Author: Daily Audio Bible Transcripts

Exodus 4:1-5:21, Matthew 18:1-20, Psalms 22:19-31, Proverbs 5:15-21

Today is the 27^th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it is wonderful to be here together today gathering to move forward and take another step forward together. And our next step will take us into the brand-new book we are getting moved into, the book of Exodus, the second book in the Bible. And as we have entered the book of Exodus, we have been introduced to a person named Moses, whom we will travel a considerable distance with. So, we learned about Moses and his birth and being raised in Pharaoh’s household and him killing an Egyptian and him fleeing and then the burning bush. And God is telling Moses I’m sending you back, sending you back to the place that you came from, I’m sending you back to the place that you ran away from. You are going to play a pivotal role in setting my people free. Moses was not planning on that and he’s not really liking this idea. He's…he’s talking to God. There’s a burning bush that’s not being consumed. His sandals are off because he’s on holy ground and he’s poking holes…like he’s poking holes with the theories that God is giving him…like how there…the challenges that will make this plan not work. And this is where we pick up the story. Exodus chapter 4 verse 1 through 5 verse 21 today.

Commentary:

Okay, so Moses and Aaron have reunited. Moses and Aaron have come back to Egypt. Moses and Aaron have met with the elders of Israel’s people and they believe that Moses has been sent and that God has heard their cry and that they should find freedom. And, so, they go before Pharaoh and tell Pharaoh exactly that - the Lord has met with us, we are to go into the wilderness to worship. And Pharaoh’s response is significantly less than favorable. He doesn’t know the Lord. He doesn’t know what they’re talking about. He’s not listening to this. They’re not going into the wilderness. He’s not letting them go. And instead, what happens is that Pharaoh makes life significantly more difficult for the Hebrew people. They’re supposed to be making bricks. This is their…this is their labor. And they’re provided straw to make these bricks. And, so, that’s what they do. Now they gotta go find their own straw and they have to make the same amount of bricks. Kind of counterintuitive because it’s gonna make the bricks probably less stable, which is probably gonna make whatever building the brick goes into less stable. But, nevertheless, to show the Hebrew people whose boss they gotta get their own straw and they can’t keep up. Literally they have been given a job that they cannot perform. They cannot find the straw and make the bricks. And, so, they are being treated severely. They are being beaten. Their foremen are being beaten. They go before Pharaoh and ask Pharaoh, why all the sudden he’s in a bad mood and why they can’t have their straw. And it’s because they asked to go worship the Lord. And, so, as we leave the reading today the Israelites are mad at Moses and Aaron and it’s just really interesting because gotta watch the story unfold. Moses was in a meeting with God and God called him personally to do a specific task, and then he was equipped with signs to display. And Moses is doing everything he can to squirm out of the job because it’s going to be a hard job and it’s going to have significant challenge. And Moses knows this. He grew up there. And, so, Moses says something that’s to…to me like…like there are a handful of phrases that happen inside of stories in the Bible that are particularly sad ans this particular…particular one where Moses responds to God is very sad to me because God is directly inviting Moses to play a significant role in the story and Moses’s respond, “please send somebody else.” That is sad because in one way or another we can find ourselves in those words.  Send somebody else. What we want is the easy assignment with lots of visibility and lots of reward and we don’t want the behind-the-scenes story of facing the challenge and leading forward and moving forward. Normally if it’s gonna be difficult then we curse the devil when life itself is full of challenges, and we are a part of a story, the ongoing story of God making all things new, of God putting things back together again. And, so, let’s consider our lives today, the path that we are walking, the place that that path is going, what we believe the Lord has invited us to be involved in, and the ways in which we can be like this scene from Moses and invite the Lord to choose somebody else, that this is going to be just too big of a hill for us to climb. Let’s think about that today and then let’s come back tomorrow and watch Moses’ story continue to unfold. It’s not like we have this scene and now everything gets easy. We see that every inch of ground in this story is contended for. And, so, let’s watch the story unfold as we watch the story of our own lives unfold and see where the Spirit might lead us.

Prayer:

Father, we thank You for another day, another day to immerse ourselves in the Scriptures another day to get familiar and another day to contemplate what Your word is speaking into our lives. And, so, come Holy Spirit into what we’ve read today. Plant it in the soil of our lives and continue to teach us as we continue to meditate throughout this day on the things that we have read. We ask this in the precious name of Jesus our Lord. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is home, home base and that is where you can find out what’s going on around here unless you are using the Daily Audio Bible app, which you can download from the app store that works with your device. And, so, check that out.

Check out the different sections - the Initiatives section, the Community section where the Prayer Wall lives, or the Daily Audio Bible Shop where there are resources for the journey. Just check it out and get connected in any way they want to, any way that you can.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if this mission to bring the spoken word of God read fresh every day and offered freely to anyone anywhere any time and to build community around that rhythm so that we take the journey together and we know we’re not alone, if that is meaningful to you than thank you humbly for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner, or the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app, or you can dial 877-942-4253.

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 Victoria Soldier just calling to pray for some of the DABbers.I wanna pray for the…for Brian who called from the Hamilton correctional facility and I wanna pray for all the different facilities, even the woman in prison who had called in that one time. I want to pray with the precious woman in there and all the people at the…at the different facilities that needs prayer and that need…and are seeking direction. I also want to pray for the little boy who called about his brother with the diabetes. I wanna pray for for…for Gigi, and I wanna pray for…for…for…for the person who is going through financial strain, the prayer about her son in the mental facility. I wanna __ the whole problem. I’m wanted to pray for…for them. I wanted to pray for Bob Levine who’s going through in his marriage and I wanna pray for the health problem of…of…of Austin, his dad was having some health problem. I want to pray for the lady with stage four cancer and I wanna pray for Bridget in…in…in New York. Gracious father you heard the names you know the situation. Father you are a God that can do anything but fail. There is nothing impossible for you at your appointed time, even those in the hospital Lord, those with the stage four cancer, those with…with other problems Lord even diabetes. Father, You have Your way in the name of Jesus. You’re a God that can just speak the word as the…as the man said, You’re the man in authority and You just speak the word. And Lord we’re asking You to speak the word, We ask You to speak the word of this precious lady who didn’t have home…a home Lord, that was homeless, the precious girl who had a baby and didn’t know what she was gonna do also. We just ask You to have Your away. You’re a God that said You would supply all our needs. You said You would never leave us and You said that at Your appointed time that nothing’s impossible for You. And we give You thanks for the victory. We give You thanks for Your blessing in the mighty name of Jesus. We ask You to touch the Bryant family and all the people of God in Jesus’ name. Have a great day DABbers. Love you all.

Good morning DAB family this is Vicki in Arizona I’m calling out and asking for prayer on behalf of my daughter Ashley and her family. Her husband has recently gone through some crazy things at work as a law enforcement officer and as a result he has PTSD. He has in the last few months pulled away from their family, their beautiful daughters and their little foster daughter that they are taken care of and now is saying he wants a divorce. My heart breaks for them. I am asking for prayer to give them strength, give all of them strength to get through all the craziness that goes with PTSD. Give their daughters who are 17 and 13 the knowledge that they’re going to be taken care of, that…that they will be OK and that their parents love them and that the little foster baby is also going to be OK in…through all of this. Lord I just ask for prayer that that things get better. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

Good morning DAB family this is Morgan in Texas. I need prayer for my family. This weekend my brother got put in jail from a different county area where we live. We don’t know what exactly what went wrong or we don’t know what he’s being held in jail for. Lord, I’m just asking prayer for…for truth for God’s peace and for all of us to sleep well at night. I just pray…need help…prayer for my parents for this time of situation. Also pray for my aunt Debbie who suffered a stroke. She doesn’t have anyone, and my parents just came back from Arkansas to see her and she just doesn’t look good. So, we just need prayer for my mom, encouragement in all of us as a family together, as a unity of family we all need prayer. And I just pray for…for your help and encouragement of words just to hear and what to say at the time and for…for Daniel while he’s in jail. Just prayer for God’s peace and His love upon him. And God knows what He’s doing. And, so, increase of faith in all of us and trust. Thank you DAB family have a blessed day.

Hi guys this is Garrett here from California. It’s been a while since I’ve called in. I’ve been going through some tough times. I had a really rough break up with someone I was with for a long time. Thought we were gonna get married and just been struggling mentally ever since then - depression and drinking and just self-medicating and just feeling I’ve lost my way of going against God. And I want to just ask for your encouragement and prayers to try and get myself back together hopefully eventually find the and…and just be a person that I want to be in life and just feel satisfied with what God has given us. So, please I would appreciate that and bless you all. Thank you.

Hello Daily Audio Bible my name is Emily. I’m calling from Grand Coulee WA. I usually call in to pray for the kids but today I need to ask you to pray for me. I have struggled for a long time with anger. I don’t know where it comes from. It just bubbles up inside of me every once in a while and explodes and it usually explodes all over my kids if you can imagine that. Just yesterday morning I had asked each of them to do a few tasks but I had asked them and asked them and asked them so many times and nothing had gotten done and I just exploded I just screamed, screamed. Oh, it was so terrible. And then they turn, and they look at you and they start crying and then everybody’s crying. And this is kind of how it happens. You know it doesn’t happen every day, but it happens enough that it’s just terrible and I just need help. It just feels like some monster inside of me that I can’t control. And, so, if you would pray for me that that Jesus would just help breakdown this stronghold of anger in me, if I am being attacked by, I don’t know, an angry spirit or something that makes this happen. But oh, I just need help. I don’t want to do that to my kids anymore. And, yeah, if you would just pray for me. Pray for healing, pray for a breakthrough. Thank you so much.

Hey DAB community I wanted to introduce myself. My name is Devin but I will be going by beloved in Bakersfield. I’ve been listening for a few years on and off and I had find out I was pregnant December of 2020 and I thought what a better year for 2021 than to listen while my girl was growing inside of me and I was successful the year of 2021 to be able to listen to consistently and I loved every minute of it. 2022 was a little bit sporadic. I…I listened to probably 75%. But I thought for 2023 I was going to be consistent in not just listening but to reading every single line of the Bible. And thus far I have been successful. I just finished January 24^th and what a blessing it’s been just to really pay attention and spend that time meditating on God’s word. I…I also resolved this year to be consistent with listening to the community line and going through those prayers. And man has that also just been such a blessing for all of you calling in with your encouragement and your prayers and just getting to walk through life with each of you. I know it’s said all the time that you really feel like you know these people that you get to hear their voices and become familiar with and that hasn’t been truer than listening to all of you and I just thank you for coming alongside each other and just the encouragement and blessings that you speak for individuals. It's…it’s been encouraging for me as well. And, so, I’ve been a lot walking along with you guys and just loving every minute. And, so, I just finally wanted to say hi and just thank you for those who call in just for the laughs and those who call in for more serious stuff too. Thank you for being vulnerable and just allowing me to be a part of your community. Thanks so much.

Exodus 2:11-3:22, Matthew 17:10-27, Psalm 22:1-18, Proverbs 5:7-14

Today is the 26th day of January, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is great to be here with you today, as we gather around the Global Campfire and take the next step forward together. And we’ve taken all of these steps that have led us to this point, which yesterday allowed us to conclude our first book on the journey, that was the book of Genesis. And we began the book of Exodus yesterday, talked about that a little bit and even in our first reading in the book of Exodus, we met this baby boy, his name is Moses. He is an important person in the Biblical narrative. And so, he’s just a baby boy and he’s being raised up in Pharaoh’s daughter’s home. She’s adopted him and we sort of see this dynamic as he’s a child. We’re gonna pick up the story from there. Getting to know Moses, getting to know his life. We’ll be journeying with Moses for quite some time. And so, let’s dive in, Exodus chapter 2 verse 11 through 3 verse 22 today.

Commentary:

Okay so, as we get ourselves immersed into the book of Exodus, we are obviously getting to know a main character, that is in, in the Bible, his name is Moses, and we’ve seen what was going on. The children of Israel were being enslaved in Egypt and marginalized and treated very cruelly. And some really awful commands were sent down by Pharaoh, about how to control the expansion of the Israelites. And it was like if a baby boy is born, throw him into the Nile River. The king had also commended the midwives to kill the baby boys, which they didn’t do. And so, Moses ended up in the Nile River, he’s a baby boy, he ended up in the Nile River, he was just in a basket, Pharaoh’s daughter found him, had mercy upon him. He was able to be raised by his own mother. And she was able to be paid to take care of her son, and so God’s providence is there. And then she, then he grows up, Moses, grows up in the home of Pharaoh’s daughter and so, he is educated like royalty. He is treated well, but he does know who he is. He does know his origin and he goes out among his people to see what they’re like and he kills an Egyptian who was mistreating a Hebrew. And the next day he goes out to…to be among his fellow Hebrews and he finds two Hebrew men fighting each other and kind of asking them like why, would like, your part of the same family, like why would you guys be fighting each other. And there’s even if we just like focused in on that and looked out among our brothers and sisters today, same question could be asked. But in this case, they turn on…on, Moses, and are like you gonna kill, you gonna kill me too, like you killed the Egyptian yesterday. And that’s when Moses knew like there’s a target on hom now, once the King finds out what has happened, he’s probably gonna be killed and so he flees. And so, we see his story of how he kind of grew up and he flees Egypt and he’s a Shepherd in the desert, this is where he meets his wife Zipporah and he is shepherding as the story concludes today, with Moses seeing a bush that is on fire but is not being consumed. And this is where Moses meets God, and God and Moses are going to have a very famous relationship, a very famous friendship. This is where Moses encounters God for the first time and God is telling Moses of his calling, that I am going to send you back to Egypt, to deliver your people, the Hebrew people, out of slavery. I am sending you back to Pharaoh to speak to Pharaoh. So, in effect, God is telling Moses, I am sending you back to the place that you feared the most, the place that you ran away from. I’m sending you back there. I am not sending you back there alone, I will go with you, which is beautiful. Moses though has some reservations, some considerable reservations at this point. And we will kind of pick that up tomorrow, but at this point, Moses is like if I go back to there and I tell them God has sent me to you. There gonna ask me what’s His name. Like they’re gonna have all kinds of questions about this, what am I supposed to say to them. That’s where God famously says I am, who I am and I used to be like, I don’t like that so much. But it’s like how does the most high God describe who He is in human terms, in his fullness, other than to say I am who I am. And so, this is how Moses meets God and that is going to completely change who Moses is. But Moses has some wrestling with himself to do and will continue this story as we move forward tomorrow.

