1 Chronicles 19:1-21:30, Romans 2:25-3:8, Ps 11:1-7, Proverbs 19:10-12
Today is July 15th welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I am Brian it is wonderful to be here with you in the center of the week in the center of the month and moving forward together step-by-step day by day on the adventure of a lifetime that takes us through a year and through the Bible. And I am supremely grateful that we can be on this journey together. Right now, our journey has us in the book of First Chronicles in the Old Testament and in the letter to the Romans. And we’re just getting moved into it and we've…we’ve witnessed enough now to know that it speaks directly. It doesn’t have a problem, like it…it’s not going to be subtle, it’s gonna be direct and speak to us directly like yesterday when we were directly speaking about hypocrisy. And we’ll see what…what’s in store for us today. But first, we’re reading from the Christian Standard Bible this week. First Chronicles 19, 20, and 21.
Commentary:
Okay. So, in the in the…in the letter to the Romans we continue to watch Paul, essentially close loopholes…kind of. Yesterday it was hypocrisy, essentially, that we were talking about in the form of judgment, judging others for things that we are guilty of ourselves and for that matter judging at all because God is “the” judge and our judgments are usually pretty judgmental, right? Bring out the verses that say this is what you’re doing wrong and all this kind of stuff that we’ve seen over the years and probably done over the years or had done to us over the years. And yet Paul says that’s not how God is doing this. God is patient. God is kind. He is long-suffering. It is His patience and His kindness that brings you to repentance. So, a stark contrast to the way that we operate.
In our reading today Paul addresses some things that he had been accused of saying, which is essentially like God is the most high. He is the glorious one above all else and I, we humans, we are not. We are not God. We are lower than God, but we are also sinful people. And, so, since God is kind and patient and long-suffering. And since there is no way that we could ever achieve righteousness on our own then doesn’t our sin just exalt God higher? Like, doesn’t us being worse make Him a higher, which is this…essentially like this back door to being able to say I can do whatever I want with whoever I want, however I want, whenever I want. God’s wither not paying attention, or His kindness will lead me to repentance. And probably we can all get our heads around that stark of a concept or that big of an analogy, but we subtly do this kind of stuff because. Like, as long as we can keep it hidden as…as long as it’s not exposed we can keep these things around. We like to do these things in secret. And Paul is directly saying this is absolutely not okay. And, so, as we go into our day we should…we should give some thought to what we’re trying to justify, that we’re trying to make okay when it’s probably not, or for sure not and we know better, and we know it. God is the judge, and He is kind, and it is His kindness that leads us to repentance. And that is beautiful. And we can like think of that is like a get out of jail free card or something but He’s not doing this because of that. He’s doing this because the trajectory, the sin that we want to justify…the things that we want to justify that we know better than, their gonna judge us…we’re gonna be…we’re gonna ruin ourselves because sin only leads to death. God is just being patient and saying, you don’t have to go there, you can come to me that you might have life. And, so, let’s think about that today. What are we justifying that isn’t going anywhere and isn’t gonna help anything?
Prayer:
Holy Spirit, we need You. We invite You into that and the truth is, we’re already thinking of some of those things but if we spend some time, we can find like there’s all this going on subtly underneath the surface. It’s part of our culture. Like we live in a culture that has so much false in it that we’re just led to always keep secrets and keep things false when You have invited us into the light to be true, to be free. And, so, help us see the chains that are around us that we’re just coexisting with because it’s just always been this way. We’re just used to it when we could be free. Come Holy Spirit we pray in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Announcements:
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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:
Good morning DAB community my name is Naomi I’m calling from reading in the UK it’s my first time of calling for prayer in about a couple of years of listening because I’ve only just found the record button. So, you might be hearing from me again now. My prayer request this morning is for myself, for my business partner who is a deaf sign language user. We have a sign language interpreting service here in the UK for the deaf community and we’ve had two really bad experiences with two companies providing us with financial services both of whom breached their contract with us and both who have subsequently raised claims against us which we’ll be going to court to both defend and also to put our own counterclaim against them. I just want to pray first of all for the experience within the courts for my business partner and how inaccessible the courts really are and just the level of service which is provided. And I just pray Lord that You will go before us at the right access level in place and I thank You so far for what You’ve done and how have You’ve orchestrated things. I want to pray for Your justice and Your victory in these cases. And I pray also that You will use these cases to highlight the iniquity that’s currently present in financial services and also the housing service, housing market service, Lord where deaf and sick people or people with vulnerabilities fall through the cracks and are burned because of people not following the equivalency act. So, I just pray You’ll use as a case study to change law and to bring new equality into our system in the name of Jesus I ask Your victory Amen.
