rabbis have wrestled all along with the Sabbath day and the command to not do any work on the Sabbath day. But you can’t just command don’t do any work on the Sabbath day, that has to be defined. What is work? And that has been being wrestled with for a long time by religious Jews. So, like, even today in Israel on the Sabbath day, there are elevators in hotels that will just go from floor to floor to floor to floor and just keep repeating so no one has to push a button, because pushing a button could be constituted as work. Jesus has a different interpretation and He’ll talk about it, but it gets Him in trouble. But what we can see beginning to emerge is that Jesus, as a Hebrew man, is willing to break with tradition and to reinterpret tradition. And this becomes a major component of Jesus ministry. So, we should pay attention to it because it invites us to look at the places that we’ve planted our feet in cement and we can’t move.

Prayer:

Father, we invite You into all of this, all that we have read today, these dramatic and fascinating stories, and we’re beginning to see just how much humanity is dripping from these stories. And we are clearly seeing that, yes, culture is different, clothes are different, times are different, but we can certainly relate to these stories, because these are human stories, and they reveal a lot about our own lives. So, come Holy Spirit, plant Your word into our lives today. We ask in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

So, the one thing that I have been mentioning is that we’ll be on the road this Sunday. I will be speaking in Louisville Kentucky at New Song Christian Fellowship Louisville. So, if you are in the region, we’ll Look forward to meeting you. Looking forward to seeing. You can get all the details at dailyaudiobible.com in the Events section. So, hope to see you there.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, then I give you all of my humble gratitude. It will be said over and over this year that, what we’ve done we’ve done together all of these years, and what we will do in the future we will continue to do together. So, thank you for your partnership. There’s is a link on the homepage of dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner very easily. If you prefer the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

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:

Good morning. It is Monday, 8 January and I’ve just finished listening to this morning’s podcast. And the reading in Genesis today reminded me quite strongly that there are stories in the Bible which don’t sit well with us and that I really don’t like. I was there thinking why, why, why is this in here? Why would you do that? But then I’m reminded as well that there are times when I’m stuck in a hard place. I am in a cave or wherever and I can’t see a solution to the problem. There is literally no way, it can’t be done. There’s just no way this thing can be resolved or a happy ending can come from this. And then I engineer a solution myself. And call myself and say, well, how can I get out of it and I come up with something. And it’s not necessarily the best thing or the most helpful thing to do, but it gets me out of that situation. But then I’ve got to live with the consequences of that. Where, what I should’ve done, and what perhaps Lot and his daughter should’ve done, is seek God through the words of Matthew today. Seek God, ask God, ask God the solution. God, I am in the situation. What can I do? Please send help. And that’s, as I was going, reminded us. It’s so, so important to seek God in all things. Remember who you are. You are a child of God. You are loved by God. God wants us. Ask Him. He wants us to talk to Him. He wants us to love and trust Him to get us out of that situation. Father God, I am so sorry the times when I haven’t asked, for the times when I haven’t trusted, and I’ve gotten myself out of it. Please help me to trust You wholeheartedly in the future. In Jesus name. Amen.

Hello this is Dave from North Carolina. I’m calling with a praise report and I wanted to share something else. My praise report is that in the new year we decided to listen to the Daily Audio Bible with our kids before bedtime at night and so far that is working great. So, thanks for that. The other thing I wanted to share is something that happened this week. There was an exchange with someone on Facebook and it made me realize that I don’t bring glory to God when I beat myself up for…like…someone complimented me about, you’re doing a great job with this…with a certain thing. And I was like, no, I’m…you know…I kind of argued with her…no I’m not good kind of a thing. I just think that in the new year I want to focus on believing what God wants for me in my life and none of us are perfect while we are here on this earth and we will mess up and we should ask for forgiveness, but we also shouldn’t waste a lot of time and energy just beating ourselves up. We should be focusing on God and what His plans are for us and just basically get right back on the horse when we mess up and focus on Him and what His plans are for our lives. It’s just something that was on my heart that I wanted to share with the rest of you as well. Have a great day, and thanks for this community.

Good morning DABber’s. This is Walda, the burning bush that will not be devoured for the glory of our God and King. I’m actually calling to just say, you know, thumbs up to China for Daily Audio Bible Chronological. And I have a 10-year-old kid who’s literally been listening to you since he was born. And Max, yes Max. Oh he loves Max. When he was younger, like four or five years old, he was like loving listening to Max. I also have a 20-year-old son who is a prodigal son right now. And I have mixed emotions as I listen to the very first podcast…and sorry…I’m getting a little emotional. But China, we love you. I’m so proud of you. I’m so, so proud of you. I’m so proud of what you’re doing and I pray that God will continue to bless you. May God protect your life. May He protect you in the future. I pray the for the future you, for the adult, and I know you’re already almost an adult. Adult China, I pray for you, that God will sustain you and continue to guide your path, that the word of God will continue to bring forth that which God has planted in your heart. I’m so, so proud of you. And I pray for all the parents who have prodigal kids. My 20-year-old is now seriously addicted to heroin. And he’s gone astray. But I praise God because God will finish what He has started. And I thank God for kids like China, for women like China who can be a light. And I pray for all the China’s out there, all the girls and boys who have grown up in the Lord in our still holding what they have, what they learned from their childhood, and I pray for…

Hello daily audio Bible family. This is Nathan from Bloomington Illinois. I just want to welcome all newcomers to our family. I was going to say strap in, but don’t strap in to tight because God’s going to move you and you don’t want to be standing so firm that you can’t be moved. So, I just wanted to throw that in there is an extra. So, Brian was talking about forgiveness and…oh my gosh…that is so powerful. We’ve all been in situations where we’ve been wrong and we can justify our anger and where we are in life, but that locks us, it freezes us into a life, a lifestyle, deeming it that won’t let us go because we have not let go. So, if you’ve ever been in a situation where you’ve forgiven someone who’s done you wrong. One, they probably don’t expect you to do that because you can be mad at them and should act mad, but that’s not what God teaches us. He says, forgive one another and I will forgive you. You know, that’s already been done. So, we have to let go. We have to let God. Because when we say the words, I forgive you, there’s a release of our emotion, there’s a release of that angriness and bitterness and tension and stress and anxiety and everything else that goes with it that’s also released and God is then able to do work through you. Keep that thought. Have a great day. Make it a great day.

