Exodus 34:1-35:9, Matthew 27:15-31, Psalms 33:12-22, Proverbs 9:1-6
Today is the 12th day of February welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian it is wonderful to be here with you today as we continue the journey…well…we’re…we’re journeying toward the center of the second month of the year. We’ll be there in a few days. And, so, we are moving right along but we have…we have moved through some significant territory in the Bibl. And as we begin our reading today from the book of Exodus, we still find ourselves around the mountain of God, otherwise known as Mount Sinai. Just some really, really important things have happened and transpired. We read of this golden calf that the people decided to worship as their redeemer as their savior as the one who brought them out of Egypt. And we saw Moses come down from the mountain away from God’s presence to discover all this, all that transpired there. Moses is back on top of the mountain again. Now he’s been pleading for the people. God basically told Moses, “yeah, I can’t deal with these people. I’m sending you to the land. You lead them in, but I’m not going.” And Moses is like, “if you don’t go, if you don’t go then I don’t even want to be a part of this story. If you don’t go, we have no hope.” And there’s this moment of real deep realization that there is no hope…hope outside of God, that we whether we acknowledge it or not we are utterly dependent upon Him. And, so, let’s continue the story. Exodus chapter 34 verse 1 through 35 verse 9. And we’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week.
Commentary:
Alright. Let’s look at some words from the Psalms that we read today or the Psalm that we read today in light of what we’re seeing kind of both in the Old and the New Testament stories. The story in the Old Testament, of course, is God beginning to give the law, but the people’s rebelliousness their stiff-necked, their neck…necked-ness…their…their stubbornness and their rebellion and their adultery spiritually by worshiping false gods and just all of this stuff that we…we’ve been able to witness.
In the New Testament we just completed the trial of Jesus, like, He’s sentenced to death, which is how…that’s what we’ll experience tomorrow. So, let’s just consider for second in these stories the posture of heart of humanity toward God.
So, in the Old Testament we have God invading Egypt to set His people free and all of the drama about that and they’re in the wilderness seeing and hearing from God and God is laying out a tapestry for a culture and yet they are stubborn, they are rebellious, they grumble, they complain, they are not grateful, and they are easily distracted into putting their hope and their allegiance and their heart into the worship of something false. And God is exasperated about it. Who wouldn’t be? But He is patient, He is continuing forward with the journey despite their rebelliousness.
We go into the book of Matthew and then we look at the posture of humanity toward God and we see that these same people, like the descendants of this stiff-necked people, they want to do away with God while trying to defend God. But now they have this law, they’re trying to obey this, and it’s turned into a power struggle of control over the people. They have to obey the rules. And then God comes in the flesh and they don’t even recognize Him. In fact, they are so put out, they are so put off by Him and His ways that they don't…like it…that’s how backwards it’s gotten. I mean you would…we would say that God would display God’s ways, right? He’s God. So, that’s what we’re seeing in Jesus. If they can’t recognize the ways of God and they call him blasphemous and they call him of the devil, then they have so perverted the actual ways of God that it can’t even be seen anymore. And what do we see? God in the person of Jesus patiently taking out there giving. He is going to allow Himself to be killed by His people. That’s a pretty stark thing to think about. But could we maybe at this point in the year acknowledge what we’re seeing here and stop blaming God for things He doesn’t do us and stop telling Him He doesn’t understand what we’re going through? He does. And He patiently and carefully continues to love humanity until this very day, including us and our complaining and our lack of gratitude and our grumbling and our turning to something else for hope and our giving our allegiance and fealty to something that is false and our acting like a two-year-old and throwing ourselves on the ground and kicking and screaming when we don’t get our way. God is patient and kind because He loves us. If we would ever actually get that through our heads it would change our very lives, it would change the way we behave toward everybody.
Prayer:
Holy Spirit come. Let us see this. Let us see Your kindness, let us see Your patience, Your compassion as we continue to navigate all of the different times and stories and people’s lives that we find in the Scriptures because we find ourselves in…in…in these stories. We find ourselves in the lives of these people. And, so, open our hearts. Give us eyes to see and ears to hear what You are speaking to us and where You are leading. We acknowledge that You have been patient, beyond what we could ever deserve. You have been kind in the face of our unkindness. You have loved us even while we were Your enemies. Help that to sink in we ask in the name of Jesus. 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:
Hello DAB family this is your friend your brother in Christ in Michigan. I want to say thank you to, so many. Your prayers have touched myself and my family in ways you can ever imagine, and we are praying for you all. I’d also like a prayer over my wife. She struggled with many many ailments now but fibromyalgia now followed by lupus and she has some problems with her liver. Through it all she’s been upbeat and God fearing and showing me what it is to be a true believer. So, I ask that you raise her in your prayers as I raise all of you all in my prayers. I want to thank the DAB family. What a blessing to hear this every day. I am new. I’ve only been here since December 21st of last year but to say…I can’t even describe the impact on my life, and I want to thank you. With love from Michigan. Bye now.
