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.
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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.