Genesis 24:52-26:16, Matthew 8:18-34, Psalms 10:1-5, Proverbs 3:7-8

Today is January 11^th. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s wonderful to be here with you today. Hopefully you’re keeping warm and cozy as we move our way through the winter. I’m sure that’s true if you’re in the southern hemisphere. Hopefully you all are keeping cool. Either way, the global campfire is burning and off we go into our next step forward. We’ve been reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week, which is what will do for the rest of the week. Genesis chapter 24 verse 52 through 26 verse 16 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, in the book of Genesis, we reached the end of Abraham’s life and we’re moving into the next generations story. And it’s easy to get lost in all of these names and trying to piece together who all of these people are and where the story is headed to. So, if we’ll just keep track of what’s going on there, we’ll see how the story unfolds, we’ll find out who the children of Israel are. We’ll find out how it is they got to Egypt and became enslaved. All of these things will begin to unfold. But understanding who the people are will help us see it unfold. So, this particular story that were in right now that is going to influence the rest of the Bible begins with this person Abram. Right? And, so, he follows God into this land. And we talked about the significance of this land. We know that at this point its Canaanite land, but Abram and then when his name changes to Abraham, he stays in the land, he raises his family in the land. And today we said goodbye. After 175 years, he dies and is buried in the cave of Machpelah, where he had buried his wife Sarah. So, Abraham and Sarah are now buried in this cave of Machpelah, which is in Hebron. Hebron still exists until this day. In fact, it’s very much a functioning city until this day. And the cave of Machpelah still exists until this day. Half of it is like a synagogue and half of it is a mosque. As I said earlier, a lot of people in the world trace their religious history back through Abraham. So, this place, where the cave of Machpelah was, is now called the Tomb of the Patriarchs. And as we move a little bit further into the story, we will revisit this field, this cave, and it will have significance. But I don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves. So, Abraham, the patriarch of this new family that is promised to be as big as the stars in the heavens and as many as the grains of the sand on the seashore, and to have this particular land that God was promising them, reaches the end of his life. So, he didn’t see this promise fulfilled, but he believed God every step of the way that it would be fulfilled. And what he did get to experience was a miracle, the child of promise, the next generation, Isaac. And then we read the story of Abraham sending his lead servant to go in pursuit of a wife for Isaac. And he goes back to his family’s ancestral land where he finds Rebekah, who agrees that she should come and become Isaac’s wife and she does. So, Abraham and Sarah become the next generation, Isaac and Rebekah. Isaac and Rebekah then have twin boys, Jacob and Esau. So, the next generation, the grand children of Abraham are born. And we see that, although they are twins, they are very different from each other. And we begin to notice that Jacob has the cunning streak that his father, Isaac, and his grandfather, Abraham, had possessed. And we’re just beginning to see that story unfold. And we’ll watch that happen. The generation of Jacob and Esau becomes very, very pivotal, and we’ll see that in the coming days.

Then in the book of Proverbs, we’ve moved past all the words of introduction and what this book is about and the voice of wisdom that speaks and have begun to be challenged by wisdom. And, so, we’re challenged today to fear the Lord and turn away from evil. So, that’s a piece of wisdom that we can get our heads around. It sounds like something we’ve heard before, ‘fear the Lord and turn away from evil.’ But, how do we do that? The beginning of the verse gives us some clues. ‘Don’t be wise in your own eyes.’ ‘Fear the Lord and turn away from evil.’ And then the wisdom attaches a promise. ‘If you do that this will be healing for your body and strengthening for your bones.’ So, if we will just come to terms that we don’t know all that we think that we know. And, so, much of the time what we’re depending on are things that we don’t know. But, rather, we set our affections and our reverence and awe on the Lord. It will expose evil. We will be able to see it and we will be able to turn away from it. We will be living in wisdom. And if we live in wisdom then this will be healing for our bodies, this will strengthen our bones. We will be living in wisdom.

Prayer:

Father, we acknowledge that we try to do things, maybe even most things, in our own strength, by our own ingenuity, and we look for you to come alongside of that, and bless it, and protect it, when so often it was never wise to begin with. And, so, we acknowledge that we don’t know all that we think that we know. And we also acknowledge that we need to set our affections, our attention, our awe, our reverence, our relationship in daily moment by moment interaction with You. And Your Holy Spirit will show us how to turn away from evil. And in systematically turning away from evil, we will find strength and we will find health. So, come Holy Spirit, this is what we’re asking for. We turn our hearts to You and You alone. All these circumstances, all this stuff that’s swirling around that has carried over from the old year and is bringing anxiety into our lives, that is keeping us awake. The beginning of a new year and the hope for something better brings its own sets of anxieties, we turn away from those things and turn to You. As Jesus taught us, this reverses the paradigm, this puts us in proper alignment, where You are first and foremost in all things. Come, Holy Spirit we pray. In Jesus’ name, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

A couple of days from now we’ll be back on the road. Well be in the Louisville Kentucky area and I’ll be speaking at New Song Christian Fellowship Louisville and hope to see you if you are in the area. You can get all the details at dailyaudiobible.com in the Events section. So, come out and say hello.

Also, want to tell you about our WindFarm coffee and tea. So, I’m a bit of a junior coffee snob, especially as it comes to starting my day. And I’m a bit of a, I wouldn’t call myself a tea snob, but I enjoy tea in the evening. And several years ago, I guess we’re getting on eight or nine years ago, we started our journey at the Daily Audio Bible with our own coffee. And we roast our coffee, fresh, at altitude, in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, where everything is shipped from and then we ship it to you, freshly roasted. And, so, what’s the big deal about coffee and tea? Why would we have coffee and tea in the Daily Audio Bible Shop? Well, most of us are drinking coffee or tea in the morning, maybe in the afternoon, maybe in the evening. It’s something that we’re consuming as a part of our life every day anyway. So, all those years ago we just started asking ourselves, what if we could deliver fresh roasted coffee that doesn’t have a long distribution chain. So, for example, if you’re buying your coffee at the grocery store and then brewing at home, it’s pretty old, and pretty bitter. If you’re driving through a café every day and getting your cup of coffee, well, then, you’re paying a premium for it. And we just starting thinking, what if we could deliver a better product and allow any margin that exists to be sewn back into the ministry, because it’s something we’re likely to be consuming anyway. And we’ve been doing that for years with our WindFarm coffee brand. And the name WindFarm comes from the book of Ezekiel, chapter 37. And we won’t get there for a little while, but we will get there this year. But the prophet Ezekiel is looking out over a vast Valley that had once been a battlefield and was now only skeletons, just dried bones that had been left there. And in the process of that story, he’s invited by God called to the four winds the breath of life. And as a community, here at the Daily Audio Bible, that is our prayer. It is our prayer that that’s what we’re doing every day, that as a community we’ve built a windfarm, where many, many thousands are calling to the four winds, the breath of life. Hence, the name WindFarm. So, check it out. It is certainly premium grade, boutique, fresh roasted coffee and small batch imported teas from around the world. And we have a number of varieties. And then we have the Daily Audio Bible coffee club, where you can have a bag or however many bags you want sent to you each month and you get a different kind every month. Find out the kinds you like the best. And that the Daily Audio Bible pairs well with morning coffee. It’s a part of my morning routine. I am drinking some of it…well…not right now…I’m talking…but it’s sitting here to my left like it is every day. So, check that out. You can find it in the Daily Audio Bible Shop at dailyaudiobible.com in the Coffee and Tea section.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at dailyaudiobible.com as well. There’s a link. It’s right on the homepage. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