My name is Latasha and I’m calling from California. I need prayer in the way of my housing situation. I was placed on a housing program for homeless and disheveled men and children. It could be for anybody for that matter, but it’s been going up and down. Sometimes I feel like I’m out of the loop. And I found out that my rent wasn’t being paid. And now that I’m able to get a lower income of housing I’m being told by management here at the property that I need to hurry up and sign my lease when there are damages, i.e., a big old hole in the ceiling of the bathroom and the thermostat not working. It seems like these companies work together and they try to make the person like myself feel as though I’m crazy almost by saying that you have to hold off but then the other parties saying you have to hurry up and expedite. And I just don’t know what to do. I’m at a complete and utter loss and I just need prayer. I need prayer so bad because I’m afraid of being homeless again. I’m afraid of my children finally being stable and it could be taken away from us. And I’m afraid bad because of my situation and circumstance maybe they believe that I’m not apt enough to understand clearly. I just need guidance and direction because I’m so tired. I’m so tired of being tired. And it hurts so bad to feel as though on this earth I am alone and by myself and mostly I’m just…
Hello Daily Audio Bible this is Janelle living in China and I wanted to call and say I am caught up. Yay. At one point last year I was over two months behind and now it is February 7th 11:37 AM in __ China and I am caught up. I just listened to today. That was all I had to listen to today. Yay. I also wanted to do a little bit of gratitude because I have not been doing much of that. So, Lord I thank you that I am living in China and I am able with the low cost of living that China has I am so grateful for my job even though it is stressful and I am trying to learn how to teach without any formal education. It’s still an amazing journey and I’m so grateful for it. I am also, as strange as this may seem, grateful for Covid still happening in the US because my church, Church of the Highlands in Alabama, is now doing online small group classes and I can be in a small group. It’s at 5:00 AM on Sunday but I can be in a small group. I will wake up for that. I just…I miss that so much and I am so grateful that I’m now able to get back into being in small groups with my church even though I’m living in China. It’s amazing and I can’t believe it. I’m…I’m in shock. I’m just odd that says even possible a possibility…
This is Whitney in South Florida and I’m here with my kids Finley, Levin, and Lenna and we just wanted to call. And mommy had heard a message from Jody from Arizona and she wanted prayers for her granddaughter Leslie. And we just wanted to let Jody know that we heard her prayer request and we are praying for Leslie and we are praying for that whole family and your daughters one year old as well. Just that their home would be safe and Leslie would feel…that Leslie would just feel Jesus comforting loving arms all around her and know that Jesus is King. And it happens that Ezekiel in his reading had the perfect words that maybe another kid to another kid could hear and he had a great prayer on February 7th, and it was just about the devil and that he has no place in our homes. And, so, we just pray that over Leslie just as Ezekiel did. And the kids wanted to tell Ezekiel one of their favorite parts about his reading and what is that you guys? Bye. Bye guys!
Hi neighbors it’s Lisa the Encourager. I’m calling tonight because I really had God press upon my heart to share with you a bit of encouragement regarding the reading that Brian did a couple of…probably a week or so ago and it was about when the disciple asked Jesus, what is the greatest commandment. And, of course, Jesus replied back to love the Lord your guard with all your heart and your soul and all your mind. And then the second one was to love your neighbor as yourself. And I really embraced that I think it was a couple of years ago and that’s when I started calling in and I’d refer to all of you as my neighbors, to remind me to love you as I love myself. And this year God pressed on my heart to share with you the first commandment and that is to love the Lord our God with all our heart our soul and our mind. And I really started thinking hard about that, like how…what would that look like in action. You know, of course we can say it with our words and our lips but in action. And the only thing that really only came to my mind and the Holy Spirit bless me with was your prayers. Your prayers to God shows the tremendous amount of love. Just think about when somebody calls into the Daily Audio Bible and they call out your name and you hear it and how much it just…it just warms your heart. Well, that’s probably the feeling that God, when you call upon His name and you seek Him, and you pray daily. So, I just encourage you to show love God and put that to action, that first commandment, to love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind.