Podcasts about jebusites

Join Matt & Jake in this enlightening discussion as they explore the biblical "Seed War" from Genesis to Revelation, starting with the powerful prophecy in Genesis 3:15. Dive deep into the enmity between the serpent and the woman's seed, and how this conflict unfolds throughout Scripture. They also unpack the prophecy of Tyre in Ezekiel, offering insight into its significance and prophetic fulfillment. From Genesis 10:15-19 and the lineage of Canaan to the final victory over evil, discover how God's plan of redemption is revealed in history and prophecy. https://itsyahushua.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/seed-war.pdf   Key Topics Discussed: Genesis 3:15 – The First Prophecy of the Messiah & the Seed War The descendants of Canaan in Genesis 10:15-19 and their role in Scripture The Prophecy of Tyre in Ezekiel and its end-time implications The battle between the seed of the woman and the serpent's seed from Genesis to Revelation How God's redemptive plan unfolds in the midst of the conflict between good and evil Scripture References: Genesis 3:15 – The first prophecy of Jesus and the ongoing war between good and evil. Genesis 10:15-19 – The genealogies of the Canaanites and their impact on the biblical narrative. Ezekiel Prophecy – The judgment and future of Tyre, and its significance in prophetic history. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and click the bell icon to stay updated with future discussions on Scripture, prophecy, and biblical insights! #Genesis315 #SeedWar #TyreProphecy #SabbathLounge #BiblicalProphecy #EndTimes #Ezekiel #Genesis #BibleStudy #ChristianFaith #Messiah #EndTimeProphecy #Canaanites #GodsPlan #ChristianPodcastFor more information see www.sabbathlounge.com   Find us on iTunes, Spotify, TikTok, and Podbean. At Sabbath Lounge we are dedicated to eating clean, keeping the Feast, Sabbath, following Torah, and leading as many people out of Babylon as possible.   Find more information below: www.sabbathlounge.com    https://linktr.ee/Sabbathlounge   https://www.britannica.com/place/Tyre   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canaan_(son_of_Ham)   https://www.julianspriggs.co.uk/Pages/TableNations   https://genesis6conspiracy.com/   https://knowingscripture.com/articles/giants-in-the-land-a-biblical-theology-of-the-nephilim-anakim-rephaim-and-goliath   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ham_(son_of_Noah)#Family_tree   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ham_(son_of_Noah)   https://www.blueletterbible.org/.   https://classic.net.bible.org/dictionary.php?word=Archite   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perizzites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hittites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canaan#Canaanites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amorites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jebusites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidon   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girgashites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minor_biblical_tribes#Sinites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minor_biblical_tribes#Arvadites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minor_biblical_tribes#Zemarites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minor_biblical_tribes#Hamathites   https://www.amazon.com/Ancient-Amorites-Amurru-Mesopotamia/dp/3330036745   https://www.blueletterbible.org/   https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/05/200528115829.htm#:~:text=The%20people%20who%20lived%20in,biblical%20texts%20as%20the%20Canaanites.   Canva AI Images https://www.biblestudying.net/phoenicians.pdf   https://www.lgic.org/en/phoenicians.php  

A @Christadelphians Video: Description: The history from the times of the patriarchs to the Babylonian exile is outlined. Although the relationships between Jew and Gentile were often hostile, they were not necessarily so. Some Gentiles came to be associated with the promises which God made to Abraham, through their faith. To this day Gentiles can share in these blessings through belief and baptism into the things concerning the Kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ.# SummaryThe presentation explores the history of the nations surrounding Israel, focusing particularly on the Canaanites during the time of Abraham and Israel's conquest. It details various groups such as the Amorites, Hittites, Hivites, Jebusites, and Perizzites, examining their origins, cultural practices, and interactions with the Israelites. The speaker highlights the significance of these groups in the biblical narrative, discussing their idolatrous practices, the moral implications of Israel's conquest, and the opportunity for the Canaanites to turn to God.

Join Matt & Jake in this enlightening discussion as they explore the biblical "Seed War" from Genesis to Revelation, starting with the powerful prophecy in Genesis 3:15. Dive deep into the enmity between the serpent and the woman's seed, and how this conflict unfolds throughout Scripture. They also unpack the prophecy of Tyre in Ezekiel, offering insight into its significance and prophetic fulfillment. From Genesis 10:15-19 and the lineage of Canaan to the final victory over evil, discover how God's plan of redemption is revealed in history and prophecy. https://itsyahushua.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/seed-war.pdf   Key Topics Discussed: Genesis 3:15 – The First Prophecy of the Messiah & the Seed War The descendants of Canaan in Genesis 10:15-19 and their role in Scripture The Prophecy of Tyre in Ezekiel and its end-time implications The battle between the seed of the woman and the serpent's seed from Genesis to Revelation How God's redemptive plan unfolds in the midst of the conflict between good and evil Scripture References: Genesis 3:15 – The first prophecy of Jesus and the ongoing war between good and evil. Genesis 10:15-19 – The genealogies of the Canaanites and their impact on the biblical narrative. Ezekiel Prophecy – The judgment and future of Tyre, and its significance in prophetic history. Don't forget to like, subscribe, and click the bell icon to stay updated with future discussions on Scripture, prophecy, and biblical insights! #Genesis315 #SeedWar #TyreProphecy #SabbathLounge #BiblicalProphecy #EndTimes #Ezekiel #Genesis #BibleStudy #ChristianFaith #Messiah #EndTimeProphecy #Canaanites #GodsPlan #ChristianPodcastFor more information see www.sabbathlounge.com Find us on iTunes, Spotify, TikTok, and Podbean. At Sabbath Lounge we are dedicated to eating clean, keeping the Feast, Sabbath, following Torah, and leading as many people out of Babylon as possible.   Find more information below: www.sabbathlounge.com    https://linktr.ee/Sabbathlounge   https://www.britannica.com/place/Tyre   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canaan_(son_of_Ham)   https://www.julianspriggs.co.uk/Pages/TableNations   https://genesis6conspiracy.com/   https://knowingscripture.com/articles/giants-in-the-land-a-biblical-theology-of-the-nephilim-anakim-rephaim-and-goliath   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ham_(son_of_Noah)#Family_tree   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ham_(son_of_Noah)   https://www.blueletterbible.org/.   https://classic.net.bible.org/dictionary.php?word=Archite   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perizzites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hittites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canaan#Canaanites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amorites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jebusites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidon   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Girgashites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minor_biblical_tribes#Sinites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minor_biblical_tribes#Arvadites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minor_biblical_tribes#Zemarites   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minor_biblical_tribes#Hamathites   https://www.amazon.com/Ancient-Amorites-Amurru-Mesopotamia/dp/3330036745   https://www.blueletterbible.org/   https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/05/200528115829.htm#:~:text=The%20people%20who%20lived%20in,biblical%20texts%20as%20the%20Canaanites.   Canva AI Images https://www.biblestudying.net/phoenicians.pdf   https://www.lgic.org/en/phoenicians.php  

Numbers 13:29-33 KJV - The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south: and the Hittites, and the Jebusites, and the Amorites, dwell in the mountains: and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the coast of Jordan. 30 And Caleb stilled the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it. 31 But the men that went up with him said, We be not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we. 32 And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched unto the children of Israel, saying, The land, through which we have gone to search it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof; and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature. 33 And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.

A Sermon for Palm Sunday Philippians 2:1-11, St. Matthew 21:1-17, and St. Matthew 27:1-54 by William Klock The Pantheon in Rome is famous for being one of the architectural and engineering wonders of the ancient world.  It was one of the buildings we studied when I took Architectural History and I remember our professor stressing that the photos in our book could never do it justice.  It's a great round building covered by the largest vaulted concrete dome in the world.  It looks big.  It is big.  The dome is 43 metres high.  But you don't realise just how big that is until you add people into the photos.  It's about twenty-five times higher than the average person is tall.  And it was built by the Romans two millennia ago.  It's survived all these years, even after builders scavenged the bronze off its roof and left the concrete exposed.  It is, again, known for being an architectural and engineering marvel. But Brothers and Sisters, the Pantheon is important for another reason that's hardly ever discussed.  It was, again, built almost two thousand years ago—in the early second century.  Begun under the Emperor Trajan and finished during the reign of Hadrian.  It stood on the Field of Mars and replaced an earlier temple dedicated to Mars, the god of war, and built by Agrippa during the reign of Augustus.  But the Pantheon, fairly quickly it seems, became an unusual temple.  The Romans usually dedicated a temple to a single god.  The gods were jealous.  They didn't like sharing.  And if a temple were, say, struck by lightning, you'd know that it was the god of that temple who was angry.  But the Pantheon became a temple for all the gods—or, at least, many of them.  That's what the name means: pan…theon.  It was one of the greatest temples of pagan Rome.  But in the Year of Our Lord Six-hundred-and-nine, at the instruction of the Christian Emperor Phocas and the Bishop of Rome, Boniface IV, the Pantheon was stripped of its pagan idols and its pagan altars.  Twenty-eight cartloads containing the bones of Christian martyrs were exhumed from the catacombs and reburied there, a Christian altar was placed in the building, and it was established as a church in honour of the memory of those martyrs whom the pagan Romans had killed in the name of their gods.  To this day, over fourteen-hundred years later, the Church of St. Mary and the Martyrs remains there, a faithful witness to conquest of Rome by the gospel and of the Lordship of Jesus.  A testimony to the power of the cross and the blood of Jesus not only to purify us from our sins and to make us a dwelling fit for God's Spirit, but to wash creation clean from our sins as well. We began Lent, listening as St. Matthew told us the story of Jesus' temptation in the wilderness.  The devil took him off to a very high mountain and showed him all the magnificent kingdoms of the world.  Off on the horizon was Rome.  “I'll give the whole lot to you,” the devil said, “if you will fall down and worship me.” It was, after all what Jesus had come for.  He was creation's true Lord.  Caesar and all the other kings were pretenders, shams, parodies of who and what Jesus really is.  All of it, from Jerusalem to Rome and beyond belongs to him.  “There is not one square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is sovereign over all, does not cry, Mine!” to quote Abraham Kuyper.  But this was not the way.  Jesus will not reclaim his creation without also setting it to rights, without dealing with the problems of sin and death.  Without purifying it from our idolatry.  To do that requires more. And so today we hear Matthew again as he tells us of Jesus' triumphal procession into Jerusalem.  When they came near to Jerusalem, and arrived at Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two of the disciples on ahead.  Go into the village over there and at once you'll find a donkey tied and a foal beside it.  Untie them and bring them to me and if anyone says anything to you, say, “The Lord needs them and he'll send them back right away.”  He sent them off at once.   Jesus was about to act out another one of his prophecies.  This time it was to show and to remind the people what sort of king the Messiah was to be.  They did want a king who would set all to rights, but in their heads, to their way of thinking, that meant leading a revolt against the Romans.  He would be like David, who defeated the Jebusites to take their city Jerusalem as his capital.  He would be like Judas Maccabeus, who defeated the Greeks and established an independent Jewish kingdom under the high priest.  The Messiah would be like that, only better, greater, more powerful, and his kingdom would be forever.  He would raise up Israel and put the gentile kings in their place.  The day before or maybe even that same day, as Jesus came to Jerusalem from Bethphage, Caesar's governor, Pontius Pilate, was marching into the city from the opposite direction, from his base in Caesarea, at the front of a column of Roman soldiers.  They were there to represent Caesar's might and to keep the peace during Passover.  If Jesus was the Messiah, now was his time—or so a lot of people thought—now was Jesus' time to finally and really be the Messiah, raise up his army, and cast down Pilate and the Romans and take his throne. But that wasn't the way to the throne any more than bowing down to the devil was.  Matthew says that Jesus did it his way to remind the people of what the Lord had said about the Messiah through the Prophet Zechariah: Tell this to Zion's daughter: Look now! Here comes your King.  He's humble, mounted on a donkey, yes, on a foal, it's young. The king they expected was going to ride into Jerusalem on a chariot or at least on a great warhorse.  But God's king is different.  A great warrior might take care of the Romans and even take his throne.  He could set things to rights in the way of earthly kings, but the world would still be subject to sin and death.  So Jesus acted out the prophecy.  The disciples brought the donkey and Jesus humbly rode it into the city.  And the people cheered all along the way.  They spread their cloaks on the road.  Others cut branches form the trees and scattered them on the road.  The crowds who went ahead of him, and those who were following behind shouted, “Hosanna to the son of David!  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!  Hosanna in the highest!”  And the whole city was gripped with excitement when they came into Jerusalem.  “Who is this!” they were saying.  And the crowds replied, “This is the prophet, Jesus from Nazareth of Galilee.   With that prophetic reminder, at least some of the people seemed to get it even if it wasn't what they expected.  Jesus was fulfilling Zechariah's prophecy.  The long-awaiting king had come.  But not everyone got it.  Jesus wasn't finished with his acted out prophesies.  Matthew says that he went straight to the temple and when he got there he threw out the people who were buying and selling in the temple.  He upturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of the dove-sellers.  It is written, he said to them, “My house will be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a brigand's lair!”  The blind and lame came to him in the temple and he healed them.  But when the chief priests and the scribes saw the remarkable things he was doing, and the children shouting, “Hosanna to the son of David!” they were very angry.   The king was fulfilling the words of the prophets.  He came in humility.  And he came announcing that he really was going to set the world to rights.  He was going to set the world to rights in a way that would make the temple obsolete.  All through his ministry he'd been showing how he was the new bridge between God and sinful humans and that last week he spent in the temple—starting with this acted out prophecy and continuing as he healed and preached, he made it clear.  So clear that the people invested in the temple and the priesthood and that whole system took it all for blasphemy and had him arrested. Our long Palm Sunday Gospel today—Matthew 27—vividly depicts the Messiah's humble way to his throne.  Betrayed by his friends, rejected by his people.  Standing humbly before the Roman governor so many people expected him to slay.  Facing trumped up charges made by lying men.  Left condemned to death as the people chose instead that Pilate should free a brutal, violent revolutionary—a man truly guilty of the trumped of charges against Jesus.  Standing humbly as the very people he came to save cried out to Pilate, “Crucify him!”  Standing humbly as he, the king, was rejected by his own people who cried out, “We have no king but Caesar!”  Standing humbly as Roman soldiers mocked him, beat him senseless and scourged him, ripping the skin from his body.  Humbly dragging the very cross on which he would be crucified through the city.  The king, nailed to a cross and hoisted to die between two violent thieves as his own people shouted blasphemies at him, as the chief priests and scribes mocked him shouting, “He rescued others, but he cannot rescue himself.  If he's the king of Israel, let him come down from the cross!  He trusts in God; let God deliver him now if he's really God's son!” For hours it went on.  Jesus, pulling on those nails driven through is wrists, pushing on the nails driven through his feet, lifting himself to gasp for breath through the pain, while the people gathered around: Jews, Romans, even the pastors, the shepherds of his people who claimed to speak for God mocked him and shouted blasphemies.  Luke writes that Jesus prayed for them: Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.  And eventually his body could take no more and Jesus breathed his last breath.  And, Matthew says, the earth shook.  The great veil that guarded the holy of holies in the temple was torn in two.  And the Roman centurions standing guard were scared out of their wits and announced the very thing Jesus' own people would not: He really was the son of God!   Brothers and Sisters, there can be no Easter without Good Friday.  To set the world to rights—to really set to rights—not just to take a throne, not just to defeat the Romans—but to defeat sin and death and to reconcile sinful men and women to God required a king willing to let evil rise up to its full height, to let evil concentrate itself all in one place, and to let it do its worst, crashing down on him all at once.  It required a king willing to throw himself into the gears of this fallen, broken, and sinful world to bring them to a stop.  It required a king willing to give his life for his own people even as they mocked and blasphemed him, so that he could rise from that humiliating death to overturn the verdict against him, rise victorious over sin and death and the absolute worst that they could do.  Only that humble king could defeat death and bring life—real and true life—back to God's creation and gather a people forgiven, cleaned by his blood, and filled with his Spirit to become a new temple, a new holy of holies where the nations would—where the nations now—enter the presence of God. It was in that humble king that those Roman centurions saw something they had never seen before.  Their Caesar called himself the son of God, but in Jesus they saw the God of Israel at work in all his glory, in all his love, in all his mercy, in all his faithfulness—like no god they'd ever known—completely unlike any god or goddess honoured in the Pantheon.  Whether they knew it or not, those centurions that first Good Friday announced the defeat of Jupiter and Mars, of Hera and Diana, of Neptune and Vesta and all the others.  And they announced the defeat of Caesar, too.  In less than three centuries, the Emperor of Rome himself would be captivated by the good news about Jesus, the son of God, the great King who was setting the world to rights. But Brothers and Sisters, the good news about Jesus, crucified and risen, didn't go out through the empire and to the nations all on its own.  It was carried, it was stewarded by a people—by a church—that, itself, took on the humility of the Saviour.  The bones of those martyrs buried in the Pantheon are a testimony to the faithful and humble witness of Jesus' people in those early centuries.  They didn't just proclaim a message.  They lived it out as a community—as the vanguard of God's new creation born that first Easter morning.  In the midst of a world of darkness, of false gods and idolatry, of brutality and immorality hard for us to imagine today, they gave the pagans a glimpse of God's future.  By the way they lived, they lifted the veil and showed the world God's new creation.  It was not only the proclamation of the church, but the very life of the church that showed the world a better way, a way no one before had ever known. Here's the truth of it: The people of the humble king must be humble too or it's all for nought.  This is why Paul, writing to the Philippians, says to them, If our shared life in the king brings any comfort; if love still has the power to make you cheerful; if we really do have a partnership in the Spirit; if your hearts are at all moved with affection and sympathy—then make my joy complete!  Bring your thinking into line with one another.  In other words, if you're going to be a gospel community for all the world to see  Have this mind amongst yourselves!  Here's how to do it.  Hold on to the same love; bring your innermost lives into harmony; fix your minds on the same object.  Never act out of selfish ambition or vanity; instead, regard everyone else as your superior.  Look after each other's best interests, not your own.   But it's so hard to do that, Paul!  So, so hard!  And Paul knew that.  And so he takes them back to the cross.  Brothers and Sisters, everything goes back to Jesus and the cross!  This is how you should think amongst yourselves, Paul goes on—with the mind that you have because you belong to Jesus the Messiah.  And now he doesn't quote from the passion narratives because they weren't written yet, although I think that would have worked just as well.  Every Holy Week we immerse ourselves in the passion narratives and Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John remind us of the very thing Paul writes here.  But instead Paul breaks out into song.  He reminds them of a hymn they presumably all knew and he copies it out for them: Who, though in God's form, did not regard his equality with God as something he ought to exploit.  Instead, he emptied himself, and received the form of a slave, being born in the likeness of men.  And then, having human appearance, he humbled himself, and became obedient even to death, yes, even death on a cross.  And so God has greatly exalted him, and to him in his favour has given the name which is over all names.  That now at the name of Jesus every knee within heaven shall bow—on earth, too, and under the earth.  And every tongue shall confess that Messiah Jesus is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.   Paul reminds them of the humble king, the son of God who not only took on our flesh, but who gave his life in the most painful and humiliating way possible so that on his way to his throne he might take us with him. Brothers and Sisters, the only way we will ever be faithful in being the people Jesus has called us to be, the only way we will ever be faithful in being the new creation people the Spirit has made us, the only way will ever be faithful stewards of the gospel is to keep the cross of Jesus always before us.  There's a reason why we confess our sins before we come to the Lord's Table.  There is a reason that we repeatedly recall our unworthiness to enter the presence of God on our own merit.  There is a reason why, as we rise in the morning and as we go to bed at night, we confess our sins.  It's so that as we hear the absolution and as we come to the Table, we will remember just how gracious and merciful and loving God has been to us.  It's why we sing songs like “Amazing Grace”.  Amazing grace is such a sweet, sweet sounds, because apart from grace we are such sinful wretches.  And it is inevitable that when we forget this, when we start to think of ourselves as deserving of the gifts God has poured out on us, when we forget the heinousness and offensiveness of our sins and our rebellion against God, dear Friends, that's when we forget the true power of the gospel and the true mercy of the cross and the great depth of the love of God for sinners.  When we forget the sinfulness of our sin, we lose sight of the amazingness of God's grace.  Eventually we lose the mind of Jesus the Messiah and we cease to be the community of humble servants that he has made us.  And our light grows dim.  Our witness fails. We see it happening all around us in the West.  We've stopped talking about sin and we've thought more highly of ourselves than we ought.  We preach a doctrine of cheap grace.  And our light has gone dim.  Our churches have emptied and the culture has claimed them for its own.  In some they preach false gospels of prosperity or the divinity of man or the goodness of sexual perversion.  We setup idols to politics and earth power in them.  Some are literally gutted, becoming theatres or bars.  Others are little more than tourist attractions: testimonies to the power of the gospel in the days we proclaimed it, but now empty, dead shells.  The culture removes the cross and sets up altars to its idols.  Brothers and Sisters, before it is too late, let us knee before the cross of Jesus and look up.  Let it fill our vision.  Let us remember that he—the sinless son of God—died the death we deserve.  And let us meditate on the depth and power of his grace that we might share the humble mind of our humble king, that we might be the people he has called us to be, the people he has given his Spirit to make us, the people who will steward the gospel until every knee bows and every tongues confesses that Jesus the Messiah is Lord and gives glory to God the Father. Let's pray: Almighty and everliving God, in your tender love for mankind you sent your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ to take upon him our nature, and to suffer death upon the cross, giving us the example of his great humility:  Mercifully grant that we may walk in the way of his suffering, and also share in his resurrection; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