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:

Well, hello there my DAB family. This is Mark Street from Sydney Australia. Today is Sunday, the 7^th of January. Happy New Year everybody. Look, I’m calling today, I just finished listening to the podcast today and I just want to stand in agreement with Brian, that forgiveness changes everything. And I know I’ve called in on it before, but I cannot believe since I’ve been listening to God and forgiving people in my life He has been restoring I’m restorable relationships all around me. I’m amazed what’s happening. And I realize now, what Brian’s saying as well, that the release of sin has all got to do with forgiveness. And the anger that was in me, that you’ve been praying for me family, has almost totally disappeared. And there is still some more forgiveness that I need to do in my life as well that happened in childhood time, in growing up, which has been bound in sexual sin. And I know this year, if I forgive, it will be a year of moving forward even more. Family, I love you all so much. And what can I say? I mean, it’s hard to forgive but the rewards God gives you when you do forgive are amazing. And that’s my love to you. I want to see all of you experience what I’ve experienced and build relationships and coming back and God honoring every word he says in his Bible if we listen to him. I love you family and I’m looking forward to another year with all of you and hopefully supporting more people as well. Love you. Bye.

Hi everybody. It’s Lisa the Encourager. I’m sorry I haven’t been able to call in lately, but I promise I’m going to do better. I just wanted to read something tonight to Brian because I’m sure all of you agree with me about what I’m about to say about how grateful we are. I don’t tell you enough, Brian Harden, but I thank God for you often and all that you have done to improve my walk with Christ in the last two years. I pray many blessings over you and Jill and your lovely family. I know I struggle to call and pray for others with all of our busy live stuff. And sometimes it’s just hard to be positive for so many people that are hurting with health issues, addictions, and insurmountable problems. It just makes my heart hurt so much. That’s why I am so very impressed with your persistence through your own personal life struggles, pain, sorrow, holidays, travel, birthdays, and sickness. No matter what it is, we can all depend on you to be there for us reading the word of God and sending it with your ‘I love you’ so well for all who will join the Daily Audio Bible family. Not to mention, always keeping it interesting free announcements like what’s coming next, like __ , Sneezing Jesus, tantalizing coffee, trips to Israel, the More conference with Jill, Black Wing pencils, or China reading the Bible chronologically. And all of this has just since I’ve been a part of Daily Audio Bible. So, I know there is so much more. But most importantly, bringing us all into a deeper relationship with our Creator. And that has honestly surpassed everything I’ve had in my entire Christian life. I thank God for you today and for giving us a man of God who has a passion for his flock. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Dear heavenly Father, I thank you God so much for Brian this family and Jill and his children and all of the people behind the scenes that work on Daily Audio Bible so we may be blessed and drawn closer to You. I thank You God from the bottom of my heart and I pray many blessings over this wonderful family and this wonderful team of individuals that bring us the Daily Audio Bible. In Jesus’ name, I pray. Amen.

Hi Daily Audio Bible family. This is Vanessa from Oregon. I’m just calling because I just finished the January 7^th podcast and, Brian, your commentary after was amazing. I listen usually in the middle of the night because I can’t sleep and I just close my eyes and just think about forgiveness and making sense of something that started bubbling up from my childhood that I haven’t even really thought about, that I really didn’t even really think there were things that were bothering me. That was just…coming to the surface. So, being a young girl of color in a small rural town, different things that happened to me…and…you know…I forgive and I give it to God. And I can specifically feel lighter sensations bubbling…I don’t know…it’s just very…new to me…and I just want to thank You for that because sometimes there’s things that we don’t realize that we haven’t let go of until we stop and pray about it. So, thank you for that. Thank you, family. I love you guys I listen every day and I pray for you guys all the time. Just want one small request. My husband’s mother is sick. Her name is Kathy. She’s in the hospital and she doesn’t have much time left. So, if you could just…I ask you to pray for her to have some peace and resting, I would appreciate it. Thank you everybody. Have a good week. Bye.

Hey DAB family. This is Byron out in Florida. Hope you guys are doing well. Need your help on something. My younger son, Nehemiah, is now three and half year’s old. Can you believe that? God has been good and he’s doing pretty well. He goes to school now, three days a week, in a special program for kids with special needs. At church, the ladies have been real nice to him, taking care of him in a nursery for all this time. But he’s getting kind of old and he’s getting kind of big and I feel that it’s time to move them out of that into the other children’s activities that they have there. But he still not speaking and, you know, there’s still issues with different transitions and things like that that, things that  you have with kids on the autism spectrum. But I think it’s time for him to start moving forward. And it’s going to be difficult, and it’s just going to be a hard transition, not just for him but for people in the family, like my wife, who is having a hard time with it, and my son, __ for him. He’s having a hard time with it. So, it’s just one of things where we’ve just got a just jump in the water in figuring out how to swim. So, I ask your prayers on that, that we can do that, that we can have confidence doing it. We’ve done it before with my older son. So, it will work out, but I need your prayers and I need the Lord to be in this. And if this is something that I should be doing then just see it clearly. But I thank you that you guys are always with me and always supporting me and my family and I just love you all. Talk to you later. Bye.

