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Read Isaiah 1
Isaiah 1:1-3, 18 The vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah son of Amos saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah. 2 Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth! For the LORD has spoken. 3 The ox knows his master, the donkey his owner’s manger, but Israel does not know, my people do not understand.”…18 “Come now, let us reason together,” says the Lord. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.” Today begins a series on Isaiah. WHAT do you need to know when you decide if you should go to a conference? You learn who is speaking. What are their qualifications? Will they speak on topics you need and desire to learn? You wonder about their personal experiences. Do they have actual life-based informaiton for your circumstances? After all, you are trusting someone with your time and the cost of traveling to and attending the conference. Many books of the Bible begin as Isaiah. Isaiah is the author. He tells who he is and what qualifies him to write: he speaks God’s message. He wanted all in Judah to know that God has given him a vision – a picture – of what will happen in Judah, the Southern Kingdom of Israel (The Northern Kingdom is Samaria.) and in the city of Jerusalem during the reigns of four kings. Their rule covered about 70 years, and Isaiah likely lived through 50 years. God has called Isaiah to prophesy. It’s as if Isaiah received a DVD or link to YouTube, so he could see God’s will for the present and the future vividly revealed to him. Of course, Isaiah trusts the message completely. His faith is secure in God’s vision. He is convicted that if people listen to – actually hear and do – God’s revelation, Judah will repent from sin to receive God’s cleansing salvation (verse 18). We can see this first chapter as a preface to the entire prophecy as Isaiah, the teacher, writes and speaks God’s will of judgment, repentance and salvation. This pattern consistently revealed throughout this long book is one reason Isaiah is considered a view of the entire Bible. It reveals the pattern of God’s Word from Genesis to Revelation. Will Isaiah’s words be useful to our life circumstances today? Do the ancient prophet’s words to a tiny country 2700 years ago matter now? Yes, they will and they do. God’s Word is unchanging and true for each day of our lives. It is an ancient book by date; yet, it is a modern, living book in its truth for our lives now and forever. When Isaiah wrote, Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth! For the LORD has spoken, he proclaimed God’s Word to humanity until the end of time. Each day our life-enriching task is to go to God’s Word. From heaven’s throne, the LORD holds a free conference for us each hour of each day in the Bible, through prayer and within Christian fellowship. Listen and know what the LORD has spoken. That’s why the apostle Paul could write eight centuries later: 2 Timothy 3:16-17 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17 so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. And We Know that is why we make every effort today to go to the Word of God. Read Nehemiah 11-13
Nehemiah 12:43 And on that day they offered great sacrifices, rejoicing because God had given them great joy. The women and children also rejoiced. The sound of rejoicing in Jerusalem could be heard far away. WORSHIP is Jerusalem’s response to their God who had rebuilt their city. The city is new and restored, prepared to protect its people. Jerusalem is again a place where God’s people can live in safety from their enemies and they can worship him. God’s peace reigns. This is an illustration of God’s plan to restore the world from Eden’s sin. As he sent Nehemiah to rebuild Jerusalem, he sent Jesus to rebuild broken humanity. Jesus has served the Father. His grief for our sins has taken him to the cross. The Father has anointed and appointed Jesus to be he way, truth and life to rebuild our lives from sin’s destruction. The Counselor, the Holy Spirit, gives us the power and the strength to take up our tools of faith, hope, love, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness and worship to administer God’s love to mankind. Each one of us, saved in Jesus’ redeeming blood, is being rebuilt from destruction into God’s perfection. Nehemiah’s story is the story God wants to write of your Christian life. I pray you understand how this one man’s life is your example to faithful living to God’s purpose. Matthew 16:18 And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. This, I believe, is a good time to take a break. We will be back at some point in July. Read Nehemiah 9-10
Nehemiah 10:30 “We promise not to give our daughters in marriage to the peoples around us or take their daughters for our sons.” THIS sentence begins a contract between the people of Jerusalem and God. With Jerusalem essentially rebuilt, the walls and gates reconstructed, Nehemiah could now have his people focus on rebuilding their spiritual house as individuals, as clans and as a nation. God formed the family to represent him on earth. Nehemiah is establishing the integrity of the family in Judah to be the foundation of the new nation. When you read this contract in Chapter 10, you will see the men make commitments to marry within their own nation. This is very crucial to the renewed nation as it was to Israel coming from Egypt. Remember, this is to help prevent false worship in Israel. A significant catalyst for Israel’s disobedience throughout the centuries prior to this is the marriage of pagan men and women. They influenced many Israelites away from God. In addition, the men also promise to observe the Sabbath, to bring the firstfruits of harvest to the priests, to set aside money for worship, and to commit all of their possessions to the LORD. The contract concludes with this statement: Nehemiah 10:39 “We will not neglect the house of our God.” As we today are people who say, “Jesus is my Lord.” I’m wondering if we’re committed to care for our homes, our spiritual lives and our church? Marriage, family and the church are all formed to exhibit God’s character the world. These relationships are precious to our Holy God. Jesus has suffered and died that we would bear God’s image in each aspect of our lives. He has sent his Holy Spirit to help and empower us. The Spirit has given men and women particular spiritual gifts to fulfill God’s will to be His people. In Nehemiah’s time, God brought people returning from exile into these communities of fellowship to show God’s glory and grace to the foreign nations. Today, he has saved us to do the same. In essence, we are to be in a true, devoted relationship with God and one another, so we can demonstrate God’s glory and grace to the world. Pause and Consider: God’s will is you live in the power of Jesus’ resurrection to bear his image. Read Nehemiah 7-8
Nehemiah 7:73b-8:3 When the seventh month came and the Israelites had settled in their towns, 8:1 all the people assembled as one man in the square before the Water Gate. They told Ezra the scribe to bring out the Book of the Law of Moses, which the Lord had commanded for Israel…3 Ezra read (the Law) aloud from daybreak till noon as he faced the square before the Water Gate in the presence of the men, women and others who could understand. And all the people listened attentively to the Book of the Law. BE sure you read chapter 7. You may not be excited about all the numbers. But this is evidence of how after their exile the people Israel were once again becoming a nation. This also describes how God’s Word was being reestablished in Jerusalem. The order of priesthood is revived to teach and administer God’s Word. Note how essential it was that men must have evidence they were a Levite if they desired to be a priest. God’s law commanded this, and the priesthood sought to obey. Chapter 8 begins in an unusual format as a sentence extends from Chapter 7. The priest Ezra reads the law to the people. Remember, they have likely not heard God’s Word before this as there has been no active teaching in Judah for 70 years. Can you imagine going to your local town square, courthouse steps or some public place to listen to the Bible read for about six hours? Would you go to a week-long “Bible fest” where each day someone reads the Bible to you? All you do is listen and absorb the Word of God. Our experience is that when God’s Word is not easily available to people, they will eagerly gather at a place to hear the Bible. That’s what happened here. Ezra and others are reading what we know as Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. God, of course, wants his people to know him in the same way the people of the exodus knew him. His will is to reveal his great mercy to re-form a nation to bless the world. The Father’s desire is to rescue Israel from physical and spiritual slavery, to care for them in the wilderness of unbelief, to raise up leaders to guard them. God wants the Jews to know “I love you. You are mine. I want to bless you. I want you to enjoy a great life. Here’s how.” Yes, God welcomes his people home. He is providing a new city from the old. The gates are up to protect them physically. The Law is now “up” before the people forming a wall of righteousness. His love is evident to bless them. Have you been away from the Word of God? Do you reject the hearing of his law? Be encouraged, then, to read all of the Bible, so you know who God is. Hear his love and his law. Know his grace. Receive his blessings for you. Before the Exile, God Promised: Jeremiah 31:33 “This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after that time,” declares the Lord. “I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.” Read Nehemiah 6