The oracle of the word of the LORD is against the land of Hadrach and Damascus is its resting place. For the LORD has an eye on mankind and on all the tribes of Israel, and on Hamath also, which borders on it, Tyre and Sidon, though they are very wise. Tyre has built herself a rampart and heaped up silver like dust, and fine gold like the mud of the streets. But behold, the Lord will strip her of her possessions and strike down her power on the sea, and she shall be devoured by fire. Ashkelon shall see it, and be afraid; Gaza too, and shall writhe in anguish; Ekron also, because its hopes are confounded. The king shall perish from Gaza; Ashkelon shall be uninhabited; a mixed people shall dwell in Ashdod, and I will cut off the pride of Philistia. I will take away its blood from its mouth, and its abominations from between its teeth; it too shall be a remnant for our God; it shall be like a clan in Judah, and Ekron shall be like the Jebusites. Then I will encamp at my house as a guard, so that none shall march to and fro; no oppressor shall again march over them, for now I see with my own eyes. Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem; and the battle bow shall be cut off, and he shall speak peace to the nations; his rule shall be from sea to sea, and from the River to the ends of the earth. As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you, I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit. Return to your stronghold

21 But the people of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites who lived in Jerusalem, so the Jebusites have lived with the people of Benjamin in Jerusalem to this day. 27 Manasseh did not drive out the inhabitants of Beth-shean and its villages, or Taanach and its villages, or the inhabitants of Dor…

Joshua 9The Gibeonite Deception1As soon as all the kings who were beyond the Jordan in the hill country and in the lowland all along the coast of the Great Sea toward Lebanon, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, heard of this, 2they gathered together as one to fight against Joshua and Israel.3But when the inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and to Ai, 4they on their part acted with cunning and went and made ready provisions and took worn-out sacks for their donkeys, and wineskins, worn-out and torn and mended, 5with worn-out, patched sandals on their feet, and worn-out clothes. And all their provisions were dry and crumbly. 6And they went to Joshua in the camp at Gilgal and said to him and to the men of Israel, “We have come from a distant country, so now make a covenant with us.” 7But the men of Israel said to the Hivites, “Perhaps you live among us; then how can we make a covenant with you?” 8They said to Joshua, “We are your servants.” And Joshua said to them, “Who are you? And where do you come from?” 9They said to him, “From a very distant country your servants have come, because of the name of the Lord your God. For we have heard a report of him, and all that he did in Egypt, 10and all that he did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, to Sihon the king of Heshbon, and to Og king of Bashan, who lived in Ashtaroth. 11So our elders and all the inhabitants of our country said to us, ‘Take provisions in your hand for the journey and go to meet them and say to them, “We are your servants. Come now, make a covenant with us.”' 12Here is our bread. It was still warm when we took it from our houses as our food for the journey on the day we set out to come to you, but now, behold, it is dry and crumbly. 13These wineskins were new when we filled them, and behold, they have burst. And these garments and sandals of ours are worn out from the very long journey.” 14So the men took some of their provisions, but did not ask counsel from the Lord. 15And Joshua made peace with them and made a covenant with them, to let them live, and the leaders of the congregation swore to them.16At the end of three days after they had made a covenant with them, they heard that they were their neighbors and that they lived among them. 17And the people of Israel set out and reached their cities on the third day. Now their cities were Gibeon, Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kiriath-jearim. 18But the people of Israel did not attack them, because the leaders of the congregation had sworn to them by the Lord, the God of Israel. Then all the congregation murmured against the leaders. 19But all the leaders said to all the congregation, “We have sworn to them by the Lord, the God of Israel, and now we may not touch them. 20This we will do to them: let them live, lest wrath be upon us, because of the oath that we swore to them.” 21And the leaders said to them, “Let them live.” So they became cutters of wood and drawers of water for all the congregation, just as the leaders had said of them.22Joshua summoned them, and he said to them, “Why did you deceive us, saying, ‘We are very far from you,' when you dwell among us? 23Now therefore you are cursed, and some of you shall never be anything but servants, cutters of wood and drawers of water for the house of my God.” 24They answered Joshua, “Because it was told to your servants for a certainty that the Lord your God had commanded his servant Moses to give you all the land and to destroy all the inhabitants of the land from before you—so we feared greatly for our lives because of you and did this thing. 25And now, behold, we are in your hand. Whatever seems good and right in your sight to do to us, do it.” 26So he did this to them and delivered them out of the hand of the people of Israel, and they did not kill them. 27But Joshua made them that day cutters of wood and drawers of water for the congregation

For today’s installment of our 40 Days Meditation series, our brother Martin Steinbereithner provides commentary on Num 12:16-13:33. Listen below, download here, or search for Words from the Brothers on your favourite podcasting app. After that the people set out from Hazeroth, and camped in the wilderness of Paran. The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel. From each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man, every one a chief among them.” So Moses sent them from the wilderness of Paran, according to the command of the Lord, all of them men who were heads of the people of Israel. And these were their names: From the tribe of Reuben, Shammua the son of Zaccur; from the tribe of Simeon, Shaphat the son of Hori; from the tribe of Judah, Caleb the son of Jephunneh; from the tribe of Issachar, Igal the son of Joseph; from the tribe of Ephraim, Hoshea the son of Nun; from the tribe of Benjamin, Palti the son of Raphu; from the tribe of Zebulun, Gaddiel the son of Sodi; from the tribe of Joseph (that is, from the tribe of Manasseh), Gaddi the son of Susi; from the tribe of Dan, Ammiel the son of Gemalli; from the tribe of Asher, Sethur the son of Michael; from the tribe of Naphtali, Nahbi the son of Vophsi; from the tribe of Gad, Geuel the son of Machi. These were the names of the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land. And Moses called Hoshea the son of Nun Joshua. Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan and said to them, “Go up into the Negeb and go up into the hill country, and see what the land is, and whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, whether they are few or many, and whether the land that they dwell in is good or bad, and whether the cities that they dwell in are camps or strongholds, and whether the land is rich or poor, and whether there are trees in it or not. Be of good courage and bring some of the fruit of the land.” Now the time was the season of the first ripe grapes. So they went up and spied out the land from the wilderness of Zin to Rehob, near Lebo-hamath. They went up into the Negeb and came to Hebron. Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the descendants of Anak, were there. (Hebron was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.) And they came to the Valley of Eshcol and cut down from there a branch with a single cluster of grapes, and they carried it on a pole between two of them; they also brought some pomegranates and figs. That place was called the Valley of Eshcol, because of the cluster that the people of Israel cut down from there. At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the people of Israel in the wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh. They brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. And they told him, “We came to the land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. And the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.” But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.” Then the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.” Num 12:16-13:33