Genesis 24:52-26:16, Matthew 8:18-34, Psalms 10:1-5, Proverbs 3:7-8

Today is January 11^th. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s wonderful to be here with you today. Hopefully you’re keeping warm and cozy as we move our way through the winter. I’m sure that’s true if you’re in the southern hemisphere. Hopefully you all are keeping cool. Either way, the global campfire is burning and off we go into our next step forward. We’ve been reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week, which is what will do for the rest of the week. Genesis chapter 24 verse 52 through 26 verse 16 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, in the book of Genesis, we reached the end of Abraham’s life and we’re moving into the next generations story. And it’s easy to get lost in all of these names and trying to piece together who all of these people are and where the story is headed to. So, if we’ll just keep track of what’s going on there, we’ll see how the story unfolds, we’ll find out who the children of Israel are. We’ll find out how it is they got to Egypt and became enslaved. All of these things will begin to unfold. But understanding who the people are will help us see it unfold. So, this particular story that were in right now that is going to influence the rest of the Bible begins with this person Abram. Right? And, so, he follows God into this land. And we talked about the significance of this land. We know that at this point its Canaanite land, but Abram and then when his name changes to Abraham, he stays in the land, he raises his family in the land. And today we said goodbye. After 175 years, he dies and is buried in the cave of Machpelah, where he had buried his wife Sarah. So, Abraham and Sarah are now buried in this cave of Machpelah, which is in Hebron. Hebron still exists until this day. In fact, it’s very much a functioning city until this day. And the cave of Machpelah still exists until this day. Half of it is like a synagogue and half of it is a mosque. As I said earlier, a lot of people in the world trace their religious history back through Abraham. So, this place, where the cave of Machpelah was, is now called the Tomb of the Patriarchs. And as we move a little bit further into the story, we will revisit this field, this cave, and it will have significance. But I don’t want to get too far ahead of ourselves. So, Abraham, the patriarch of this new family that is promised to be as big as the stars in the heavens and as many as the grains of the sand on the seashore, and to have this particular land that God was promising them, reaches the end of his life. So, he didn’t see this promise fulfilled, but he believed God every step of the way that it would be fulfilled. And what he did get to experience was a miracle, the child of promise, the next generation, Isaac. And then we read the story of Abraham sending his lead servant to go in pursuit of a wife for Isaac. And he goes back to his family’s ancestral land where he finds Rebekah, who agrees that she should come and become Isaac’s wife and she does. So, Abraham and Sarah become the next generation, Isaac and Rebekah. Isaac and Rebekah then have twin boys, Jacob and Esau. So, the next generation, the grand children of Abraham are born. And we see that, although they are twins, they are very different from each other. And we begin to notice that Jacob has the cunning streak that his father, Isaac, and his grandfather, Abraham, had possessed. And we’re just beginning to see that story unfold. And we’ll watch that happen. The generation of Jacob and Esau becomes very, very pivotal, and we’ll see that in the coming days.

Then in the book of Proverbs, we’ve moved past all the words of introduction and what this book is about and the voice of wisdom that speaks and have begun to be challenged by wisdom. And, so, we’re challenged today to fear the Lord and turn away from evil. So, that’s a piece of wisdom that we can get our heads around. It sounds like something we’ve heard before, ‘fear the Lord and turn away from evil.’ But, how do we do that? The beginning of the verse gives us some clues. ‘Don’t be wise in your own eyes.’ ‘Fear the Lord and turn away from evil.’ And then the wisdom attaches a promise. ‘If you do that this will be healing for your body and strengthening for your bones.’ So, if we will just come to terms that we don’t know all that we think that we know. And, so, much of the time what we’re depending on are things that we don’t know. But, rather, we set our affections and our reverence and awe on the Lord. It will expose evil. We will be able to see it and we will be able to turn away from it. We will be living in wisdom. And if we live in wisdom then this will be healing for our bodies, this will strengthen our bones. We will be living in wisdom.

Prayer:

Father, we acknowledge that we try to do things, maybe even most things, in our own strength, by our own ingenuity, and we look for you to come alongside of that, and bless it, and protect it, when so often it was never wise to begin with. And, so, we acknowledge that we don’t know all that we think that we know. And we also acknowledge that we need to set our affections, our attention, our awe, our reverence, our relationship in daily moment by moment interaction with You. And Your Holy Spirit will show us how to turn away from evil. And in systematically turning away from evil, we will find strength and we will find health. So, come Holy Spirit, this is what we’re asking for. We turn our hearts to You and You alone. All these circumstances, all this stuff that’s swirling around that has carried over from the old year and is bringing anxiety into our lives, that is keeping us awake. The beginning of a new year and the hope for something better brings its own sets of anxieties, we turn away from those things and turn to You. As Jesus taught us, this reverses the paradigm, this puts us in proper alignment, where You are first and foremost in all things. Come, Holy Spirit we pray. In Jesus’ name, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here.

A couple of days from now we’ll be back on the road. Well be in the Louisville Kentucky area and I’ll be speaking at New Song Christian Fellowship Louisville and hope to see you if you are in the area. You can get all the details at dailyaudiobible.com in the Events section. So, come out and say hello.

Also, want to tell you about our WindFarm coffee and tea. So, I’m a bit of a junior coffee snob, especially as it comes to starting my day. And I’m a bit of a, I wouldn’t call myself a tea snob, but I enjoy tea in the evening. And several years ago, I guess we’re getting on eight or nine years ago, we started our journey at the Daily Audio Bible with our own coffee. And we roast our coffee, fresh, at altitude, in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado, where everything is shipped from and then we ship it to you, freshly roasted. And, so, what’s the big deal about coffee and tea? Why would we have coffee and tea in the Daily Audio Bible Shop? Well, most of us are drinking coffee or tea in the morning, maybe in the afternoon, maybe in the evening. It’s something that we’re consuming as a part of our life every day anyway. So, all those years ago we just started asking ourselves, what if we could deliver fresh roasted coffee that doesn’t have a long distribution chain. So, for example, if you’re buying your coffee at the grocery store and then brewing at home, it’s pretty old, and pretty bitter. If you’re driving through a café every day and getting your cup of coffee, well, then, you’re paying a premium for it. And we just starting thinking, what if we could deliver a better product and allow any margin that exists to be sewn back into the ministry, because it’s something we’re likely to be consuming anyway. And we’ve been doing that for years with our WindFarm coffee brand. And the name WindFarm comes from the book of Ezekiel, chapter 37. And we won’t get there for a little while, but we will get there this year. But the prophet Ezekiel is looking out over a vast Valley that had once been a battlefield and was now only skeletons, just dried bones that had been left there. And in the process of that story, he’s invited by God called to the four winds the breath of life. And as a community, here at the Daily Audio Bible, that is our prayer. It is our prayer that that’s what we’re doing every day, that as a community we’ve built a windfarm, where many, many thousands are calling to the four winds, the breath of life. Hence, the name WindFarm. So, check it out. It is certainly premium grade, boutique, fresh roasted coffee and small batch imported teas from around the world. And we have a number of varieties. And then we have the Daily Audio Bible coffee club, where you can have a bag or however many bags you want sent to you each month and you get a different kind every month. Find out the kinds you like the best. And that the Daily Audio Bible pairs well with morning coffee. It’s a part of my morning routine. I am drinking some of it…well…not right now…I’m talking…but it’s sitting here to my left like it is every day. So, check that out. You can find it in the Daily Audio Bible Shop at dailyaudiobible.com in the Coffee and Tea section.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that at dailyaudiobible.com as well. There’s a link. It’s right on the homepage. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

