01/29/2019 DAB Transcript

Exodus 8:1-9:35, Matthew 19:13-30, Psalms 24:1-10, Proverbs 6:1-5

Today is the 29th day of January. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I am Brian and like every day of my life and hopefully of yours too, it’s great to be together here with you for these few minutes that we can step aside from all the chaos and distractions and just…just breathe…just sit…just let God’s word speak to us. And, so, that’s what we’re here to do and that’s what we will do. We’re reading from the Common English Bible this week and we find ourselves in the middle of a pretty dramatic situation where plagues are descending upon Egypt and God is setting His people free. Exodus chapter 8 and 9 today.

Commentary:

Okay. So, today in the book of Exodus the plagues began to devastate the Egyptians and, you know, we probably have all heard of the plagues sent upon Egypt. This is a pretty famous story. But now, we’re kind of reading it order and as it happened, and Pharaoh had been warned and God had even given signs to warn Pharaoh. The thing is, Pharaoh could not get his mind around at all the idea of a God that was higher than himself and the gods of Egypt, right? So, any God coming into his land and saying, you know, do anything whether it be let my people go or have oatmeal for breakfast, like, no god gets to come into this land and tell Pharaoh what to do. And, so, he’s bristled and thinks himself as a son of God himself. So, there’s this struggle that is happening in today’s reading. So, the Nile River, the freshwater source was turned to blood, and the frogs invaded the land, and the gnats swarm infested Egypt, and then flies, which I hate by the way, pestered and contaminated the countryside, and the Egyptian livestock died, and boils and sores begin to break out on the Egyptian population, and then this legendary hail fell from the sky that destroyed the crops. And every single time Pharaoh summoned Moses and begged for help and relief, right? He asked him, “pray for me.” And, so, Moses did pray and then the plagues were relieved and then at each turn Pharaoh hardened his heart. He thought the whole thing over and was like, “who is this foreign God coming into my land trying to take over not only my land but also to push me around?” So, you think about it. Even though they were being devastated systematically it hardened his heart. And, I mean, it’s not like we don’t do the same thing. It’s not like, you know, if somebody comes at us with a demand and their coming kind of invading our space with this demand, it’s very easy for us to resist and harden our hearts toward them even if what they’re telling us is the absolute truth. So, this is what’s going on here only a grand, a much grander stage.

And then in our reading from the New Testament from the book of Matthew there’s a story that’s also a very famous story that’s known as the story of the rich young ruler. And, so, this rich young ruler who’s, you know, we can look at this person as arrogant or we can look at this person as anything, but the Scripture reference to this guy is that he is actually devout and trying his very best to follow the Mosaic law and serve God. And, so, he comes to Jesus and he’s got questions about eternal life. What do I need to do? What good must I do to have eternal life. That’s the question. It’s fair. So, like this guy’s devoutly serving God and comes to Jesus to ask this important question. And Jesus tells him to obey the great commandments and the guys like, you know, I have, I’ve tried my best to do everything that I’ve been taught. So then Jesus says to him, “if you want to be perfect, go get rid of everything”, well He says, “go, sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven and then come, follow me.” And I see that every year and I’m like, man, Jesus is inviting this rich young ruler to become a disciple, “come and follow me” is what He says to everybody who becomes His disciple. But in this case the man had a lot and any he was saddened but he walked away. And, so, in this encounter we see Jesus doing what He always does. Like, He takes stock of the situation, what’s being presented to Him and then He goes around behind all of that to what’s really going on. And we’ve talked about this before because we go out into the world and we present something but then there’s this interior monologue or this interior life that we have. Jesus is after that life, the true one, the real one, right, the unspoken one, the one that is within us not the one that we are presenting. And, so, we watch this over and over and over because that’s what Jesus is after, the truth, what is real. And, so, in this particular story with the rich young ruler, Jesus invited him to get rid of the one thing that gave him status and security, like the one thing that was giving him an identity outside of God. This is a devout person obeying the rules trying to follow God but he’s got this thing, his wealth in this case, between him and God. It’s like this idol and his life and Jesus is after it. So, that gives us an opportunity. Maybe that’s not our issue. Maybe we don’t need to go sell all that we have and give it to the poor because that’s not the thing that’s between us and God. But what are we valuing more than a relationship with God? I mean, that’s a stark thought because our initial reaction is nothing but that's…that may not be as accurate as we think. What are we valuing more than our relationship with God? Because as stark as that is, that’s where to find the idols in our lives. And in the story of the rich young ruler we realize once again a true life of faith is going to be and has always been an all or nothing proposition. And that’s the thing that we’ll see distinctly as we continue to journey into the Gospels.

