Notes from my Bible Study for January 15, 2010

Passages Read: Psalm 14, Genesis 15, 1 Chronicles 15:1‐16:3, Luke 9:1‐50

Psalm 14 - "The fool says in his heart, 'There is no God.'" is a theme that is seen in many places in Scripture. The idea that God is watching and that there is no one who seeks God, no one who does good, not even one should shake us to the core.

David is speaking of the godless in this passage, but he could just as easily be speaking about the propensity to sin that many of us find ourselves in. We may not say, "There is not God," but sometimes we act as if God's existence should have no impact on our daily lives. When we do such things, we are fools.

May we be a people who live our very lives as an act of worship to Almighty God! May we recognize that how we live matters. What we do says to others what we believe about God. Our actions speak louder than words.

Genesis 15 - We read about God's covenant with Abram in Genesis 15. This isn't the first time that God told Abram that he would be the father of a great nation, but it was the most important time. The first time had been years earlier, and Abram still had no child. God reassures Abram that He will keep His promises.

Verse six is an important verse. We'll see it talked about again in the book of Romans. "And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness."

Abram's faith was extraordinary, but it is the same type of faith that God wants to see from us. God asked Abram to believe in something that he couldn't see. He asked Abram to trust His word. And, Abram did. And that act of faith was seen as righteousness in the eyes of God. May God see you as righteous when he looks upon you!

1 Chronicles 15:1-16:3 - What a difference in how the Children of Israel approach the Ark of the Covenant here. The mishandling of the Ark had led to death a couple chapters ago. Now, David makes sure that the Ark is handled by Levites in the way that God had prescribed through Moses.

There is a great celebration that comes with bringing the Ark to Jerusalem. David leads the celebration with dancing, and his wife despises him for it. He was willing to become "undignified" so that God might be glorified.

Luke 9:1-50 - What an amazing passage of Scripture! Luke 9:1-50 begins with the sending out of the twelve apostles. They were ready to go. Whether they knew it or not, God intended to work through them to do miraculous things.

Jesus would later say that they would do even "greater things" than He had done while on earth.

They come back from their first ministry trip excited! They have seen God work. And, they also come back worn out. It's not uncommon, when serving the Lord, to feel fatigue. Serving God is spiritual battle. It can be intense. It's people work. People can say mean things, or do mean things. Jesus even told his disciples that might happen.

So, even though they come back excited, they are ready for rest. But, when they come back they encounter a crowd of 5,000 men, and many more women and children, who have come to hear Jesus teach and see the disciples. That's right, news had spread about what God was doing through the disciples.

I write all of this to point out something that Jesus said in Luke 9:13. After telling Jesus to send the crowd away, for evening was coming, the disciples were tired, and they were in a desolate place with no food, Jesus said, "You give them something to eat."

The feeding of the 5,000 is one of the most famous stories in the Bible. Have you ever heard a pastor speak about Jesus' first solution to the problem? He said, "You give them something to eat."

The disciples had just been the instruments of God, casting out demons and curing diseases. Jesus knew, if they would let God do it, that the disciples could feed the crowd. The disciples immediately responded to Jesus by showing Him why they couldn't feed the crowd. Jesus then preformed the miracle.

I wonder how many miracles we miss out on because we don't trust the Lord. He wants to do something great, and we miss it. I'm praying that I won't miss my "You give them something to eat" moment.