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:

Well, hello there my DAB family. This is Mark Street from Sydney Australia. Today is Sunday, the 7^th of January. Happy New Year everybody. Look, I’m calling today, I just finished listening to the podcast today and I just want to stand in agreement with Brian, that forgiveness changes everything. And I know I’ve called in on it before, but I cannot believe since I’ve been listening to God and forgiving people in my life He has been restoring I’m restorable relationships all around me. I’m amazed what’s happening. And I realize now, what Brian’s saying as well, that the release of sin has all got to do with forgiveness. And the anger that was in me, that you’ve been praying for me family, has almost totally disappeared. And there is still some more forgiveness that I need to do in my life as well that happened in childhood time, in growing up, which has been bound in sexual sin. And I know this year, if I forgive, it will be a year of moving forward even more. Family, I love you all so much. And what can I say? I mean, it’s hard to forgive but the rewards God gives you when you do forgive are amazing. And that’s my love to you. I want to see all of you experience what I’ve experienced and build relationships and coming back and God honoring every word he says in his Bible if we listen to him. I love you family and I’m looking forward to another year with all of you and hopefully supporting more people as well. Love you. Bye.

Hi everybody. It’s Lisa the Encourager. I’m sorry I haven’t been able to call in lately, but I promise I’m going to do better. I just wanted to read something tonight to Brian because I’m sure all of you agree with me about what I’m about to say about how grateful we are. I don’t tell you enough, Brian Harden, but I thank God for you often and all that you have done to improve my walk with Christ in the last two years. I pray many blessings over you and Jill and your lovely family. I know I struggle to call and pray for others with all of our busy live stuff. And sometimes it’s just hard to be positive for so many people that are hurting with health issues, addictions, and insurmountable problems. It just makes my heart hurt so much. That’s why I am so very impressed with your persistence through your own personal life struggles, pain, sorrow, holidays, travel, birthdays, and sickness. No matter what it is, we can all depend on you to be there for us reading the word of God and sending it with your ‘I love you’ so well for all who will join the Daily Audio Bible family. Not to mention, always keeping it interesting free announcements like what’s coming next, like __ , Sneezing Jesus, tantalizing coffee, trips to Israel, the More conference with Jill, Black Wing pencils, or China reading the Bible chronologically. And all of this has just since I’ve been a part of Daily Audio Bible. So, I know there is so much more. But most importantly, bringing us all into a deeper relationship with our Creator. And that has honestly surpassed everything I’ve had in my entire Christian life. I thank God for you today and for giving us a man of God who has a passion for his flock. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Dear heavenly Father, I thank you God so much for Brian this family and Jill and his children and all of the people behind the scenes that work on Daily Audio Bible so we may be blessed and drawn closer to You. I thank You God from the bottom of my heart and I pray many blessings over this wonderful family and this wonderful team of individuals that bring us the Daily Audio Bible. In Jesus’ name, I pray. Amen.

Hi Daily Audio Bible family. This is Vanessa from Oregon. I’m just calling because I just finished the January 7^th podcast and, Brian, your commentary after was amazing. I listen usually in the middle of the night because I can’t sleep and I just close my eyes and just think about forgiveness and making sense of something that started bubbling up from my childhood that I haven’t even really thought about, that I really didn’t even really think there were things that were bothering me. That was just…coming to the surface. So, being a young girl of color in a small rural town, different things that happened to me…and…you know…I forgive and I give it to God. And I can specifically feel lighter sensations bubbling…I don’t know…it’s just very…new to me…and I just want to thank You for that because sometimes there’s things that we don’t realize that we haven’t let go of until we stop and pray about it. So, thank you for that. Thank you, family. I love you guys I listen every day and I pray for you guys all the time. Just want one small request. My husband’s mother is sick. Her name is Kathy. She’s in the hospital and she doesn’t have much time left. So, if you could just…I ask you to pray for her to have some peace and resting, I would appreciate it. Thank you everybody. Have a good week. Bye.

Hey DAB family. This is Byron out in Florida. Hope you guys are doing well. Need your help on something. My younger son, Nehemiah, is now three and half year’s old. Can you believe that? God has been good and he’s doing pretty well. He goes to school now, three days a week, in a special program for kids with special needs. At church, the ladies have been real nice to him, taking care of him in a nursery for all this time. But he’s getting kind of old and he’s getting kind of big and I feel that it’s time to move them out of that into the other children’s activities that they have there. But he still not speaking and, you know, there’s still issues with different transitions and things like that that, things that  you have with kids on the autism spectrum. But I think it’s time for him to start moving forward. And it’s going to be difficult, and it’s just going to be a hard transition, not just for him but for people in the family, like my wife, who is having a hard time with it, and my son, __ for him. He’s having a hard time with it. So, it’s just one of things where we’ve just got a just jump in the water in figuring out how to swim. So, I ask your prayers on that, that we can do that, that we can have confidence doing it. We’ve done it before with my older son. So, it will work out, but I need your prayers and I need the Lord to be in this. And if this is something that I should be doing then just see it clearly. But I thank you that you guys are always with me and always supporting me and my family and I just love you all. Talk to you later. Bye.

Genesis 20:1-22:24, Matthew7:15-29, Psalms 9:1-12, Proverbs 2:16-22

Today is the 9^th day of January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It’s great to be here with you today around this roaring global campfire that we call our community, where we can come in out of the cold, out of the dark, out of the struggles, and just center ourselves in the presence of the Lord and allow His word to wash over us. So, we’re all set. Nice cup of steamy coffee here to my left, a nice microphone right in front of my face, and off we go. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week and picking up from where we left off yesterday, Genesis chapter 20 through chapter 22 today.