Prayer:

And, Father, we thank You that we have this story and that as it unfolds before us over time, that we find ourselves in these stories, we find our postures of heart, we locate our own fears, we locate our own reservations, we locate our own self-preservation techniques, we…we see ourselves as we see the people in the Bible, and the way that they conducted their lives and where the paths lead, based on the choices that they made. And so, Holy Spirit, come and show us the path we are walking and where that is leading, and use the Scriptures in our lives each and every day to give us direction and clarity. We pray, in the name of Jesus we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is home base, that is the website, that is where you can find out what is going on around here. There is something going on around here right now that I mentioned yesterday and will mention again today. And that is that registration for our pilgrimage to the land of the Bible for the year 2024 is now open and available. We will be going to the land of the Bible here in about a week and ½ in 2023, for our 2023 pilgrimage. Very much looking forward to that and all of those of you who are coming along. Can’t wait to see you, can’t wait to meet you. Can’t wait for all of us to be together, can’t wait for all of us to have this experience together, but not talking about this year, talking about next year. We’re gonna go back in February next year. Between the 12th and 25th of February 2024, and registration for that pilgrimage is open for now, while there are seats available. So, just go to dailyaudiobible.com or open up the Daily Audio Bible app. In the app, push the drawer icon in the upper left-hand corner, on the web, just look for the Initiatives Section. If you’re using the app and opened the drawer look for Initiatives, there and in the Initiatives Section you will find Israel 2024 and going in there will give you all of the details that you would want to know. And so, check that out and hope to see you in the Promised Land, in the land of the Bible in 2024.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if what we’re doing here around the Global Campfire every day is life-giving to you, then thank you for your partnership, we wouldn’t be here around the Global Campfire, there wouldn’t be anything like that if we hadn’t been in this together all these years and so thank you, humbly. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or the mailing address is P.O. Box 1996 Springhill, Tennessee 37174.

And as always if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app or you can dial 877-942-4253.

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

Prayer and Encouragements:

Hi DAB family, I am new to listening to the Bible through this app. I am loving every minute of it and growing so much in the Lord. I am asking for prayer for a new job. There were some things going on at my current job which have really, have hurt me and so, I’ve resigned. And I’m just praying that God would open up the right job in educational leadership for me. This is Sheila, please pray for me to find a new job. Thank you.

Hello, my beautiful DAB family. This is your sister Ashley from California. And I just wanted to call in, today is January 22nd, 2023. And I wanted to give you an update. So, gang, Jackson was released on Friday the 20th, one day short of being in the hospital for a month. And God gave me a word while we were in there to give to Jackson, that he is set-apart. That God has done, has a plan for Jackson and that He is up to something. I can’t tell you, guys, how many, how many mighty works that I see God doing right now, in my family and in the lives of the people that I know. So, I can’t even, I can’t even tell you, guys, it’s amazing. I, it’s hard to see it though, sometimes, when you’re walking through the trenches and it’s literally just a day at a time. Sometimes it’s an hour at a time, and sometimes it’s a breath at a time. But God is so good, and He sustained us, and I can’t thank you all enough for your prayers. You guys blow me away. Thank you so much for blessing us and blessing my sweet son who is just [sigh] he’s…he’s making, we’re…we’re taking it a moment at a time. But I also wanted to respond to, there was somebody on the community prayer request that asked to contact me, so my email is A as in Ashley, E and in Edward, A as in Ashley, 921@gmail.com. Okay, DAB family, I love you and I will be letting you know what is going on soon. Bye.

Good morning, DAB family this is Saved By Grace from California. I’d like to lift up my sister who’s requesting prayer for her, as her husband, she just found out something about her husband and her marriage of 29 years. Father, in the name of Jesus, I just lift up my sister to You, I plead the blood of Jesus over her, and I pray for Your love, Your comfort would just immerse her body, Father God. Encamp Your guardian angels round about her, Father. And shower Your love around her God. Let her know that she is not alone in this, Father God, and that You got her. And I pray, Lord, that You would just bring spirit filled people around her to minister to her and to encourage her, Father God. That Your will, will be done and help her to know, Lord, that it doesn’t matter what it feels like, what it looks like, we know Father, that You are still on the throne and that You still are in control. And that anything that is removed from Your children, Father, You got something better. And I thank You for my sister, Lord, and her…her courage to…to always lean on You, Father God, to trust You. Just harden that trust, Father God. Bless you, my sister. I will continue to pray for you. In the name of Jesus, I pray.

Good morning, this is Doctor __ from Washington, DC area. I am calling in to pray for that young lady who asked us to pray for the husband who broke her heart. My sister, I know what it is to have a broken heart. My heart also was broken by my husband and that’s what brought me here to the United States. And God brought me here and blessed me so amazingly. But I’m not saying that God is in every situation where people have broken hearts. But he can use your brokenness and turn it into power. In the meantime, let me pray for you. Know that we love you and that we’ve got you and most importantly God got you. Father, in the name of Jesus, I pray for my dear sister this morning. You hear her heart, how broken it is. Father, I pray that You would hold her heart in Your hand and let it break into a million pieces but Lord God, strengthen and encourage her. In the midst of this pain, turn that pain into blessing. Lord, let her find a way that she has never found before. Father, You’re so amazing. Let her experience how amazing You are, in the midst of pain. Father God, for all the women out there that are in the same situation that she’s in, we come together to pray for them. That You also will mend broken hearts. And that You would cause that they would know that there is nothing that You cannot do. Oh, amazing Father, Oh, wonderful Father, strengthen her and all the women out there. In the mighty name of Jesus and may you get the glory. In Jesus name …    

Hello Daily Audio Bible, this is Paul from Houston. Long time have been a DABer since 2017 so, it’s been going on almost 6 years now. Anyways, I’m calling for prayer. I’ve been separated for six years and just access to kids. I’ve had visitation with kids but, I have three, but they’re not wanting to come over now, for some reason. And I’m having to go through mediation or go to court by the end of February. So, just please pray for me and my family. Just trying to make peace with…with my wife and with my kids. Just trying to, trying to just trying to take it a day at a time. That’s how I can put it because it’s a little difficult at the moment. So, I appreciate your prayers so, thank you so much. I love this program, it’s been an incredible, just an incredible feeling around the campfire, hearing everyone and being able to pray for everyone. Thank you again, it’s Paul from Houston. Love you all, bye.

Hello DAB family, Pastor Steve from Southwest Ohio. Just calling to say I praise the Lord for all of you. I thank you all for your prayers, for your needs and for your concerns. And I pray Father, today, in Jesus name, that You would be, through the power of Your Holy Spirit, touch each and every prayer request, each and every need answered as only You can, and You will receive the glory. I really am so thankful for this family and this ministry. For Brian and his family for everyone who helps him put this together. I pray and trust you will continue to remember me and my family in your prayers and thoughts, just know that He is worthy to be praised and greatly to be praised constantly, as is our prayer without ceasing. Just know that you’re greatly loved and prayed for with and the Lord willing, will talk again. Until then have a blessed and joyous day in Jesus.

Genesis 50:1-Ex 2:10, Matthew 16:13-17:9, Psalms 21:1-13, Proverbs 5:1-6

Today is the 25^th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian it is fantastic to be here with you today as we take the next step forward together on the adventure that we have embarked on 25 days ago. We’re 25…well…once we read today, we’ll be 25 days into our year. This is a day of a bit of transition. We will finish our first full book of the Bible today and then move forward. So, we will be doing that right now. We’ll finish the book of Genesis and then we’ll get into the second book of the Bible, the book of Exodus and we’ll talk about Exodus when we get there but we’ve got one chapter of Genesis to finish up the book. And one last thing before we get going, we will be going to the land of the Bible here in less…well…in about a week and a half and a bunch of us will be there actually in person and the rest of us will be traveling virtually. But hang out until the end today because we’ll be talking about Israel 2024 next year. But let’s dive into the Scriptures now. And if we will recall, we said goodbye to Jacob and we remember his name was changed to Israel, which is where we get this name, Israel. And Israel’s children are the children of Israel. We said goodbye to Jacob yesterday as he passed from the story and into history. Today we finish the book of Genesis with chapter 50.

Introduction to the book of Exodus:

Okay. So, that concludes the book of Genesis, Jacob has passed, they took him back to the land. They took his body back to the land of Canaan, back to the cave at Machpelah in the Valley of Eshkol and buried him in the ancestral family plot, the only piece of land that’s owned by any children of Israel. And, so, they go back to this place and then they returned to Egypt, and Joseph passes away at 110 years of age, telling his family that there’s a promise and there’s a land and when God leads you into this land take my bones with you. And, so, now we are about to open up the second book in the Bible, the book of Exodus. And, so, as we open up the book of Exodus, when we flip that page, we’re flipping the page by several hundred years. And, so, all of these original children of Israel that we’ve met along the way and all of the family dynamics that we’ve been able to observe, all of these people have passed away. All of these original people that we been, walking alongside, they’re all gone now but their families, the generations have flourished and the people have become numerous, numerous as the stars in the heavens, numerous like sand on the seashore like God had promised to Abraham. It’s just that they’re not in the land that they were promised, they’re in the land of Egypt and they’re growing more and more numerous and more and more powerful, and the Egyptians are starting to become afraid of them and starting to marginalize them. And now that we’re several centuries into the future Egypt has forgotten about Joseph and the way that they were saved from the devastation so long ago. And, so, the Egyptians enslaved the children of Israel in Egypt. And Pharaoh, seeking to stop them from growing more and more numerous and more and more powerful, instituted some population control that’s horrible. Like if the baby is a boy, throw him into the Nile River. This is the command of the King. And, so, baby boys were being drowned in the Nile River. But there was a promise. There was a hope for a future for this people. And it’s interesting because we flip into…into Exodus and we’re hundreds of years in the future and when we think about God’s promises in our day and age normally, we are thinking about things that…that need to materialize in a hurry, right? And we don’t really think that will give a promise that we won’t get to see, like this Longview, like that…that…that we’re a part of a story that is centuries and centuries, even millennia old. We want the instant gratification of it all. But there’s a story going on as we read through the Bible. There was a person, Abraham. And we followed his family and there was a promise. And it’s still out there and it’s still unfulfilled and it’s still going on and it’s still a part of the…of the people. God finds Abraham and sends him to a land that he doesn’t know. God promises a son of promise and Isaac is born and God appears to Isaac and Isaac passes the promise to his son Jacob. Then God reveals himself to Jacob who passes this onto his 12 sons, the children of Israel who are now marginalized and enslaved in Egypt. But the promise is still there. And they begin to cry out to God. And a baby boy is born, and this baby boy is put into the Nile as commended, but he was put into the Nile in a wicker basket and he was floating and this wicker basket was discovered, as we will see, by Pharaoh’s daughter and she names the baby boy Moses. And we will be traveling a good distance with Moses. And, so, we begin. Exodus chapter 1.

Prayer:

Father, we thank You for Your word. We thank You for the next step forward. And for the first time we get to experience transitioning from one book to another, and we thank You for bringing us through the book of Genesis, and that sense of accomplishment that we are under way. We are on our way. And even as we look back to the book of Genesis, how much You brought up and out into our lives for us to consider and for us to be transformed by. And, so, we are grateful for that, for that journey through the book of Genesis. And now as we move into the book of Exodus, we’ve met this baby boy who’s going to be the mighty Moses. And as we engage with this story, we invite Your Holy Spirit to lead, guide and direct us. May we see what we need to see and hear what we need to hear as we continue this journey forward. We ask this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.

Announcements:

Okay. So, like I said at the beginning we will be going to the land of the Bible here in about a week and a half. And we’ll be spending the better part of a couple weeks in the land, moving throughout the land from the Mediterranean coast, the border of Jordan, from the Red Sea all the way to the borders of Lebanon and Syria in the north, north, south, east, west and the interior of the land. We have over the years created the most comprehensive biblical immersion into the land of the Bible that that we know how to do while making it a pilgrimage for our hearts. And, so, we’re certainly looking forward to that. And, so, the first thing is to ask the community here to begin to pray over all of the things that are involved in a trip like that - international travel, jet lag, time zone changes, culture changes, all kinds of logistics, all kinds of things that are set up to fire in a certain order and work in a certain way, and of course technology, the technology that binds us together each and every day continues to go forward no matter where we may be in the world. And, so, technology, safety, wisdom, all that we will need to take this journey, covering it with prayer. And this community is a community of prayer, and I have witnessed that over all of these years. And, so, just asking for everyone to begin to pray over all of these things is my…is…is my request, is my ask, that the Holy Spirit might hover over us as we take the journey and do the work in us that…that we need as we open ourselves to the experience. This will be our first journey back since the pandemic era that we went through. It was 2020 was the last time we were in the land and really truly rode the wave ahead of Covid, like literally got back in 2020, two weeks before the world locked down. And…and we had such an interesting strange year in 2020. In 2021, things were still on lock down as far as that kind of international travel goes. 22 went by. And in 2022 we decided as things were opening back up, as restrictions were going down, as things were…at least for international travel returning to something that looks a little more regular…we decided to go. And that’s what we’re about to do. We decided in 2022 to go in 2023. And, so, we’re about to do that. But we’ve also looked at this surge coming into Israel, as things do return to normal. And, so, we weren’t really able to go back and kind of then reevaluate and see how things were. It was like man unless you want to go in 2025 or 2026 you gotta…you gotta kind of make a commitment for 2024. And we have done that. And we have to do those kinds of things because we have a whole…an entire team, both on the Israeli side and on the American siding. And, so, keeping that all together and keeping everybody booked in advance kind of to know what’s gonna happen, we’ve had to do that. And, so, we are going to go back in 2024 on a pilgrimage to the land of the Bible. This will take place between February 12^th and 25^th of 2024. So, just a bit over a year from now. Registration is now open. You can find out all about Israel 2024 and experiencing the land of the Bible on pilgrimage with Daily Audio Bible at dailyaudiobible.com or if you are using the app, you can press the little Drawer icon in the upper left-hand corner and that will open up a drawer. Either place. Look for the Initiatives section and in the initiatives you will find Israel 2024 and all of the kinds of details that you would want to know as you consider taking this pilgrimage, but registration for 2024, February 2024 is open now. Just a little bit of a heads up. When we announced the pilgrimage that we’re about to go on, the one for 2023, the one that we announced back last year, I wasn’t really sure. I just knew that if we didn’t take a step and return then years and years and years would go by. And this has been part of the rhythm of our year, but with all that had gone on in the world with all the sickness, all the pandemic, all of the restrictions, all of the cares of it, all of the uncertainty of it, we just didn’t know. Does anybody want to go back to Israel? What ended up happening was very surprising and that was that the pilgrimage for 2023 had sold out within 24 hours. And even if there had been something that…that we could have or wanted to do about that, there was nothing that we could do. Like literally all of the rooms in Israel and all of the places that we were going were all full. So, there has been an extreme demand for…for the holy land. But even had we been able to expand, that’s not really what we’re doing here. We’re not trying to take a dozen buses or even half a dozen buses or anything like that. That…that really really becomes limiting to the kind of schedule that we’re trying to keep and the amount of places that we’re trying to allow ourselves to be immersed in and just the entire breadth and depth and width of the country that we’re trying to see. And, so, we take two buses, just enough people that everybody can get to know everybody and we can be family together and a community together as we take the journey together. And, so, that is what we are planning for 2024 as well. And, so, if going to the land of the Bible is something that has been a dream or something on the bucket list, something that you feel compelled toward in your heart, something that you need to feel, like you need to see with your own eyes that you need to smell with your own nose that you need to hear with your own ears then registration is open for the 2024 Daily Audio Bible pilgrimage to the land of the Bible, than registration is available now for that trip. And I’ve told you where to find it. I will let you know again that…that that trip did sell out in a day and then we had a couple hundred people on a waiting list. And, so, if you are compelled to take the journey I wouldn’t delay. So, check it out.

