Sat, 30 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

Psalm 81:1-5

¹ Sing aloud to God our strength;
shout for joy to the God of Jacob!
² Raise a song; sound the tambourine,
the sweet lyre with the harp.
³ Blow the trumpet at the new moon,
at the full moon, on our feast day.

⁴ For it is a statute for Israel,
a rule of the God of Jacob.
⁵ He made it a decree in Joseph
when he went out over the land of Egypt.
I hear a language I had not known:

The psalmist here has the people sing and play music, and gather at the appointed feast times. He tells Israel that God made it a statute and decree that they should observer these things. When He brought them out of Egypt, God ordered that they come together at the feast times and worship Him with song and instrument (and sacrifice, though the sacrifice is not mentioned here).

What do we learn from this?

This is an Old Testament command, and of the three parts (song, instruments, and festival observance), only the first (song) is given to us in the New Testament as a command we are to now keep.

The festivals were a time for the people of Israel to gather to worship God. They would come from their many dispersed places to join together in Jerusalem for fellowship and worship.

We no longer have to keep the Old Testament festivals, for these have all been fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Now the only day we observe as special, according to the New Testament teaching, is the Lord’s day, when we gather together in our local congregations for the purpose of singing and worshiping God. We celebrate Jesus Christ’s birth, death and resurrection on the day that He resurrected from the dead, for it is His day. It is the Christian Sabbath, the one day in seven we set apart for His worship.

Now we are commanded to gather together, more than a few times a year, but once every week. We are to meet to encourage and build each other up, to worship God in word and song, and to be built up in grace through the preaching of the word.

Where is Christ in this passage?

Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the Old Testament festivals, and of the sacrificial system (and hence of instruments as part of temple worship). He has fulfilled it all, by living the perfect life, doing all the law required. The festivals and the sacrificial system pointed to Him, and now that He has fulfilled them, they fall by the wayside, no longer necessary.

Jesus Christ is the point of our worship on the Lord’s day. We gather together to remember what He has done for His people. We sing His praises, and we hear of the redemption He has purchased for us. We are offered Christ as our salvation, and we express our faith in Him in our corporate worship.

Fri, 29 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

Ezekiel 32:1-8

¹ In the twelfth year, in the twelfth month, on the first day of the month, the word of the LORD came to me: ² “Son of man, raise a lamentation over Pharaoh king of Egypt and say to him:

“You consider yourself a lion of the nations,
but you are like a dragon in the seas;
you burst forth in your rivers,
trouble the waters with your feet,
and foul their rivers.
³ Thus says the Lord GOD:
I will throw my net over you
with a host of many peoples,
and they will haul you up in my dragnet.
⁴ And I will cast you on the ground;
on the open field I will fling you,
and will cause all the birds of the heavens to settle on you,
and I will gorge the beasts of the whole earth with you.
⁵ I will strew your flesh upon the mountains
and fill the valleys with your carcass.
⁶ I will drench the land even to the mountains
with your flowing blood,
and the ravines will be full of you.
⁷ When I blot you out, I will cover the heavens
and make their stars dark;
I will cover the sun with a cloud,
and the moon shall not give its light.
⁸ All the bright lights of heaven
will I make dark over you,
and put darkness on your land,
declares the Lord GOD.”

Jerusalem has been destroyed by the Babylonians. As we learned from reading Jeremiah, the Jewishremnant left in the land will flee to Egypt because they believe Egypt will be safe from Babylonian aggression. Egypt considered themselves to be a rival power to the Babylonians, but they would soon be broken by Babylon.

Ezekiel relates God’s message that though Egypt thinks it is a lion among the nations, it is really like a monster in the seas that is about to be destroyed.

This seems to be referring to the creation myths of the people in Ezekiel’s day, where the world is created when a god and a sea dragon do battle. The god kills the sea monster, and the world is created from the remains of the sea dragon.

So Egypt thinks it is a great world power, but it is destined to be destroyed.