Commentary:

Alright. So, in the book of Genesis we have the fulfillment of the promise. Isaac is born to Abraham and Sarah in their old age. This child that this couple had longed for for so many years finally was in their arms as God promised, and they obviously raised him up until he could walk and talk and travel. But then God asks Abraham to do something pretty much unthinkable and he gets up the next day and heads out to do just that. And we need to step out of the story for second and just talk about the Bible. I mean, a story like this one with Abraham and Isaac, it makes you go, wait, wait, wait, what is going on here? This doesn’t feel right. That’s on purpose. The Bible will disrupt us in all sorts of ways as we move through it this year. It has no problem doing that and it will happen on a lot of levels and when that does happen it’s intended to stop you in your tracks. You’re supposed to then invite God into what it is bringing up in you, no matter what that is. So, yes, this story of Abraham and Isaac going to a mountain where Isaac will become a sacrifice to God is disruptive, but as the story goes, Abraham believed God, he put his faith in God and that was credited to him as righteousness. And God entered into covenant with Abraham, which fundamentally meant what’s mine is yours, what yours is mine, I will fight for you, you will fight for me, whatever I have you can have, I will withhold nothing from you. And although the idea of covenant is ancient, it is also very modern. Many, many of us are in covenant. Right? The covenant of marriage. And don’t we say basically the same thing, I will withhold nothing from you, all that I have is yours, all that you have is mine. So, Abraham’s in covenant with God and one of the promises of the covenant is that Abraham’s offspring will grow to be a multitude that cannot be numbered and will bless the nations of the earth. In other words, God is beginning a new thing with a new people. And God had promised that that would come through Isaac. So, when Abraham set off with Isaac to go to this Mount Moriah where this sacrifice would be made, he knows all of that. This is cryptic. It’s counterintuitive, what he’s being commanded to do, but he knows all of that. And we get clues into Abraham’s state of mind when he and Isaac have this conversation, when they kind of depart together. Isaac asks him, we have all of this stuff for the sacrifice, but what about the Lamb? And Abraham’s reply is, God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son. And when the time comes, that’s exactly what God does. And when Abraham is halted it’s very clear that Abraham will withhold nothing from God, which becomes an amazing foreshadowing, because God will withhold nothing from those He is in covenant with. So, Isaac was spared and God sent His son. And one of things we can get out of this is the fact that God will withhold and is not withholding things from us that are good for us. But we also have to acknowledge that we’re not the ones that get to define that. So often our estrangement from God is that we cannot seem to find a way to get Him to do what we want Him to do.

But that’s not the posture that Jesus is showing us in the Sermon on the Mount. It’s almost backward to that. Our identity and our hope itself can only be centered and rooted in God alone. Everything starts there and spills outward, not the other way around. And as dramatic as the story of Abraham and Isaac is, that’s what Abraham is modeling. The covenant with God is the central thing. Nothing can be withheld with God. It begins and ends with God. So, Abraham knew God had promised through Isaac would be this multitude of people and he believed that and he believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. So, he didn’t know how this was going to work, but it was going to work out. He was in covenant with God. So, the question then becomes, what am I withholding from God? Is my motivation the benefits of this covenant? Am I trying to make God my squire that I can order around to do things and throw promises in his face that He has to do them? Am I making myself shiny and sparkly and running around trying to show off my spirituality because, somehow, I think that’s what’s going to get me what I want from God? That posture isn’t going to work. And we hear that from Jesus as we’re concluding the Sermon on the Mount today. Jesus says, ‘not everyone who says to me Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. On that day many will say to me Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in Your name, didn’t we drive out demons in Your name, didn’t we even perform miracles in Your name. Then Jesus says, ‘I will announce to them. I never knew you.’ And all the sudden we see how big of a deal were talking about here between the Old and the New Testaments today. God wants to know us and be known by us in a covenantal relationship that is faithful and that is loyal and that is deeper than even our own marriage covenant. And God withheld nothing from us to make that happen. He offered His Son. So, what are we withholding from God. When you answer that question, you have identified idols in your life.

Prayer:

Father, this is disruptive. This makes things shake inside of us. This opens our eyes and lets us have a glimpse of clarity. This explains so much about how we’ve been trying to make our relationship with You work. And we confess, we’ve withheld plenty from You and we’ve lived backward a long time just trying to jump through whatever hoops that we feel like are in front of us so that You will do what we want You to do. When what You want is our heart. What You want is to know us and for us to know You intimately. And, so, we invite You to continue the work that You’ve begun from Your word today. May it continue to churn inside of us. We invite your Holy Spirit to bring up the ways that we been living backward and the ways that we’re withholding from you, that we’re giving our heart in worship to something else besides you, in pursuit of life. Come, Holy Spirit. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here. Couple things.

And I’ve been mentioning for a few days that the 14^th of January, which is this coming Sunday, I’ll be speaking in Louisville Kentucky at New Song Christian Fellowship Louisville. So, love to see you. If you are in that region, you can get all the details at dailyaudiobible.com in the Events section.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, then I give you humble, heartfelt gratitude. This global campfire that we have, this community that we share is something that sprang up out of the dust of the Internet and is what it is today because we did it together and it continues into the future because we’re doing it together. So, thank you for your partnership. There’s a link on the homepage of dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

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:

Hello, my Daily Audio Bible Community. This is Brett M. From Chambersburg, Pennsylvania. I called in for the first time for the Christmas Holiday Party. I’m calling in this time because I have a surgery on my ear on January 9^th. And I’m just praying that, I’m requesting prayers that my hearing will improve after this surgery. I am in the process of becoming a chaplain for the United States Army and this is kind of put a wrench, if you may, in the process. It’s kind of caused everything to be put on hold until they figure out what’s causing my hearing loss. So, we are hoping that this surgery will improve my hearing. And just please pray for my ear to heal after the surgery. I’m actually driving down to Murfreesboro Tennessee, where my brother is an ear nose and throat surgeon and he will be doing the surgery for me. And this, again, is on January 9^th. If you would please remember me in prayers that would be great. And please know my friends, I hear all your prayer requests and I pray for you all on a daily basis and I am thankful for the Daily Audio Bible. This is year number two for me. This is my second time around going through the Bible with Brian. And, so I am very thankful. I have three of my family members on board and I’m working on the other ones to join us as well. Thank you. I love you guys and I am…

Hello DAB family. This is Marsha from Colorado. This morning, while listening to Brian talk about the growing pains DAB has experienced, I was stunned to hear that there have been 5 to 10 requests per second to access the Daily Audio Bible web player and the new app. So, Beloved By Him from the UK, it looks like your prayer for people to find the DAB app has definitely been answered. My prayer is that everyone that listens on a daily basis would prayerfully and financially support this ministry so that the added expense to deal with the influx of new people wanting to hear the word of God in 2018 would never be a concern for Brian and his team. The people that called into the prayer lines today blessed me so much. His Little Sharee from Canada, what you said about this life on earth being the only chance we have to love and worship God in the middle of our messes really spoke to me. And John from Bethlehem Pennsylvania, your prayer of blessing over Brian, reading back to him what he read over us on the last day of 2017 was so special. Thank you for doing that. Jordan from Michigan, I want you to know that I’m praying for you to finish well in 2018 as a teacher. The world needs teachers like you and I know God will give you the strength that you need this year to finish well. And Purely Pampered from Maine, all I can say is, wow! You have been faithful to pray for people you’ve never met all this time. I was humbled by your call. And today I am asking for personal prayer. I was diagnosed with cancer in 2017 and after seven weeks of treatment I will have a PET scan the first week of February to determine if the cancer is gone. So, I’m asking God for a good final report and for healing of the many side effects that resulted in my treatment. I’m humbled and I’m thankful for your prayers. God bless you.