That is the announcement and that is it for today. I am Brian I love you and I will be waiting for you here tomorrow.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hi this is Dan from AZ and I’m calling to ask for a prayer request for my wife who’s been suffering from migraine headaches for over a year every day. And I just…I’ve been praying for her. She’s been praying but it just doesn’t seem to help. She’s been seeing doctors and stuff and I just would like to get a prayer request out there for all the DABbers. This is my first time calling. This is my first time listening to the daily Bible and it’s been a blessing and I just want to reach out and ask for…for help in Jesus’ name. Thank you.

Hello Daily Audio Bible family I am reaching out for prayer. I am dealing with many issues in my life. My marriage needs prayer. My husband needs a lot of prayer. He’s dealing with very difficult job depression, anxiety, anger issues, temper tantrums. He’s quite abusive as of late and there is potential that he’s having an affair. And if he’s not having an affair, he’s definitely hiding pornography. Anyway, I am also trying to declutter everything that I own for preparation for moving because it looks like this marriage is going to end. Not by my choice but by his and I just need help. I need willpower. I need the ability to let go of stuff that I do not need and to fight this hoarding pack ratting mentality. I don’t have a ton of stuff, but I have so much more than is necessary and it’s embarrassing, and I’m just appalled by myself as I pull things out of closets and just see how horrible it really is. On the surface the house looked great but underneath it’s terrible. So anyway, please pray for me. Pray for my daughter in the midst of all of this. Pray for God to provide. Pray for my husband to come back to the Lord. And if it’s God’s will, to save this marriage but in such a way that my husband is no longer abusive on so many levels. And pray that I would have patience and be more like Christ through it all. Thank you so much family.

Hi Daily Audio Bible family my name is Evelyn and I’m calling from Germany. I would like to ask for prayers for my mother. Right now, she’s at stage four cancer and it has spread to…according to the doctors the brain, the liver, the bones. And yeah, she has done some sessions of chemotherapy and she also did radiotherapy, and she was asked to do so more radiotherapy for the bones. I just could not look at __ yesterday because she broke down crying. And yeah, the doctors gave her news that we just…had broken. And for me it’s also breaking my heart and I’m also trying to manage my emotional __ here. So, please ask that you join me in prayers for her. There is nothing impossible for our God to do. Our God will step __. Nothing is impossible for God to do. __ the Lord emotionally, financially. And even looking at her is…is…is…is really breaking my heart. But I trust God and we all trust God. Nothing is impossible for God to do. Thank you so much for sending in your prayers. I would really appreciate it. I’ve been blessed by following the Daily Audio Bible every day and it has really blessed my life and lifted my spirit and built my faith up. Thank you so much. Bye.

This is Nobody Gets Left Behind from Colorado calling in a praise report and a couple prayer requests. My mom, she is at a homeless shelter now. Praise God for that. Her tent went up in fire. Somebody rescued her saved her life. I just asked that my DAB family can just join me in prayer to put it in her heart to go to and assisted living. She’s a bit stubborn but I thank God that she’s still here. And I’m about to go pick her up for church today. I want to ask if you could pray for my brother. I had mentioned that he had been released from prison. He was there for 20 years, and I just ask that you join me in prayer that his life can worship Jesus and just be a light to people and that his repentance and his remorse for what he did wrong will always give him the contrite heart and that his music and his talents and all the things that he does that that can just clarify you Jesus. I just also wanted to say that I loved hearing Annette Allison’s story today. I love you sister. You always bring a big, big smile on my face. Praise God for you…you sister and for Blind Tony. I just always love your wisdom that flows from your heart Tony. I praise God for you and Lisa with stage four cancer you’ve been heavy on my heart, heavy on all of our hearts sister. And, you know, let God’s will be done in our lives no matter what we go through. We have eternal mindset. Love you guys.

Good morning everyone __. My name is Gloria __. I’m just calling in to get some help with some things. I just need help with, you know, worrying about myself and staying happy, you know, because I don’t want to be depressed anymore. I just want to be happy. When I come to work, I’m very depressed. Just thinking about work I’m very depressing for me. Like, you know, I’m happy to have a job. I was homeless before I even got this job. So, you know, I’m blessed for it. But, you know, it’s not even the job. It’s the people, you know. This new generation…I’m even in the new generation…I’m only 26 years old. So, you know, this new generation just wants to come to work, stay on their phone, not help others, not, you know, help out and it’s kind of hard to endure. It’s kind of hard to grasp, you know. I go home every day depressed. And, you know, even talking to someone. you know, here doesn’t help. Supervisors doesn’t help with it. The management doesn’t help. I did therapy. Therapy doesn’t work for me. I don’t know what else to do, you know, because I go home and I’m so depressed that I don’t even have time for my babies. And that’s not an excuse. I know it. I’m trying. I just need your prayers you guys. So, please pray for me. Thank you Brian, thank you Jill, thank you China, thank you Ezekiel, thank you everyone, and most importantly thank you God. I am trying my hardest, you know, stay on the right path. Just pray for me please. I love you guys. Bye.

This is Sabina calling asking for prayers for myself and my family. I have been…in the last 15 years I’ve struggled with really deep tiredness, and I’ve been sick a lot and…and I have an education, I’ve been working and sometimes I can work for some months and then suddenly I just get so deeply tired that…that I can’t work anymore. It’s not possible. I get sick and sometimes depressed and a little stressed and I have a lot of pain and ache in my body. And it’s been like this for on and off for 15 years. I’ve had good times as well but it’s really hard sometimes, hard for me and for the family and financially very hard. So, I would just ask if somebody would pray for me and…and our situation and that somehow things will change and, yeah, that I may follow God’s will whatever it is. I really want to work. I really want to do things and just…not only just stay at home and not have anything to do. I really want to do something for God and for my family for people around me and for myself as well. So, I pray that, yeah, somehow there will come a change and…and I will know what to do, what is in God’s will.

Genesis 48:1-49:33, Matthew 15:29-16:12, Psalm 20:1-9, Proverbs 4:20-27

Today is the 24th day of January, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It is fantastic to be here with you today, as we gather around the Global Campfire and release the cares of this life. And we can pick back up. I always say that because we say…say things like this all the time and it’s like yeah, yeah, yeah living that out practically is difficult. This is just a break. It’s like a reorientation, whatever we have to deal with, we have to deal with, how we deal with it though Scriptures can inform. And just a little breather, just a little oasis to step away for a second, can completely change the orientation of what we’re doing. And so, it’s wonderful to be around this Global Campfire and that we even have this place, that we know is a safe place and that the Scriptures are just coming into our lives. And so, let’s move in that direction and allow the Scriptures to come into our lives for today. We have been working our way through the story of Joseph in the book of Genesis and that’s what we are continuing to do as we approach the conclusion of the book of Genesis tomorrow. But we are in today and so today, Genesis chapters 48 and 49.

Commentary:

Okay so, we will conclude the book of Genesis tomorrow and we can feel it kind of coming to a close as we come to the close of…of the narrative of Joseph’s story. And in today’s reading, we said goodbye to Jacob, the one whose name was changed to Israel, the one whose children are the children of Israel. So, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob have lived, and we’ve moved through their lives and their stories and now they have all passed away. And so, it is to Joseph’s generation, his brother’s generation, the ones who become tribes, to carry the story forward in Egypt.

In the book of Matthew, we see Jesus having encounters with the educated religious authorities that are out and among the people, the Pharisees and Sadducees, the teachers of religious law. Like Jesus is on the radar now that he’s moving around, doing what he’s doing, and it doesn’t take long for that kind of news to start spreading. And so, it spreads among the common people. First, the villagers the people that he’s going to, but eventually it gets to the the religious leaders even all the way back to Jerusalem. And so, we see that on a regular basis now Jesus is being questioned by these people about what he’s doing and why he’s doing it and who told him he could do it, and why he’s not doing it the way that they’ve decided it should be done. Why He chooses to do things that are may be different than the way that it has been interpreted and determined to be done by the elders as they’ve wrestled with the text and have determined what God wants. Why would Jesus do something different than that. And of course, Jesus confronts them back by saying why are you actually like how have you deviated so far from the actual text that you have created traditions that are contrary to what God actually wants. How can you be so blind, how can you not see, if you’re looking for us sign, you know how to tell signs, you can even look up at the sky and foretell the signs of the weather that’s coming. How do you not have eyes to see and ears to hear the signs that are all around you. You guys are the religious leaders. Which is what leads Jesus to tell His disciples than to beware of the leaven or the yeast of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. And they’re thinking that they forgot bread right, they’re…that they don’t have food and that’s what He’s talking about. And so, He clarifies for them again. Like, opening their eyes to see in their ears to hear is not talking about food, He’s talking about the teachings of these religious leaders that have been wrestled with over time and the traditions that have come around them that have become more important. Like adherence to the traditions is more important than what God actually wants or what the text is actually teaching. And so, as the Pharisees and Sadducees go out and about and try to enforce these traditions, Jesus is likening that the yeast or leaven and this is their teachings. It's…it’s not unlike the parable that we talked about just couple days ago where Jesus says that the kingdom of heaven is like leaven or yeast put into flour and mixed in. In terms of the kingdom, once the loaf rises the yeast is done its job, but you can’t find the yeast anymore. Once it’s mixed in you can’t find it and Jesus is saying beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and Sadducees it’s all mixed in here. But God actually was commanding and the traditions that had grown up around that, it’s all mixed in here. You have to have eyes to see and ears to hear. And so, Jesus is saying just because they’re educated, just because they’re seen, just because they’re famous, just because they have a platform, just because they have authority, doesn’t mean they can’t be wrong. Open your eyes, open your ears, have eyes to see and ears to hear.

Prayer:

And so, Jesus, we take that to heart as well. When we consider the traditions that we adhere to and wonder why sometimes and we elevate any number of people, which isn’t a bad thing that, but we will elevate what they say and what they interpret and put it in a position higher than the text itself because we don’t know the text itself. And so, to even begin to do what you are saying here, which is to have eyes to see and ears to hear, to be able to discern the difference between essentially between yeast and flour. We’re gonna have to know what flour is like and in this example were going to need to know what you are like more and more and more. As the Scriptures lead us deeper and deeper into understanding and as we walk by the power of your Holy Spirit into an ever-deepening love story together where our hearts are for you and your heart is for us and we love you and desire to please you and not just please you by adhering to rituals but please you out of our hearts from within us, from the inside out. So, we ask Holy Spirit, lead us into all truth, lead us on the pathways of truth, that we may walk in them, and we know that you will, and we know that you are, and we confess that we’re not always paying attention. Help us pay attention, we ask. In Jesus name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is home base and that is where you find out what’s going on around here so certainly check it out. Check out the different sections like the Daily Audio Bible Shop. There are a number of resources in the Shop that are for the journey we are on, and we are about to take a journey to the land of the Bible. I guess less than two weeks from now. And so, whether you’re actually going physically are whether you will be going virtually just make sure your bags are packed because I’ll be putting everybody my suitcase and we’ll all go together virtually or in person. And looking forward to that, haven’t been in several years because of well, pandemic issues and that so looking forward to that. What does that got to do with the Daily Audio Bible Shop? In the Shop you will find a number of resources, but one of the resources is called Promised Land, the essential pilgrims addition. And that’s a digital download of the Promised Land films and so there are a number of films, I think over 70 films that we made over the course of a couple years to just really bring, just really bring that the land to life the best that we can and give a comprehensive of…of a view in a few short minutes of all of the different locations. So that is a resource that is good for going through the Bible with for sure because so often we are rooted in a location and we have filmed so many of the locations and so, just kind of have a window open up just look through it and understand some of the important things that happened in the Scriptures and what it looks like, all around the area is really, really helpful for moving through the stories of the Bible and understanding geography. And so, that’s Promised Land, the essential pilgrim’s addition, that can be found in the Daily Audio Bible Shop. And you can download it and unzip it and watch it.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if it is in life-giving thing to come around the Global Campfire as a community and take the next step forward every day and thank you for your partnership and humbly. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or the mailing address is P.O. Box 1996 Springhill, Tennessee 37174.

And as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app or you can dial 877-942-4253.

And that is it for today, I’m Brian, I love you and I’ll be waiting for you here, tomorrow.