Ezekiel deals with Egypt from chapter 29 through chapter 33, detailing how the nation that has elevated itself will be thrown down and destroyed.

The language is very apocalyptic: the sky will darkened, etc. That is not because Ezekiel is speaking of the end times, but that this refers to major, world changing events. Egypt has been a major world power in the area since before the Exodus. But here God promises to humble them and bring them down by another world power.

What do we learn from this?

God deals with the small areas of life. He knows the number of hairs on your head. He governs when a sparrow falls from the sky. The minute details of life are all within His knowledge and His providence.

But the big, world shaking things of life are under God’s control as well. He throws down nations, and He rises up nations. He brings nations from obscurity to center stage of the world’s arena, and then He sends them back to obscurity. No nation is too big for God. If He decides to bring it down, it will fall, as He ordains.

Where is Christ in this passage?

We are comforted by this passage. Nothing is too big for God, not even the most powerful nation. But neither is anything to little. He cares about the nations. He also cares about the individuals that make up the nations. He cares enough about us as sinful individuals to provide a means for us to be reconciled to Him, and that reconciliation is by the person and work of Jesus Christ.

Thu, 28 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

Galatians 4:8-11

⁸ Formerly, when you did not know God, you were enslaved to those that by nature are not gods. ⁹ But now that you have come to know God, or rather to be known by God, how can you turn back again to the weak and worthless elementary principles of the world, whose slaves you want to be once more? ¹⁰ You observe days and months and seasons and years! ¹¹ I am afraid I may have labored over you in vain.

The Galatians had come from the Jewish system of sacrificial worship and ceremonial cleanliness. They had to maintain their ritual purity, and observe feasts and times of sacrifice. These rituals had served their purpose, but once Jesus Christ came, these things were no longer required. Not understanding what Jesus Christ had done for them, the Galatians submitted to these regulations in hopes of coming to salvation.

But now that they have come to fully realize the truth of the gospel, and to know what God had done for them, they came to faith. They then understood that the rituals had been only for the purpose of pointing them to Christ, who perfectly fulfilled them. They no longer had to submit to these. They were freed from them.

Paul is very concerned for the Galatians, because after understanding that their salvation does not come from observing these rituals, and in fact the rituals have been fulfilled and no longer are in effect, they are turning back to these rituals as a means of being right with God. They are seeking to be right with God by keeping the Jewish ceremonial law.

Paul is vehement in condemning such thinking. If they believe they can be right with God by observing the ceremonial law, the Galatians don’t understand the gospel at all, and all Paul’s labor over them has been wasted.

What do we learn from this?

The gospel frees us from the need to attempt to gain our salvation through our own efforts. In fact, the gospel condemns such efforts. If we are in any way trying to earn God’s favor to influence Him to save us, we have completely misunderstood the gospel. We are then trusting in our own efforts, and not in what God has done for us. We are condemning ourselves, because we are rejecting what God has done and are replacing it with what we can do.

Where is Christ in this passage?

Jesus Christ is the one who has perfectly kept the ceremonial law, fulfilling it in our place. It was all pointing to Him, and now that He has come, we no longer need the laws of sacrifice, cleansing, and external purity. We are now free from these. He is their fulfillment, and they no longer are required. If we go back to the old rituals, we are rejecting Jesus Christ and what He has done for us in fulfilling these Old Covenant laws.

Wed, 27 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

2 Samuel 23:1-7

¹ Now these are the last words of David:

The oracle of David, the son of Jesse,
the oracle of the man who was raised on high,
the anointed of the God of Jacob,
the sweet psalmist of Israel:

² “The Spirit of the LORD speaks by me;
his word is on my tongue.
³ The God of Israel has spoken;
the Rock of Israel has said to me:
When one rules justly over men,
ruling in the fear of God,
⁴ he dawns on them like the morning light,
like the sun shining forth on a cloudless morning,
like rain that makes grass to sprout from the earth.