Hi Daily Audio Bible. I have been listening for several years but this is my first time calling and leaving a prayer request. I really need prayer for my family. I went to a part-time position this year because of serious migraines that I get, chronic migraines that I’ve had for over 40 years. And my husband is a realtor and business has really just come to a complete halt. And, so, I would just ask that God would pour out his provision and open doors for business for him. And then, we also have a 16-year-old son who’s making some terrible choices, rejecting godly values, and getting into drugs, and believing all of the enemies lies. And we know that he has a strong foundation in the Lord. And, so, I’m just asking that you would lift him up in prayer, that he would stop believing those lies, and that he would remember who he is in Christ, and that you would just unify our family with all of these challenges were faced with. So, thank you for your prayers and bless all of you. Bye-bye.

Hello Daily Audio Bible community. Happy New Year. It’s the 5^th January today. My name is Judith, I live in England, south of England. And I’m calling for two reasons today. One, was really encouraged by someone who called in from Canada yesterday, 4^th of January, talking about praising God in our brokenness. You were talking about when we’re going to be in glory with God and everything’s going to be perfect but how…and how wonderful that will be…but how it’s great that we can come to him in our brokenness now. That was so encouraging to me. So, thank you very much. Number two, I have an adopted brother. I myself am married and with my husband and baby. So, I’m not at the family home. But I do have an adopted brother who I won’t name for security reasons, but he lives with my parents and he’s been with us…oh…with my family for eight…coming up for nine…I think…years. He’s just turned 13. He’s very, very difficult. He has a lot of problems based on his background and it’s getting really, really difficult for my parents and there’s potential it could get to the point where the adoption will be ended, which is not of course what my parents want and not what would be good for my brother. So, please, please be praying for him, that my parents get the support that they need, and that he will be able to stay as part of our family and…yeah…please be praying for that. It’s really important. Thank you so much for your thoughts and prayers. You might also hear Isaac, my son, in the background. Please be praying for us too, but mostly for my brother at this time and for my parents and family, that they would get the help they need. Thank you so much. Lots of love to you all. And happy New Year again. Bye.

Happy New Year Daily Audio Bible family. This is Michael in Compton California calling to wish the DAB family a happy New Year and a happy New Year to all of the new listeners for this year. If you’re new to the forum this year you will enjoy this ride because it is a wonderful blessing to be able to listen to God’s word each day. And I thank you Brian and Jill and China and the other Hardin family members and the workers behind the scene that make sure that this podcast gets played 365 days of the year. What a blessing. And, I understand Brian, at the end…what you mean when you say at the end of…when you read the very last of the Bible for the year. There’s an overwhelming feeling of…its indescribable…it’s…I think we…it’s a glimpse of God’s glory and His grace that He’s allowed us to do this for a year, to be able to stay in His word and to listen to His word and enjoy it with an international family. So, God bless everyone. Looking forward to a great 2018 and looking forward to Daily Audio Bible every day. God bless you all. Bye.

Genesis 16:1-18:19, Matthew 6:1-24, Psalms 7:1-17, Proverbs 2:1-5

Today is 8^th January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It’s great to be here with you today. It was one week ago today that we set sail and started this journey that’s going to take us through the entire Bible this year. So, well done, we have completed our first week and are now going into our second week together. And, as you can see, a lot happens in the Bible inside of a week. So, let’s take the next step forward. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Genesis chapter 18 verse 16 through 19 verse 38 today.

Commentary:

Alright. So, in the book of Matthew, we’re working our way through the Sermon on the Mount, and we should be able to see pretty clearly that what Jesus is laying out is very rooted in the human experience and it’s very connected to how we how we behave toward one another and it’s all centered around our devotion and allegiance to God. So, what Jesus is describing is almost backwards from the way that we live most of the time. So, for example we were talking about forgiveness yesterday. So, like, how can you forgive in the moment? How can you actually let go of things that have been poisoned? How does that happen? Well, it can’t, unless you are first and centrally connected in relationship with God. So, when our identity is rooted and centered, first and foremost, above all other things, in God, then our identity is in Him and we can release offenses to Him in the same way that we ask Him to forgive us of our trespasses. So often it’s the other way around. We are wronged, we are carrying a grudge, we are offended, we want to be the judge. And, so were carrying all of that around inside of ourselves and because of the exterior circumstances it’s shaping how we see God, as opposed to, first and foremost we are in relationship with God and that relationship with God informs the way we look and feel about everything. So, anxiety is something Jesus was talking about today, basically, and, you know, this is a very, very anxious world and we battle with anxiety in all kinds of ways. And that anxiety pulls us into isolation and it shapes how we view God. Where did He go? Why isn’t He coming through? These kinds of things that breed doubt into our lives, which only makes us more anxious. Jesus kind of flips that backwards and says, look, don’t worry about your life, what you’re going to can eat, what you’re going to drink, about your body, what you’re going to wear. You don’t have to do this. All you have to do is slow down enough to look around. Look at the natural world. Look at the birds. Look at the flowers. Your Father takes care of them. He can take care of you. This is a byproduct of our most important connection and relationship in life, being that with God, as opposed to being self-centered, where we’re carrying all the stress and load of life inside of ourselves, trying to order it in a way that will work. And it doesn’t work. And, so, it affects how we view the relationship with God. Jesus is showing us that if God really, truly is our source of life, and that’s not just, like, lip service. That’s actually true. God is our source of life and that relationship is the one relationship that we are vigilant about, then it will all together change the way that we look at everything. We’ll be living from the inside out, and so are exterior circumstances and the challenges, the things that won’t let us sleep at night, the things that are giving us panic attacks, those will be seen completely differently. So, we can watch ourselves this week. We can observe ourselves. We can see when it is we’re moving into stress mode. We can see when the anxiety is rising up. And when we catch ourselves moving in that direction, we can stop for a second. We can say, what’s going on here? And what we’ll find is that we’ve lost connection. And we can stop right then and there and breathe and re-center ourselves in Christ, which is not to say that things don’t get challenging. I mean, life has its challenges. But when those challenges have a direct line to our heart and identity, well, we’re going to get tossed to and fro, we’re going to be all over the map, and we’re going to be shaking our fist at the sky saying, where did you go, when it’s really the Lord saying, I’m right here, where did you go? You don’t have to carry this alone. If I can take care of the birds and flowers, I can take care you. Don’t worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will worry about itself. These teachings that Jesus is laying out would later become known as ‘The Way’. Early followers of Jesus, they weren’t becoming Christians. That was a term coined much later. They were originally following ‘The Way’. And ‘The Way’ grew up to become the faith as we know it. But, in a lot of ways, we’ve over complicated things. Jesus invitation is ultimately to treat one another as we would want to be treated and to keep our central relationship rooted in God, which changes the way that we look at everything, it changes the way we work and live in the world. It’s ‘The Way’ we’re invited to live. It’s ‘The Way’ things were always supposed to be for us.