Prayer and Encouragements:

Good morning family this is Allie from New York. I am a visiting nurse, and I had the pleasure of meeting a patient yesterday, very sick patients on dialysis and she also has an autistic daughter. And she is so sick, she is weak. Her daughter is so helpful, but she is limited on what she can help her mom with. I’m gonna call her V and the daughter A. They’re both in need of help. Please pray that the Lord provides them with support. V is so sick; she is so weak when she comes back from dialysis. She can’t do anything for herself, and A tries her best, but she is so limited on what she can actually do to help her out. They have no family support. They really need help. Please pray for health to return to V’s body. Please pray for support for A. Please bless them can then set the kind of support, community support. We’ve been trying to help her but this it’s so limited now, after the pandemic. Family, V and A are in need of your praise. Please pray for them. Please pray for health of V’s body, please pray that she could get better because all things are possible with God. I just ask you family. I don’t typically call in for my patients but yesterday it was so heartbreaking. Please pray…

Heidi Ho siblings, it’s your little sis, His Little Sharie from Canada. Don’t you just love hearing all the different voices in the community prayer podcast? Everyone is so different and that’s what makes it beautiful. I have such a tendency to compare myself to others. I don’t know if you do that but it’s hard sometimes to feel like, or it’s hard not to feel like some people are more important than I am or, I think we all have that tendency to compare and I just wanted to share that today more than ever, I’m aware of how valuable each one of us is because we’re different and we’re unique. And we may see that as…as a failure but only because we’re comparing ourselves to somebody else. The Lord doesn’t feel that way about us. Every one of us is the only one as far as his affection for us is inspiring, right. So, every one of us is his favorite and everyone is beautiful and he like’s spending time with each one of us because we’re not so-and-so, we’re uniquely ourselves. And He treasures that so much. And I think, if I’m hearing his heart correctly, he’s saying please don’t twist yourself into something you’re not trying to please me. Just let me love you and let me, let my love free to be who you are, the way we we’re intended to be. Jesus will change us right, to make us more free, more ourselves but it’s His love that does that. It is His affection that heals us.

Hello Daily Audio Bible. I found you all on a day before the beginning of the year. I wanted to start reading my Bible, but I did something to my eye which is requiring me to have surgery on it. And my vision was impaired. I’ve had a rough last year. I lost my son to an overdose and have just been feeling very numb and a little lost lately. I’ve lost every one of my children and I know that that God has something for me to do. But I keep getting these attacks. I have issues, I have an issue with my heart and with my eyes. And I just need healing and I need healing in my heart after the loss of my son. I am, I know God has something for me and I know I’m here for a reason. Just, I just need Him to guide me and to show me the way.

Hi DAB, this is Beloved Daughter, Ashley. Right now, I would rather have you call me, the name that I cannot think of, but it means all that bitterness and whatever. Ruth said to call her, I’m sorry not Ruth, Naomi said to call her when she came back home. She said don’t call me Naomi, call me whatever it was she said to call her. That’s how I feel. I’m gonna be 51 in May. And pretty much I just feel like, you gave me a shot and all of a sudden, all this 51 years of rejection, pain, hatred, betrayal, you know, everything wrong in my life that’s ever been wrong has just completely flooded me. I thought, this year’s gonna be great. I can just, you know, I wanna be closer to the Lord, I’m gonna be happy, this is gonna be a happy year. Nothing happened. I mean, you know, I was happy and looking forward to it and you know, the new year came, and we started. And then I got the flu. And that’s just, you know, you got to deal with that. But aside from that, nothing actually happened. I don’t know what happened. All I know is that I’m sitting here hating my life, hating God, hating everybody and everything. And I’m just very resentful. Can’t stand anything. And I don’t know why. I know what I hate and stuff, but I don’t …

Hello DABers my name is Kristen or Christ in Me. I started listening to ya’ll at the end of last year, the very last day of the year. So, I’ve been there since the beginning of the year with ya’ll, listening every day, listening to your praise reports and your prayer requests. I have recently experienced some troubling things with my health, and I have lost my last child. I’ve had three children die to drugs or suicide. And I’ve always felt like my calling was to minister to those in grieving. That’s something that I’ve done. But right now, I’m just having to comfort myself. And I’m feeling a little numb and I’m dealing with some health issues, my heart. I have to get surgery on my eye. I’ve partially lost my vision in my left eye. And but that has what brought me to here because I couldn’t read my Bible, but I wanted to read my Bible. So, I found ya’ll so I could listen to it and follow along. I’ve been doing that since the beginning of the year. I feel like I’ve found a home. I’ve been looking for a home for a while. I didn’t’ know I could find a home this way but just listening to your prayer requests, I feel like I can relate to ya’ll. And just kind of have a community. It’s a blessing. But I just would ask that you would heal my eye and my heart. And heal my heart for the grief that I’m dealing with so that I can minister to others. And I just pray this in your, your

Hey, my extraordinary DAB fam, this is Kingdom Seeker Daniel. Family, I just want to lift up some of our DABers. So, if you would be so kind to join me. Father, I give You thanks for our brother, Bush Man, who is fighting for joint custody for his children. And God, we thank You that the judge is in favor, but his wife is struggling and pushing against this. Lord, as difficult as this can be. I thank God, that Bush Man has the mind to press in, concerning his children. Lord, would You rule in a favorable way so that the children win. Lord, this is never an easy situation. And Lord, we know that You can do anything. And so, Lord, we pray that Your Devine will would be done concerning this marriage. And if it’s not going to be restored, will You let the children come out of this as unscathed as possible and let Your will be done, concerning the custody. In Jesus name. And for the young man that’s 15 years old, God, I thank You for this precious young man. Thank You for his generation. Raise this young man to be a voice in his generation, crying out and standing out to be different. And I give You praise for what You’re doing in this young man’s life. For our young brother, Renzo, Lord, we thank You for how You are keeping him, how You are guarding him, how You are watching over him. You are protecting his thoughts, his mind and his life. Keep him in perfect peace with his mind on You. In Jesus name. Amen.

Genesis 46:1-47:31, Matthew 15:1-28, Psalms 19:1-14, Proverbs 4:14-19

Today is the 23^rd day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian it is great to be here with you today as we gather and take the next step forward together. And our…our steps lately have been centered, at least in the book of Genesis on the story of Joseph. So, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, whose name became Israel and now his son Joseph. And we don’t need to review everything. He got trafficked into Egypt. He was sold into slavery. He eventually became the second in command of all of Egypt. Eventually his brothers who had trafficked him are before him bowing down to him. They need to buy grain and there’s been some back-and-forth there, a lot of drama, a lot of family drama, a lot of back story. Finally, Joseph in yesterday’s reading revealed himself to his brothers and the word has traveled and now Jacob, Joseph’s father who believed that Joseph had been dead for a very long time now has found out that his son is alive and he wants to go see him before he dies. And that’s where we pick up the story. Genesis chapters 46 and 47 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, a very dramatic reunion between Jacob and his lost son Joseph occurs today. The family arrives in Egypt. They go before Pharaoh. They are assigned a place to live, a good land, the land of Goshen, good for livestock. And, so, they are…you know…because the shepherds and stuff are like beneath the dignity of the Egyptians, they are in a land that they have to themselves - a beautiful spacious land that is their salvation. It is keeping them alive. The whole family of Jacob. So, Jacob’s name was changed to Israel, right? So, all of his family, all of the children of Israel, and grandchildren. The entire household has migrated to Egypt. Jacob is about to die. And, so, he makes Joseph promise not to bury him in Egypt to take him back to his ancestral burial plot in the land of promise. Like, he is instilling in his son, this isn’t our home. We were promised a land. This isn’t our home. Bury me back in the land of promise. But this is how the children of Israel got to Egypt. And it shouldn’t probably be too much of a spoiler alert. They’re going to stay in Egypt, like for centuries now. Like for 400 years they’re going to stay in Egypt and we will get to know that story as we continue the story. But we are coming to the end of the book of Genesis. I believe we finished Genesis, the day after tomorrow. And, so, the story of Joseph and the formation of the family of Israel, the children of Israel and their migration, how they ended up in Egypt in the first place, this is the part of the story that we’re in. This is the part of the story that we’re learning about. And what a beautiful story. So much for us in Joseph. So much injustice in the story of Joseph. So much to be bitter about. So much to be depressed about. So much to be in anguish and hopelessness about. And yet somehow, he continues to navigate forward believing that this…this wasn’t the end of his story. And we see that the story has turned out well and that Joseph’s perspective on his own story is that although evil was intended for him God intended it for good, and it had a greater purposes beyond just Joseph. He was sent to save lives, thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of lives, including the children of Israel, his own family. And we are beginning to bring that chapter to a close here in the next couple of days.

Then we get into the book of Matthew today and Jesus teaches something really really important. It’s not like He’s not teaching this in every way that He teaches. But there’s a confrontation that happens. The Pharisees, the legal experts come to Jesus and go like, why are your disciples breaking the traditions that the elders have handed down to us? Jesus kinda flips that around and says, why are you breaking God’s commands by keeping traditions that are handed down to you from the elders? Like, you’re going after my disciples for things that you do all the time. And He gives an example about honoring your father and your mother, and that a tradition had come down and a ruling had been dealt that, yes you have to honor your father, mother, but if you’re going to honor your father and mother by taking care of them in their old age and you had been…you know…you had some money for that, resources for that and you decided you’re gonna not take care of your mom and dad, you’re just gonna…you’re gonna give that money to God. Well, then you don’t have to honor your father and your mother with that…with that money because they…I guess…I guess they’re on their own. And Jesus is just calling the hypocrisy out of that as He leads to what He’s trying to point out, what He points out often, that our lives are lived from within and when we only focus on the exterior of our lives, we are missing the central component of what makes us us. And if our interior lives and our exterior lives are incongruent then there is hypocrisy present. But even beyond just like, it’s wrong to be hypocritical we are divided. We are presenting a false reality externally that is different than what is actually true inside of us. This is not how we were made. We were made to be true inside and outside. And, so, we live our exterior lives with levels of deception. And if we look back just a few weeks, we’re just getting into the year, we remember in the garden of Eden that it was a deception that eventually caused a fall. And, so, living into this deception where there’s an exterior life and an interior life Jesus is trying to unify, to bring back together, to put back together what got broken. And, so, Jesus teaches. Everything that goes into the mouth enters the stomach and then goes out into the sewer but what goes out of the mouth comes from the heart. And that is what contaminates a person in God’s sight because that is coming from the heart, that is coming from the interior life. And he’s using these Pharisees and teachers of the law, experts in the law as the backdrop for this teaching essentially saying they look good. And this isn’t the only time Jesus says this kind of stuff. We’ll see this repeatedly. You look good on the outside but on the inside you’re like…you’re like a whitewashed tomb. That’s an example that Jesus uses elsewhere. You look pretty on the outside but on the inside you’re just a corpse, a rotting dead corpse. And this helps us kind of understand that like our bodies have systems, right? So, like what you eat gets processed by these systems and what does not get used leaves the body one way or the other. And whatever leaves the body one way, or the other is what was processed by what we put into our bodies. This is how the body works. If we understand that our interior lives have these kinds of systems, what we’re going to put into us is going to get processed and then exit. And in Jesus example here the exit is the mouth. So, are we just pooping things out of our mouth constantly? Is that what our language is like? Is that what’s coming out of us? Is that because that’s what we put into us and that’s what got processed inside of us? And, so, that is informing who we are and making us very duplicitous. Understanding that what we put in is what comes out is not something that should be so foreign concept to us. It’s something we’ve been learning since we were born. Maybe if we begin to apply this in spiritual terms in our interior lives it could be a lightbulb moment for us. It could turn the lights on and go O okay. Well, I am I am consuming things that do nothing but make me anxious and make me full of anxiety and so that is coming out of my mouth because that is what is going on inside of me. Maybe my diet needs to change. We certainly understand this concept externally. We understand that if you only eat Twinkies, you’ll get sick eventually and only Twinkies whatever is left over is what’s gonna come out. But a well-balanced diet that gives us energy and that our bodies know what to do with provide us what we need for health. Why would that be any different than what’s going on inside of us? And, so, something to think about today.

Prayer:

Holy Spirit, we invite you to lead us in how to think about that and kind of examine what we’re consuming. And not just consuming as entertainment, but just the way that we are framing everything in our story, the way that we are looking at everything. We surrender these things to you asking you to lead and guide us into what we should be putting within us, and what will yield fruit for your kingdom. Come Holy Spirit into this we ask as we think about it today as we watch ourselves today. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com, that’s home base and that is where you find out what's…what’s happening around here. And, so, check that out. The Daily Audio Bible app does that as well in the palm of your hand and that can be found wherever the app store is that’s connected to your device. So, just search for Daily Audio Bible and you’ll find that. Check that out.

And while you doing all this checking out, check out the Community section whether on the app or in the web. This is where to get connected. This is where links to the different social media channels that we participate in are. It’s also the home of the Prayer Wall, which is a place for us as we take this journey that is always available no matter what time of day or night, whether we can’t sleep, whether we can’t eat, whatever’s going on in our lives we can share the story and ask our brothers and sisters who are literally taking the same journey that we are each and every day through the Scriptures to pray for us and bring encouragement into our lives. And, so, that’s the Prayer Wall. That is in the Community section. You can get to it from the app or from the web. Certainly, check it out.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if the mission to bring the spoken word of God read fresh every day and offered freely to whoever may listen wherever they may be whatever time a day or night it is no matter where we are in the world no matter what is going on and to build community around showing up every day, being here around the Global Campfire, if that is life-giving to you then thank you humbly for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner, or the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app or you can dial 877-942-4253.

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 beautiful Daily Audio Bible family this is Asia from the city of angels. I haven’t called in for a while and I have been meaning to call in and just let you all know how edifying it is to hear all of your prayers your praise reports and your general encouragement on this line. Thank you again to the Hardin family for this most anointed ministry that we are all being blessed with. I did want to call in today and give some encouragement to the teen who called in on January 18^th talking about faith and really encouraging those other teens out there to not be ashamed of their faith. And I would step that one step further to say not be ashamed of the gospel and while you are being saved and that young people to have this type of encouragement and knowledge at such a young age, it's…it’s nothing less than beautiful. So, thank you for calling in. And I am praying for you as well as the rest of the teens out there. I also want to give some encouragement to Lisa who called in from the West Coast, Philippians 4:6. You let us know that you do have stage four stomach cancer and you need prayer, that the hospital that you’re in will that you stay there for the rest of these next, I guess, about almost five days or so before your caregivers are available. And you sounded still so hopeful and…and encouraging. And I just wanted to pray for you as well as Speaking from the Desert who called in asking for prayers for people who have cancer. And I just want to do that. So, heavenly Father we lift up our beautiful brethren to You that are suffering from diseases like cancer, and we just lift them up to You. May You have Your perfect will for them Lord God and may they soften in the presence of Your grace.