Prayer:

Father once again here we are with plenty…plenty to consider. You’ve brought up plenty of things in these stories for us to look at, the way that we resist and harden our hearts, the way that we allow idols to continue to dwell between us and You. These are big things. And, so, we invite Your Holy Spirit to come and we continue to open ourselves up. Nothing is off limits to You. You can go anywhere in our lives that You want to go, You can touch anything in our lives that You need to touch because we trust You. So, come Holy Spirit we pray. In Jesus’ name 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.

Community Prayer and Praise:

Hi, this is Protect You with His Wings from Virginia. I’m calling on 23 January. I have two shout-outs and one prayer request. Christina with a bumpy dog, I believe your name is Christina, I just started listening to the Daily Audio Bible this fall, so I didn’t write your name down, I’m sorry, I think you have leukemia. You were calling from a hospital, you were let out for Christmas. I heard your call and I haven’t heard you in a while. I would like to hear your voice and I’m praying for you. Jeff from Virginia you called about a restored relationship your father and grandfather. I’m praying for you and my prayer request is also for restored relationship with my father. I’m also asking for prayer for my dad’s salvation. He’s 76 years old and his health is failing. I don’t really have much of a relationship with my dad. I love my father. He is not only an atheist, but he’s verbally abusive to anyone who is of faith and believes in God. He’s extremely toxic, he’s very manipulative. My mom’s an alcoholic and is codependent upon him. I have been counseled by a trusted pastor, a social worker counselor and several women in the faith who are women ministry leaders. They’ve all advised me to set boundaries which he’s crossed. And, so, I’ve been advised to stay away. I cannot reach him, but I know God can and I’m asking for your prayers Daily Audio Bible faithful believers. Fellow prayers in the Lord, please pray for my dad’s salvation. Please pray for a restored relationship. God bless this wonderful podcast. Thank you Brian, Jill, China and all of those behind the scenes. God bless you.

Hello this is Anne from Charlotte North Carolina and I just wanted to thank everybody that calls in and shares prayer requests and praise reports because it helps me feel trust in community. And I wanted to respond to many people but today is to Tim from Michigan. And Tim I was so moved, and I had to call. You said that you are listening with us now and you are hoping for enough faith to become a Christian. And I wanted to encourage you that, I think you already have enough faith. And many decades ago when I became a Christian I just got alone and I got down on my knees and I asked God if He was real and Jesus was really the King of Kings and Lord of lords and the Savior of the world and I wanted to know Him, I wanted to give my life to Him, I wanted Him to be real to me, I wanted Him to save me and forgive me my sins and asked Him if He would do that. And He did. And He will for you too. All you have to do is have enough faith to speak that question of asking God and telling Him those things. It’s not hard. It just…it does take humbling ourselves enough to admit that we need God, where he is God and we’re not. I like thinking of when we have to go to sleep every night, it’s one way God reminds us that He’s God…