Return of the Man-Child (5)  (audio)  David Eells – 4/2/25  We've been exploring what it means that everything that happened in the Gospels and in the Book of Acts is going to happen again, except it will be on a worldwide scale, and the cast of characters will be multiplied. So we've been looking at the characters to see what they will do in their corporate bodies in our day. We need prayer.   Father, in the name of Jesus, we ask You to be with us this day, to open our understanding, to lead us, to guide us, to give words of wisdom and knowledge that will reveal Your Will to us. Thank You so much, Father. You are our guide, our wisdom, and we thank You so much for leading us in this Bible study. Amen  Let's back up to where we left off. We saw that Herod, as a type of the Beast, was attempting to destroy the Man-child and actually did murder many “man-children” in Bethlehem (which means “the house of food”). We also saw that, as a type and shadow, the Lord told us, A voice was heard in Ramah, Weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children; And she would not be comforted because they are not (Mat.2:18). When we were looking at the text in Jeremiah 31:15-20, the words “they are not” did not mean physical death. It meant spiritual death because Rachel's children had been taken into Babylonish captivity. They were in bondage to the Beast, and they were not serving God but serving the Beast. The Beast was their head and ruler; it was ruling over them. (Rom.8:13) For if ye live after the flesh, ye must die; but if by the Spirit ye put to death the deeds of the body, ye shall live. (14) For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. So spiritual death is definitely what is being pointed out here in this text. There was no physical death involved in the original text of Jeremiah. It's very interesting that, in all of our lives, the Beast has to die. If it does not die, we are not free to follow the Lord.  The very next two verses give us more clues. (Mat.2:19) But when Herod was dead, behold, an angel of the Lord appeareth in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, saying, (20) Arise and take the young child and his mother, and go into the land of Israel: for they are dead that sought the young child's life. Notice again the word “they,” meaning more than one person. That may point to the fact that Herod represents in our day a corporate body, but we know from this that Jesus was ready to come out of His wilderness and start His ministry when Herod, the Beast who ruled, was dead. I believe that's a type and shadow for us in our day.   It goes on to say, And he arose and took the young child (Note that He is still being called a “young child,” the same as He was called when the wise men came.) and his mother, and came into the land of Israel (Mat.2:21). He had to come out of His wilderness to do that. He came from Egypt, a type of the world, through the Sinai Peninsula and the wilderness there, and into the land of Israel. And Jesus was coming out of His wilderness from Chapter 4:1 on down, where He came from His personal wilderness to His ministry. This may be the exact same type. We noticed that Moses, David, and Jesus all had a perfect parallel.   (Mat.2:22) But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judaea in the room of his father Herod, he was afraid to go thither; and being warned [of God] in a dream, he withdrew into the parts of Galilee, (23) and came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth; that it might be fulfilled which was spoken through the prophets, that he should be called a Nazarene. This is rather interesting. We've seen many revelations about a baby being born in a type of the Man-child, yet the baby was born very mature and alert and grew up very quickly. We've seen quite a few of those and I think we see in this text that this is true. It refers to a “young child” in verse 21, and it's still talking about that young child for the next two verses.  But immediately following this, it says, And in those days cometh John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judaea (Mat.3:1). That's intriguing; what happened to all those years in between? John the Baptist was only six months older than Jesus, so in Matthew 3:1, Jesus had to be almost 30 years old. You could not start your public ministry to the congregation until you were 30. That was the law. The text jumps from Jesus as a young child all the way to “in those days” with John the Baptist starting his ministry at age 30, and it makes you think, “Well, that Man-child must have grown-up very quickly.” Do you suppose this was a type and shadow of what is going to happen in our day? That the Man-child will be birthed and then immediately be caught up to the throne? In Revelation 12:5, the baby was born and then he was caught up to the throne of God; then he was leading the woman through the wilderness, which appears pretty fast. Clearly, God is shortening the time span that it takes because we don't have a lot of time for Jesus in the Man-child to grow up.  At any rate, John the Baptist's ministry was very short, starting when he was 30 years old. Six months later, Jesus was anointed to preach the Isaiah 61 anointing message, and He was 30 years old, so Matthew 3 is actually between when John the Baptist began his ministry and when Jesus began His. (Mat.3:1) And in those days cometh John the Baptist, preaching in the wilderness of Judaea, saying, (2) Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. That was proven by the great signs and wonders that God did in the midst of them, to show them that the Kingdom of Heaven was at hand. In other words, the Kingdom where God rules and where He reigns over the curse, over the devil, and over the flesh was at hand. It's obvious where the Kingdom of God rules because He does signs and wonders.  John the Baptist had a relatively simple ministry, which was the preaching of repentance. It did not seem that he ever went into much deep doctrine. He preached, “turning from your sins,” yet he had a very anointed ministry and he was, according to Jesus, the greatest of the Old Testament teachers “born of women” (Matthew 11:7). Jesus also said he that is but little in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he (Mat.11:11), meaning John the Baptist was the greatest of the old order ministers before the former rain came. Jesus came with the former rain, and that brought the Kingdom. So John was the greatest born of women up until that time.  I believe that we have just such a corporate body of preachers coming right now, who will probably be considered the greatest from among the former rain, before the latter rain comes, because now the former rain is the old order and we're coming to the latter rain. Some of you are seeing this program down the road, and all this is history, but at the point we are now, this revival is starting with the John the Baptist ministry and is yet to happen. We're on the very brink of it, and it is going to be a corporate body of people around the world who are coming to prepare the way for the coming of the Lord. (Mat.3:3) For this is he that was spoken of through Isaiah the prophet, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make ye ready the way of the Lord, Make his paths straight. Obviously, without repentance, you cannot do that. If you want the Lord to live in you, it will not happen without repentance. John the Baptist was preparing hearts to receive the Lord Jesus and to receive the Man-child in our day. History is repeating.  (Mat.3:4) Now John himself had his raiment of camel's hair, and a leathern girdle about his loins; and his food was locusts and wild honey. (5) Then went out unto him Jerusalem, and all Judaea, and all the region round about the Jordan. This sounds like a great revival, doesn't it? I did learn that “all” was not all because the Lord said that the Pharisees and the Sadducees rejected for themselves the counsel of John, being not baptized of him (Luk.7:30). So “all” here means all of the elect, not all of the people. The Jews understood that very well because they believed in election. They believed that they were the elect people, the “chosen” (which is the same word, eklektos), people of God, and that God did not choose anyone outside of them.  Well, it's still the same today. (Mat.22:14) For many are called, but few chosen. God does call “many” unto Him, but not all are called, and of those whom He calls, He still chooses only those who bear fruit. The first thing people need is repentance, and I believe that we will see this preaching of repentance through some very anointed men of God, men who have the former rain anointing. And it's going to start a great revival, as in this passage where you see people coming out of their “churches” and going into the wilderness to meet John. (Mat.3:6) And they were baptized of him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. That's a good sign of repentance, when people confess their sins. Every great revival starts out that way, and a great anointing falls on people to be grieved over their sinfulness and to repent and confess their sins.  (Mat.3:7) But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said unto them, Ye offspring of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? John was very hard on their preachers, wasn't he? That got him in a lot of trouble – and Jesus, as well. No doubt that the same exact thing is going to happen in our day because the leadership of the churches has been leading them astray for a long, long time. (Mat.3:8) Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of repentance: (9) and think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham to our father: for I say unto you, that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. Notice that it says we are to bring forth fruits. It hasn't been very long since I was confronted by a preacher who told me that he had repented of various abominable things that he was doing. He said that he had gone to God and asked God to forgive him, and he was forgiven. I said, “Well, that's fine, but that's not repentance because repentance is changing, and you're still in the middle of a crime spree.” So you have to change your mind because that's what “repentance” means; it means “to turn and go the other way.” That preacher didn't know what repentance was because he was not doing it. That's what John is saying here: “Bring forth fruit worthy of repentance.” There has to be fruit of repentance.  There has to be fruit showing in your actions that you are changing your mind, and John demanded that, even of these religious leaders. Obviously, some of them put on a show for the people. (Mat.3:10) And even now the axe lieth at the root of the trees … Amen! That was true in John's ministry, and it will be true in ministries today, that the axe is at the root of the trees. By Matthew 13, Jesus was saying that those religious leaders were reprobated, saying, Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but unto them it is not given (Mat.13:11); and that He had blinded their eyes (Matthew 13:13). (Mat.3:10) And even now the axe lieth at the root of the trees: every tree therefore that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.  (Mat.3:11) I indeed baptize you in water unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear: he shall baptize you in the Holy Spirit and [in] fire. And Jesus did just that; He brought the baptism of the Holy Spirit and was the first one of the former rain to receive, according to type, the baptism of the Holy Spirit. In fact, He received it in the verses immediately following these that we're studying. (Mat.3:12) Whose fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly cleanse his threshing-floor (The fan was used to blow away the chaff, which was useless, and to leave the heavier grain, which is the fruit that God was after.); and he will gather his wheat into the garner, but the chaff he will burn up with unquenchable fire. The chaff represents the old man, the carnal man, the fiery trials that we go through to burn up the old man and leave nothing but the spiritual man. Notice that John preached to “make His paths straight” and here Jesus is cleansing the people.  There is a text that speaks of this differently. (Mal.3:1) Behold, I send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord, whom ye seek, will suddenly come to his temple (That represented Jesus, but it also represents the Manchild because this is a repetition of history. The word “temple” here means His body. (Heb.10:5) A body didst thou prepare for me.); and the messenger of the covenant, whom ye desire, behold, he cometh, saith the Lord of hosts. (Mal.3:2) But who can abide the day of his coming? and who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like a refiner's fire (That is the fire to burn up the chaff.), and like fullers' soap: (3) and he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi. Remember, the sons of Levi were the only ones who did not bow to the golden calf, the image of the Beast. They were the true ministers of the sanctuary.  He also said that He had called us to be a kingdom of priests (Exodus 19:6), so really all of God's true people are priests because we have an offering of fire to bring forth and we present our bodies as a living sacrifice on that altar of the fiery trial. That is the crucified life. That is what Jesus called taking up your cross and following Him, for you to be His disciple (Matthew 16:24). (Mal.3:3) And he will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, and refine them as gold and silver; and they shall offer unto the Lord offerings in righteousness. (4) Then shall the offering of Judah and Jerusalem be pleasant unto the Lord, as in the days of old, and as in ancient years. For our day, He's talking about New Testament spiritual Judah and Israel and the New Jerusalem.   (Mal.3:5) And I will come near to you to judgment; and I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, and against the adulterers, and against the false swearers, and against those that oppress the hireling in his wages, the widow, and the fatherless, and that turn aside the sojourner [from his right,] and fear not me, saith the Lord of hosts. God is going to judge quickly those hanging around His people who are walking in their sinfulness. He will be very protective of His holy Church in these days with Ananias and Sapphira-like judgments on people trying to sneak in, acting as though they are Christians while they are not. So far, it's been difficult to keep that from happening, but the Lord says that He will put an end to it. Praise God! He is going to have a holy Church.  (Mat.3:13) Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to the Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him. (14) But John would have hindered him, saying, I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me? (15) But Jesus answering said unto him, Suffer [it] now: for thus it becometh us to fulfil all righteousness. Then he suffereth him. Obviously, we need to be baptized, or put to death, by the washing of the water of the Word (Ephesians 5:26), a crucifixion of the old man, which is what it's all about. It behooves us to do this. Jesus went through this before He came to His anointing, which is very important. (Mat.3:16) And Jesus, when he was baptized, went up straightway from the water: and lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove, and coming upon him; (17) and lo, a voice out of the heavens, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Jesus was baptized in the Spirit here; He was anointed in order to start His ministry.   And we're also told this in (Luk.1:31) Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS. (32) He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Most High: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David: (33) and he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end. So Jesus came to be anointed to take David's throne. That's what this anointing was about; it was the king's anointing. All the kings received this anointing when they took their position. Right after Jesus was filled with the Spirit and before going into His wilderness, it says, The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, Because he anointed me to preach good tidings to the poor (Luk.4:18). Jesus was 30 years old when this happened. This anointing of the Spirit started His public ministry and goes right along with history.  Joseph was 30 years old, according to Genesis 41:46, when he stood before Pharaoh and received the kingdom, and David was 30 years old when he began his ministry, which is very interesting. All these types of the Man-child were 30 years old. (2Sa.5:3) So all the elders of Israel came to the king to Hebron; and king David made a covenant with them in Hebron before the Lord: and they anointed David king over Israel. (4) David was thirty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned forty years. Forty is the number of tribulation. (5) In Hebron he reigned over Judah seven years and six months; and in Jerusalem he reigned thirty and three years over all Israel and Judah. Jesus came to sit on David's throne. Jesus was anointed King of kings and He reigned over the true tribes of Israel. The apostate tribes did not recognize Him, but the true tribes did. Those who were born of God recognized Him immediately. He merely walked by His disciples and said, “Come, follow Me,” and they dropped their nets, left their business, left everything, and walked after Him. Now that's a strong calling! They just followed Him.  Well, what was the first thing that David did after he was anointed? (2Sa.5:6) And the king and his men went to Jerusalem … It wasn't called Jerusalem then. (1Ch.11:4) And David and all Israel went to Jerusalem (the same is Jebus); and the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land, were there. It wasn't called Jerusalem until they conquered it. (2Sa.5:6) And the king and his men went to Jerusalem against the Jebusites (which means “to trample down” or “trodden under foot”), the inhabitants of the land, who spake unto David, saying, Except thou take away the blind and the lame, thou shalt not come in hither; thinking, David cannot come in hither. Jerusalem had to be conquered before it could be called Jerusalem, before it could be Zion. It was in the hands of the pagans, in the hands of the old man, the Jebusite. We know from Revelation that Jerusalem is the Bride, but she did not start out as the Bride; she started out as a pagan, as an unbeliever, and was converted and became the Bride. Jerusalem, before David conquered it, was Jebus.  David's job was to take Jerusalem, to show his men how to conquer and take Jerusalem. With the coming of the Man-child ministry, which is also a Davidic ministry, the first thing that's going to happen is that they'll be conquering Jebus. They're going to raise up Jerusalem again – not old Jerusalem; they're going to raise up New Jerusalem. Paul spoke about it in Hebrews 12, but then there was a great falling away, and this place represented holiness, the place of safety, the Bride. It represented the only place the Beast could not conquer, and it represented the Philadelphia church because it was the only one that escaped the hour of trial from the Beast kingdom. Here, we see that the Jebusites were telling David, “You'd better get rid of the blind and the lame, or you can't come here.” In other words, nobody who is blind and lame can take Zion. It represents the Bride, who is not blind and lame. She is spotless and blemishless because she has overcome some things, especially being lame, which represents being crippled or not being able to walk right with the Lord. And she has overcome being blind, which represents not being able to see, understand, or discern the truths of God.  So they said, Except thou take away the blind and the lame, thou shalt not come in hither; thinking, David cannot come in hither (2Sa.5:6). You know, some people do not think it's possible and, in fact, there are a lot of preachers right now who are saying that it's not possible for you to be an overcomer. They say that you just have to settle for being “a sinner saved by grace.” The old man does not think that it's possible for you to conquer him and have this place become Zion, the holy city. (2Sa.5:7) Nevertheless David took the stronghold of Zion; the same is the city of David. (8) And David said on that day, Whosoever smiteth the Jebusites, let him get up to the watercourse, and [smite] the lame and the blind, that are hated of David's soul … The lame and the blind represent the apostates. Of course, the Jebusite represents the old man, and David and his men represent the spiritual man who must conquer Zion. We've been called to do that, and David is telling them that the way to do it is to “get up to the watercourse and smite the lame and the blind.” Put to death the old apostasy in your life. Two rivers fed Jerusalem, and David's men used those rivers to get into Jerusalem.  The place of the watercourses was where the water drained out of Jerusalem, akin to the sewer system. Instead of scaling the walls, they could go up the sewer. They probably smelled pretty bad by the time they got in there to take their sword and go to work, but that's what he was saying. Though most of this was probably river water, they still had to go against the current that was coming out of Jebus, so they were “going against the flow,” so to speak. And that's the way it is with us. Everything we do is contrary to the world: what they think is the right way, we think is the wrong way; what they think is up, we think is down. If we humble ourselves, God will exalt us. At any rate, David was teaching them that the way to conquer the city and the lame and the blind was through the water. (2Sa.5:8) … Wherefore they say, There are the blind and the lame; he cannot come into the house.  (2Sa.5:9) And David dwelt in the stronghold, and called it the city of David. And David built round about from Millo and inward. He is talking about the ramparts of Jerusalem, so David built Jerusalem. He was the one who started building the “New Jerusalem” at that point. Jesus was doing the same thing. What Paul described with, ye are come unto mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem (Heb.12:22) … and to the spirits of just men made perfect (23), was what Jesus was building. I've shared with you a revelation the Lord gave me many years ago, where He showed me the tower in the midst of what was depicted as the New Jerusalem and He was giving it to me, revealing to me that my ministry was to build this tower. I found that Micah 4:8 spoke of Jerusalem as “the tower of the flock,” and it was the kind of tower that they actually built in those days in the midst of those cities to preserve them from invading beast armies. Jerusalem was just that; it was a place of safety where, if beasts invaded, whether from Babylon or Assyria, the people could flee into the broad walls and be protected.  David was building the tower of the flock here. (2Sa.5:10) And David waxed greater and greater; for the Lord, the God of hosts, was with him. I have found this language referring to only two people in the Scriptures, where it says, “waxed greater and greater.” It spoke of David, and it spoke of Mordecai, whose name means “little man” or “man-child.” Mordecai was the same type as David; both of them were the Man-child. Mordecai's job was to raise up the Bride, Esther, and save the people of God from the Beast, Haman. Basically, this is the same thing that David did. He raised up the Bride, Jerusalem, and defended the people from one of the Beasts, the Philistines. David's first job was to conquer the Jebusites and take their city away.  In thinking about this, I'd like to share with you a revelation we received concerning the same thing. This is Pamela Orr's revelation, and she received it in January 2010. My notes are in parentheses.  In a dream, I was in a house that is safe and secure. I have no desire or plans to leave this house. (Pamela is a part of our broader UBM Fellowship safe-house, but also, I believe that this is referring to Zion, and she had no plans to leave.) To my amazement, though, there are people leaving. … I'm given to know that there are many who do not return. (This is necessary because the sons of perdition and the Jezebels and the rest of the tares who have come in amongst God's people cannot be a part of this Zion, as I will show you shortly. The only people who entered Zion were the ones who conquered the lame and the blind, and it became Zion, the holy city, because they were the only people there. The Jebusites were driven out. The carnal Jebusites are leaving Jebus so that it may become Zion. They're being conquered. Zion is the Bride. Praise the Lord!   I remember her brother Mark Fritz, who is a part of our fellowship, asked the Lord when he first met us about the church he was currently attending. God answered that it was Pergamum, which was the third church of Revelation that was caught up in the Nicolaitan error. So Mark asked the Lord about UBM, and the Lord said, “The sixth church.” So he counted and found out that the sixth church was the Philadelphia church, which is the Bride, the one that escapes the hour of trial under the dominion of the Beast, and the name means “the love of the brethren.”)  There are locks on this house, a whole row of them, probably seven or more, but I didn't count them. (This is a very secure place, like Zion, which was called “the stronghold of Zion.” We're all supposed to be climbing Mount Zion to enter into the presence of the King. The throne is on Mount Zion; the Temple is on Mount Zion; His presence is there.) These locks are high up in the wall. We can't touch them or tamper with them; they are a fixture of the house. (The key to enter is high up with God. It is not with man.) Some, if not all, of these locks are specific to profiles. For example, there is the ‘age 18-and-over' lock. I'm given to know that when a certain lock turns over, then no one fitting this profile will ever again be allowed to enter the house. (I thought about that and felt that the Lord was saying that God gives more grace to the immature and innocent. He does not impute iniquity to them, but the further they go in their walk, the more they are held accountable. (Luk.12:48) to whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required, so when people become accountable and they do not walk in their accountability, then they will be out of there. They will not have a position in that house.)  As I watch these locks turn, as if of their own accord, I realize that when the final lock has been turned, no one else will be allowed to enter. (That's the way it is with spiritual Zion, folks. Many years ago, I saw in a vision our ministry starting in Pensacola as a Zion, the Tower of the Flock, the Bride. I know that this is going on around the world with people who are desiring earnestly to be obedient to the Scriptures, live the crucified life before their Lord, and walk in the grace of God. (Mic.4:8) And thou, O tower of the flock, the hill of the daughter of Zion, unto thee shall it come, yea, the former dominion shall come … When David took Jebus and it became the stronghold of Zion, the City of David, that was their stronghold. That was where the dominion started, right there. It said the former dominion was going to return to Zion, the Tower of the Flock, the Kingdom of the daughter of Jerusalem. Note that the former dominion is not going to return to Jerusalem, but it's going to return to the daughter of Jerusalem or, in other words, to New Jerusalem. God is once again, in our day, going to raise up a David who will raise up Zion once more as the stronghold, the Bride.)  (In this New Jerusalem Zion, the wicked were not allowed, as Scripture says. (Isa.52:1) Awake, awake, put on thy strength, O Zion (So it is coming to its former dominion.); put on thy beautiful garments (These garments are righteousness, purity and holiness.), O Jerusalem, the holy city: for henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean. A New Jerusalem is started that does not allow any of the wicked. You can only do that with a spiritual city. In any physical city, you're going to have all kinds of people there, some of them good, some of them bad. But in this spiritual city, there will not be anybody unclean. That's what these locks are all about; they're to find out who is walking in purity and to keep out the rest. As I said, with knowledge comes responsibility, so the further you go, the more that's expected of you. When David first became king as a type of the Man-child, he taught his overcomers how to take the stronghold of Jebus from the Jebusites, representing the old man. Then Jebus became Zion, the City of David, a type of the Bride following the Man-child at the beginning of the Tribulation.)  (Father is cleaning house and will keep the evil ones out of His safe-house. Praise the Lord! As John said, He that hath the bride is the bridegroom (Joh.3:29). Soon, many, by their own evil nature, will not want to associate with the righteous for fear of alienating their Beast associations. God is separating here, and He is going to make His heavenly Zion a place where only the righteous will want to go. They will have had to conquer the lame and the blind to get there. They will have had to overcome. David's mighty men were sent by David to take Zion, and they took it. Jesus did the same thing with the disciples He raised up, who were His mighty men. Praise God!)  Speaking of entering this safe-house, people are entering. (The righteous are entering because they are the only ones who can come into this safe-house, the New Jerusalem.) Others are trying to enter, but the “bad guys” don't seem to make it past the door. (Praise the Lord! That is awesome. This is just like Ananias and Sapphira; they tried to enter, but God took them out.) And each bad guy gets done-in by the next bad guy. The bad guys get progressively worse, too. (2 Timothy 3 speaks about how bad the Church is going to get in our day. Verses 1 through 6 are pretty rough, and then it says, But evil men and impostors (KJV: “seducers”) shall wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived (2Ti.3:13). This is true in the Church today because that's what he was referring to. He wasn't talking about the world.) The second-to-last bad guy is sort of a handicapped or perverted or dwarflike individual with short little legs like tree trunks. (Here is a perverted dwarf. I see one thing here, spiritually speaking: those who do not measure up to the stature of the fruit of Christ are not going to be permitted in Zion.)  This is where it gets awful. The final bad guy (the Beast) begins to compress, squeeze, or fold this dwarf-like individual until he murders him. (Spiritually speaking, those who have not yet experienced the crucified life will have help from the Beast to go to their cross and to manifest death-to-self. Those who do not measure up will need crucifixion in the world. How do we grow up into Christ? Jesus said, He that findeth his life shall lose it; and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it (Mat.10:39). You do not gain your life unless you lose your life, so growing up is a matter of the crucified life. If we do not accept it, we cannot grow up. If we do not accept it, we cannot put away the blindness and the lameness and cannot expect to go into Zion. Remember, we are told, for henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean (Isa.52:1).) The evil nature of this final bad guy was beyond description. (That is the Beast.) I can only say that I could almost feel this individual's sick joy and satisfaction in pressing the life out of the other poor sucker. (She is talking about the apostate Christians, I believe. Many of the apostate Christians are going to be saved because of the crucifixion that the Lord puts them in. His fan is in his hand, and he will thoroughly cleanse his threshing-floor; and … the chaff he will burn up with unquenchable fire (Mat.3:12), but He will have something in the midst of that which will be holy and precious.)   (Not everyone will be sanctified. Some people just get worse in tribulation. One thing that helps people to be able to come to Zion in the midst of tribulation is to know what God is doing. He is doing something for them. He is putting to death their old flesh, which cannot enter the Kingdom. By the Word of God, you learn how to cooperate with God, and then you see that this is a victory, not a failure. If the Church receives a lot of this prosperity doctrine and they do not believe that they are ever going to go through anything, any trouble, any tribulation, then these things come upon them as a shock, and they think that God has forsaken them. They are tempted to fall, and many do. So there has to be knowledge for the people to understand that God is doing a good thing with them and that they need to go through this, that they're privileged to go through this, and that they can have eternal life in the Kingdom. That's what the Man-child is coming to do; that's what Jesus came to do. Spiritually speaking, that's what David was doing. He was teaching men how to overcome the blind and the lame, teaching them how to take Jebus.) Even though I was horrified and sickened at the depravity, I was still safe in the (UBM) house. (Praise the Lord! Because God has a safe-house. He really does! I know that many people think that this is heresy, but that's not true. God has His safe-house.)  This same story is in 1 Chronicles. (1Ch.11:4) And David and all Israel went to Jerusalem (the same is Jebus); and the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land, were there. (5) And the inhabitants of Jebus said to David, Thou shalt not come in hither. Nevertheless David took the stronghold of Zion; the same is the city of David. (6) And David said, Whosoever smiteth the Jebusites first shall be chief and captain. And Joab the son of Zeruiah went up first, and was made chief. (7) And David dwelt in the stronghold; therefore they called it the city of David. (8) And he built the city round about, from Millo even round about; and Joab repaired the rest of the city. (9) And David waxed greater and greater; for the Lord of hosts was with him.  Yes, and what was the next thing David did? He brought the Ark of the Covenant. (1Ch.13:3) And let us bring again the ark of our God to us: for we sought not unto it in the days of Saul. The Israelites had been following after the flesh of Saul. That's why they got destroyed, and that's why Saul died. But David said, “No, we have to follow the Ark of the Covenant.” (1Ch.15:1) And [David] made him houses in the city of David; and he prepared a place for the ark of God, and pitched for it a tent. The word for “tent” is the same word for “tabernacle.” (2) Then David said, None ought to carry the ark of God but the Levites … Absolutely! Who else can carry the presence of God but the priests of God who have offered their bodies as living sacrifices? They are the ones who are holy; they are the ones who are the temple of God.  If you read further, it says, And they brought in the ark of God, and set it in the midst of the tent that David had pitched for it (1Ch.16:1). We know that God said He was going to raise up again this tabernacle. (Act.15:14) Symeon hath rehearsed how first God visited the Gentiles, to take out of them a people for his name. (15) And to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written, (16) After these things I will return, And I will build again the tabernacle of David, which is fallen; And I will build again the ruins thereof, And I will set it up: (17) That the residue of men may seek after the Lord, And all the Gentiles, upon whom my name is called. So now we're talking about raising up a tabernacle of David, which represents the portable temple, for the wilderness, but also the portable temple of the Church. Once again, we see that there is a David coming for the Church, and that's the Lord Jesus Himself, Who is the Son of David, Who was sitting upon His throne.  But the Bible also says, David shall never want a man to sit upon the throne of the house of Israel (Jer.33:17). There is a body in whom the Lord Jesus comes. The Son of Man came in the son of David 2000 years ago, and the Son of Man is coming in a spiritual Son of David today, a corporate Body called the Man-child ministry. Jesus is going to minister to His people, to raise up, once again, the Bride, the New Jerusalem. “He that hath the bride is the bridegroom,” as John said when he pointed at Jesus. He will raise up the Bride, the New Jerusalem, which is protected from the Assyrian Beast. When the Beast tried to conquer Jerusalem, God killed 185,000 of them and they left it alone (2 Kings 19:35). Folks, I tell you, the same thing is going to happen again. God is going to protect His Bride.  For instance, in the Book of Esther, there was the Bride, and there were also the people who were threatened by the Beast. Haman, the Beast, had been given authority to destroy the people of God (Esther 2:10-11), but Mordecai and Esther had been given authority to save the people of God (Esther 8:8). There were two contrary commands given, but they have their purpose and that is to make us decide whom we are going to serve, the Lord or the Beast.  Rachel's children fell into captivity of the Beast, and they were counted as dead, like the parable in Matthew 2:18, of the children of Bethlehem. It physically happened, but it was also a parable of things to come. In our day, many people are going to follow the Beast. They will take the mark of the Beast, which is a sign of his ownership, and these people will die. They will not bear the fruit of the Man-child, as Jesus did. Once again, we see that God is just going to repeat history, and Matthew 2 is going to be fulfilled, as well as Matthew 3. All the types of the Man-child are running in perfect parallel. Joseph was 30 years old, Jesus was 30 years old and David was 30 years old when they started their ministries, and they basically had the same job to do. It was shown in a slightly different parable each time, but it was the same job to be done.  Now the Man-child ministry is spiritually going to be 30 and it's going to start by building the New Jerusalem. Praise be to God! First, however, the Jebusites have to lose their grip and be conquered. And we need to know how to conquer this old man so that we can scale the heights of the City of God, the mountain of His holiness, and enter into His Presence. That is what the Word will do, and that is what the new anointed leadership is going to do for us. They are to teach us how to cooperate with God's work in our lives and be happy about it. Let's face it: if you don't know what God is doing, you're not happy about it. As soon as you get revelation, you can enjoy going through tribulation because you know that the Lord is getting you ready for His Kingdom, the manifestation of eternal life. Praise God!  Father, we thank You, in Jesus' name. Please open our eyes and make us joyful in cooperating with You in this process of sanctification, in becoming that holy, spotless, and blemishless Bride that You always wanted. Thank You, Father, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