Hello DAB family this is God’s Tree. Not many branches but I’m rooted by the word of God. And I’ve really got to be rooted today. I just got my heart broken by my husband and right now I don’t know what to do with it. But I found out that he was doing some things behind my back. But it is what it is. It’s what marriage is. Been married 29 years so things are bound to go wrong sometimes. But I asked God to fix our marriage and I kept praying and kept praying and then this happened. And now I’m wondering if this is the reason why God never tried to renew our relationship, was because He saw this going on. But anyway, I’m not gonna stop trusting God. I’m not gonna be angry with God. I trust and believe He knows what’s best for me and He sees what the end is going to be. He’s going to carry me through it. I just ask for my DAB family to pray for me and help me to get through the situation in my life and keep trusting God and believing, not reacting, but holding my peace and let God work it out. And I ask God to hold my heart together is what I need because it’s really broken right now. I thank you for your prayers. And as you continue to pray for one another we’re going to get through this y'all because God got us. God bless you.

Hi DABbers, it’s Angie from Winchester VA. I just heard Laurie from South Carolina share her experience about God filling her tank and the kindness of the worker at the gas station and it brought to mind 13 years ago God calling me out of a 35 year career and into the field of nursing. I was fighting Him. I could not see away where financially I could do this. I could not take two years off of work to go to nursing school. And I kept fighting Him and He said trust me, I can do this. So, I kept hiding it. And low and behold I got laid off from my job and instead of being devastated I said you know what, God is trying to show me something here. And I ended up getting a severance package of 18 months and it was just enough money to pay for my tuition and pay for my bills while I was a nursing school for two years. How that happened I do not know but He provided for me so beautifully. So, I’m telling you anytime that God is calling you into something don’t hesitate. He will provide for you. He will bring people into your lives. He will work situations to where the situation where He is calling you into will be provided for you. So, He’s making beauty out of ashes and I am doing things in my career now that I never imagined possible and I am helping people in a way that I never ever ever ever believed I would. You guys have a great day and I love you guys and God bless.

Hi this is Donna from California and today is January 18^th and I’d like to lift up Lisa from the West Coast in prayer today. She called in and is…has been diagnosed with terminal stomach cancer, stage four, and she is asking if she can just be allowed to stay in the hospital until Thursday which I think would be tomorrow. Hopefully that’s been granted until her caregivers can…can get to her and take her home with them. We thank you that you have provided people who can help her. And let’s pray for Lisa. O Father, Your daughter Lisa needs You and we thank You for her. We thank You for her mighty faith. Her faith just so deeply touched me that she still sees God and all of this. She also goes by Philippians 4:6 which is just be beautiful. Be anxious for nothing. We ask that You ease any anxiety about procedures. We ask that You take away pain and we ask that You keep her focused on You through all of this. Keep her eyes on You and gather people around. May people see You in her, people who are caring for her. If they don’t know You may they see You Lord. I pray that a miracle can be done for Lisa and that she…she can be healed. But You have this in Your hands, and we know that You are good and mighty God and that whatever plans You have for Lisa will be good ones. Thank You, Lord. Amen. And we love you, Lisa. We love you.

This is from Junk to Treasurer, and I have a special prayer request. My great uncle had married his second wife who is the great grandmother of three young girls all under 18. They were coming home after school and were involved in a car wreck. They pulled out from what the reports say in front of a truck that was going down the state road. One of the girls is suffering with a brain bleed. One of the girls had had to have jaw surgery and had several of her teeth knocked out. And one of the other sisters was treated and released. And their grandmother is raising them. And she works as a bus driver and the two girls that are hospitalized are in two different hospitals in different parts of the state which are in opposite directions of each other. So, I ask you to also pray for traveling mercies for the grandmother who I am undoubtedly sure will want to travel to see both of the girls as often as she can. So, I just ask you once again to lift these girls up. Their names are Lacey Lila and Lexus and the grandmother’s name is Jill. Thank you so much for your…

Hello dad family this is Diana from Florida and I want to pray for Lisa from the West Coast who also goes by Philippians 4:16 I believe on the Prayer Wall. She has stage four cancer. O, Lisa, you got me, you got me mourning with you and in the trenches with you because I could hear the noise of the hospital equipment in the background as you spoke and I was just like, God help this young lady. So, let’s pray. Dear Jesus, I pray for Lisa. Lord look at her prayers. She is praying O Lord God that You would extend her stay at the hospital to align with the arrival of her caregivers so that she won’t have to struggle at home by herself with the inability to do her basic tasks. Lord God, I pray that You would supply this need O Lord, that You would extend her stay, that You would provide for the hospital bills, that You would use Lisa as a light in that place oh Lord to preach the gospel Father God. And if it is Your will to heal her body of this infirmity, I pray that You would do so in Jesus’ name. Father, I pray that You would continue to foster in her that strong faith that she is carrying and that she would continue to give her boldness for You in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Genesis 44:1-45:28, Matthew 14:13-36, Psalm 18:37-50, Proverbs 4:11-13

Today is the 22nd day of January, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It is wonderful, wonderful to greet a brand-new week together and step into it together, as we gather around the Global Campfire and move into this brand-new week. And as we so often pay attention to, it’s a brand-new week, everything that has gone before is in the past, it’s a brand-new week, it’s a reset, it’s a restart. Whatever we failed at last week, we don’t have to fail at this, we can learn we can amass wisdom, we get discernment, we can pay attention. We get a fresh start and so, let’s walk into this brand-new week together with a hope, knowing that nothing has happened yet, it’s all out there in front of us. And what we do will write the story of this week, what we say will write the story of this week. May we navigate this week wisely, using wisdom as the Scriptures are so abundantly making clear to us that we need to do. So, let’s do that. One of the ways we do that is to immerse ourselves daily in the Scriptures and take the next step forward together. And that next step forward together leads us back into the book of Genesis and back into the story of Joseph. We have gotten ourselves very deep in the story of Joseph and so, Joseph is now seeing his brother Benjamin. The other brothers they had to come back they ran out of food and the famine is severe. Joseph is second in command in Egypt, and he gets to see his little brother who he hasn’t gotten to see. Like his whole childhood was taken from Joseph and he had to suffer through slavery and imprisonments before he became a commander, second in command and all of Egypt. So, he never got to grow up with his little brother and now he’s seeing him. He’s got all of the brothers in his house; they’re having a meal. He arranged all the brothers in their birth order, they’re astonished by this, they know something’s up. They believe they’re being judged for what they did to Joseph and it’s at that meal that we pick up the story, Genesis chapters 44 and 45 today and we will read from the Common English Bible this week.

Prayer:

Father, we thank You for Your word and we thank You for this brand-new shiny week that we get to walk into together, as a community here around the Global Campfire but together. We’re all sharing the same piece of history. You’ve allowed us to all be here on earth at this time and we thank You. So, as we move into this new week, we invite Your Holy Spirit to come and direct and bring clarity and correction and comfort into our week and into our lives. And these things that are looming out in front of us, the things that get us all knotted up inside and bring anxiety and worry, may we remember how this week started in the Scriptures, with You walking to Your friends on the lake, and they are scared, they are worried and frightened. And You said, be encouraged, it’s me, don’t be afraid. May we carry that, be encouraged, it’s me, don’t be afraid, every moment as we navigate this new week. We pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Prayer and Encouragements:

Good morning, everybody. Hey, it’s Annette Allison from Oklahoma City. Man, this is gonna be like a weird thing, I actually have a praise report and you’ll see why it’s weird. So, I’ve been helping out with the VA disability claim, and I finally got one. And it took a really long time, so I got kind of discouraged. You know, like one day it just finally all came together. And I’d been kind of putting off getting my ID card and getting signed up for the health stuff. Because I was like hey, you know, I’ll just save that for somebody else, you know. I got, my own health and you know, and insurance and stuff like that. And it was just one day the thought crossed my mind, you just need to get on down there and do that thing. So, I did, and it turned out like here’s my ID card, it was like a wife with one of the guys I work with. And she knew who I was and she’s like telling me all this stuff. And she goes, hey, I’m gonna walk you over here to the health, where you sign up for the health stuff. And I said, I don’t really need that. And no, no, no, come on let’s go. And it was like, it was so cool. And then the person there, he helped me out, got me all signed up and he’s like, hey, let’s get you signed up for your appointment. And I’m like, ah, you know, I’m all good. No, no, no, come on, help me. Let’s just get this done. Everything was just so kind and so nice. It’s like, I didn’t really want to tell them no. Right, so, anyways, I did it and here’s the blessing part. So, I get down there and gotta do all this lab work and hey, we’ll let you know if we find anything funky. Course I wasn’t expecting nothing, you know, I’ve been good. And two days later, I get a phone call and the guy says, hey, this is so and so from the pharmacy. We’re gonna get you hooked up on all your diabetes medicine. Turns out that I have type 2 diabetes and didn’t even know it. I had no idea. It was a shock, but I knew there was something kind of wrong with me, but I didn’t know quite what. I mean besides mentally of course, you know. But it was like, man, they got me hooked up. And I feel so good. I could not believe how sick I actually was until I wasn’t. And I thank God for everything and it just, it was such a God thing, the whole way through. And I just wanna give Him thanks and praise for this blessing because some people might say, well, what a death sentence and I go, uh uh man. I feel, it’s like the biggest blessing of my whole life. So, I just wanna give God thanks and praise for taking care of me and looking out for me. So, I love you guys and you know if you’ve got those symptoms boy, you don’t know what’s wrong go, go and find out. Maybe it might be just like this and turn out so good for you. You know, you never know. So, I love you all. Have a wonderful day. Bye bye.

Hey family, it’s Valiant Val, we just heard our girl Lisa aka Philippians 4:6. I love that verse. Be anxious for nothing. Hey sis, I don’t know if I’ve ever shared my life verse, it’s Philippians 2:14, it says, oh Gosh, do everything without complaining or arguing. Good luck with that family. Let’s gather around this campfire right now. She’s our friend that has terminal cancer. But we know that God is able. Sis, your request is that you can stay in the hospital until your family member or friends come through for a place to stay. So, right now, let’s go before the throne and ask for that. Lord God, right now, we come before You, we lay it all at the cross. God, we shall be anxious for nothing. And in that Lord, we are believing that she can stay in the hospital Lord, until she can get into the care providing situation. And Lord God, there is nothing too hard for You. So, Heavenly Father, if it’s Your will, Lord God, heal our friend. Heal our sister in Christ, Father. Take this cancer from her body, Lord. Let her be a miracle, Lord Jesus. And God, if You see it to be another way and You’re ready to take her to glory, God, let it be as pain-free as possible, Lord. Please, in the name of Jesus. I love you sis. Muah. I’m praying for you.

Hi Daily Audio Bible family. This is Pamela, previously Refined by the Fine from Pennsylvania going by, Living Life Victoriously in Pennsylvania. I am being so encouraged by listening to all the wonderful love and care being shared on the community prayer. And just wanted to call in and encourage all of you as we lift one another up in prayer and encourage one another. I just want to say a brief prayer for us. Father, we come before You in the mighty name of Your son, Yeshua, Jesus Christ. You, Lord, are great and greatly to be praised. We come together boldy before Your throne of grace to find mercy and grace in all of our times of need. I thank You and I praise You for this community of prayer warriors, that we can come together and lift one another up and pray believing. We lift our voice to You and You hear our voices. And we eagerly watch to see Your answers to our prayers. I thank You and I praise You Lord. And I ask all these things in Jesus precious name. Amen.

Good morning, this is John Ransom calling from Budapest. Specifically, for you, Lisa, from the West Coast. You know, struggling with stage 4 cancer. And I was listening very intently to everything you asked for, praying for you. I know you meant for every need you have, not only for this intermittent week but for complete and utter healing. You know, I went through cancer, I went through Lymphoma, an entire year. And chemo and the whole thing. To the extent that the chemo knocked out my immune system and I need two weeks to be in isolation to have my immune system restored, you know, with stem cell therapy, etc. So, I truly know where you are at and I also know how the Lord appears in the middle of that situation. And I, my heart was glad when I heard that you see God in this situation. And nevertheless, I was very, very touched when immediately following your message, another woman called in and prayed for everyone suffering from cancer. And I joined her fervently in that. I want you to know that I’ll be praying for you from this point on as the Holy Spirit nudges me, reminds me. You know, you’re not alone. I had the Lord speak one clear message the day of the diagnoses, He said, I am doing a new thing. And I said, ok, Lord, I trust You will do it. And in the worse chemo, at three o’clock in the morning, He woke me up and I felt Jesus standing to the right of my bed. So, I pray for this intimacy with Him, and I pray for your complete and utter healing in His glorious and precious name. Amen.

Hello, this is Bonnie from Virginia. I was very thrilled to hear a boy who was 15 years old. He didn’t leave his name when he was encouraging other teenagers. And today is Wednesday, January 18th of 2023. I really get excited and very encouraged whenever I hear the children and the teenagers and young adults requesting for prayer and encouraging others. I am promising that I will pray for you, 15-year-old. God’s son, it’s very encouraging to hear that you being in that age, encouraging other teenagers. Life is long and there may be many challenges coming in your life, also. So, I will promise that you will be strong in God’s faith and will keep on encouraging others and be strong in His faith. Remember, we love you and it thills to hear that these teenagers are listening to DAB and making there __ to God. Thank you.

Genesis 42:18-43:34, Matthew 13:47-14:12, Psalms 18:16-36, Proverbs 4:7-10

Today is the 21^st day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian and it is wonderful to be here with you today as we gather around the Global Campfire 21 days. So, when we finish our reading today, we will have completed three full weeks in the Bible and it will be three full weeks in the new year that we’re getting ourselves acclimated to. So, wonderful! Wonderful! We are well underway. I’m looking back at the last three weeks and saying to myself, the Bible is speaking a lot. There’s a lot that I’ve been able to consider and hopefully you too. There’s a lot going on. The Bible is so rich and full of things for us to examine that so deeply bring up the questions that we need to ask in our own lives. And, so, it’s great to be here with you today as we celebrate three weeks in the Bible together. And we’ll do what we do every day, which is to take the next step forward together. And picking up where we left off brings us back into the book of Genesis. We are navigating through the story of Joseph, who is now second in command in all of Egypt. A terrible famine is in the land. The land of Canaan has been affected. Joseph’s family is suffering because of the famine. His brothers, the ones who trafficked him have come to Egypt to find grain so that they can live, and they have ended up before Joseph their brother. He knows who they are. They don’t know who he is, and they have bowed down before him and he is accused of being spies. And, so, they’re a little unsettled to say the least. He’s demanding that one of the brothers go back to Canaan and get his little brother Benjamin and he’s gonna hold the other ones in prison until Benjamin gets back to prove that they’re not spies. And this is where we pick up the story. Genesis chapter 42 verse 18 through 43 verse 34.

Prayer:

Father, we thank you for your word and we thank you for bringing us three weeks into this year, safe and sound. We thank you for all that you have begun to shift and transform and shake loose within us as we simply engage with the Scriptures, as we simply allow them to wash into our lives and speak to us, speak truth to us. We are grateful. And, so, as we kind of bring to a close, our land this week we look at the last thing that was said from the Scriptures this week. Wisdom is supreme so get wisdom. And whatever else you get, get understanding. She will exalt you. Embrace her. She will honor you. She will place a garland of favor on your head. She will give you a crown of beauty. Father in our own strength we confess that we can only create wisdom out of our own personal experiences and then we can insulate ourselves and think that our own personal experiences and wisdom that we’ve derived from them is all that there is and we know more than everybody else when the truth is we can’t access the kind of wisdom that we need to navigate this life. We navigate ourselves into situations that we do not understand and cannot interpret all the time. And so often we find ourselves confused and blaming you for something you had nothing to do with. We need wisdom, we confess that. We thank you for the wisdom that we have been able to accumulate. We are asking through the power of your Holy Spirit and through the authority of the Scriptures that you increase our wisdom exponentially. May we be wise sons and daughters of your kingdom, and may we operate and interact with one another using wisdom. We need it now more than ever it seems and it’s only going to increase. Our need for discernment and wisdom is very vital and it has been vital for thousands of years as we are reading it from the Scriptures thousands of years ago. Give it to us as we seek as we humble ourselves before you as we open our hands to you as we open our hearts to you. Come fill us, we pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is a home base, that is the website, it’s where you find out what’s going on around here. And the alternative is the Daily Audio Bible app, which you can download free from whatever app store works with your device. And, so, check that out.

Check out the Daily Audio Bible Shop. There are resources there in a number of categories for our journey at the global campfire through a year together.

Also, the Community section is where the Prayer Wall is. It’s where different links to get connected are. So, check that out as well. If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, thank you humbly. We wouldn’t be here if we weren’t in this together. So, thank you profoundly and humbly. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app. That’s the little red button up at the top or you can dial 877-942-4253.

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:

Coming soon… Traveling back to the USA today.

Genesis 41:17-42:17, Matthew 13:24-46, Psalm 18:1-15, Proverbs 4:1-6

Today is the 20th day of January, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian and it’s great to be here with you today, as we gather around the Global Campfire and take the next step forward together. And we are fully immersed in the story of Joseph, at this point. And so, that’s where we’re picking up the story. Joseph has been in the dungeon for a while, he’s interpreted some dreams, the news of this interpretation has reached Pharaoh, who has had some troubling dreams. Joseph has been summoned from the dungeon and is now in front of Pharaoh, Pharaoh wants Joseph to take a stab at it. Whether or not Joseph could interpret Pharaoh’s dreams. So, let’s pick up the story, Genesis chapter 41 verses 17 through 42 today.

Commentary:

Okay so, as we continue our journey through the book of Genesis, and now continue our journey through Joseph’s story. We’ve seen a remarkable twist of fate, a remarkable change of fortunes. Joseph who really had the latter part of his childhood in his early adulthood essentially stolen from him, by being trafficked into slavery by his own brothers, by his own family, sold into slavery. And having to go through all of the injustice that he went through while retaining character and integrity, it has actually worked out. Even though Joseph had to go through an awful lot of things that would be incredibly traumatic to go through, everywhere he went he tried to thrive where he was. So, even while he’s in prison, he thrives there and is in charge of everything there. And it gives us this picture of the fact that difficult things really, even injust, unjust things happen, and that can become the story, that can become the identity, that can become who we are, what’s happened to us can become who we are. But in the story of Joseph, we watch a person taking the long view and believing that the story isn’t over, there’s other chapters. And in the case of Joseph, he’s brought before Pharaoh, he interprets Pharaoh’s dreams, gives Pharaoh some administrative advice. Pharaoh puts Joseph in charge, and he is second in command of all of Egypt. Like from the dungeon, to second in command of the nation. And as it turns out there are seven years of prosperity and Joseph has been able to begin to accumulate resources that can be used during this, the…the season of famine that is coming. So, Joseph is a very powerful person in Egypt, and he will actually redeem, he will, he will save Egypt during the famine, as well as all the surrounding countries, which is how Joseph’s brothers end up before him. The famine is in Canaan, there isn’t any food. The rumor is there’s food in Egypt, why is there food in Egypt, because somebody foresaw what was happening. That was Joseph and he was able to prepare Egypt for the oncoming famine. Israel and his children back in the land of Canaan, they’re not prepared and so they have to come to Egypt for food, and that’s when the brothers come before Joseph. And they bowed before Joseph and Joseph’s dream came true, and he is aware of who they are, and they are not aware of who he is. And we will watch, as this story continues forward, the way that Joseph is seeking to find out more about his family, but also, more about the hearts of his brothers. And we will continue this story in the days ahead as it reaches a very, very dramatic conclusion.

Then we turn into the book of Matthew today and we encounter Jesus teaching in parables and he gives three parables today, that are all about the same thing. And if we look at them and not just kind of read them and go like there’s another Jesus parable, I’ve heard this a thousand times in Sunday school like, yeah, yeah, I know all the stories of Jesus. If we actually just look at what He’s teaching us. He’s teaching us a lot because the three stories that He talks about today are telling us what God’s kingdom is like and if it’s God’s kingdom then it is administrated by God. It is God’s kingdom. And so, it represents God. So, God’s kingdom is also what God is like. So, in these three parables, Jesus specifically says this is what the kingdom is like. So, for example, the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in the field, or the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, or the kingdom of heaven is like leaven. So, let’s look at what God’s kingdom is like and see how that knowledge applies to our lives, because we all consider ourselves part of the kingdom, right. But if we’re claiming to be part of the kingdom, but we are nothing like the kingdom, well then that’s a problem, we’re claiming something that isn’t true. So, what is God’s kingdom like? Jesus says the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while people were sleeping, his enemy came, sowed sees among the wheat and left. When the plants sprouted and produced grain, then the weeds also appeared. The landowner’s servants came to him and said master didn’t you sow good seed in your field. And where did the weeds come from? An enemy did this, he told them. So, do you want us to go and pull them up, the servants asked him. No, he said, when you pull up the weeds you might also uproot the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest, at harvest time I’ll tell the reapers, gather the weeds first and tie them in bundles to burn them. But collect the wheat in my barn. So, that’s the parable. And with a parable like this, we look at the characters in the story and go, who is who here? Because if we know who’s who, then we have context for what is being said. Thankfully, in the case of the parable of the wheat and the weeds, Jesus gives us an explanation. The one who sows the good seed is the son of man. So, this is Jesus. The field is the world. The good seed, these are the children of the kingdom. The weeds are the children of the evil one. The harvest is the end of the age. The harvesters are angels. This is how Jesus explains this parable. So, if that’s what we’re looking at, then the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. Jesus the son of man, who sowed good seed in his field. But while people were sleeping, his enemy came, sowed weeds among the wheat, and left. The enemy then, according to Jesus, is the evil one. When the plants sprouted and produced grain then there were weeds and wheat growing together, and the servants came and said didn’t you sow good seed? And remember, the good seed are the children of the kingdom, and the weeds are what was sown in among the field of good seed. I guess we could say that like the children of darkness. The children following after the evil one. So, let’s pause here for a second. We look at a scenario like this, a good field that could yield a harvest full of weeds and if we take the metaphor and go this is, this is God’s kingdom. Then we often find ourselves in the position of the servants. Do you want us to go and pull up the weeds? Like we are the defenders of God, and we are going to uproot everything that isn’t part of God’s kingdom, no matter who we have to take out to do that, no matter who has to get hurt, no matter who has to get marginalized, no matter who has to become estranged from God because of a misrepresentation of who God is. We often jump to that place where we are like, we are the weeders of God’s field. The irony is that the message of this parable is quite different, the servants notice that wheat and weeds are growing up together in the same field and this field is God’s kingdom and the servants come and say do you want us to go pull out the weeds. The master says no, when you pull up the weeds you might also uproot the wheat with them. Let both grow together until the harvest, at harvest time I’ll tell the reapers, gather the weeds first time in bundles to burn them. But collect the wheat in my barn. And so, often we also can think I’m not only the weeding and the gardener, but I am also a part of the reaping. So, maybe I can’t pull out the weeds now, but one day I’m gonna get sent in and I’m gonna gather the harvest for God. Ironically, we don’t have anything to do with that, at least according to Jesus, the reapers are angels. So, who are we in this story then, are we the children of the kingdom? If we’re the children of the kingdom, then we are, like we have a job and it’s not the jobs that we try to take on ourselves. Our job is to grow, is to grow where we are among the weeds. God is allowing the weeds to grow up among the wheat. We aren’t to do the weeding and we aren’t doing the harvesting either. We have no business calling somebody wheat or weeds, we’re not doing the separating. So, when we look at this parable just under the surface a little deeper, think it through a little bit, we begin to realize I am jumping into, we jump into all kinds of things that we have no business in. It’s not our job, it’s not our role, it’s not our assignment. And we need to start thinking about how we are acting toward the weeds, are we trying to pull them up? Because we can destroy good at the same time, exactly like the master said in this parable. We can cause destruction, while we try to do jobs that were not assigned to us. There is a lot to think about in there but that wasn’t the only parable that Jesus used to describe what the kingdom of heaven is like. He said, the kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that a man took. So, a man was used in the previous parable. So, a man, we’re talking about the Son of Man here, Jesus. The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. The smallest of all the seeds, but when grown, it’s taller than the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the sky come and nest in its branches. So, what can we say here. This is just a couple of sentences and a little story but what’s lurking here? What are we learning? First of all, it’s Son of Man that sowed the seed. So, we didn’t sow the seed, we’re not, we’re not the sower. God is the sower here and he plants a mustard seed and ironically mustard seed is…is more of a weed for the hearers here. It’s the kind of plant that if it takes root, you can’t get rid of it. Jill and I had a yucca plant at our last house, and I loved it. We had a couple of them. They were there when we got there and I love them, but they grew, and she got sick of them and decided to cut one of them down and she cut it down and it came right back. We found out no, you’re gonna have to find the root. Like you have to get uproot this. I mean, this thing got dug up, got changed to a pickup truck and still couldn’t be pulled out of the ground. It, once it took root, like it’s near impossible to get rid of. And mustard seed is like that. So, it’s not particularly desirable. Like, it’s not something that people want to go and plant. It’s something that people, want to keep rid of. And yet, yet God is planting in his field things that people want to get rid of. And isn’t that story of the gospel, that while we were his enemies, He still came for us, that He would plant us even when we were the undesirable, even when we were in the margin. Like, isn’t this who Jesus is going to. And He’s saying, this is what I’m planting in my field, it’s the smallest of all the seeds, but when grown, it’s taller than the garden plants and becomes a tree. So, that the birds of the sky come and nest in its branches. So, God’s kingdom is like this small thing that when it takes root is impossible to get rid of. And the very thing that people wanted to get rid of actually grows enough to bring life and shelter. Powerful teachings here. And then, the last parable that we came to today, the kingdom of heaven is like leaven that a woman took and mixed into 50 pounds of flour until all of it was leavened. So, leaven is yeast and I’m not a baker, my wife is like a magical cook. I’m not a baker or a cook of any of any sort really. I can follow a recipe, but I know what yeast does. I’ve actually made bread before, and I’ve made unleavened bread before and the two are very different loaves. So, yeast makes…makes the dough rise, gives fluffiness and makes a more palatable loaf of bread. But if you took that loaf of bread and decided you wanted to take the yeast out of it, that I don’t know how, I don’t think that’s possible. Right, so once the yeast is mixed in, you can’t take it back out. But because it was there, the whole loaf was a different loaf. It changed the constitution, it changed everything. So, how do we look at this in terms of God’s kingdom. It’s mixed in just like wheat and weeds, it’s mixed in and once it’s mixed in, you can’t get it out and it changes everything. This is what God’s kingdom is like, we have to stop saying it’s different, this is what it’s like. I mean, unless the gospel of Matthew is just a joke and shouldn’t be in the, all of the Gospels for that matter because they all have parables in them. So, if…if the New Testament is a joke, okay then we don’t need to pay attention to any of this, but these are the words of the one that we believe to be God incarnate, the one who came to rescue us, like our Savior. Our hopes are placed in Him. He’s teaching this. He’s teaching about what His kingdom is like and it’s not like this bombastic massive enterprise that is world dominant. Actually, God’s kingdom is like God. God’s kingdom is like what Jesus looks like and what Jesus did and how He operated in this world. God’s kingdom is this small, imperceptible thing that changes everything. God’s kingdom is this small thing that once it takes root, it cannot be taken away, it cannot be removed. God’s kingdom is growing, God’s kingdom is happening now, we are to grow where we are among everything else. It’s not our role to do the weeding, it’s our role to do the growing. Let’s give some thought today to what the master is teaching us about His kingdom and what that might mean to the way we operate in it, live in it, be in it, and conduct ourselves in it.

Prayer:

So, Jesus, we love You and we thank You for another opportunity to gather together and take the next step forward in the Scriptures. And we thank You for all that we can learn and glean and apply to our lives in the story of Joseph and all that we can learn and glean in our lives from, You are teaching in the Gospels. Holy Spirit, come, help us to consider, help us to change, forgive us Lord, for the ways that we have misrepresented so many things and taken on roles that were never assigned to us, help us to be children of the kingdom. We pray in the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.

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

Prayer and Encouragements:

Hi, this is Bob the Bean. I’m asking for my brothers and sisters to lift my marriage up. Been 40 years, I married my high school sweetheart. Our marriage just crumbling to the ground, right now. I don’t know how to stop it. I don’t know what life could be without it. I’m trying to do this alone and I know that’s not right. So, I wanna reach out to my brothers and sisters. Pray for my wife please. Really struggling now with a lot of anger and help me to not to react to things that are done that are trying to provoke me to react. We haven’t been going to church and I know that’s not right. I’m going to church this morning. Trying to get the train back on the wheels, on the track. Thank you, brothers and sisters.

Hello, this is my first on here. My name is Austin. I’m from Pemberton. And my dad Leo is having health problems, he’s 85 years old. We lost my mother last Christmas, so Christmas of 2021. And so, once the, once this holiday season came his health started to deteriorate as well. Some of the doctors are optimistic but some of them are quite negative and quite grim. I’m worried about him because I love him so much. I loved both of them so much. They are all I have; they’ve always been great parents. So, please pray for them. Pray for him, pray for me please. Thank you.

Good morning DAB family, this is Bridgett from Leo City and I just wanna pray for a few of the DABers. First, I wanna pray for Incognito. Lord, I just ask for Your, Your Spirit of comfort to come upon this family to, to come upon this tragic situation. And God, that, Lord, You would let Your Spirit rest on this ten-year-old who found her father, my God. Just ask You sweet Jesus, to come and to turn this around, this situation Lord God, in only the way that You can, my God. I ask You Father God, to just let Your Spirit come and comfort each and every person, my God. I pray also Father, for Renzo, Lord God. For his eyes and ears, Lord, I pray that Lord, that You would help him to meditate on You, Lord God. Philippians 4:8, Renzo, focus on such things in Philippians 4:8 and be mindful and watchful yourself. And that is what you’re doing. So, continue to do that. Don’t let the enemy lie and steal the truth that you are already doing that. In the name of Jesus. And I want to pray for this wife, Anonymous. Lord, I just ask You for this marriage, my God, Jesus. Lord, I pray, Father God, Lord, that You would come Holy Spirit, and uproot and expose everything that is in the dark, Lord God. That Your Holy Spirit would speak to this man of God. That Your Holy Spirit would comfort this woman of God. That Your Holy Spirit, my God, would take what the enemy intends for evil and turn it around for good, Lord God. Show up my God, in this situation.

Hello DAB friends, this Anna in the Trenches. I wanna thank you all so much for praying for me. We have been losing people due to accidental overdoses. We have a lot of friends that struggle with addiction. And so, on Wednesday we had a funeral for a girl who came to our church from the prison, got out of prison and then started using again. Often, people disappear once they get out of prison, they stop coming to church then you know, you can only do so much. And anyway, it wasn’t an intentional overdose. But if you could just pray for her sister and her friend. Her name was Jessica. Anyway, and last night we found out that Melissa, another girl that got out of prison not that long ago, and just got off parole, was with Jessica when Jessica died. And we’re really worried about Melissa. And about her sobriety and her walk with the Lord. So, if you could just pray for Melissa right now that she would stay sober and process her trauma and just reach out to anyone and walk with the Lord during this time.

Hello my Daily Audio Bible Family. This is Aussie James and yeah, I no longer live in Japan, I’ve been back in Australia since 2019. But I haven’t called in for ages. I think last time I called in was 2018. But I’ve been listening along most of the time though sometimes I haven’t, but I have been listening pretty much consistently in the last little while. So, yeah, I just heard about Pelham’s passing and I’m really to bad to hear about that. When I first joined the Daily Audio Bible, he had just joined it as well and we were praying for each other, on the prayer line. Yeah, just pray for me, I’m, I’ve got, you know, just finding it hard with my work and I’m doing a bit of seminary study as well. Just thinking direction of when we go back to Japan to live or even just for a visit, cause we haven’t been back because of the you know, the situation in the world with all the lock downs and everything, we haven’t been back yet. But things are starting to open up. But we’re just planning when that will be the right time to make a visit. And yeah, there’s opportunity for maybe move back there for longer term. But I just wanna get my seminary studies completed before I do that. And a shout out to my friend Slave of Jesus, glad to hear you’re still around mate. And also, James the Teacher we’re praying for you and all the situations in your life at the moment. Thank you, my wonderful Daily Audio Bible. Love you all, bye.

Hi guys, it’s Emily in Seattle. It’s Saturday January 14 and I have a prayer request. My husband is a delivery driver for a small courier company. And his dispatcher, dispatches two companies. And the one that my husband doesn’t work for is in a serious situation right now. A driver is missing and he had some samples of blood with him that were from a clinic going to hospital, I think. And we can’t find the guy or the samples or his car or anything. And because this is blood, that he was supposed to deliver, there could be lawsuits involved because patients’ lives are at stake. So, if you could pray for Jack, that’s the dispatcher and the owner of the company, named Kevin. That God would protect it and then they wouldn’t go under because of this situation. Even if they were taken to court. Just pray that God would that everything would work out for the best. Thank guys.

Genesis 39:1-41:16, Matthew 12:46-13:23, Psalms 17:1-15, Proverbs 3:33-35

Today is the 19^th day of January welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian it is great to be here with you on this 19^th day of the brand-new year and it’s great to be around the Global Campfire as we take the next step forward, the 19^th step forward in the Scriptures this year, which will lead us back into the book of Genesis and back into the story of Joseph, who is one of the sons of Israel, Jacob’s sons. And, so, let’s dive in. We’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. Genesis chapter 39 verse 1 through 41 verse 16.

Commentary:

Okay. So, we have several things going on as we do each and every day that we move through the Scriptures. And, so, looking back into the book of Genesis as we really get fully immersed in the story of Joseph, who is the favored son of Jacob, whose name has become Israel. And, so, he had the coat of many colors and he was a child in Jacob’s old age and so his other brothers despised him in part because of the affection that his father had for him that was different than the real rest of the brothers but also because he’s a teenager, he’s a teenage boy. And, so, he has dreams and obviously like later on he becomes an interpreter of dreams. That’s one of the things that we were reading about today. So, obviously these dreams have significant…significance in his life, but he’s a kid and he doesn’t know exactly how to interpret what he’s seeing. And, so, he tells his family the way that the dreams go, are that the family ends up bowing down to him. And, so, he has a couple of dreams and the brothers just hate him for the dreams. Even his dad’s is kinda like, really? You think we’re gonna bow down to you? And, so, as the story goes there’s animosity specifically toward Joseph. Among all of the children of Israel there’s some animosity toward Joseph. He’s a boy coming of age and that can be problematic and a difficult time in any young boy’s life and in the family’s life as well. So, this is all going on, but there is favoritism going on as well. And Joseph kind of reports back to his dad what his brothers are doing. And, so, he’s kinda like the tattletale. And as it turns out Joseph is sent to find his brothers and find out how they’re doing. And he has to go on a pretty long journey. If he’s going from…from the south near the Negev all the way Shechem he’s gotta go pretty far to the north to find them. And as the story goes, they see him from far off, they decide let’s end the dreaming by ending the dreamer. Let’s kill him. Let’s be done with him. He ends up being thrown into a pit. They take his precious robe, his…this unique gift given to him by his father. This robe is taken from him. But he retains his integrity. His clothes aren’t his character. He retains his integrity, even as he’s thrown by his own family into a pit, while they figure out what they’re going to do. And can you imagine Joseph in a pit in the middle of the desert screaming for help and no one coming to help him, just kind of being in this pit and left there. And then he gets pulled from the pit, only to be transferred into the hand of the Ishmaelites trafficked by his own family and he is taken into Egypt where he is sold into slavery. Well…sold…I guess as if…if you can think of it in those terms. He ends up in Potiphar’s house. So, he ends up in a high-ranking officials home and his integrity is intact, and his hope isn’t lost. He isn’t bitter. He's…he’s not in a corner going, how…why is this happening to me. He’s holding onto God to figure out where this whole story is going. And in short order, he becomes the…the supreme leader of Pharaoh’s house. He’s in charge of his household. And of course, Pharaoh’s wife notices that he’s handsome and well-built and she wants a little of that action. And, so, she goes and asks for it, and he won’t. He won’t go to bed with her. And this goes on and on and on, right? She keeps pressuring him and pressuring him. And he keeps telling her, I can't…like I can’t do that. I cannot break trust with my master. I cannot sin against God. And, so, one day they’re alone and she presses in on him and he has to remove himself and he flees and he…he leaves his robe behind. This is like the second time this has happened. His robe has been taken from him again. And yet he flees with his character and integrity intact. And for all of that, for this young man who is vital and handsome and good-looking and desirable, for all of his integrity and character where does he end up? In another dungeon and another pit. He had been thrown into a pit in the desert and now he is in a pit after losing his robe again. Now he’s in the dungeon and he hasn’t done anything wrong and he has to stay there for years. And of course, he does interpret some dreams and those dreams come true, and it eventually gets him out of the dungeon and before Pharaoh. And that’s gotta be crazy culture shock if you’ve been for years in a dungeon and the next thing you know guards are coming in going, get a bath boy. Shave. You’re going to see Pharaoh. And he ends up in front of Pharaoh and he’s told a dream that he needs to interpret. And we’ll pick up the story from there. But we’re watching a story unfold that has many many layers to it in. I mean one of those layers are that what Joseph is wearing is not who Joseph is. And even when we find ourselves in the corner going, why is this happening to me, the story of Joseph allows us to understand that maybe we’re in the middle. Maybe this is the part of the story where there is challenge and difficulties to overcome, but maybe this isn’t the end of the story. Because as we will see in the coming days this is not the end of Joseph’s story.

And then we move into the book of Matthew and Jesus begins now to teach with parables and they’ll be many parables that we will encounter as we continue our journey through the book of Matthew. But a parable is a like an illustration story, a story that says more than just the words, pictures that mean more than the words and nuances that allow for many layers so that like a parable story can be pondered and looked at from many different angles and many truths can emerge from these parables. This is part of a rabbinic tradition, teach your disciples using parables. And in the parable today, Jesus says, consider the sower who went out to sow. When he sowed some seed…some seed. And, so, as the story goes, a sower goes out to sow and he sows a field that has different kinds of soil in it, different kinds of terrain. And the way that the seed gets established in the soil depends upon the soil that the seed fell upon. And in this case, Jesus gives the interpretation. When anyone hears the word about the kingdom and doesn’t understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what was sown in his heart. This is the one sown along the path. So, seed was sown along a path. For us we need to consider in our hearts what kind of soil are we. What type of soil is available to the seed of the good news of God’s kingdom? If we are the path, then we hear the word about the kingdom, but we don’t understand it and it’s easily snatched away from us. So, if we’re the path, what we do? Seek understanding. The reason that it was stolen away was because the person didn’t understand. But there’s other soil. And…and I’m quoting Jesus, “and the one sown on rocky ground”…so seed that fell on soil that is rocky, “this is one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy, but he has no root and is short-lived. When distress, or persecution comes because the word, immediately he falls away.” So, what do we do if we’re rocky soil? What do we do if we’re the person who hears and we rejoice and we’re like, yes, I am in. Yes, absolutely count me in. But there are rocks all around so that the roots cannot go deep. We cannot get routed because there is no soil to take root. And, so, when we’re challenged, according to Jesus, when distress, or persecution comes to when were challenged we aren’t rooted and so we immediately fall away. And, so, what do we do if we’re rocky soil? I…I have to deal with rocky soil. Like, we have a farm and we have to take care of it and it has rocky soil. And I have learned that you can kinda deal with the rocky soil, you can work around it. But if you want it to be fertile, you want to use it for something, you gotta dig up the rocks. You gotta get them out of there. And, so, if we are rocky soil, if we believe in the good news of the kingdom of God but anytime we’re challenged internally we have to face hardship, we find ourselves shaking our fists at the sky going why are you letting this happen to me. Then we need to get routed. And in order to get routed we need to take a look at the soil in our hearts, the hardness, the rockiness and begin to work with the Holy Spirit in removing the rocks so that there is good soil. And then there’s the thorny soil. So, some seed falls on soil that is thorny and according to Jesus this is one who hears the word, but the worries of this age and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word and it becomes unfruitful. So, what do we do if we’re thorny? And isn’t that what it feels like, the worries of the world, the worries that we’re carrying around on our shoulders, the worries of this age, the deceitfulness of wealth, like this treadmill that we’re running on thinking that we can achieve and achieve and achieve and it becomes a distraction that we spend our whole lives trying to pursue. It feels like thorns. Anxiety and worry feel like thorns and our gut, right? So, what do we do if we’re thorny soil? We begin to become aware that the worries of life, the worries of this age, the deceitfulness of our pursuits are distracting us. And then finally there is seed that was sown on good ground, and it bore fruit, some 100, some 60, some 30 times what was sown. And, so, we look at this and go…I mean we can look at this from lots of different angles and it’s been taught from lots of different angles, but I read this and I go, well, what kind of soil am I because the goal here is to become good soil that bears fruit. And what fruit do we want to bear? The fruit of the Spirit. But we need to look at the soil. We need to get out and walk around and investigate the terrain of our hearts.

Prayer:

Father, we invite you into all this. That’s a lot we’ve covered today, and we thank you for the examples that are in the story of Joseph. We thank you for all that they have for us to learn about our own lives and we thank you that the story of your people is unfolding before us in the book of Genesis. And Jesus, we thank you for the way that you taught, way that you are gentle and kind but…but willing to step into things when they were simply wrong and make corrections and the way that you have given us these stories to ponder and contemplate and consider. And, so, Holy Spirit we invite you to help us examine the soil of our hearts today. What kind of soil are we? The truth is, we can be all in these kinds soil in different areas of our lives, but it’s our desire to be good soil that produces good fruit for your kingdom. Help us. We will never navigate this without you. Help us, we pray. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com is home base and that is where you can find out what is going on around here unless you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app and then you have it in the palm of your hand. So, just push the Drawer icon in the upper left-hand corner of the main app screen and that will open up a drawer and check out the different sections.

Check out the Daily Audio Bible Shop. There are resources there in the shop for the journey that we are on in a number of categories. So, look into that.

And of course, the Community section is where to get connected. There are different links to the social media channels that we are a part of as well as the Prayer Wall there in the community section. So, dive in and get connected in any way that you want to and in any way that you can.

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

And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement you can for sure hit the Hotline button in the app. That should work wherever you may be in the world as long as you have an Internet connection, or there are a number of numbers that you can dial. In the Americas 877-942-4253 is the number to call. If you are in the UK or Europe 44-20-3608-8078 is the number to call. And if you are in Australia or that part of the world 61-3-8820-5459 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:

Coming soon. Day 6 of our missions trip to Nicaragua. Prayer and Praise will be posted when we return to the states…

Genesis 37:1-38:30, Matthew 12:22-45, Psalm 16:1-11, Proverbs 3:27-32

Today is the 18th day of January, welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian. It is fantastic to be here with you today. Got a nice steamy cup of Wind Farm coffee to my left, as is the normal way of things. Looking out over the day, coming in and centering ourselves here at the Global Campfire, allowing the cares of this life to just take a break. Just kind of leave them outside the circle. We can go grab all the cares of this life all we want; we can drag around worries that aren’t even ours if we want. But we need a break from it, and this is that break. So, we come in here and it’s safe and we allow the Scriptures to speak to us and then we can go deal with those cares of life. We can pick them back up and drag them around or we can approach them with maybe some new clarity that the Scriptures bring into our story. And so, it is wonderful to be here with you today as we take the next step forward, which leads us back into the book of Genesis. We’ve been moving through Abraham and then Isaac and then Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel and then we learned of his children, who will one day be the tribes of Israel. Yesterday, we also learned about Esau’s family tree and his family line because he becomes the Edomites. We have not seen the last of the Edomites. And although the brothers have kind of reconciled, there is enmity between the Edomites and the Israelites, although they are brothers. And we’ll see this pickup along the way, as we continue the story. But now, we are about to meet one of Israel’s or Jacob’s sons and immerse ourselves fully in his story for a while, his name is Joseph. So, we’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week, Genesis chapter 37 and 38.

Commentary:

Okay so, in the gospel of Matthew today, Jesus talks about something that is, that…that won’t be forgiven. And so, we should probably like go wait, what and pay attention to what is being said here and what is going on here. Specifically, like we’ll just start at the statement that Jesus makes. “Therefore, I tell you, people will be forgiven every sin and blasphemy. But the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. Whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man, it will be forgiven him. But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him, either in this age or in the one to come.” That is intense. And you know, I grew up as a church kid, I grew up as a pastor’s kid. I’ve been around this my entire life. And so, this particular passage really haunted me as a child, really badly. Like really badly. Enough to have me at the altar every time the altar was available, worrying about this unpardonable, this unforgivable thing that is somehow blaspheming against the Holy Spirit. As a kid, I didn’t know what that meant but I was terrified that I had done it. And I was much too afraid to talk to anybody, like my parents about it, in case well, in case I had done it. Ironically, it’s a bit different in context. It’s a bit different what Jesus is saying. And it’s more near then we then we understand. I can remember, like maybe a decade ago, maybe a decade ago, I came across this website where people who had been hurt or people who were just atheist or whatever, like they were literally like taping or recording their confessions and posting them like this was them getting on camera saying I deny the Holy Spirit. And that was going to be the unpardonable sin, so like you can’t go back from that, you’re damned after that. If there is a God, you’re damned and so that clears it all up. I deny the Holy Spirit. I am doomed, if there is an afterlife but I don’t believe there is one. And that’s kind of what was going on there. I thought man this is dark, but man, this is sad. What would…would bring somebody to that place that they would do this. And the irony is that some of them were doing it because someone else had blasphemed the Holy Spirit and destroyed what that could be for another person, who in turn denied it all together, which is generally what Jesus is talking about here. So, we started our story today, Jesus is healing, and the Pharisees are upset about him healing on the Sabbath day and even plotting to destroy him. But Jesus continues to do what Jesus is doing, to reveal God’s kingdom and to bring the benefits of God’s kingdom into the lives of people. And so, people were finding wholeness again. They were being healed and as the Bible tells us that the crowds were astounded and said could this be the son of David. In response, the Pharisees say it’s not, he’s not the son of David. He throws out demons by the power of Beelzebub, by the power of the evil one, by the ruler of demons, he casts out demons. So let us pause there for second. Was Jesus bringing healing and wholeness and restoration to the people, by the power of the ruler of demons? Like were the Pharisees telling the truth? That’s kind of a softball question, we can all say no, they weren’t telling the truth. No, He wasn’t throwing out demons by the power of the ruler of the demons, He’s God, He was throwing them out. He was doing what He’s doing under the power of God, or we might say by the Spirit of God, or we might say, the power of the Holy Spirit. So, it’s either the prince of demons or the power of the Holy Spirit, which is Jesus operating under? We would say, of course, the power of the Holy Spirit. The Pharisees were attributing the works of the Holy Spirit to the ruler of the demons, that is blasphemy. Elevating anything to the position of or above God is blasphemy. That is what Jesus is saying and going after here. Like, hey Pharisees, you are calling what God is doing of the devil. Like God is doing this and you are attributing it to the forces of evil, you are elevating the forces of evil to the position of God. You don’t want to do that. It doesn’t even make sense, which is why Jesus goes on to say every kingdom divided against itself is headed for destruction, no city or house divided against itself will stand. If Satan’s driving out Satan, he’s divided against himself, how will that stand. This doesn’t even make any sense. If I throw out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your sons drive them out? Where this gets really close to home, especially in the Christian subculture is that we can be quite flippant with what we label things as. We can be very flippant and very easily say something is of the devil, and it may be, that may be true but we can be loose enough that to start labeling things of the evil one that we just don’t understand. And that’s not okay. To call something of the evil one, that we just don’t understand it, doesn’t mean it’s evil or from the evil one. We have this example, right in front of us, clear as day, the Pharisees were certainly envious of Jesus, but they were also calling Jesus of the devil, which means that they were calling God of the devil, which also means that they were calling what God was doing of the devil. And according to Jesus that won’t work, that’s not a good plan. And so, before we start labeling things because we don’t understand them and we can’t imagine that God would work in such and such a way, that we then make it of the devil, then were doing the same thing. God has no problem doing things we don’t understand. God doesn’t really care, He’s going to do what is right and good and He’s going to restore things, even if it breaks the rules, even if it’s on the Sabbath, even if it’s not part of the tradition. Even if nobody’s ever done it that way before. And so, like yesterday, we were talking from the book of Proverbs about how wisdom and discernment are the things we need most as we’re looking at the world. We needed in these times. We can’t just go around labeling things that God might be doing just because we don’t understand them, because we could inadvertently find ourselves calling what God is doing of the devil. I just don’t think any of us want to even be anywhere near that territory. We just have to observe ourselves and realize how close to that territory we get.

Prayer:

And so, Jesus, we are taking what You are saying to heart and examining it in our lives and inviting Your Holy Spirit to come and show us the ways that we’re dancing around things that are dangerous and are not healthy and are not good. We do not want to stand in Your way. We don’t want to stand in Your way, whether we understand what’s going on or not. We want to follow You. So, Holy Spirit, come. Help us see the ways that we label things and dismissed things and deny things, that You may be doing in this world. Help us to have eyes to see and ears to hear. Help us to have wisdom and discernment. We pray, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Announcements:

dailyaudiobible.com, that’s home base and that’s the website and home base is also in the palm of your hand if you have the Daily Audio Bible app, which you can download free from whatever app store is connected to your device. So, check that out. Check out the Community Section, there are links to get connected on social media on the different social media platforms that we participate in there, in the Community Section. And that is also the home of the Prayer Wall, which is always available to us no matter what is happening, no matter where we are, no matter what time it is, we can always go and share our story with our brothers and sisters and invite them, invite them into the story and hear back prayer and encouragement from our brothers and sisters around the world, showing us yet again that we are in this together and not alone and that is the Prayer Wall. So be aware of that. It is in the Community Section on the app or on the website.

If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible. Thank you, humbly, we would not be here if we weren’t here together and so, thank you deeply for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage at dailyaudiobible.com. If you’re using the app, you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner or the mailing address is P.O. Box 1996 Springhill, Tennessee 37174.

And as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement, you can hit the Hotline button in the app, or you can dial 877-942-4253.

And that’s it for today, I’m Brian, I love you and I will be waiting for you here, tomorrow.

Prayer and Encouragements:

Hi, this is Victorious Soldier, just calling to pray for some of the DABers. I want to pray for To Be a Blessing from California, glad to know that you got a miracle of finding a place to live. I’m praying for all of you all in California and the disasters that that are going there. I want to pray for Tony. I want to pray for Victoria who going through with her husband, and I want to also pray for Kathy. I want to pray for Kathy from New York, her friend Natalie over the brain. I want to pray for them in the surgery, even the guiding of the doctor’s hand. I want to pray for Eva who is going through some challenges with the…with the, in the mental hospital. I want to pray for my precious sister. And I want to pray for Debbie. I want to pray for Debbie and also Victoria. Lord in the name of Jesus, the names I called You know everything about them. Father, You’re a miracle working God. You’re a mighty God; You’re a Holy God. We ask You to have Your way. We ask You to open doors that no man can close. We ask You to bless that precious baby, to be the baby that…that you called him to be. We ask You to touch that ___. We ask You to guide that doctor’s hand, let it be a tremendous miracle. And everything be done, and everything being done under one roof, at one time. You guide the doctor’s hand, the doctor’s mind and all of the minds of those that are going through. Father, will You just have Your way in the DABers life. We just ask You to give them life and favor. We ask You to give them mercy. We ask You to have mercy and we ask You to have Your way. We thank You for this podcast. And we just thank you for blessing Your people. We give You the glory and the honor and the praise. In Jesus mighty name, we pray. Amen.      

Hey Daily Audio Bible, this is a message to all those teens out there that are struggling voice faith, in the storms of this world, who is a hard place, the struggle of faith. But Bible tells us to be bold. Romans 1:16 I believe, be bold in our faith. I myself am a teenager, I’m 15. And I want to speak encouragement to all of us out there. If we are struggling with our beliefs, it doesn’t matter. We are serving the creator who created all and no one can tell us to do otherwise. Just praise him and spread the Bible. So, if you have a friend that may need help, they’re not that close with God. They’re one heartbeat away, one car crash away from not being with Jesus eternal. So, be bold and spread the faith. Pray for that. In Jesus name. Amen.

Hello fellow DABers this is Wind and Wire from Vancouver Washington and my number one prayer, and I ask for your prayers for my children, who just need to come to know Jesus in their own, each in their own way. And just pray for that and I ask you to pray for that. I’m also asking for prayers for my wife that…that her shoulder will be healed completely. And these are the prayers that I have today. Thank you so much. In Jesus name. Amen.

Hi this is Lorrie from South Carolina. I just wanted to call in a praise report because something happened that is a miracle to me. But tonight, I was driving home from work and my gas tank showed that it was empty, and I didn’t have any gas. So, I got out, I pulled over to a gas station and I prayed, all the way inside. Father, please let me find money in my bill fold that I don’t know about. But instead, the clerk, Tracy. I said, Tracy, let me try my debit card for three dollars. And I tried it and it wouldn’t work. And she said, I’m gonna give you 10 dollars on tank number 10. And I said, no, I can’t take your money and she said yes ma’am you can. And after I fought with her, I gave her my company’s name because she needs to be working at my company as a caregiver too. Because obviously she has the compassion of Jesus. And she paid for my gas home tonight. So, I’m gonna be praising Jesus all the way home tonight. I was saying, Jesus, how was I gonna make it. And He made a way for me. He made a way where there was no way. And that’s what He does in my life every single day. And if there’s people out there who don’t believe all they had to do is call me. I am one living miracle after another. And I pray for all of you, and I love you all. And I pray that you get the same miracles today that I received. I love you Jesus. And I love you Hardin Family. Amen.

Hi DAB family, this is Linza calling from the West Coast. I also go by Philippians 4:6 on the Prayer Wall. Thank you all so much for all your prayers about my cancer. It does turn out that I have stage 4 terminal cancer, stomach cancer. And my health has just deteriorated pretty fast. I could really use your prayers that the hospital that I’m at keeps me admitted until my amazing care takers fly in on Thursday. If you could just pray about that, it’s been kind of a battle to make that happen. And I’m really scared to go home because I’m not able to do basic things like get in and out of bed, dress myself, make food. So, I’m just really praying that God protects me in the week that I have before my caretakers get here. I’m really blessed that my best friend from college is a doctor and she…she and her dad and her mom are gonna have me stay with her parents and they’re a retired nurse and surgeon. And so, they’re medical professionals. And they’re so amazing and kind that they’re opening up their home for me. So, I just have to wait until Thursday when I’ll get there and have somewhere safe where I can be cared for outside of the hospital. So, I’m just blessed and praising God for providing for me in that way. And also, I just really need your prayers urgently. I’ve just been in so much pain and just the procedure gets scarier and more painful. And that I still see God’s light in all of it. So, thank you so much for your prayers. I really appreciate it.

Hello Daily Audio Bible. This is Vicky from the Desert. Please pray with me tonight for all who have cancer and for their healing. Heavenly Father, I come to your throne of grace. I’m grateful for Jesus dying for my sins. Thank you for Jesus shedding His blood, His blood that washes all our sins away and has great healing power. Heavenly Father, I ask that You apply the blood of Jesus over all who have cancer, that You have your healing power blow through them, from the head to the bottom of their feet. Your healing, healing of any cancer in them. I ask this Lord, for all who have this, whether they know they have cancer or not. Whether they go through chemo or not, I ask Lord God. Asking for a miracle. Please heal them Lord with Your healing power. In Jesus name I pray. Thank you, family, for praying with me. Vicky from the Desert. Thank you.