Nehemiah 6:9 Now therefore, O God, strengthen my hands. DO you know someone with strong hands? Good, strong hands belong to one who can expertly craft and build. Skilled strong hands mix strength with a delicate touch. They can lift heavy weight and gently hold a newborn baby. My son-in-law’s hands are like that. He works all day with tools to remove dents from cars. To me those tools are complicated, and I have no understanding of how they can remove a dent from the middle of a car door and not touch or disturb the rest of the door. He makes the dent smooth. It disappears, and you would not know it existed. He has strong hands with a delicate touch, the hands of a craftsman. Our hands for the gospel of God are to be those same kind of hands. In Christ’s sacrifice, he has stretched out his hands to receive the piercing, agonizing wounds. Then he rose from the dead to say, “See and touch my wounds.” so we would know his delicate love to forgive our sins. In his grace God has given us strong, faithful hands to actively love and to serve the risen Christ and to serve one another. In the strength of His Spirit and in the delicate touch of His healing mercy, we use our hands to pray for a broken heart, to embrace one in grief, to lift high in praise, to hold a child in love, to wipe tears from a grieving eye, to administer justice to victims, to guide an aged one to the table. He has given us hands to “remove the dents” from people’s lives to make them whole in heart and Spirit. Jesus’ strong hands remove the sins as if they never existed. Thank you, God, for strong hands we can use as we trust your strong hands caring for us. Nehemiah’s prayer is a good prayer for us all, as we consider the physical and spiritual demands of our lives, let us look higher to know the power of God’s strong, loving and delicate helping hands. Proverbs 12:14 From the fruit of his lips a man is filled with good things as surely as the work of his hands rewards him. Read Nehemiah 4-5
Nehemiah 4:1-4 When Sanballat heard that we were rebuilding the wall, he became angry and was greatly incensed. He ridiculed the Jews, 2 and in the presence of his associates and the army of Samaria, he said, “What are those feeble Jews doing? Will they restore their wall? Will they offer sacrifices? Will they finish in a day? Can they bring the stones back to life from those heaps of rubble – burned as they are? 3 Tobiah the Ammonite, who was at his side, said, “What they are building – if even a fox climbed up on it, he would break down their wall of stones!” THE nations around Judah and Israel benefited from a ruined, defeated Jerusalem. God’s glory – his power and his rule – had departed. A strong country was gone. A beautiful city lay in ruins. The LORD’s people were weak and powerless. Surely they would never rise again. But wait. What’s that sound in the distance? It is the sound of men and women working to move dirt and rubble. “Did you see that? The walls are going up? What’s happening?” Judah’s enemies – God’s and Nehemiah’s enemies – ridiculed the rebuilding. Surely those weak Jews’ work would be weak, too. But they forgot one thing. Judah’s God was guiding them. Judah’s God was empowering them to build. Judah’s God was protecting them. Judah’s God had given them a vision, leaders and will to rebuild. God’s favor was once again upon his people. It is possible in their heart Sanballat and Tobiah and the others knew there would be no stopping Nehemiah and his people. Nehemiah was truly God’s man, a good shepherd to justly lead. He stayed true to God, trusting him and guiding his people as God guided him. God’s enemies would receive judgment. God’s people would receive reward. Is your life in disarray? Are you seeing only a pile of rubble around you? Then believe that you, too, can trust God to lead you to rebuilding your life in him. He has written his blueprint. He has given you the tools. Read the plans. Use the tools. Be strong and patient in the rebuilding. Stand firm against those who will doubt and attempt to stop you. There will be many such people. There is much more of God. Pause and Consider: that God is so much, much more than any rubble. Read Nehemiah 2-3
Nehemiah 2:4-5 The king said to me, “What is it you want?” Then I prayed to the God of heaven, 5 and I answered the king, “If it pleases the king and if your servant has found favor in his sight, let him send me to the city in Judah where my fathers are buried so that I can rebuild it.” THERE is often risk in responding to God’s call on your life. Especially if you’ve been a valuable member of an organization, or you have wonderful relationships with family members, people who value you may not be pleased with the work God is giving you to do. For Nehemiah, a servant, it was not a simple matter to say to a king, “I need to go away.” And even to be sad before the king was a potentially deadly matter. Kings wanted humble and grateful people around them. A sad servant would reflect badly on the master. And kings were prone to remove servants who displeased them. We might consider our own attitude before the LORD. So why then do you think the king so quickly granted Nehemiah’s significant requests? Could it be that Nehemiah had always demonstrated humility and devotion to his work? Perhaps the king has learned to trust Nehemiah. As cupbearer, Nehemiah tasted each drink to prevent the king from being poisoned. Nehemiah had faithfully served the king with his life. The king knows his servant is not a frivolous man. There is a sadness in Nehemiah’s heart, and the king wants to help his servant. You can say, “Nehemiah and the king had a close relationship.” This is a good example of our relationship with God. Many people live as if God is only available when there is trouble in their lives. They lack joy, devotion and commitment to the LORD, unwilling to serve him with gladness. When they request something from God and get no answer, they wonder, “Where’s God when I need him?” Maybe it’s better to ask, “Have I been faithful to serve the King, who has called me to serve him? What kind of relationship do I have with the King of kings?” One of Jesus’ most frightening teachings relates to the matter of unfaithful service to God: Matthew 7:21-23 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?’ 23 Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’” Jesus condemns hypocrisy. To say, “I believe in God.” yet to deny his authority in your life brings your salvation into question. Pause and Know: To be an effective leader for Christ begins with an active humility before Christ. Read Nehemiah 1
Nehemiah 1:4-6 When I heard these things, I sat down and wept. For some days I mourned and fasted and prayed before the God of heaven. 5 “O Lord, God of heaven, the great and awesome God, who keeps his covenant of love with those who love him and obey his commands, 6 let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer your servant is praying before you day and night for your servants, the people of Israel. I confess the sins we Israelites, including myself and my father’s house, have committed against you.” WE move past the stories of the kings and major prophets Elijah and Elisha* to the book of Nehemiah. Ezra, Nehemiah and Zechariah record the rebuilding of Jerusalem and the temple as the Jews return from the Exile in Babylon. The dates of their writing make them among the last in the Old Testament timeline. Nehemiah is a very practical example of faithful God-inspired leadership. As Christians are called to lead in God’s kingdom, we can learn much from Nehemiah. The first thing we learn is that a proper to grief can compel us to action. Are you grieved – very sad – about some aspect of your own life, your family, your faith, your nation or your church? Would you like those circumstances to change? Then Nehemiah teaches you to seek the Lord and respond to what the LORD points you to do. Seek a solution. Listen to the what you must do. Then do it. For example, there are people who become politicians, business people, missionaries, soldiers, social workers, teachers, attorneys, nurses, engineers, farmers, etc. because they believe God is leading them to those vocations as a means to respond to issues that grieve them. History records a great number of people who have helped improve the human condition, even changed cultures and worldviews, as they saw the effects of poverty, slavery, hunger, disease and hard labor. Some of the world’s most effective companies, governments and ministries came about because some one or several people grieved the circumstances they witnessed. Then they did something about it. Nehemiah was a servant of a king who became a servant of God. Cupbearer to one of the world’s most powerful kings, his position certainly didn’t qualify him to rebuild Jerusalem. But his compassion and his faith did. Read his humble prayer, and pray it for yourself. See its confession, intercession and compassion. Read how Nehemiah specifically asked God to grant his desires and ease his grief in the will of God. Too often when something grieves us, we may say, “It is what it is.” Well, that could be true because no one does anything to change “it”. Maybe it’s time you did. Colossians 3:16-17 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs with gratitude in your hearts to God. 17 And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Read 1 Kings 11
1 Kings 11:1-6 King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh's daughter – Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. 2 They were from nations about which the Lord had told the Israelites, “You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods.” Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. 3 He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. 4 As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the Lord his God, as the heart of David his father had been. 5 He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites. 6 So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the Lord; he did not follow the Lord completely, as David his father had done. YOU might say, “Solomon had a heart attack.” His heart seemed to stop beating for the LORD God. What contrast from 1 Kings 4 declaring the happiness and peace in Israel! You read there of Israel’s glory under a wise ruler. Now we read one of the Bible’s most tragic paragraphs. Solomon’s wisdom left him when it came to women. He heard God’s warnings and deliberately disobeyed. He worshiped idols and religions that killed babies and used temple prostitutes. These horrible cults cut and killed. They annulled the Creator to glorify nature. What manner of lust was in Solomon’s heart that he preferred women to the gracious LORD of hosts? Did he really believe he would still receive God’s blessings? How could he believe God would ignore his disobedience? Apparently his wise heart stopped. Perhaps Solomon was as many of us; he thought he could have life both ways – his way and God’s way. Is this not sin? “I want.” “God wants.” “Let’s compromise. Surely God won’t mind giving me some of what I want, even if he says it’s wrong.” Too many Christians and too many churches today acts the same as Solomon. They’ve replaced “God correct” with “politically correct” – God’s way with the world’s way. Despite the Holy Bible’s truth and devoted teachers throughout the ages, the church acts the ignorant fool. Even worse, the sin did not stop with the sinner. God did as he promised. He removed his blessing from Solomon’s family, and Israel split, to suffer generations of warfare, idolatry and exile. Continue reading in 1 and 2 Kings, and you’ll see sin rage through the generations. This is a sad way to leave Solomon. But we know God powerfully used this man, his gifts and his reign to demonstrate God’s power on earth. As we look to the many people God used to fulfill his covenant of salvation for us, we praise His Name. We thank God he forgives and forgets our sins as we are faithful to repent and confess. Be diligent to love God as you remain in his commands. (John 15). Proverbs 6:23 For these commands are a lamp, this teaching is a light, and the corrections of discipline are the way to life, 24 keeping you from the immoral woman, from the smooth tongue of the wayward wife. 25 Do not lust in your heart after her beauty or let her captivate you with her eyes, 26 for the prostitute reduces you to a loaf of bread, and the adulteress preys upon your very life. Read 1 Kings 10
1 Kings 10:8-9 “How happy your men must be! How happy your officials, who continually stand before you and hear your wisdom! 9 Praise be to the Lord your God, who has delighted in you and placed you on the throne of Israel. Because of the Lord’s eternal love for Israel, he has made you king, to maintain justice and righteousness.” 14 The weight of the gold that Solomon received yearly was 666 talents ($106,000,000). JESUS refers to the Queen of Sheba’s visit to Solomon in Matthew 12:42 The Queen of the South will rise at the judgment with this generation and condemn it; for she came from the ends of the earth to listen to Solomon’s wisdom, and now one greater than Solomon is here. Our Lord was condemning some of the Pharisees’ and teachers’ continual demand, “Teacher, we want to see a miraculous sign from you.” (Matthew 12:38b) The queen exhibited a remarkable understanding of God’s providence to grant Solomon’s wisdom. She essentially said, “God so loved Israel, he has made you king, Solomon, to rule with wisdom.” Nine centuries later, John would write his elegant gospel summary, “God so loved the world, he gave his one and only Son.” (John 3:16a) God used both a pagan queen and a loving disciple to define his love and purpose for his chosen people. The Jewish teachers missed God’s love. Their faithless hearts dismissed the true miracle of God’s love initiating and fulfilling Jesus’ great miracle of salvation to a faithless world. You see the extraordinary sum of Solomon’s annual wages. But the wealth that matters is, of course, our eternal riches in Christ Jesus. As great as Solomon’s physical wealth, it paled in contrast to his wealth of knowledge. This is the gift that could have enriched generations of Israelites to come. What do you think Solomon thought as he lived in the luxury? He tells us some of his wisdom in Proverbs 3:13-17 Blessed is the man who finds wisdom, the man who gains understanding, 14 for she is more profitable than silver and yields better returns than gold. 15 She is more precious than rubies; nothing you desire can compare with her. 16 Long life is in her right hand; in her left hand are riches and honor. 17 Her ways are pleasant ways, and all her paths are peace. These are powerful words from one of history’s wisest persons. It is sad his wisdom was too often words without action. Ephesians 6:10 Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. |
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January 2025
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