Prayer:

Jesus, we invite You into that. We want to live the way that You are showing that we can, where our hearts are irreversibly given to You and we are centered in You in everything that we think, do, and say. And if this is true, then we can forgive and we don’t have to judge each other because we’re not trying to get our identity from each other. We understand that we’re all on a journey with You and we don’t have to live frantic lives full of worry and anxiety. But we acknowledge, it takes a lot of vigilance, and it is a lot of work. But You told us that. You told us to enter through the narrow gate. And You told us it’s narrow and difficult, but it’s the road that leads to life, and few find it, and we want to be one of the ones who find it. So, come Holy Spirit and help us to see when we start moving in all of these different directions, help us to observe ourselves, and slow down, and re-center ourselves in You. You said, ask and it will be given, You said, seek and we’ll find, knock and the door will be open. So, we’re asking, and that’s going to require that we seek. And that’s going require that we be vigilant about this and do the work of turning to You first and foremost in all things, everything. Come, Holy Spirit, we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is the website, its home base, its where you find out what’s going on around here. Couple things.

We will be out on the road this coming Sunday in the Louisville Kentucky area. So, if you are in that area, love to see you. We’ll be at New Song Christian Fellowship Louisville. And you can get all the details at dailyaudiobible.com. Just go to the Events section and everything that you need to know is there. Looking forward to it.

Also, want to remind you of the Prayer Wall that can be found at the website. Just go into the Community section and you’ll find it. If you’re using the new Daily Audio Bible app, you can find it in there by just pushing the Drawer menu in the upper left-hand corner. It’s a good place to post prayer requests and get responses from different people who are praying for you. So, be sure to check that out.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, you can do that dailyaudiobible.com. There’s a link there on the homepage. If you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or, if you prefer, the mailing address is PO Box 1996. Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or comment, 877-942-4253 is the number to dial.

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:

Hello. This is Shannon. I’m calling for Christie from Washington state. Every time that you call in, I am so moved to call in as well. I just want to take a minute and pray for you. I know when you’re so sick and you’re in so much pain that it’s hard to have faith. So, I’m glad you called in. And you can lean on our faith and our prayers to help carry you through. And I know that Yahweh is going to heal you and meet you in the deep. You are in a storm of illness that is baffling specialists. And I…I hear you and I pray for you. So, I just want to pray quick for you. Father God I pray for Christie. And I pray that You would touch her heart. And I pray that You would touch her heart and her stomach and all of these organs that are not working properly and functioning properly. I pray that You would quiet the pain of her heart and her gut and I pray that You would give her peace and wholeness and health. And I pray that You would quiet her fear and panic because of all of this pain and because of all of these illnesses. Father, we cry out to You because you are a God that hears, and You are a God that heals, and You are a God that restores the wholeness. And Father, I pray for Christie. I pray that You would heal her and restore her. And I pray that You would meet her in the midst of this storm of illness and that You would quiet her soul and quiet her sickness and that she would declare your work. I pray that she would be whole. I thank you, Father God, for hearing us. I thank you for your healing. Christie, I’m praying for you so call in and let us know how you’re doing…

High Daily Audio Bible family. This is Terry from Chicago. You may remember, I called months ago because I fell into sin and ruined my family in my infidelities. The repercussions have rippled out and have hurt everyone. I’m asking that you pray for my family. My son is, right now, losing his shop. He had a warehouse where he’d work on cars. My wife, of course, we’re going through…is…of course…suffering from my sin. My daughter is, so far, unaffected. But, thank goodness, because God is protecting us. I do have a praise report. I called in and it was played at the community prayer on December 30^th that I needed a job. I did get a job making half what I make. I just want to ask, Lord, and brothers and sisters, that you pray for me, because I only make half what I make and I do need to get back to where I am. I still praise though. [singing] How great is our God? Sing with me. How great is our God? And all will see how great, how great is our God. Name above all names. Worthy of all praise. My heart will sing how great is our God. [singing ends] Thank you DAB family because it could always be worse. I still have my health. Thank you, Brian and Jill. Thank you, Hardin family. Thank you for all you do. You give me a place to turn to and I love you all.

Hello everyone. As I’m sitting around this global campfire, I have a praise report. My name is Elizabeth. I’m calling from BC Canada and this is January 3^rd. So, my praise report is this, I found this amazing family. About a year ago, I tuned in, and I listened all the way through to the end and just about two weeks from the end of the year God reminded me that I had a prayer request that I was feeling this deep heartfelt need to read the Bible but feeling frustrated because I didn’t really understand it. And I found a few other podcasts and then, lo and behold, God led me to this podcast. And, boy, it’s exactly what I wanted. I was asking for somebody to walk me through the Bible. Brian and his family, you guys are that somebody. And I want to thank you. So, that’s praise report number one. And praise report number two is that, I’m actually calling you family. I mean, I have a belong to a church for quite a number of years. I have a lot of reasons why you don’t belong to one now. And again, I was feeling lost. And it’s really a need for fellowship, because nobody in my family believes, almost nobody anyhow. And then you guys came along. And now I’m calling you family. I don’t know you, but I’ve grown to know you and people like Blind Tony, Salvation is Mine, Victoria Soldier, Prayer Warrior Princess, Lisa the Encourager, The Lord is Our Banner, Pastor Gene, Slave of Jesus, Beloved by the Beach, Joe the Protector, Pastor Gene, Candice from Oregon, Sherry from BC, and Little Sharee. I’ve come to think if you guys his family…

High Daily Audio Bible.  My name is Michael. I’m calling from Parkville Maryland. I’m a first time caller. I’ve been listening for about a year. My prayer request is, God You give me the gifts and talents. I’ve lost my job and am asking God what he wants me to be, not where I want to be, but where exactly the gifts and talents He has me for the future. So, my prayer would be that you would look me up in prayer. That I need to get my GED date. I need to step out of the boat. So, Father, I just ask you for the guidance and wisdom for my life. I surrender to You. And I lift this prayer request up to Daily Audio Bible. Thank you.