At last all of Israel recognizes David as their king whom God has appointed to be their shepherd. Once more, David is anointed as king, and we learn that his combined reign in Hebron and Jerusalem was a complete forty years. Although the Jebusites mock David's ability to take their city, the LORD grants David success and gives to him Jerusalem. There, Hiram the king of Tyre builds David a palace for David's growing family and court. The LORD further gives David success on the battlefield against the Philistines. David continues to inquire of the LORD for military strategy, and the LORD continues to fight for David and defeat His enemies. Throughout this chapter, both David's successes and sins point toward Jesus as the true Good Shepherd and King for all people.  Rev. Matt Wietfeldt, Assistant Vice President of Admissions and Director of the Christ Academy Program at Concordia Theological Seminary in Ft. Wayne, IN, joins host Rev. Timothy Appel to study 2 Samuel 5:1-25.  "A Kingdom Unlike All the Nations” is a series on Sharper Iron that goes through 1-2 Samuel. This time in Israel's history has its highs and lows, but the LORD's faithfulness never wavers. He provides His Word to be proclaimed faithfully through prophets like Samuel and Nathan. Even as princes like Saul and David sit on an earthly throne, the LORD remains King over His people, even as He does now and forever through the Lord Jesus Christ. Sharper Iron, hosted by Rev. Timothy Appel, looks at the text of Holy Scripture both in its broad context and its narrow detail, all for the sake of proclaiming Christ crucified and risen for sinners. Two pastors engage with God's Word to sharpen not only their own faith and knowledge, but the faith and knowledge of all who listen. Submit comments or questions to: listener@kfuo.org

After this, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision: “Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield,[a] your very great reward.[b]” 2 But Abram said, “Sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit[c] my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3 And Abram said, “You have given me no children; so a servant in my household will be my heir.” 4 Then the word of the Lord came to him: “This man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir.” 5 He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars—if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring[d] be.” 6 Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness. 7 He also said to him, “I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to take possession of it.” 8 But Abram said, “Sovereign Lord, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?” 9 So the Lord said to him, “Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon.” 10 Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half. 11 Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them away. 12 As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him. 13 Then the Lord said to him, “Know for certain that for four hundred years your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and that they will be enslaved and mistreated there. 14 But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will come out with great possessions. 15 You, however, will go to your ancestors in peace and be buried at a good old age. 16 In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure.” 17 When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces. 18 On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, “To your descendants I give this land, from the Wadi[e] of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates— 19 the land of the Kenites, Kenizzites, Kadmonites, 20 Hittites, Perizzites, Rephaites, 21 Amorites, Canaanites, Girgashites and Jebusites.”

For today’s installment of our 40 Days Meditation series, our brother Miguel Vargas provides commentary on Ex 34:10-28. Listen below, download here, or search for Words from the Brothers on your favourite podcasting app. And he said, “Behold, I am making a covenant. Before all your people I will do marvels, such as have not been created in all the earth or in any nation. And all the people among whom you are shall see the work of the Lord, for it is an awesome thing that I will do with you. “Observe what I command you this day. Behold, I will drive out before you the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. Take care, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land to which you go, lest it become a snare in your midst. You shall tear down their altars and break their pillars and cut down their Asherim (for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God), lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and when they whore after their gods and sacrifice to their gods and you are invited, you eat of his sacrifice, and you take of their daughters for your sons, and their daughters whore after their gods and make your sons whore after their gods. “You shall not make for yourself any gods of cast metal. “You shall keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, at the time appointed in the month Abib, for in the month Abib you came out from Egypt. All that open the womb are mine, all your male livestock, the firstborn of cow and sheep. The firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb, or if you will not redeem it you shall break its neck. All the firstborn of your sons you shall redeem. And none shall appear before me empty-handed. “Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest. In plowing time and in harvest you shall rest. You shall observe the Feast of Weeks, the firstfruits of wheat harvest, and the Feast of Ingathering at the year’s end. Three times in the year shall all your males appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel. For I will cast out nations before you and enlarge your borders; no one shall covet your land, when you go up to appear before the Lord your God three times in the year. “You shall not offer the blood of my sacrifice with anything leavened, or let the sacrifice of the Feast of the Passover remain until the morning. The best of the firstfruits of your ground you shall bring to the house of the Lord your God. You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.” And the Lord said to Moses, “Write these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.” So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights. He neither ate bread nor drank water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments. Ex 34:10-28

Third Sunday in Lent Old Testament Exodus 3:1-15 Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian; he led his flock beyond the wilderness, and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of a bush; he looked, and the bush was blazing, yet it was not consumed. Then Moses said, "I must turn aside and look at this great sight, and see why the bush is not burned up." When the Lord saw that he had turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, "Moses, Moses!" And he said, "Here I am." Then he said, "Come no closer! Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground." He said further, "I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. Then the Lord said, "I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them from the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the country of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. The cry of the Israelites has now come to me; I have also seen how the Egyptians oppress them. So come, I will send you to Pharaoh to bring my people, the Israelites, out of Egypt." But Moses said to God, "Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and bring the Israelites out of Egypt?" He said, "I will be with you; and this shall be the sign for you that it is I who sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall worship God on this mountain." But Moses said to God, "If I come to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your ancestors has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' what shall I say to them?" God said to Moses, "I am who I am." He said further, "Thus you shall say to the Israelites, 'I am has sent me to you.'" God also said to Moses, "Thus you shall say to the Israelites, 'The Lord, the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you': This is my name forever, and this my title for all generations.” The Psalm Psalm 63:1-8 Deus, Deus meus 1 O God, you are my God; eagerly I seek you; * my soul thirsts for you, my flesh faints for you, as in a barren and dry land where there is no water. 2 Therefore I have gazed upon you in your holy place, * that I might behold your power and your glory. 3 For your loving-kindness is better than life itself; * my lips shall give you praise. 4 So will I bless you as long as I live * and lift up my hands in your Name. 5 My soul is content, as with marrow and fatness, * and my mouth praises you with joyful lips, 6 When I remember you upon my bed, * and meditate on you in the night watches. 7 For you have been my helper, * and under the shadow of your wings I will rejoice. 8 My soul clings to you; * your right hand holds me fast. The Epistle 1 Corinthians 10:1-13 I do not want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate the same spiritual food, and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ. Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them, and they were struck down in the wilderness. Now these things occurred as examples for us, so that we might not desire evil as they did. Do not become idolaters as some of them did; as it is written, "The people sat down to eat and drink, and they rose up to play." We must not indulge in sexual immorality as some of them did, and twenty-three thousand fell in a single day. We must not put Christ to the test, as some of them did, and were destroyed by serpents. And do not complain as some of them did, and were destroyed by the destroyer. These things happened to them to serve as an example, and they were written down to instruct us, on whom the ends of the ages have come. So if you think you are standing, watch out that you do not fall. No testing has overtaken you that is not common to everyone. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it. The Gospel Luke 13:1-9 At that very time there were some present who told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. He asked them, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were worse sinners than all other Galileans? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish as they did. Or those eighteen who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them--do you think that they were worse offenders than all the others living in Jerusalem? No, I tell you; but unless you repent, you will all perish just as they did." Then he told this parable: "A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came looking for fruit on it and found none. So he said to the gardener, 'See here! For three years I have come looking for fruit on this fig tree, and still I find none. Cut it down! Why should it be wasting the soil?' He replied, 'Sir, let it alone for one more year, until I dig around it and put manure on it. If it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.'"

16 But in the cities of these peoples that the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes, 17 but you shall devote them to complete destruction, the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the Lord…

The Bible is filled with Key Chapters that are necessary to know in order to understand the message of the Bible. Today we'll study one of those passages as we look upon the installation of David as king. Join us as we see what this passage has to say and how it ties into the overall Word of God!  DISCUSSION AND STUDY QUESTIONS: 1.    The podcast gave a brief overview of the first few chapters of 2nd Samuel. How would you describe the political climate of Israel during this time?  2.    In light of the political climate of Israel prior to chapter 5, what is the significance of the statement in verse 1 that “all the tribes of Israel came to David?” Why would this have not been a “given”?  3.    We tend to assume that Jerusalem was always under Israelite control, and yet it was not. Joshua 15:63 explains that it was inhabited by Jebusites. What does David do in verse 7 and why do you think he did this? 4.    In verse 12, who did David recognize as the reason for him becoming king over Israel? How was this perspective different from Saul's perspective? How do you think this understanding fed into why David was a man after God's own heart (1 Samuel 13:14)?  5.    The podcast explains that Saul viewed his kingdom as something for himself, whereas David viewed it as something to bring about God's laws to be used for God's glory. How do we see these differences in the reigns of Saul versus David?  Check out our Bible Study Guide on the Key Chapters of Genesis! Available on Amazon! To see our dedicated podcast website with access to all our episodes and other resources, visit us at: www.keychapters.org. Find us on all major platforms, or use these direct links: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6OqbnDRrfuyHRmkpUSyoHv Itunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/366-key-chapters-in-the-bible/id1493571819 YouTube: Key Chapters of the Bible on YouTube. As always, we are grateful to be included in the "Top 100 Bible Podcasts to Follow" from Feedspot.com. Also for regularly being awarded "Podcast of the Day" from PlayerFM. Special thanks to Joseph McDade for providing our theme music.   

Sometimes, we can be walking in the promises of God, and things start getting tough.  Opposition.  Battles.  What's going on?  Is it time to give up? What happened to all those promises?   THE SPIRITUAL BATTLEFIELD Well over these last weeks on the program we've been looking at the fact that it's time to take the Promised Land. God makes so many promises of peace and of joy and His protection and forgiveness and eternal life, the list goes on and on and you know you and I can come up with so many excuses in our lives as to why those promises couldn't possibly ever be for us. It's true, we do. In a sense those excuses are completely natural and understandable. There was a young woman who wrote recently in response to a program, I want to share with you what she wrote because it's kind of a road we all travel sometimes, this is what she said: For a while now I've been getting negative thoughts and saying negative things, I know the devil's doing it and not God but it won't stop. I want so much to do Gods will and to walk in His ways, am I going mad? Will this wreck my relationship with God? I so much want to do His will for His glory and not mine. I want to be a serving and faithful servant for Him. I have all these problems; I say bad and negative things. I can say things without thinking, I tell lies and other unchristian things, what does it mean for me? Is it going to ruin my relationship with God? See this young woman is struggling with the realities of life. She wants to live in that Promised Land but somehow she's just, she just can't see how it's for her, she just can't seem to get there. We all struggle with these things, we struggle with doubt, we struggle with our failings, will this wreck everything with God? We go over that over and over again. Listen to me, it is time to take the Promised land. Over the last three weeks on the program we've been looking at Israel. God promised to Abraham, the father of Israel, this land of the Canaanites, the Promised Land. And centuries later, centuries, after Israel had grown into a large and mighty nation in slavery in Egypt God brought Moses and through a series of miracles he brought the nation of Israel, His chosen people, out of Egypt, through the Red Sea and they wandered in the desert for forty years as God purified them. And then one day under the leadership of Joshua because Moses had just died, they're standing on the banks of the Jordan River and finally ready to cross into the Promised Land. And what they discover is that there's already a whole bunch of other people living there, the Canaanites and the Jebusites and the Amorites and all those other little vegemites were already there. And even though this was Gods Promised Land it wasn't going to be delivered to them on a platter like a pizza, they had to go out and take it, they were on a war footing. They had to fight battle after battle beginning with Jericho, they went through a lot of battles to take the Promised Land. You know something, it's the same with you and with me and with that young woman, we live on a spiritual battlefield. That is the reality of life. And the moment we step out and we believe in Jesus, the moment we step out and say, "Lord, I'm going to follow you in your promises", we step onto that spiritual battlefield. John Eldridge in his book Waking The Dead makes this powerful statement, he says: Things are not what they seem, this is a world at war. And then he goes on to explain what he means, he writes this: The world in which we live is a combat zone. A violent clash of kingdoms, a bitter struggle unto the death. You were born into a world at war and you will live all your days in the midst of a great battle involving all the forces of heaven and hell and played out here on earth. Until we come to terms with that war as the context of our days, we simply will not understand life. See this is why over the last few weeks we've been working our way through this series in the Book of Joshua called, "It's Time To Take The Promised Land" because the context is war. The devil is not going to hand us God's promises on a silver platter. In fact, he is going to try to rob us of Gods promises at every turn. We'd like to think, particularly those of us who live in the affluent west that being a Christian means living in the blessings of God and having a comfortable life and having plenty of money and taking it easy. Well I don't know if you've noticed but life is not like that especially when we step onto the spiritual battlefield by giving our lives to Jesus Christ. The moment we do that all the forces of hell are unleashed against us. That's the reality, we shouldn't be surprised. I think that the surprise element is what makes it worse. We have these expectations of an easy and comfortable life and when satan unleashes all his devils against us, of temptation, of doubt, failure and opposition and trials and on and on and on, over and over and over, we start thinking 'wow there must be something wrong with me'. Au contraire! Inevitably when we decide to take hold of the promises of God in our lives there will be a battle involved. Don't be surprised by this, it's in the Bible. C S Lewis in his book Mere Christianity put it like this: One of the things that surprised me when I first read the New Testament, seriously, was that it talked so much about a dark power in the universe. A mighty evil spirit who was held to be the power behind death and disease and sin. This universe (writes Lewis) is at war. Wake up! The world is at war. The context of our lives following after Jesus Christ is a spiritual battlefield. See Israel was promised this land through Abraham centuries before they even got there. Do you think when God made that beautiful promise to Abraham that he expected battles and wars and stuff? Listen again just briefly to this beautiful promise to an old man, this impossible promise in Genesis chapter 15. The word of the Lord came to Abraham in a vision. He said 'don't be afraid, I'm your shield and your very great reward'. But Abraham said, 'O Sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus.' Abraham said, 'you have given me no children so a servant in my household will become my heir. And then the word of the Lord came to Abraham, 'this man will not be your heir but a son who comes from your own body will be your heir' and God took Abraham outside of the tent and said, 'look up at the heavens and count the stars if indeed you can count them' and then He said , 'so shall your offspring be. And Abraham believed the Lord and God credited it to him as righteousness. And God also said to him, 'I am the Lord who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to take possession of it.' But Abraham said, 'O Sovereign Lord how can I know that I will gain possession of it? So the Lord said to him, 'bring me a heifer and a goat and a ram, each three years old along with a dove and a young pigeon'. Abraham did that he brought all of those things and cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other. The birds however he did not cut in half. And then the birds of prey came down on the carcasses but Abraham drove them away and as the sun was setting Abraham fell into a deep sleep and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him and then the Lord said to him, 'know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and they will be enslaved and mistreated for four hundred years but I will punish the nation they serve as slaves and afterwards they will come out with great possessions. You however will go to your father's in peace and be buried at a good old age. In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure. And when the sun had set and the darkness had fallen, the smoking fire pot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces. On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abraham and said, "To your descendants I give this land. From the river of Egypt to the river of the Euphrates. The land of the Kenites and the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites and the Rephaites and Amorites and Canaanites and the Girgashites and the Jebushites. This was a serious promise, who would have ever had expected that is would involve battle after battle after battle after battle.   IT'S TIME So let's go from that promise of God to Abraham centuries before into the midst of the taking of the Promised Land. Israel, under the leadership of Joshua, crossed over, they fought battle after battle, they'd taken Jericho and city after city has fallen before them. Why? Because that's what God promised and we're going to pick up the story in Joshua chapter 18, they're not quite half way through taking this Promised Land. There are twelve tribes in Israel, five tribes have their land and seven are left to go, seven have yet to get their Promised Land. It must have seemed like an eternity. You know when you face battle after battle, we're tempted to pull over and stop, to take a breather that kind of turns into a lunch break that turns into a holiday that turns into long service leave and before you know it we haven't got what it takes to keep going again. I tell you, in my life in this ministry Christianityworks, I've been involved now for just on three years and the call on my heart as I took over to start producing radio programs again we weren't on any stations three years ago and today we're on over seven hundred stations in eighty countries around the world. I have to tell you it was hard work, battle after battle after battle. Sometimes there were not enough funds and people said they'd help but then they realised how hard it was to do this work and they just didn't deliver and they fell by the wayside. And people criticised and people didn't understand, you know what I'm talking about and you get tired, you get exhausted. It would have been so easy just to pull up, to slow down, to give up, what a temptation. And yet there was this promise of God in my heart that He'd called me to do this. But we're all tempted to give up half way. You know the only reason I haven't is because along the way I've had some great teaching on this subject from a wonderful teacher called Joyce Meyer and there was just one message and God wrote this stuff on my heart, 'to keep going' and that's my prayer for you today, just this one message that in these few moments we spend together that He will write His word on your heart to keep on pressing forward into the promises of God. Whether we're struggling with fear or sin or addiction or a tough relationship and we hear about Gods promises so we set out on that journey of faith but after a while, oh it's hard work and there is opposition and there are battles and we want to give up, you know what I mean. In fact my hunch is you know exactly what I mean. And it was the same with Israel, they were almost half way into taking the Promised Land, if you've got a Bible open it up, lets listen to Joshua chapter 18. The whole assembly of the Israelites gathered at Shiloh and set up there the Tent of the Meeting. The country was subdued before them but there were still seven Israelite tribes who had not yet received their inheritance. So Joshua said to the Israelites, 'how long will you wait before you begin to take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers has given you. Appoint three men from each tribe, I will send them out to make a survey of the land to write a description of it according to the inheritance of each then you will return to me. You are to divide the land into seven parts. Judah is to remain in its territory on the south and the House of Joseph in it's territory on the north. After you have written the descriptions of the seven parts of the land bring them here to me and I will cast lots for you in the presence of the Lord. The Levites however do not get a portion among you because the priestly service of the Lord is their inheritance and Gad and Rueben and the half tribe of Manassah have already received their inheritance on the east side of the Jordan, Moses the servant of the Lord gave it to them. As the men started on their way to map out the land Joshua instructed them, 'go and make a survey of the land, write a description of it then return to me and I will cast lots for you here at Shiloh in the presence of the Lord'. So the men left, they went through the land, they wrote its description on a scroll, town by town, in seven parts and returned to Joshua in the camp of Shiloh. Joshua then cast lots for them in Shiloh in the presence of the Lord and there he distributed the land to the Israelites according to their tribal divisions. I love this passage because they're almost half way through and it begins by saying, "the whole land, the whole country was subdued before them". See so much of the work had already been done , God had done so many things, they were so far down the track and sometimes when we're tired of the battle after battle we lose sight of how far we've come. We look back and then, then we see the mighty hand of God at work in the victories. Isn't it the same in our lives? You get tired and you think, "argh Lord this is too hard". It's time to just take a quick look back and see all the mighty things that God has done in our lives. I get such great courage from just looking back, even over these last three years in the ministry of Christianityworks and I think, "man, look at what God has done." And once they've looked back Joshua asks the sixty four million dollar question. Joshua said to the Israelites: How long will you wait before you take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers has already given you? How long will you wait? See you're almost half way there. You take a breather, you pull over, you stop, you get set in your ways, you can't go any further, you lose heart, what are you people doing, how long will you wait? What came next? There was work to be done. They sent the men out, they looked forward, they divided up the land into seven portions. See God always, ALWAYS involves us in what's going on, He never lets us become spiritual couch potatoes, He sent three men from each tribe out to survey the land, to record the land and to choose the seven divisions. And next they came back to Joshua and in the presence of the Lord Joshua cast lots. Really what Joshua was saying there is, "we're going to leave this up to God, we've got some work to do but God is in charge. We're going to cast lots for this land between the seven tribes in front of God and we will let God choose through the lots who gets what land." See there's a message for us here. If we're a people thats pressing forward into the promises of God don't stop, don't pull over, don't give up. If it's a tough relationship that you've been praying over and the Lords has been leading you to do good things, to serve and to support, to humble yourself and you're tired and you want to take a breather and you think, "augh, it's just not going to happen" and get to thinking, "this isn't working, it's not going anywhere, it's time to give up". Or God's called you to something, a ministry or a job or whatever it is that somehow, as you look back you can see all the good things He's done. But the promises seem like such a long way off. Whatever the situation, how long will you hang around here before you take the land that God has already given to you. Come on! Get up and do the things you know you have to do, do them under God and, and what? Do you think God is going to fail you? Do you think God is just leading you up the garden path? Do you think that God has put you up the creek in a barbed wire canoe without a paddle? Are His promises faithful, are they worth following, are they worth it?   THE FAITHFULNESS OF GOD Well are the promises of God real? In a sense in theory we can all answer, "sure, I mean if God is God and He makes a promise then it has to be real". But you know something, the theory and the reality can be two different things. I shared a little before about the battles over the last three years that I've travelled through in taking this ministry from, I guess, pretty much nothing to reaching millions of people each week. Now I don't want any of that to seem remarkable because it's nothing that we did, God opened door after door and performed miracle after miracle to do that and it's what God's called me to do, He's called you to something different. So let's not compare as I share my story, hear what God is saying to you today about your story. Now I'm someone who knows the theory of God's promises as well as anyone. I mean a big part of my job is to study God's Word to put together these programs. So I'm "in the theory" if you like all the time but the reality has been that it's been lots of hard work and there have been disappointments and setbacks. And one of the hardest things has been often the people closest to us, people in our own Church, who haven't understood what we do or supported us or encouraged us, there's so many times the finances looked critical. It's still something that happens now and I find myself thinking, "why is it that the people in our own Church don't even support us?" Or one station where we've had a huge audience for a number of years was talking about taking our program off air and we've had to pray and pray and pray and then finally see God's victory. And sometimes I think, "God why can't it be easier than this? God why does there have to be so many battles along the way?" And you know what Gods answer has been to me, so that you my child would discover my faithfulness for yourself. See God wants us to experience his faithfulness, not in theory but in practice and you know something, I know so much more today about the faithfulness of God than ever have simply by travelling through battle after battle and seeing the victories that God has brought along the way. And there is such an intense satisfaction as I look back on that and I can truly say, "yes Lord, it's been hard work but all the glory goes to you and not to me because I could never have done this". The Book of Joshua that we've been travelling through these last weeks is about Israel's battles on the journey of taking the Promised Land. And when finally all the land is taken and allocated to all the tribes have a listen to what God's Word says, if you've got a Bible open it at Joshua chapter 21 beginning at verse 43. So the Lord gave Israel all the land that He had sworn to give their forefathers and they took possession of it and settled there and the Lord gave them rest on every side just as He had sworn to their forefathers, not one of their enemies withstood them, the Lord handed all their enemies over to them, not one of all the Lord's good promises to the House of Israel failed, every one was fulfilled. WOW! Let's just let that sink in for a minute. Not one of all the Lords good promises to the House of Israel failed, every one was fulfilled. When God makes a promise he never ever fails to deliver. When Jesus promised that He came that we would have life in all its abundance, that is a promise of God and it's a promise He intends to keep in your life and in mine. And as we travel through battle after battle and hang close to Him and just let those promises of God glow in our hearts and we hang on to them through this spiritual battlefield the devil comes after you with a meat cleaver and you fail some days and you stumble and you remember Jesus on that cross, you remember He purchased that life for you, we can know in our hearts that now, now it's time to take the Promised Land. And not one of all the Lord's good promises to you or to me will fail; every one of them will be fulfilled. It is time to take the Promised Land.

For today’s installment of our 40 Days Meditation series, our brother John Yocum provides commentary on Ex 2:23-3:20. Listen below, download here, or search for Words from the Brothers on your favourite podcasting app. During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. God saw the people of Israel-and God knew. Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.” When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” Then he said, “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” And he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God. Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” He said, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.” Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.'” God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. Go and gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has appeared to me, saying, I have observed you and what has been done to you in Egypt, and I promise that I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, a land flowing with milk and honey.’ And they will listen to your voice, and you and the elders of Israel shall go to the king of Egypt and say to him, ‘The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us; and now, please let us go a three days’ journey into the wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God.’ But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless compelled by a mighty hand. So I will stretch out my hand and strike Egypt with all the wonders that I will do in it; after that he will let you go. Ex 2:23-3:20

We unravel the murky history of Jerusalem's conquest, where nothing is as simple as it seems. The Bible tells us the tribe of Judah "took" the city, but did they? From Abraham's encounter with Melchizedek to Joshua's victories, Jerusalem remains a prize that no one seems to truly hold. The Jebusites lingered, the city was burned but never fully conquered, and through it all, the Israelites' inability to erase the city's inhabitants foreshadows their spiritual decline. It's a tale of incomplete victories, forgotten kings, and a city that wouldn't die.   If you'd like to support "The History of the Bible" podcast, visit our Patreon Page at https://patreon.com/TheHistoryoftheBible. Your feedback is valuable to us! Share your thoughts and insights via our feedback form at https://forms.gle/AtzUReJ8gLuFYPaP8. Let us know how our podcast has impacted you or someone you know by filling out our impact form at https://forms.gle/jr4EdGsqCaFk4qZm8. If you have concerns about any information presented, please inform us via our correction form at https://forms.gle/PiMMkPnJFaa4j5p37.   #Jerusalem, #BibleHistory, #Israelites, #Judah, #Conquest, #Jebusites, #Melchizedek, #Joshua, #AncientHistory, #BiblicalArchaeology, #Hebrews, #CityOfPeace, #TribeOfJudah, #TribeOfBenjamin, #KingDavid, #OldTestament, #HistoricalConquest, #Canaan, #Abraham, #Judges1, #BiblicalBattles, #ReligiousHistory, #BiblicalCities, #AncientJerusalem, #ScriptureAnalysis, #FaithAndHistory

The Reluctant ProphetExodus 3:7-4:17 [ESV]7 Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, 8 and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 9 And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. 10 Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” 11 But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” 12 He said, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.”13 Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, ‘What is his name?' what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.'” 15 God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. 16 Go and gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has appeared to me, saying, “I have observed you and what has been done to you in Egypt, 17 and I promise that I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, a land flowing with milk and honey.”' 18 And they will listen to your voice, and you and the elders of Israel shall go to the king of Egypt and say to him, ‘The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us; and now, please let us go a three days' journey into the wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God.' 19 But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless compelled by a mighty hand. 20 So I will stretch out my hand and strike Egypt with all the wonders that I will do in it; after that he will let you go. 21 And I will give this people favor in the sight of the Egyptians; and when you go, you shall not go empty, 22 but each woman shall ask of her neighbor, and any woman who lives in her house, for silver and gold jewelry, and for clothing. You shall put them on your sons and on your daughters. So you shall plunder the Egyptians.”1 Then Moses answered, “But behold, they will not believe me or listen to my voice, for they will say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you.'” 2 The Lord said to him, “What is that in your hand?” He said, “A staff.” 3 And he said, “Throw it on the ground.” So he threw it on the ground, and it became a serpent, and Moses ran from it. 4 But the Lord said to Moses, “Put out your hand and catch it by the tail”—so he put out his hand and caught it, and it became a staff in his hand— 5 “tCONNECT WITH USIf you have any questions or would like to get to know us further, head over to https://www.triumphlbc.org/connect and fill out our online connection card.ABOUT TRIUMPHTriumph wants to see the life and message of Jesus transform your heart, home, and city. To learn more visit https://www.triumphlbc.org/

Send Someone ElseExodus 3:9-4:17 [ESV]9 And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. 10 Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” 11 But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” 12 He said, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.”13 Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, ‘What is his name?' what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.'” 15 God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations. 16 Go and gather the elders of Israel together and say to them, ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, has appeared to me, saying, “I have observed you and what has been done to you in Egypt, 17 and I promise that I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, a land flowing with milk and honey.”' 18 And they will listen to your voice, and you and the elders of Israel shall go to the king of Egypt and say to him, ‘The Lord, the God of the Hebrews, has met with us; and now, please let us go a three days' journey into the wilderness, that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God.' 19 But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go unless compelled by a mighty hand. 20 So I will stretch out my hand and strike Egypt with all the wonders that I will do in it; after that he will let you go. 21 And I will give this people favor in the sight of the Egyptians; and when you go, you shall not go empty, 22 but each woman shall ask of her neighbor, and any woman who lives in her house, for silver and gold jewelry, and for clothing. You shall put them on your sons and on your daughters. So you shall plunder the Egyptians.”1 Then Moses answered, “But behold, they will not believe me or listen to my voice, for they will say, ‘The Lord did not appear to you.'” 2 The Lord said to him, “What is that in your hand?” He said, “A staff.” 3 And he said, “Throw it on the ground.” So he threw it on the ground, and it became a serpent, and Moses ran from it. 4 But the Lord said to Moses, “Put out your hand and catch it by the tail”—so he put out his hand and caught it, and it became a staff in his hand— 5 “that they may believe that the Lord, the God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has appeared to you.” 6 Again, the Lord said to him, “Put your hand inside your cloak.” And he put his hand inside his cloak, and when he took it out, behold, his hand was leprous[e] like snow. 7 Then God said, “Put yoCONNECT WITH USIf you have any questions or would like to get to know us further, head over to https://www.triumphlbc.org/connect and fill out our online connection card.ABOUT TRIUMPHTriumph wants to see the life and message of Jesus transform your heart, home, and city. To learn more visit https://www.triumphlbc.org/

Moses Meets GodExodus 3:1-15 [ESV]1 Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. 3 And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.” 4 When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” 5 Then he said, “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” 6 And he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.7 Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, 8 and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 9 And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. 10 Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” 11 But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” 12 He said, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.”13 Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, ‘What is his name?' what shall I say to them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.'” 15 God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations.CONNECT WITH USIf you have any questions or would like to get to know us further, head over to https://www.triumphlbc.org/connect and fill out our online connection card.ABOUT TRIUMPHTriumph wants to see the life and message of Jesus transform your heart, home, and city. To learn more visit https://www.triumphlbc.org/

Moses, Meet God.Exodus 3:1-10 [ESV]1 Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. 2 And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. 3 And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.” 4 When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” 5 Then he said, “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” 6 And he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.7 Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, 8 and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 9 And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. 10 Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.”CONNECT WITH USIf you have any questions or would like to get to know us further, head over to https://www.triumphlbc.org/connect and fill out our online connection card.ABOUT TRIUMPHTriumph wants to see the life and message of Jesus transform your heart, home, and city. To learn more visit https://www.triumphlbc.org/

2 Samuel 5:8-10 New King James Version   8 Now David said on that day, “Whoever climbs up by way of the water shaft and defeats the Jebusites (the lame and the blind, who are hated by David's soul), he shall be chief and captain.” Therefore, they say, “The blind and the lame shall not come into the house.” 9 Then David dwelt in the stronghold and called it the City of David. And David built all around from the Millo and inward. 10 So David went on and became great, and the Lord God of hosts was with him.

You may recall that the Hebrews were said to be building the storage cities of Pithom and Rameses.  You can read this in … Exo 1:11  So they appointed taskmasters over them to afflict them with hard labor. And they built for Pharaoh storage cities, Pithom and Raamses. Problem.  We have studied that the Hebrews left Egypt in 1446 B.C. and Rameses the Great (a.k.a. as Rameses II), the supposed pharaoh of the Exodus as per the late date (the wrong date) did not come to power until 1279 B.C. reigned until 1213 B.C.  So there are no cities named Rameses in the Nile Delta in 1446 B.C.  The city, later called Rameses, is called Avaris in the 15th century B.C., the time of the Exodus.  You can visit this site today.  It is called Tel el-daba.  So, what's going on?  Also, in this lesson, we deal with the city of Dan in the days of Abraham.  The events in chapter 15 are close to 2091 B.C. when Abraham and Sarah entered Canaan.  The city of Dan was named by the tribe of Dan – Dan is the son of Jacob the grandson of Abraham – when they moved north and captured the city of Laish (pronounced Lay Esh).  This is clear when we read … Jdg 18:29  They called the name of the city Dan, after the name of Dan their father who was born in Israel; however, the name of the city formerly was Laish. So, Abraham comes to a city called Dan, as we read in the Bible, and the city of Dan is not even there yet!  This is nuts!  What is going on?  Is the Bible wrong? Was it written later in 3rd or 2nd century B.C.?  We need to find out and again show the truthfulness of the Bible.  In lesson 30 in Genesis 15 we then come across this verse … Gen 14:17  Then after his return from the defeat of Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him, the king of Sodom went out to meet him at the valley of Shaveh (that is, the King's Valley). And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; now he was a priest of God Most High.   Who is this guy?  There are some who say it's Jesus!  That's crazy.  Some rabbis say it is Shem or the son of Shem the son of Noah.  Consider a few references from ancient Jewish (non-biblical) literature … Melchizedek was Shem the son of Noah, a priest most high." (Pirke De Rabbi Eliezari) "And Melchizedek is Shem, the son of Noah." (Rashi, Commentaries, Genesis 14:18) "And Melchizedek is Shem, the son of Noah." (Talmud, Tr. Nedarim32) That Melchizedek is Shem or his son is a major error since Melchizedek is the king of Salem.  Salem is probably Jerusalem.  At this time when Abraham and Melchizedek meet, Salem is a Jebusite city.  The Jebusites are a clan of the pagan Canaanites.  The rabbis show they dismiss real history and make up their own opinions which are in total conflict with historical truth. So, who is this guy?  Not Jesus.  Not Shem.  Not the son of Shem.  How do we understand this enigmatic Bible character?  Come and join us in lesson 30.  Come and do what your Lord commanded you to do if you are a TRUE Christian, a real disciple of Rabbi Yeshua. Rev. Ferret - who is this guy?  What's his background?  Why should I listen to him?  Check his background at this link - https://www.dropbox.com/s/ortnret3oxcicu4/BackgrndTeacher%20mar%2025%202020.pdf?dl=0  

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

Today we continue our study verse by verse through the book of Joshua. The tribe of Judah is receiving their inheritance within the promised land on the west side of the Jordan. Caleb continues his obedience in service to the Lord as he drives out the remaining sons of the Anakim in Hebron. But the story ends on a negative note as the Jebusites remain in Jerusalem despite the presence of the sons of the tribe of Judah. Scripture text is Joshua 15:1-63.

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

Passage: 1 After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision: “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” 2 But Abram said, “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” 3 And Abram said, “Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir.” 4 And behold, the word of the Lord came to him: “This man shall not be your heir; your very own son shall be your heir.” 5 And he brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” 6 And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness. 7 And he said to him, “I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to possess.” 8 But he said, “O Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it?” 9 He said to him, “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.” 10 And he brought him all these, cut them in half, and laid each half over against the other. But he did not cut the birds in half. 11 And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away. 12 As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram. And behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him. 13 Then the Lord said to Abram, “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. 14 But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. 15 As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age. 16 And they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.” 17 When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. 18 On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, 19 the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, 20 the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, 21 the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites.” (Genesis 15:1-21 ESV) Song: Promises (https://open.spotify.com/track/1l4XUxfkBwv43NMRzDe4Mj?si=db82e92dbb3d4bcc) by Jonny Robinson, Matt Boswell, Matt Papa, and Rich Thompson Lyrics: I can always call you father You chose me as your child And your word is always faithful You will not turn aside Now I live in full assurance For my savior paid that price Every promise that you made me Is yes in Jesus Christ You are faithful to your promises We will trust in what the cross has said Through the ages hallelujah you are Faithful to your promises Are you with us in the fire Will you keep us in the storm Are you still the light that guides us When the darkness overwhelms Through the doubts and through the valleys Through the passing years we find Every promise you have spoken Is yes in Jesus Christ You will be our God We will be your people You will be with us Keep us from all evil Every promise made Is a promise kept You are faithful to your promises You began this work within us You will bring it to the end You're the one who goes before us You will have the last Amen So we set our hope upon this An on this we build our lives All your promises forever Are yes in Jesus Christ Prayer: Most loving Father, whose will it is for us to give thanks for all things, to fear nothing but the loss of you, and to cast all our care on you who care for us: Preserve us from faithless fears and worldly anxieties, that no clouds of this mortal life may hide from us the light of that love which is immortal, and which you have manifested to us in your Son Jesus Christ our Lord; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. -The Book of Common Prayer

Northwest Bible Church – Jan. 12, 2025 – Joshua – Alan Conner Josh. 15 Inheritance by Lot Intro  A.  JUDAH'S ALLOTMENT (15:1-63). 1. General borders (Joshua 15:1-12).    South (1-4);  East (5a);  North (5b-11); West (12).   2. Review of Caleb taking his portion (Joshua 15:13-20). 3. Judah's cities listed (Joshua 15:21-62).   4. The failure to capture the Jebusites in Jerusalem (Joshua 15:63).   B. GOD'S SOVEREIGNTY IN THE ALLOTMENT (15:1a). 1. The lot controls the division of the land (Joshua 15:1a).    Numb. 26:55 2. God controls the lot.   Prov. 16:33   3. The parallel with our inheritance. a. Our heavenly portion is called an “inheritance”.  1 Pet. 1:3-4 b. The LOT determined our inheritance in heaven.  Eph. 1:11  c. The LOT determined the gift of our faith.   2 Pet. 1:1  4. The role of the high priest and the picture of Christ.  Josh. 14:1-2 a.  The high priest would make atonement.   Heb. 2:17 b. The high priest had charge of the Urim and Thummim.  Jn. 15:16, 19 Conclusion Things to Ponder:  What do the lots tell us about God?   Why was the use of the lot important in determining Israel's inheritance in the land?   Since our heavenly inheritance and faith are due to the sovereignty of God, how should we respond?

Exodus 33: An Overview and Reflection Exodus 33 is a powerful and pivotal chapter in the story of the Israelites' journey through the wilderness. It emphasizes God's presence, Moses' intercession, and the profound relationship between God and His chosen people. Below is a breakdown of the key themes and reflections: 1. God's Command to Depart (Verses 1–6) After the Israelites' sin with the golden calf in Exodus 32, God commands them to leave Mount Sinai and continue toward the Promised Land. He assures them of His promise to send an angel ahead to drive out their enemies (the Canaanites, Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites). However, God declares He will not go with them directly, warning that their stubbornness might lead to their destruction. Reflection: This section shows God's holiness and justice. Despite their sin, God remains faithful to His promises but highlights the consequences of disobedience. It challenges readers to consider the importance of repentance and God's mercy even when discipline is required. 2. The Israelites' Mourning (Verses 7–11) When the people hear that God will not go with them, they mourn deeply. Moses sets up a tent outside the camp called the “tent of meeting,” where he meets with God. This tent becomes a symbol of God's presence and guidance, with the pillar of cloud signifying God's glory. The text highlights the unique relationship between Moses and God, describing it as a face-to-face friendship. Reflection: The Israelites' mourning demonstrates the deep desire for God's presence, reminding us that material blessings (like the Promised Land) are meaningless without the spiritual blessing of God's closeness. Moses' relationship with God encourages us to pursue intimacy with Him through prayer and trust. 3. Moses' Intercession (Verses 12–17) Moses intercedes on behalf of the Israelites, pleading with God to accompany them on their journey. He argues that it is only God's presence that sets Israel apart from other nations. In response to Moses' faith and persistence, God relents, promising that His presence will go with them and give them rest. Reflection: This dialogue highlights the power of intercessory prayer. Moses' boldness in asking God to remain with His people is an example of deep faith and leadership. It also underscores God's compassion and willingness to listen to His people. 4. Moses' Request to See God's Glory (Verses 18–23) Moses makes an extraordinary request: to see God's glory. God agrees to reveal His goodness and proclaim His name but explains that no one can see His face and live. Instead, God places Moses in a cleft of the rock, covering him with His hand as His glory passes by. Moses is allowed to see God's back, a partial but profound revelation of His majesty. Reflection: This section reminds us of God's transcendence and holiness. Even Moses, who had a unique relationship with God, could not fully behold His glory. At the same time, it reveals God's graciousness in allowing humans to experience His presence in ways they can handle. It invites us to seek God's glory in our lives while respecting His awe-inspiring holiness. Key Lessons from Exodus 33 1.The Value of God's Presence: The chapter repeatedly emphasizes that God's presence is more important than any physical blessing or achievement. Like Moses, we should desire God above all else. 2.The Power of Intercession: Moses' role as an intercessor foreshadows Christ's role as our mediator. It teaches us the importance of praying for others and standing in the gap for those in need. 3.God's Faithfulness and Holiness: Despite Israel's unfaithfulness, God remains true to His promises. Yet His holiness demands respect and repentance, reminding us of the balance between God's love and justice. 4.The Pursuit of God's Glory: Moses' bold request to see God's glory challenges us to seek a deeper relationship with Him. While we cannot fully comprehend His majesty, we can experience His presence through worship, prayer, and His Word. Final Reflection Exodus 33 invites us into a deeper understanding of God's character—His holiness, faithfulness, and relational nature. It encourages us to prioritize God's presence in our lives, seek intimacy with Him, and intercede for others. Like Moses, we can boldly approach God, trusting in His grace and goodness as we navigate our own spiritual journeys.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/sendme-radio--732966/support.

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

Support Common Prayer Daily @ PatreonVisit our Website for more www.commonprayerdaily.com_______________Opening Words:The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth.John 1:14 Confession:Let us humbly confess our sins unto Almighty God. Most merciful God, we confess that we have sinned against you in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone. We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We are truly sorry and we humbly repent. For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ, have mercy on us and forgive us; that we may delight in your will, and walk in your ways, to the glory of your Name. Amen. Almighty God have mercy on you, forgive you all your sins through our Lord Jesus Christ, strengthen you in all goodness, and by the power of the Holy Spirit keep you in eternal life. Amen. The InvitatoryLord, open our lips.And our mouth shall proclaim your praise.Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen. Alleluia. Jubilate (Psalm 100)Alleluia. To us a child is born: O come, let us adore him. Alleluia.Be joyful in the Lord, all you lands; *serve the Lord with gladnessand come before his presence with a song.Know this: The Lord himself is God; *he himself has made us, and we are his;we are his people and the sheep of his pasture.Enter his gates with thanksgiving;go into his courts with praise; *give thanks to him and call upon his Name.For the Lord is good;his mercy is everlasting; *and his faithfulness endures from age to age.Alleluia. To us a child is born: O come, let us adore him. Alleluia. The PsalterPsalm 851You have been gracious to your land, O Lord, *you have restored the good fortune of Jacob.2You have forgiven the iniquity of your people *and blotted out all their sins.3You have withdrawn all your fury *and turned yourself from your wrathful indignation.4Restore us then, O God our Savior; *let your anger depart from us.5Will you be displeased with us for ever? *will you prolong your anger from age to age?6Will you not give us life again, *that your people may rejoice in you?7Show us your mercy, O Lord, *and grant us your salvation.8I will listen to what the Lord God is saying, *for he is speaking peace to his faithful peopleand to those who turn their hearts to him.9Truly, his salvation is very near to those who fear him, *that his glory may dwell in our land.10Mercy and truth have met together; *righteousness and peace have kissed each other.11Truth shall spring up from the earth, *and righteousness shall look down from heaven.12The Lord will indeed grant prosperity, *and our land will yield its increase.13Righteousness shall go before him, *and peace shall be a pathway for his feet. Psalm 871On the holy mountain stands the city he has founded; *the Lord loves the gates of Zionmore than all the dwellings of Jacob.2Glorious things are spoken of you, *O city of our God.3I count Egypt and Babylon among those who know me; *behold Philistia, Tyre, and Ethiopia:in Zion were they born.4Of Zion it shall be said, “Everyone was born in her, *and the Most High himself shall sustain her.”5The Lord will record as he enrolls the peoples, *“These also were born there.”6The singers and the dancers will say, *“All my fresh springs are in you.” Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: *as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen. LessonsExod. 3:1-12A Reading from the Book of Exodus.Now Moses was keeping the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led his flock to the west side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. He looked, and behold, the bush was burning, yet it was not consumed. And Moses said, “I will turn aside to see this great sight, why the bush is not burned.” When the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called to him out of the bush, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” Then he said, “Do not come near; take your sandals off your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground.” And he said, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” And Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look at God.  Then the Lord said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey, to the place of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. And now, behold, the cry of the people of Israel has come to me, and I have also seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them. Come, I will send you to Pharaoh that you may bring my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?” He said, “But I will be with you, and this shall be the sign for you, that I have sent you: when you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.” The Word of the Lord.Thanks Be To God. Te Deum laudamusYou are God: we praise you;You are the Lord: we acclaim you;You are the eternal Father:All creation worships you.To you all angels, all the powers of heaven, Cherubim and Seraphim, sing in endless praise:Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might,heaven and earth are full of your glory.The glorious company of apostles praise you.The noble fellowship of prophets praise you.The white-robed army of martyrs praise you. Throughout the world the holy Church acclaims you;Father, of majesty unbounded,your true and only Son, worthy of all worship, and the Holy Spirit, advocate and guide.You, Christ, are the king of glory, the eternal Son of the Father.When you became man to set us free you did not shun the Virgin's womb. You overcame the sting of deathand opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers. You are seated at God's right hand in glory.We believe that you will come and be our judge.Come then, Lord, and help your people, bought with the price of your own blood, and bring us with your saintsto glory everlasting. Heb. 11:23-31A Reading from the Book of Hebrews.By faith Moses, when he was born, was hidden for three months by his parents, because they saw that the child was beautiful, and they were not afraid of the king's edict. By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward. By faith he left Egypt, not being afraid of the anger of the king, for he endured as seeing him who is invisible. By faith he kept the Passover and sprinkled the blood, so that the Destroyer of the firstborn might not touch them.  By faith the people crossed the Red Sea as on dry land, but the Egyptians, when they attempted to do the same, were drowned. By faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days. By faith Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient, because she had given a friendly welcome to the spies.The Word of the Lord.Thanks Be To God. John 14:6-14A Reading from the Gospel According to John.Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.”  Philip said to him, “Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us.” Jesus said to him, “Have I been with you so long, and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, ‘Show us the Father'? Do you not believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I say to you I do not speak on my own authority, but the Father who dwells in me does his works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.  “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.The Word of the Lord.Thanks Be To God. Benedictus Dominus DeusBlessed be the Lord, the God of Israel; * he has come to his people and set them free.He has raised up for us a mighty savior, * born of the house of his servant David.Through his holy prophets he promised of old, that he would save us from our enemies, * from the hands of all who hate us. He promised to show mercy to our fathers * and to remember his holy covenant. This was the oath he swore to our father Abraham, * to set us free from the hands of our enemies, Free to worship him without fear, * holy and righteous in his sight all the days of our life.You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High, * for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way, To give his people knowledge of salvation * by the forgiveness of their sins.In the tender compassion of our God * the dawn from on high shall break upon us, To shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, * and to guide our feet into the way of peace.Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be for ever. Amen. The Apostles CreedI believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to the dead. On the third day he rose again. He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead.I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen. The PrayersThe Lord be with you.And also with you.Let us pray.Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen. Suffrages AV. Show us your mercy, O Lord;R. And grant us your salvation.V. Clothe your ministers with righteousness; R. Let your people sing with joy.V. Give peace, O Lord, in all the world;R. For only in you can we live in safety. V. Lord, keep this nation under your care;R. And guide us in the way of justice and truth.V. Let your way be known upon earth;R. Your saving health among all nations.V. Let not the needy, O Lord, be forgotten;R. Nor the hope of the poor be taken away.V. Create in us clean hearts, O God;R. And sustain us with your Holy Spirit.   The CollectsCollect of the DayAlmighty God, you have poured upon us the new light of your incarnate Word: Grant that this light, enkindled in our hearts, may shine forth in our lives; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. Daily Collects:A Collect for PeaceO God, the author of peace and lover of concord, to know you is eternal life and to serve you is perfect freedom: Defend us, your humble servants, in all assaults of our enemies; that we, surely trusting in your defense, may not fear the power of any adversaries, through the might of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.A Collect for GraceO Lord, our heavenly Father, almighty and everlasting God, you have brought us safely to the beginning of this day: Defend us by your mighty power, that we may not fall into sin nor run into any danger; and that, guided by your Spirit, we may do what is righteous in your sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. Take a moment of silence at this time to reflect and pray for others. Collect of Saint BasilO Christ God, Who art worshipped and glorified at every place and time; Who art long-suffering, most merciful and compassionate; Who lovest the righteous and art merciful to sinners; Who callest all to salvation with the promise of good things to come: receive, Lord, the prayers we now offer, and direct our lives in the way of Thy commandments. Sanctify our souls, cleanse our bodies, correct our thoughts, purify our minds and deliver us from all affliction, evil and illness. Surround us with Thy holy angels, that guarded and instructed by their forces, we may reach unity of faith and the understanding of Thine unapproachable glory: for blessed art Thou unto ages of ages. Amen. A Prayer of St. John ChrysostomAlmighty God, you have given us grace at this time, with one accord to make our common supplications to you; and you have promised through your well-beloved Son that when two or three are gathered together in his Name you will grant their requests: Fulfill now, O Lord, our desires and petitions as may be best for us; granting us in this world knowledge of your truth, and in the age to come life everlasting. Amen. DismissalLet us bless the LordThanks be to God! The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all evermore. Amen