⁵ For does not my house stand so with God?
For he has made with me an everlasting covenant,
ordered in all things and secure.
For will he not cause to prosper
all my help and my desire?
⁶ But worthless men are all like thorns that are thrown away,
for they cannot be taken with the hand;
⁷ but the man who touches them
arms himself with iron and the shaft of a spear,
and they are utterly consumed with fire.”

We have here the last words of David. David wrote many of the psalms we are privileged to have preserved for us in the book of Psalms. He here tells us the source of these psalms: They are from God.

What do we learn from this?

The psalms are God’s gift to us. Like the rest of scripture, God has verbally inspired the psalmist (His word is on my tongue) to record these songs for posterity.

God has given us a song book for us to use in our worship of Him. It is located right in the middle of our Bibles. We need not look any further for what to sing in worship than His own word.

What does it say about our view of the sufficiency of scripture if we reject God’s song book and write our own? How could we ever hope to, of our own accord and by our own abilities, write a songbook superior to what God has already provided?

When we sing the psalms, we are singing the very words of God back to Him. Why would we want to sing anything less?

Where is Christ in this passage?

One argument I’ve heard against singing the psalms and in favor of singing man-made hymns is that in hymns we sing of Christ. We don’t sing of Christ in the psalms, according to this argument.

That argument is wrong because the premise that Christ isn’t in the psalms is a false premise. The main point of these meditations is to find Jesus Christ in whatever the daily passage happens to be. As we go through all of the scriptures, New Testament, or Old Testament, and Psalms included, we find Jesus Christ presented to us.

When we sing the psalms, we are singing of Christ, for the word of God is all about Jesus Christ and it points us to Him. Jesus Christ is in the psalms!

Tue, 26 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

Psalm 78:1-3

¹ Give ear, O my people, to my teaching;
incline your ears to the words of my mouth!
² I will open my mouth in a parable;
I will utter dark sayings from of old,
³ things that we have heard and known,
that our fathers have told us.
⁴ We will not hide them from their children,
but tell to the coming generation
the glorious deeds of the LORD, and his might,
and the wonders that he has done.
⁵ He established a testimony in Jacob
and appointed a law in Israel,
which he commanded our fathers
to teach to their children,
⁶ that the next generation might know them,
the children yet unborn,
and arise and tell them to their children,
⁷ so that they should set their hope in God
and not forget the works of God,
but keep his commandments;
⁸ and that they should not be like their fathers,
a stubborn and rebellious generation,
a generation whose heart was not steadfast,
whose spirit was not faithful to God.

Organic growth is a buzz word phrase I hear a lot from the business folks at work. The idea is that you don’t have to get new customers to increase the business. If you develop a good working relationship with your customers, you can increase your business by these satisfied customers increasing the business they do with you. You have grown organically.

The same is true in the Christian church. We greatly desire to expand the kingdom of God by the conversion of the unsaved people who live around the world and around the corner. We want to see people brought to Christ through foreign missions and through our own personal evangelism. But even as we seek that kind of growth, we must never forget the organic growth. We desire to see our children come to faith and to grow into mighty warriors for Christ.

The psalmist understood this focus, and in Psalm 78, he encourages us to tell our children about what God has done for us so that they will know of the wonders He has done for us.

What do we learn from this?

This is a common theme in scripture. We are encouraged to talk to our children about the ways of God in all the ordinary daily tasks around the house. We are to teach them God’s rules, and we are to explain to them what God has done for us.

We don’t want Christianity to die out with the current generation. We want to pass on our faith to our children in such a way that they can pass it on to their children. We can’t save them. They have to make the choice to follow Jesus Christ themselves. But we can train them so they know the need for the gospel, the truth of what God has done, and the absolute need for faith in God. To do that, we must tell our children of the things that God has done in history and in our own lives.

Where is Christ in this passage?