Hello Daily Audio Bible family, this is Sherry who Loves to Worship in Southpass Cal and I just want to tell you how much I love, love, love you all. I just am amazed at this wonderful family that we have. Thank you, Brian, and all that is behind him lifting his hands to make this possible. And I love your readings and I can’t live without it. I’ve been doing this since, I think, spring of 2009 and it’s so exciting. Just wanted to lift up…well…first of all I want to thank Miguel for praying for my pastor back in the day when you were asking for prayer requests for our churches or pastors and so I just wanted to let you know that it was really heavy on my pastor’s heart at of the time, it’s been years, we’d been kind of homeless, we’d been renting halls and things like that and we are now in our own building and you prayed for that and thank you so much. And then I wanted to lift up Margo from, actually she’s now in the UK heading to Liberia. And I just wanted to tell her that I have been praying for you nonstop and daily ever since you let us know that you have this call upon you and your husbands lives. And I just want to say you are courageous. I know that is hard to follow the call. I can’t know exactly what you’re going through, you know, but it just kind of lets us know when we are…don’t have anything or comforts around us that we really look forward to what is ahead. And as that’s the hope and you’re gonna be sharing that. So, I’m about of time, so I just want to say I love you, I’m praying for you and God bless you.

Hi Daily Audio Bible family this is Stanley from Maryland. I haven’t called in a long time. I’d like to call and just pay for…pray for others. For a long time, I’ve __ calling and I don’t know…just thinking may be like it’s too busy…I’m too busy…or I just can’t do it, I don’t know. But I’d like to pray for those who are affected by shame and guilt and pride because these are things that I’m asking God to help me to deal with. So, God, I know that I can’t deal with these things on my own, pride, shame, guilt, frustration with life and I feel like I’m flailing and anxious all the time and I want to stop because I know that there is rest with You and I want to live in the present and be able to enjoy the call that You have on my life and not be so worried about the future and what’s missing. Help me God, help others, help others who are facing disappointment, things that they can’t control. Help us to release these things to You and to seek Your help and ask for help and to get rid of our pride in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Hi everyone, Daily Audio Bible family, this is Beth calling from the Bay Area and I’m calling in again. I called last week as well for prayer but today I was listening to this guy who called in. I’m sorry I don’t remember your name but you’re from South Africa, but you live in London. And I just want to say thank you and praise God for your encouragement and your message of hope, it was exactly what I needed to hear, that God’s already answered my prayer before I even spoke it. And it reminded me of the day I was diagnosed with breast cancer about a month ago. That morning Brian read Psalm 131. And I’m reading it from The Message Version but is says, “I’ve kept my feet on the ground, I’ve cultivated a quiet heart. Like a baby content in its mother’s arms, my soul is a baby content.” And that was exactly what I needed to hear that morning, that like a weaned child with its mother I am to be content. And the Lord told me that he’s __ . I heard him tell me that, not audibly, but I knew it and that was when I knew even before I was diagnosed…before I heard the diagnosis. But anyway, I know the Lord is with me, I know He’s going to use this, and I would just appreciate everyone’s continued prayers but I just want to thank everyone who calls in and encourages one another. And I just love this family so much. I love you all. Have a good night. Bye.

Oh, my goodness, hello my Daily Audio Bible family. This is God’s Girl in East Texas. I’ve had stomach surgery since I last caught talked to guys and had a hernia fixed, but my God reigns. And I was thinking about when my little five-year-old grandson was here the other night. We were trying to go to sleep and he kept talking and he says, “Kiki”, he calls me Kiki, “can we please listen to the Daily Audio Bible?” So, I turned it on and it just helps him and it’s so cute because every time I turn the Bible on, give it about 10 minutes, he’s is out like a light. The soothing word of God, that’s how I take it. It’s the word of God is such a medicine for our souls and our minds and in these last days it just seems like things are getting worse, but our God reigns, and He wants us to stay faithful to Him. I love each and every one of you. Happy new year. Brian and your family, the Lord bless you and happy new year to you. Thank you for this beautiful and precious ministry. My husband drives a truck, he’s on the road all the time and he listens to it as well. So, our families connected in so many ways to keep the Lord our God close as possible. But I just wanted to call in and tell you guys I love you and Jesus bless you and keep looking up. Our redemption draws nigh. Bye-bye.