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

Wednesday, 18 December 2024   “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' Matthew 5:43   “You heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor, and you shall hate your enemy.'” (CG).   In the previous verse, Jesus spoke of giving to all who ask of you and to not turn away those wanting to borrow. Now, He says, “You heard that it was said.”   Jesus will again cite precepts from the law of Moses. The first clause is very close to a direct quote from the law. However, the second clause is something that is more to be inferred. It may be that rabbinic commentaries went further in their analysis than the law, but what Jesus says can be rightly inferred from various portions of the law. They are not far from what Moses said in some ways. And so, He begins with, “You shall love your neighbor.”   The words are formed from a greater precept found in Leviticus 19:18 –   “You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.”   Jesus cites this to His disciples to begin the instruction which follows. Before He gets to that, He next cites the contrary precept saying, “and you shall hate your enemy.”   This precept could be found in the law. For example –   “When the Lord your God brings you into the land which you go to possess, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you, 2 and when the Lord your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them nor show mercy to them. 3 Nor shall you make marriages with them. You shall not give your daughter to their son, nor take their daughter for your son. 4 For they will turn your sons away from following Me, to serve other gods; so the anger of the Lord will be aroused against you and destroy you suddenly. 5 But thus you shall deal with them: you shall destroy their altars, and break down their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images, and burn their carved images with fire.” Deuteronomy 7:1-5   Likewise, this was instructed in Exodus 17 –   “Then the Lord said to Moses, ‘Write this for a memorial in the book and recount it in the hearing of Joshua, that I will utterly blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven.' 15 And Moses built an altar and called its name, The-Lord-Is-My-Banner; 16 for he said, ‘Because the Lord has sworn: the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.'” Exodus 17:14-16   Moses then repeated the precept in Deuteronomy –   “Remember what Amalek did to you on the way as you were coming out of Egypt, 18 how he met you on the way and attacked your rear ranks, all the stragglers at your rear, when you were tired and weary; and he did not fear God. 19 Therefore it shall be, when the Lord your God has given you rest from your enemies all around, in the land which the Lord your God is giving you to possess as an inheritance, that you will blot out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. You shall not forget.” Deuteronomy 25:17-19   As these words are found in the law, Jesus cannot be said to be citing only rabbinic commentaries. Anyone who reads these instructions could only conclude that these particular enemies were to be hated and destroyed.   Life application: A large majority of the commentaries on Jesus' words in this verse say that He is citing the law in the first clause and only citing rabbinic commentaries in the second. As seen, this is not necessarily correct. If God said to utterly destroy particular people groups, it means that they were not to be associated with. They were to be hated and abhorred.   A problem arises, however, when the term “enemy” is abused. The law notes that when Israel is attacking an “enemy,” if they accept the terms of peace set forth by Israel, they are to be given leniency (see Deuteronomy 20:10-15).   If the rabbis were saying that all “enemies” of Israel were to be hated, it would be contrary to the tenor of Scripture concerning the guidelines for warfare in Deuteronomy 20 as well as other places where enemies become allies.   As such, we need to be attentive to not accept commentaries on Scripture, Christian or otherwise, without checking to see if what those commentaries say aligns with Scripture. But we cannot actually do that unless we are familiar with Scripture already. Putting your trust in what other people say without checking is not a good way to run your life. How much more when it involves spiritual matters that can affect one's eternal destiny?   Be sure to read your Bible daily. Take in what it says and store it away as the finest of treasures. When it is time, take it out and enjoy it again as you carefully consider each word.   Heavenly Father, Your word is wonderful. It is without contradiction, but it has to be considered in light of the context You provide in each passage. Help us to maintain the proper context and carefully consider what You are telling us. In this, we will have a more perfect understanding of Your will and intent for us. Thank You, O God. Amen.

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

In Numbers 13, we find God's chosen people in Paran, standing on the verge of the Promised Land of Canaan. And we might imagine standing in anticipation, waiting, looking off in the distance, for the site of twelve men. For 39 days they've been awaiting these 12 men. Now it is day 40, and the twelve men begin to appear on the horizon. From the way it looks, these twelve men are not empty-handed. Far from it, in fact. Some of them are hauling sacks of pomegranates. Others are carrying baskets of figs. At least two of them are shouldering a pole from which hangs a cluster of grapes larger than anything they've ever seen before. The 12 men reach the outer camp, move in toward the center where they find Moses and Aaron, and then, begin to share the news of all they've seen throughout their 40-day exploration in the Promised Land. Numbers 13:27, ”And they told him [Moses], “We came to the land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit…” But before smiles can appear among the people, and relief and rejoicing can erupt within the camp, down like a hammer falls the killer of all good news…the word however. “We came to the land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. However…” However what?Verse 28,“However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. And the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan...”The land is good, say the twelve…however…In this morning's sermon, we're going to witness one of the greatest tragedies ever told. A tragedy not brought on by famine, disease, or sword. But by a far graver foe. One that had been lurking within each one of those Israelites waiting in the wilderness that day, and, in varying degrees, lurks in each and every one of us here this morning.And that is unbelief. Unbelief. And for those who are helped by outlines, this story is going to teach us four things about unbelief: (1) What unbelief cuts out, (2) adds in, (3) and leads to, and (4) how we should respond to unbelief. What unbelief cuts out, adds in, and leads to, and how we should respond to it.So, the report given by the spies is that the land is good, however… And with that one word “however,” at least 10 of those 12 total spies betray their forgone conclusion that what lies before them in Canaan is not a land of promise, but a land of sure and certain death. Well, upon reception of such a foreboding report, you could imagine the people begin to pick up on the doubts of those ten men. They begin to exchange glances with one another. Whispers are heard. A general sense of gloom begins to spread amongst the camp. Caleb, one of the other spies, stands up and tries to quiet the growing sense of despair, but his voice is quickly drowned out by the other ten who counter, Numbers 13:31, “We are not able to go up against the people, for…” and now just pause. What's going on here? Why has the mood so suddenly changed? Unbelief has descended upon the camp. And what does it cause the people to do? We said this story is going to teach us four things about unbelief. Here's the first…1. What Unbelief Cuts OutSee, because here's the thing, this peoples' unbelief in this moment — “We are not able to go up against the people” — is not taking place within a historical vacuum. Like, they weren't all just suddenly dropped into Paran without a backstory. They've not just been heading out to the Promised Land on a whim. But what unbelief has done, in a matter of seconds, it seems, is cut out from these peoples' minds the memory of all the Lord their God has told them regarding this land — namely, the fact that for over the last 800 years, God has been assuring them, “I am going to give this land to you.” Stretching all the way back to the day God first spoke to their father Abraham, Genesis 12:7, “To your offspring I will give this land.” And spoke again to him in Genesis 13:15, 17: “For all the land that you see I will give to you and to your offspring forever…Arise, walk through the length and the breadth of the land, for I will give it to you.” And again, to him, in Genesis 17:8:“I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God.” And when Abraham was no more, God kept the promise going with Jacob, saying to him, Genesis 28:10-13:“I am the Lord, the God of Abraham your father and the God of Isaac. The land on which you lie I will give to you and to your offspring.”And as Jacob's people, the Israelites, traveled down in Egypt…and found themselves overpowered and enslaved there…even as all hope of their ever returning to the land seemed totally lost…even there God spoke to Moses from a burning bush, Exodus 3:17:“I promise that I will bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt to the land of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, a land flowing with milk and honey.”He even promised to Moses, Exodus 23:20-24:Behold, I send an angel before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared…“When my angel goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces.” Why just a few chapters back we heard Moses say to his father in law, Numbers 10:29, “We are setting out for the place of which the Lord said, ‘I will give it to you.' Come with us, and we will do good to you, for the Lord has promised good to Israel.” And if that weren't enough, just forty days earlier, just as these twelve were setting out, God spoke to Moses, “Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel.” I mean, how many times is God going to say it? “I'm going to give it to you — you just have to trust me!”But when push comes to shove, they won't. They won't. Instead, in an act of high-handed, widespread, shocking unbelief, the people pull an Adam and Eve — we trust our understanding concerning this thing, not yours. Unbelief, my brothers and sisters, is an old, old story. What does unbelief do? First, unbelief cuts out all recollection of God's promises to us, wipes them from our memory, causes spiritual amnesia to the point where we say, “We are not able to go up against the people…In fact, we're not sure why we ever thought we could.” What does unbelief do? First, unbelief cuts out all recollection of God's promises to us. And, unbelief cuts out all recollection of God's presence with us.God HimselfLook with me again at Numbers 13:31,“We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” Notice, they are stronger than we. “But where is God?” He's entirely absent from view. All the people instead is us and them and no other. Which is amazing considering that this whole scene is unfolding before Moses and Aaron who, as we're told earlier in Numbers, camp just outside The Tent of Meeting. So somewhere in the background of this whole thing are the Levites, the priests, the Tent of Meeting itself, and the cloud of God's glory emanating out from it. But none of that makes any difference in this moment. For this people, it is as if they've suddenly awoken from a heavy sleep and concluded God's presence among them had only been a dream.And in such a godless frame of mind, all this people can arrive upon is a conclusion drawn by simple math, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” You ever do that kind of math? You ever forget to consider God and his power and promise over your life?What does unbelief do? Unbelief cuts out all recollection of God's promises to us, and God's presence among us. That's what unbelief cuts out. What does unbelief add in to fill the void?2. What Unbelief Adds InSee if you can tell for yourself. Go with me to verse 32. Numbers 13:32-33,“The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”God, we might say, has a stabilizing effect when it comes to our understanding of the world. When he is in our worldview, and in its center, the peoples, places, and things all round him remain in proper size, scale, and proportion. But, when God is cut out, everything destabilizes — causing the peoples, places, and things around us to begin to balloon far out of proportion. To play off Ed Welch's phrase, “when God becomes small, people become big.” That's exactly what's going on here. With God cut out from view, the Israelites look upon the people in the land and think, “They look big. They look scary.” As we read in verse 33, “We seemed [when we looked upon them] to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.” We seemed to ourselves like easy-to-squash bugs, and they thought the same. What does unbelief add in? Unbelief adds in a picture of man the size of God himself. See, because here's the thing: God has designed you and I to have God in our worldview. Should we choose to take him out, the position of deity does not vanish. It simply gets replaced by another. And right now, those peoples in Canaan have become that replacement. They're larger than life in our minds. Before them, we're tiny grasshoppers. So, unbelief adds in a picture of man the size of God himself. It also adds in a distorted view of what life was like prior to God.Distorted View of Life before GodTurn with me to Numbers 14:2,“And all the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron. The whole congregation said to them, “Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness!”Don't miss this. They're basically saying, “Our life in Egypt as slaves was better than life right now with God. And our life would've been better had God never intervened. And if God would've just minded his own business and left us alone, oh how much simpler and easier things could have been for us. But it's only been since God's taken over that all these problems have come in.”This is a distorted view of what life was like prior to God. A view that labels God, rather than our sin, as the problem. Unbelief peppers us with this distortion of memory, in order to add in its final, most vile ingredient of all — the view of God as our enemy. God as enemyNumbers 14:3,“Why is the Lord bringing us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become a prey.”Who is God in this picture? A God who tells his people of a good land, only to bring them into a land that, verse 32, “devours inhabitants.” A God who lifts his peoples' hopes up high, only to send them crashing down. A God not of bless you and keep you, lift up his countenance and give you peace, but curse you and disappoint you, lift up his anger and pour out his wrath to you.See, with God's good promises and good presence cut out. Unbelief pulls a slight of hand — adding in man as God, the view of life without God as the good life, and a skewed picture of a god whose only enjoyment is to bring us pain. Have you ever found yourself picturing God this way? That's what unbelief cuts out and adds in. Now, third, what unbelief ultimately leads to.3. What Unbelief Leads ToFor this I'll have us go to verse 21. Numbers 14:21, where God says, “But truly, as I live, and as all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord...” — And you'll want to note the irony there because there's more of that coming — God says that all the earth, which includes Canaan, will be filled with his glory. The Israelites are making the claim that Canaan will continue to be filled with the glory of these enemy nations. God says, “No it won't! My glory will go forth into it, and, from there, into all the world.” “Truly, as I live, and as all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord…[but]…” Verse 22,“None of the men who have seen my glory and my signs that I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and yet have put me to the test these ten times and have not obeyed my voice, shall see the land that I swore to give to their fathers. And none of those who despised me shall see it.”But rather, verse 29: “Your dead bodies shall fall in this wilderness, and of all your number, listed in the census from twenty years old and upward, who have grumbled against me not one shall come into the land where I swore that I would make you dwell,”There were six hundred thousand men numbered in that census back in Numbers 1. Six hundred thousand men who were to follow the Lord wherever he called them. Six hundred thousand men who were to trust in the Lord no matter what enemy or danger laid before them. Six hundred thousand men who were so close to finally experiencing the joy of seeing God's promise to them fulfilled. Six hundred thousand men who'll become six hundred thousand desert graves in as little as 40 years. Where does unbelief lead to? Death apart from God. To the people who had said, Numbers 14:2, “Would that we had died in this wilderness!” God says, “okay, you will.” To the people who had said, “Our little ones will become a prey [if they follow God].” God says, no, they won't, but, as verse 24 tells us, all of Caleb's descendants will possess the land, and as the book of Joshua shows us, so will all of this generation's descendants as well. But as for them, they will die in the desert. So will all who ultimately fail to trust God. This is unbelief's end — death apart from God.So, we've seen what unbelief cuts out, adds in, and leads to. Fourth and finally, how should we respond to unbelief?4. How to Respond to UnbeliefAnd it's simply this: when unbelief threatens to cut out God's promises and add in a false view of God, belief counters by taking hold of God's promises and reasserting God's true revelation of himself. And that is exactly what Caleb and Moses do in this story. Taking hold of God's promises and reasserting God's true revelation of himself.CalebWe see the taking hold of God's promises with Caleb. And, you know, this is of special significance to me because I named my son after this man. (Which, in a way, is a feat, because as a former fifth grade teacher, you tend to have a lot of boys names already scratched from the list by the time it comes to naming your own child. Can't name him that. Can't name him that. Certainly can't name him that.)But when my wife and I went to name our son, we named him Caleb because, as his parents, we want him, and indeed all our children, to grow up and respond to unbelief like Caleb of Numbers 14 did. As one of your pastors, I too want all of us to grow more and more to respond to unbelief like Caleb of Numbers 14 did. See, because when Caleb is outnumbered 10 to 1, and the ten are making that claim that, “The land is good, however…” Caleb does not buckle under the pressure. He doesn't simply go along with the crowd. He stands up and says, Numbers 13:30,“Let us go up at once and occupy it for we are well able to overcome it.”And when he hears, Numbers 13:32, “this is a land that devours its inhabitants.” He responds, Numbers 14:7,“The land, which we passed through to spy it out, is an exceedingly good land. If the Lord delights in us, he will bring us into this land and give it to us, a land that flows with milk and honey.”Caleb knows that this is precisely what God has already promised to do for them. And when cowardice begins to claim, Numbers 13:33, “We were like grasshoppers compared to them.” Then with courage, he proclaims, Numbers 14:9, “Do not fear the people of the land, for they are bread for us...”And when his fellow companions say, Numbers 14:3, “The Lord is bringing us [in] to fall by the sword,” he remembers the covenant, the tent of meeting, the cloud of glory and says, Numbers 14:9, “…Their protection is removed from them, and the Lord is with us.”Caleb shows us how to respond to unbelief by taking hold of God's promises — “he's going to bring us into the land just as he said he would.”MOSESMoses shows us how to respond to unbelief by reasserting God's true revelation of himself. See, after the Israelites fail to trust God, God could've totally destroyed them right then and there. One reason he doesn't is because Moses intercedes before God and pleads on their behalf. In so doing, he calls upon God's passion for his glory among the peoples', Numbers 14:15, “Now if you kill this people as one man, then the nations who have heard your fame will say, ‘It is because the Lord was not able to bring this people into the land that he swore to give to them that he has killed them in the wilderness.'”Moses reasserts what he knows to be true about God — his desire to be glorified among the peoples', and the fact that he's hitched his glory to this particular people, Israel. He continues, verse 17: “And now, please let the power of the Lord be great as you have promised, saying, [so he's reasserting what God has already revealed to him concerning himself, namely that he is, verse 18, the Lord who is] ‘…slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, to the third and the fourth generation.'”Moses reasserts, God is not our enemy seeking to disappoint us and bring us pain. He is our God who is slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, and who pardons even this fallen, faithless, wayward people. ApplicationHow do you respond to unbelief? You respond by taking hold of God's promises, as Caleb did, and reasserting God's true revelation of himself, as Moses did.With that, I want to close with two brief notes of application — one for the Christians in this room, one for those here who've yet to trust Christ. For Christians, ask yourself: where do you see unbelief in your life right now? You've trusted Jesus, he's got a hold of you, and yet for all of us this morning there are yet areas of our life, areas of our heart, where unbelief still reigns. Where is it in you?In your continuing to pursue pleasure in certain sins? Perhaps not believing if you were to fully and finally turn your back on that sin that God would be enough for you? If that is you, might God be calling you today to trust him to be enough to once-and-for-all put that sin away. To say, “God, I know that I will not lack so long as I'm with you.”Is unbelief in your life in terms of a job you want, a spouse you want, a family you want? You've been trusting in God for some time now but recently you've felt the pull to stop trusting God and begin putting things into your own hands instead. Begin making little exceptions, little allowances, slight loosening of your morals, boundaries, and non-negotiables. If that is you, might God be calling you today to recommit your trust in him. To say, “God, I'll continue to follow you whether you change my circumstances or not.”Is unbelief in your life causing you to play it safe? To avoid risk? With regard to making disciples, with regard to living on mission, with regard to giving toward ministry to the unreached, or going yourself to do ministry to the unreached? If that is you, might God be calling you today to pray, seek counsel, and risk if God continues to say “go.” Say to God, “God, if you call me to go, I'll go.”Last word, for non-Christians. Might God be calling you to make today the day you first put your trust in him? I urge you, do not go another day in the wilderness of unbelief. Do not take another step toward death apart from God. Turn from self, turn to God, receive his invitation into the true promised land — heaven with God forever. Now, in just a moment, we're going to be joined up here by a few individuals who have, indeed, turned from self, turned to God, and received his invitation into the true promised land. And they're wanting to be baptized as an outward demonstration of that inward reality. And as we witness these friends going down into the water and coming up again, let us remember, we who trust in God do not die in the wilderness apart from God. But rise to heaven to be with God forever. Let's pray.