The goal of all we do should be for our children to come to saving faith in Jesus Christ. We want them to trust fully and only in Jesus Christ for their salvation. For what can compare to the eternal salvation of our children?

Mon, 25 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

Ezekiel 28:1-10

¹ The word of the LORD came to me: ² “Son of man, say to the prince of Tyre, Thus says the Lord GOD:

“Because your heart is proud,
and you have said, ‘I am a god,
I sit in the seat of the gods,
in the heart of the seas,’
yet you are but a man, and no god,
though you make your heart like the heart of a god–
³ you are indeed wiser than Daniel;
no secret is hidden from you;
⁴ by your wisdom and your understanding
you have made wealth for yourself,
and have gathered gold and silver
into your treasuries;
⁵ by your great wisdom in your trade
you have increased your wealth,
and your heart has become proud in your wealth–
⁶ therefore thus says the Lord GOD:
Because you make your heart
like the heart of a god,
⁷ therefore, behold, I will bring foreigners upon you,
the most ruthless of the nations;
and they shall draw their swords against the beauty of your wisdom
and defile your splendor.
⁸ They shall thrust you down into the pit,
and you shall die the death of the slain
in the heart of the seas.
⁹ Will you still say, ‘I am a god,’
in the presence of those who kill you,
though you are but a man, and no god,
in the hands of those who slay you?
¹⁰ You shall die the death of the uncircumcised
by the hand of foreigners;
for I have spoken, declares the Lord GOD.”

Tyre was a wealthy and powerful city built upon its shipping trade throughout the Mediterranean. The king of Tyre became quite proud of the influence he had earned through the mastery of the sea. In fact, he apparently thought of himself as a god in his control over the sea. Because of this pride, God says He will destroy Tyre.

What do we learn from this?

God hates pride. God tells us He will oppose the proud but show grace to the humble. So as we are prideful, God sets Himself in opposition to us. God is against Tyre and says He will destroy it because of their pride.

He will do the same to us. If we are proud of ourselves and what we have done, God will oppose us. If we are proud of our gifts and abilities, our wealth and our power, God will destroy us.

Where is Christ in this passage?

The salvation we have in Jesus Christ is the exact opposite of pride. Instead of looking at ourselves, what we have done or can do, we are to look to Jesus Christ and what He has done for us. We don’t claim any merit or ability for our salvation. Just the opposite. When we are trusting in Jesus Christ savingly, we recognize there is noting of merit in us. We have nothing to be proud of, but instead look only to Jesus Christ and what He has done for our salvation.

Sun, 24 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

2 Corinthians 13:5-7

⁵ Examine yourselves, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you? –unless indeed you fail to meet the test! ⁶ I hope you will find out that we have not failed the test. ⁷ But we pray to God that you may not do wrong–not that we may appear to have met the test, but that you may do what is right, though we may seem to have failed.

Paul is warning the Corinthian church not to take their Christianity for granted. Don’t just assume you are saved, for it might not be true.

What do we learn from this?

Just because you have been born into a Christian home and attend a Christian church doesn’t make you a Christian. Being saved is not something inherited. This is the a matter of our eternal destiny. It is our eternal life or eternal death.

Where is Christ in this passage?

Examine yourself to see if you are in the faith. Salvation is in Jesus Christ, as we place our faith in Him. It is faith in Jesus Christ alone that saves us. Not our church membership. Not our family connections. We are saved by the person and work of Jesus Christ, applied to us by faith alone.