Good afternoon this is Renee calling from New York calling on July 12th and I’m just calling for a young lady who called in from Chicago regarding…she said she was the caregiver of someone going through dementia and expressed her anger and her lack of patience and frustration. And then she explained that it is her mom which makes all the sense of the world. And, you know, this is not just some random person this is your mom. So, all of those feelings and all of those emotions I just need you to know that it is coming from a place of hurt and you and I know just from the sound of your voice know that, you know, God He mends our heart and He’s gonna do that for you. He’s gonna give you a peace that surpasses all understanding and He’s with you and He’s with your mom. And I just need you to know that it’s OK. It’s OK to feel everything that you’re feeling because it’s your mom. And I’m just want you to know not like take away from how you are feeling and also know that it is a…a blessing that you can be there with her. She’s not in a home she’s with her daughter and she may have some good days and bad days and may not really know who you are at times but knowing that you’re there with her is a blessing. So, through all the frustrations I just want you to remember that. Also remember that we serve a mighty God who’s a keeper and He is a God of peace and love. So, I’m just praying for your peace, your love, your patience, and restoration and strength.
Hi this is Brian from Australia I’m calling for the very first time. I’m calling because I heard a prayer request form Margo a missionary in Liberia. Dear sister I want to encourage you that we are praying for you. Last week as a church we had a fasting and prayer retreat in which we had prayed for every nation by name, and we prayed for Liberia. We prayed that God would have mercy on that nation and that God would open the gates of that nation to their local churches and the missionaries working in that country to be able to preach the gospel so that the remnant might be saved. I want to…I want to encourage you sister. Just hang in there. You have the backing of a huge army that’s praying and lifting you up in this time of need. God bless you and your husband in your work for the Lord. Praise God.
Hello, my name is Megan I’ve called before. I’ve listened for about four years on and off now four maybe five and I just heard Micah with his prayer request about his marriage and I want you to know Micah and every other discouraged person in a relationship that God is in amongst you. God is in the middle of you, He’s surrounding you, He’s in the midst of you. And you reaching out to Him is so important for the future of your marriage. I’m gonna pray for you, all you and all marriages right now. Dear holy God thank You so much for this man Micah, for every person who is uplifting their marriage today holy God. Thank You, Jesus that You purposed them with an amazing companion. And holy God I thank You that You are the protector of our relationships. You’re the protector of our hearts Lord God and we present those hearts to You today Lord Jesus. I thank You that in Your word You are about unity, You are about peace, You are about love Lord Jesus. I thank You that You are gonna bring a supernatural peace, supernatural favor upon Micah, upon others. Lord Jesus Your name is gonna be made famous in this relationship Lord Jesus. Thank You, God that You are a healer, You heal emotions, You heal pain, You he’ll struggle, You heal insecurities holy God. And Lord Jesus we just uplift everybody to You today. In Your name. Amen.
This is OK with not being OK from Alberta. Margo from Liberia when I pray for you and bring you for before Jesus, I see him blowing a fresh cool wind on you. Your hair is gently blowing and it’s so refreshing for you and it’s full of the scent of flowers and trees and you just drink it in and it’s just giving you hope and energy and just renewing you. So, that’s my prayer for you. Vincent, praying for you. John who doesn’t know how to pray. Sometimes your heart is so full, and your burdens are so heavy. Just sit with Jesus in your mind, in your favorite place. I don’t know, maybe some people have to crawl into a dark closet and just sit with Him or go out somewhere peaceful. Just close your eyes and hand Him the big, awful backpack or garbage bag of stuff. See what He does with it. Watch Him. Just sit with Him. Let Him…I don’t know…He knows what to do with it. This is OK with not being OK. Make it a great day.