Sat, 23 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

2 Samuel 19:1-8

¹ It was told Joab, “Behold, the king is weeping and mourning for Absalom.” ² So the victory that day was turned into mourning for all the people, for the people heard that day, “The king is grieving for his son.” ³ And the people stole into the city that day as people steal in who are ashamed when they flee in battle. ⁴ The king covered his face, and the king cried with a loud voice, “O my son Absalom, O Absalom, my son, my son!” ⁵ Then Joab came into the house to the king and said, “You have today covered with shame the faces of all your servants, who have this day saved your life and the lives of your sons and your daughters and the lives of your wives and your concubines, ⁶ because you love those who hate you and hate those who love you. For you have made it clear today that commanders and servants are nothing to you, for today I know that if Absalom were alive and all of us were dead today, then you would be pleased. ⁷ Now therefore arise, go out and speak kindly to your servants, for I swear by the LORD, if you do not go, not a man will stay with you this night, and this will be worse for you than all the evil that has come upon you from your youth until now.” ⁸ Then the king arose and took his seat in the gate. And the people were all told, “Behold, the king is sitting in the gate.” And all the people came before the king.

We are now coming to the conclusion of the sad results of David’s sin with Bathsheba. Absalom is dead, and victory goes to David’s forces. But David is in mourning over the loss of his son. Joab has to intervene to break David out of his mourning before he loses the entire kingdom, and David responds as he must to return to the kingship.

But yet we see that David is torn apart by the events that have just occurred. David knows that his own sin is the ultimate cause of his son’s death, and so he mourns.

What do we learn from this?

We don’t always see such obvious linkage between our own sin and the suffering that is caused in the people around us. But it does happen. Our sin can cause hardship in our family and in our friends. We can sometimes trace a line between our own actions and the pain and difficulty in ourselves and others. In those situations, we mourn for our sin.

But even if we can’t see the direct results of our sin, we still should mourn for it, and repent of it. Our sin is terrible. It is a great offense before God. Even if we don’t see chaos and pain as a result from our sin, and so might not see the need to mourn and repent, we still should mourn for our sin and repent of it. Just the fact that God hates the sin we commit should be enough to cause us to mourn and repent, for it should be the deepest desire of our hearts to please God.

Where is Christ in this passage?

When we mourn for our sin, repent of it, and turn to God in faith, we find forgiveness for our sins. Our mourning is turned to dancing, as we leave behind the guilt of our sins and take up the joy of the Lord. There will still be consequences. David’s son was still dead and there will be much work to do to reunite the fractured kingdom. But because God has taken away the guilt of our sins, a huge burden has been removed, and we can have joy again.

The forgiveness and joy we find comes to us because of the work of Jesus Christ on our behalf. He has paid the price for our sins, and gives us His righteousness, so that we can now find the joy of a relationship with God.

Fri, 22 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

Psalm 73:1-3

¹ Truly God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart. ² But as for me, my feet had almost stumbled, my steps had nearly slipped. ³ For I was envious of the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

The psalmist had almost stumbled and fallen in his faith. Why? He tells us frankly: it was due to his envy of the wicked.

What do we learn from this?

When we look around us, we will find things that will challenge our faith, not the least of which is the success of the wicked. If God hates sin, and God is active in the world, why do sinful people prosper? Doesn’t this prove that either God doesn’t care about sin, or that He doesn’t act in this world, or that He does not exist at all?

The psalmist is surprisingly straight forward about this. The prosperity of the wicked was a crisis of faith for him. And it can be for us as well.

The solution to the psalmist’s struggle can possibly help us as well. What helped to change his attitude? What broke the problem he had of envying prosperity of the wicked?

The psalmist tells us this was a problem for him until I went into the sanctuary of God; then I discerned their end.

Worship, and a correct understanding of the eternal consequences of our actions solves the problem.

When we spend time worshiping God, hearing His word sung and preached, we grow in grace and obedience. We focus on God and not on our circumstances, and the circumstances of those around us. We learn to be content with what God has given us, and so we overcome our tendency towards envy.

And focusing on God also helps us to think about eternity. The wicked might be prospering in life now, but when we consider that they must pay for their sin, we realize we have no reason to envy them. No amount of prosperity today will make up for an eternity in hell, and we would be fools to desire to trade places with them.

Where is Christ in this passage?

Despite what might happen today, the wicked will eventually pay for their sins, for all sin must be punished. Even the sins of God’s people must be punished.

But the good news is that Jesus Christ has paid the penalty for the sins of all who come to Him in faith. Because Jesus took the guilt of their sins upon Himself on the cross, so that His people can be declared right with Him.

Thu, 21 September, 2006: Today’s Bible readings.

Ezekiel 24:1-14

¹ In the ninth year, in the tenth month, on the tenth day of the month, the word of the LORD came to me: ² “Son of man, write down the name of this day, this very day. The king of Babylon has laid siege to Jerusalem this very day. ³ And utter a parable to the rebellious house and say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD:

“Set on the pot, set it on;
pour in water also;
⁴ put in it the pieces of meat,
all the good pieces, the thigh and the shoulder;
fill it with choice bones.
⁵ Take the choicest one of the flock;
pile the logs under it;
boil it well;
seethe also its bones in it.

⁶ “Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: Woe to the bloody city, to the pot whose corrosion is in it, and whose corrosion has not gone out of it! Take out of it piece after piece, without making any choice. ⁷ For the blood she has shed is in her midst; she put it on the bare rock; she did not pour it out on the ground to cover it with dust. ⁸ To rouse my wrath, to take vengeance, I have set on the bare rock the blood she has shed, that it may not be covered. ⁹ Therefore thus says the Lord GOD: Woe to the bloody city! I also will make the pile great. ¹⁰ Heap on the logs, kindle the fire, boil the meat well, mix in the spices, and let the bones be burned up. ¹¹ Then set it empty upon the coals, that it may become hot, and its copper may burn, that its uncleanness may be melted in it, its corrosion consumed. ¹² She has wearied herself with toil; its abundant corrosion does not go out of it. Into the fire with its corrosion! ¹³ On account of your unclean lewdness, because I would have cleansed you and you were not cleansed from your uncleanness, you shall not be cleansed anymore till I have satisfied my fury upon you. ¹⁴ I am the LORD. I have spoken; it shall come to pass; I will do it. I will not go back; I will not spare; I will not relent; according to your ways and your deeds you will be judged, declares the Lord GOD.”

Ezekiel give us many illustrations of what is going on in Jerusalem while he is in exile in Babylon. In today’s reading, Ezekiel tells the people that the the siege of Jerusalem is like a pot set on to boil too long. The pot is left in the heat long after the water boils away and the meat and bones are burned up.

In the same way, the corrupt nation of Judah will be “burned up” in the siege. The picture here is of a fire that burns away all those who are sinful. Since the people refuse to repent, the corruption is removed only by removing those who are corrupt. And so God sends the siege to burn up the corruption. But this cleansing is just a temporal cleansing, gained by removing the sinners from life. It is not a saving cleansing where the sinners are made right with God and purified of their sins for eternity.

What do we learn from this?

God hates sin and He will punish it. Those who do not repent will experience the full wrath of God poured out upon their guilt. But this won’t be like the mythical purgatory, where your sins are slowly burned off, eventually leaving you purified and ready to stand in God’s presence. The problem is not just that you have sinned but that YOU are sinful. No amount of burning will remove the corruption from you and leave you purified and able to stand before God. Those in hell experience the wrath of God against their sin for eternity. It will never end, because they will never be pure for the fires of hell are not redemptive, but punitive.

Where is Christ in this passage?

God speaks through Ezekiel telling of the judgment coming upon Jerusalem because of their sin. But this has only come upon them because they have rejected the cleansing He has offered. God says He would have cleansed them, but they have refused it.

The cleansing from sin that God offers comes through trusting in God’s provision for salvation. He has given a substitute who will take the punishment for the sins of those who trust in Him. And the substitute has earned the perfect salvation we need, and He offers it freely to those who come to Him in faith.

The substitute God has provided is Jesus Christ, the Second Person of the Trinity, who came to earth to bear the sins of His people. Through faith in Him, we can be cleansed from every sin and made right with God. We can be purified from our corruption and made acceptable in God’s presence to spend eternity with Him in heaven.