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

Support Common Prayer Daily @ PatreonVisit our Website for more www.commonprayerdaily.com_______________Opening Words:“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.”Psalm 19:14 (ESV) Confession:Let us humbly confess our sins unto Almighty God. Most merciful God, we confess that we have sinned against you in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone. We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves. We are truly sorry and we humbly repent. For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ, have mercy on us and forgive us; that we may delight in your will, and walk in your ways, to the glory of your Name. Amen. Almighty God have mercy on you, forgive you all your sins through our Lord Jesus Christ, strengthen you in all goodness, and by the power of the Holy Spirit keep you in eternal life. Amen. The InvitatoryLord, open our lips.And our mouth shall proclaim your praise.Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen. Venite (Psalm 95:1-7)Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness: Come let us adore him. Come, let us sing to the Lord; * let us shout for joy to the Rock of our salvation.Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving * and raise a loud shout to him with psalms.For the Lord is a great God, * and a great King above all gods.In his hand are the caverns of the earth, * and the heights of the hills are his also.The sea is his, for he made it, * and his hands have molded the dry land.Come, let us bow down, and bend the knee, * and kneel before the Lord our Maker.For he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand. *Oh, that today you would hearken to his voice! Worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness: Come let us adore him. The PsalterPsalm 75Confitebimur tibi1We give you thanks, O God, we give you thanks, *calling upon your Name and declaring all your wonderful deeds.2“I will appoint a time,” says God; *“I will judge with equity.3Though the earth and all its inhabitants are quaking, *I will make its pillars fast.4I will say to the boasters, ‘Boast no more,' *and to the wicked, ‘Do not toss your horns;5Do not toss your horns so high, *nor speak with a proud neck.' ”6For judgment is neither from the east nor from the west, *nor yet from the wilderness or the mountains.7It is God who judges; *he puts down one and lifts up another.8For in the Lord's hand there is a cup,full of spiced and foaming wine, which he pours out, *and all the wicked of the earth shall drink and drain the dregs.9But I will rejoice for ever; *I will sing praises to the God of Jacob.10He shall break off all the horns of the wicked; *but the horns of the righteous shall be exalted.Psalm 76Notus in Judæa1In Judah is God known; *his Name is great in Israel.2At Salem is his tabernacle, *and his dwelling is in Zion.3There he broke the flashing arrows, *the shield, the sword, and the weapons of battle.4How glorious you are! *more splendid than the everlasting mountains!5The strong of heart have been despoiled;they sink into sleep; *none of the warriors can lift a hand.6At your rebuke, O God of Jacob, *both horse and rider lie stunned.7What terror you inspire! *who can stand before you when you are angry?8From heaven you pronounced judgment; *the earth was afraid and was still;9When God rose up to judgment *and to save all the oppressed of the earth.10Truly, wrathful Edom will give you thanks, *and the remnant of Hamath will keep your feasts.11Make a vow to the Lord your God and keep it; *let all around him bring gifts to him who is worthy to be feared.12He breaks the spirit of princes, *and strikes terror in the kings of the earth. Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit: *as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. Amen. LessonsEzra 9English Standard Version9 After these things had been done, the officials approached me and said, “The people of Israel and the priests and the Levites have not separated themselves from the peoples of the lands with their abominations, from the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites. 2 For they have taken some of their daughters to be wives for themselves and for their sons, so that the holy race has mixed itself with the peoples of the lands. And in this faithlessness the hand of the officials and chief men has been foremost.” 3 As soon as I heard this, I tore my garment and my cloak and pulled hair from my head and beard and sat appalled. 4 Then all who trembled at the words of the God of Israel, because of the faithlessness of the returned exiles, gathered around me while I sat appalled until the evening sacrifice. 5 And at the evening sacrifice I rose from my fasting, with my garment and my cloak torn, and fell upon my knees and spread out my hands to the Lord my God, 6 saying:“O my God, I am ashamed and blush to lift my face to you, my God, for our iniquities have risen higher than our heads, and our guilt has mounted up to the heavens. 7 From the days of our fathers to this day we have been in great guilt. And for our iniquities we, our kings, and our priests have been given into the hand of the kings of the lands, to the sword, to captivity, to plundering, and to utter shame, as it is today. 8 But now for a brief moment favor has been shown by the Lord our God, to leave us a remnant and to give us a secure hold within his holy place, that our God may brighten our eyes and grant us a little reviving in our slavery. 9 For we are slaves. Yet our God has not forsaken us in our slavery, but has extended to us his steadfast love before the kings of Persia, to grant us some reviving to set up the house of our God, to repair its ruins, and to give us protection in Judea and Jerusalem.10 “And now, O our God, what shall we say after this? For we have forsaken your commandments, 11 which you commanded by your servants the prophets, saying, ‘The land that you are entering, to take possession of it, is a land impure with the impurity of the peoples of the lands, with their abominations that have filled it from end to end with their uncleanness. 12 Therefore do not give your daughters to their sons, neither take their daughters for your sons, and never seek their peace or prosperity, that you may be strong and eat the good of the land and leave it for an inheritance to your children forever.' 13 And after all that has come upon us for our evil deeds and for our great guilt, seeing that you, our God, have punished us less than our iniquities deserved and have given us such a remnant as this, 14 shall we break your commandments again and intermarry with the peoples who practice these abominations? Would you not be angry with us until you consumed us, so that there should be no remnant, nor any to escape? 15 O Lord, the God of Israel, you are just, for we are left a remnant that has escaped, as it is today. Behold, we are before you in our guilt, for none can stand before you because of this.”Revelation 17:1-14English Standard Version17 Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and said to me, “Come, I will show you the judgment of the great prostitute who is seated on many waters, 2 with whom the kings of the earth have committed sexual immorality, and with the wine of whose sexual immorality the dwellers on earth have become drunk.” 3 And he carried me away in the Spirit into a wilderness, and I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was full of blasphemous names, and it had seven heads and ten horns. 4 The woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet, and adorned with gold and jewels and pearls, holding in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of her sexual immorality. 5 And on her forehead was written a name of mystery: “Babylon the great, mother of prostitutes and of earth's abominations.” 6 And I saw the woman, drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of the martyrs of Jesus.When I saw her, I marveled greatly. 7 But the angel said to me, “Why do you marvel? I will tell you the mystery of the woman, and of the beast with seven heads and ten horns that carries her. 8 The beast that you saw was, and is not, and is about to rise from the bottomless pit and go to destruction. And the dwellers on earth whose names have not been written in the book of life from the foundation of the world will marvel to see the beast, because it was and is not and is to come. 9 This calls for a mind with wisdom: the seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman is seated; 10 they are also seven kings, five of whom have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come, and when he does come he must remain only a little while. 11 As for the beast that was and is not, it is an eighth but it belongs to the seven, and it goes to destruction. 12 And the ten horns that you saw are ten kings who have not yet received royal power, but they are to receive authority as kings for one hour, together with the beast. 13 These are of one mind, and they hand over their power and authority to the beast. 14 They will make war on the Lamb, and the Lamb will conquer them, for he is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those with him are called and chosen and faithful.” The Word of the Lord.Thanks Be To God. Benedictus (The Song of Zechariah)Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel; * he has come to his people and set them free.He has raised up for us a mighty savior, * born of the house of his servant David.Through his holy prophets he promised of old, that he would save us from our enemies, * from the hands of all who hate us. He promised to show mercy to our fathers * and to remember his holy covenant. This was the oath he swore to our father Abraham, * to set us free from the hands of our enemies, Free to worship him without fear, * holy and righteous in his sight all the days of our life.You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High, * for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way, To give his people knowledge of salvation * by the forgiveness of their sins.In the tender compassion of our God * the dawn from on high shall break upon us, To shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, * and to guide our feet into the way of peace.Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be for ever. Amen. The Apostles CreedI believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. He was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. He descended to the dead. On the third day he rose again. He ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again to judge the living and the dead.I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen. The PrayersLord, have mercy.Christ, have mercyLord, have mercyOur Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever. Amen. The SuffragesO Lord, show your mercy upon us;And grant us your salvation.O Lord, guide those who govern usAnd lead us in the way of justice and truth.Clothe your ministers with righteousnessAnd let your people sing with joy.O Lord, save your peopleAnd bless your inheritance.Give peace in our time, O LordAnd defend us by your mighty power.Let not the needy, O Lord, be forgottenNor the hope of the poor be taken away.Create in us clean hearts, O GodAnd take not your Holy Spirit from us. Take a moment of silence at this time to reflect and pray for others. The CollectsProper 26Almighty and merciful God, it is only by your gift that your faithful people offer you true and laudable service: Grant that we may run without stumbling to obtain your heavenly promises; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen. Daily Collects:A Collect for PeaceO God, the author of peace and lover of concord, to know you is eternal life and to serve you is perfect freedom: Defend us, your humble servants, in all assaults of our enemies; that we, surely trusting in your defense, may not fear the power of any adversaries, through the might of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.A Collect for GraceO Lord, our heavenly Father, almighty and everlasting God, you have brought us safely to the beginning of this day: Defend us by your mighty power, that we may not fall into sin nor run into any danger; and that, guided by your Spirit, we may do what is righteous in your sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.Collect of Saint BasilO Christ God, Who art worshipped and glorified at every place and time; Who art long-suffering, most merciful and compassionate; Who lovest the righteous and art merciful to sinners; Who callest all to salvation with the promise of good things to come: receive, Lord, the prayers we now offer, and direct our lives in the way of Thy commandments. Sanctify our souls, cleanse our bodies, correct our thoughts, purify our minds and deliver us from all affliction, evil and illness. Surround us with Thy holy angels, that guarded and instructed by their forces, we may reach unity of faith and the understanding of Thine unapproachable glory: for blessed art Thou unto ages of ages. Amen. General ThanksgivingAlmighty God, Father of all mercies, we your unworthy servants give you humble thanks for all your goodness and loving-kindness to us and to all whom you have made. We bless you for our creation, preservation, and all the blessings of this life; but above all for your immeasurable love in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ; for the means of grace, and for the hope of glory. And, we pray, give us such an awareness of your mercies, that with truly thankful hearts we may show forth your praise, not only with our lips, but in our lives, by giving up our selves to your service, and by walking before you in holiness and righteousness all our days; Through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom, with you and the Holy Spirit, be honor and glory throughout all ages. Amen. A Prayer of St. John ChrysostomAlmighty God, you have given us grace at this time, with one accord to make our common supplications to you; and you have promised through your well-beloved Son that when two or three are gathered together in his Name you will grant their requests: Fulfill now, O Lord, our desires and petitions as may be best for us; granting us in this world knowledge of your truth, and in the age to come life everlasting. Amen. DismissalLet us bless the LordThanks be to God!Alleluia, Alleluia! BenedictionThe grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with us all evermore. Amen

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)

The book of Hosea is especially apropos at this time (October 2024) as we are currently drafting our second Christian Atheist series on malaki (the Hebrew word explicitly this time), which first occurs in Exodus 23:20–24: “Behold, I send an angel [malak - "a messenger"] before you to guard you on the way and to bring you to the place that I have prepared. Pay careful attention to him and obey his voice; do not rebel against him, for he will not pardon your transgression, for my name is in him. “But if you carefully obey his voice and do all that I say, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries. “When my angel [malaki - "my messenger"] goes before you and brings you to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, and I blot them out, you shall not bow down to their gods nor serve them, nor do as they do, but you shall utterly overthrow them and break their pillars in pieces. (ESV) The Hebrews described by Hosea are the same as those described by Moses in the Pentateuch and, by extension, the Christian church of today. We are all unfaithful spouses of our Lord. By right, God's holiness should "break out" against us, and we should be consumed. His faithfulness, however, is new every morning. But we should never forget that we serve a holy God, and we live by His grace: Malachi 3:6 [6] “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed." (ESV) Join Jenny and me in this faithless and compromising generation in cleansing our lives from all elements of unfaithfulness, unbelief and disobedience to our LORD's revealed word. Farther up, and farther in to God's infinite wisdom, love and knowledge! We highly recommend this excellent summary of Hosea: https://youtu.be/kE6SZ1ogOVU?si=xmg5ZhYVRTILGC6y Malachi 3:7 From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the LORD of hosts. (ESV)  

34 The Lord said to Moses, “Cut for yourself two tablets of stone like the first, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets, which you broke. 2 Be ready by the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself there to me on the top of the mountain. 3 No one shall come up with you, and let no one be seen throughout all the mountain. Let no flocks or herds graze opposite that mountain.” 4 So Moses cut two tablets of stone like the first. And he rose early in the morning and went up on Mount Sinai, as the Lord had commanded him, and took in his hand two tablets of stone. 5 The Lord descended in the cloud and stood with him there, and proclaimed the name of the Lord. 6 The Lord passed before him and proclaimed, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, 7 keeping steadfast love for thousands,[a] forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children's children, to the third and the fourth generation.” 8 And Moses quickly bowed his head toward the earth and worshiped. 9 And he said, “If now I have found favor in your sight, O Lord, please let the Lord go in the midst of us, for it is a stiff-necked people, and pardon our iniquity and our sin, and take us for your inheritance.” 10 And he said, “Behold, I am making a covenant. Before all your people I will do marvels, such as have not been created in all the earth or in any nation. And all the people among whom you are shall see the work of the Lord, for it is an awesome thing that I will do with you. 11 “Observe what I command you this day. Behold, I will drive out before you the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 12 Take care, lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land to which you go, lest it become a snare in your midst. 13 You shall tear down their altars and break their pillars and cut down their Asherim14 (for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God), 15 lest you make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, and when they whore after their gods and sacrifice to their gods and you are invited, you eat of his sacrifice, 16 and you take of their daughters for your sons, and their daughters whore after their gods and make your sons whore after their gods. 17 “You shall not make for yourself any gods of cast metal. 18 “You shall keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, at the time appointed in the month Abib, for in the month Abib you came out from Egypt. 19 All that open the womb are mine, all your male[b] livestock, the firstborn of cow and sheep. 20 The firstborn of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb, or if you will not redeem it you shall break its neck. All the firstborn of your sons you shall redeem. And none shall appear before me empty-handed. 21 “Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall rest. In plowing time and in harvest you shall rest. 22 You shall observe the Feast of Weeks, the firstfruits of wheat harvest, and the Feast of Ingathering at the year's end. 23 Three times in the year shall all your males appear before the Lord God, the God of Israel. 24 For I will cast out nations before you and enlarge your borders; no one shall covet your land, when you go up to appear before the Lord your God three times in the year. 25 “You shall not offer the blood of my sacrifice with anything leavened, or let the sacrifice of the Feast of the Passover remain until the morning. 26 The best of the firstfruits of your ground you shall bring to the house of the Lord your God. You shall not boil a young goat in its mother's milk.” 27 And the Lord said to Moses, “Write these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel.” 28 So he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights. He neither ate bread nor drank water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.[c] 29 When Moses came down from Mount Sinai, with the two tablets of the testimony in his hand as he came down from the mountain, Moses did not know that the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God.[d] 30 Aaron and all the people of Israel saw Moses, and behold, the skin of his face shone, and they were afraid to come near him. 31 But Moses called to them, and Aaron and all the leaders of the congregation returned to him, and Moses talked with them.32 Afterward all the people of Israel came near, and he commanded them all that the Lord had spoken with him in Mount Sinai. 33 And when Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil over his face. Whenever Moses went in before the Lord to speak with him, he would remove the veil, until he came out. And when he came out and told the people of Israel what he was commanded,35 the people of Israel would see the face of Moses, that the skin of Moses' face was shining. And Moses would put the veil over his face again, until he went in to speak with him.

NUMBERS 13:17-20 “Then Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan, and said to them, “Go up this way into the South, and go up to the mountains, and see what the land is like: whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, few or many; whether the land they dwell in is good or bad; whether the cities they inhabit are like camps or strongholds; whether the land is rich or poor; and whether there are forests there or not. Be of good courage. And bring some of the fruit of the land.” Now the time was the season of the first ripe grapes. (NKJV) NUMBERS 13:26-28 “26 to Moses, Aaron, and the whole community of Israel at Kadesh in the wilderness of Paran. They reported to the whole community what they had seen and showed them the fruit they had taken from the land. 27 This was their report to Moses: “We entered the land you sent us to explore, and it is indeed a bountiful country—a land flowing with milk and honey. Here is the kind of fruit it produces. 28 But the people living there are powerful, and their towns are large and fortified. We even saw giants there, the descendants of Anak! (NLT)    7 WORLD CHANGING MINDSETS THAT WON’T ALLOW ME TO SETTLE      #1 I’M FREE BUT NOT FINISHED     EXODUS 16:3 And the children of Israel said to them, “Oh, that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the pots of meat and when we ate bread to the full! For you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.” (NKJV)    #2 I’M NOT GOING UNLESS I’M SENT     NUMBERS 13:17-20 Then Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan, and said to them, “Go up this way into the South, and go up to the mountains. (NKJV)    JEREMIAH 1:5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; Before you were born I sanctified you; I [ordained you a prophet to the nations.” (NKJV)    #3 I’M GOING TO PUT A DATE ON IT     NUMBERS 13:25 And they returned from spying out the land after forty days. (NKJV)    JOSHUA 3:5 And Joshua said to the people, “Sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you.” (NKJV)    #4 THE FEAR IN MY HEART WILL NEVER BE GREATER THAN THE FRUIT IN MY HANDS     NUMBERS 13:27 Then they told him, and said: “We went to the land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit.  (NKJV)    #5 I REFUSE TO ALLOW WHAT I’M LOOKING AT TO DETERMINE WHAT I SEE     NUMBERS 13: 28 -29 Nevertheless the people who dwell in the land are strong; the cities are fortified and very large; moreover we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the South; the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the mountains; and the Canaanites dwell by the sea and along the banks of the Jordan. (NKJV)   #6 NOTHING WILL STEAL MY VOICE     NUMBERS 13:30 Then Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, “Let us go up at once and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it.” (NKJV)    #7 I WILL NEVER SEE MYSELF AS SMALL    NUMBERS 13:33 There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.” (NKJV)

Psalm 110 ( LSB)Andrew and Edwin consider what events in David's life might have produced this psalm, looking at his victory at Jerusalem and sitting on the throne of Melchizedek's descendants. Read the written devo that goes along with this episode by clicking here.    Let us know what you are learning or any questions you have. Email us at TextTalk@ChristiansMeetHere.org.    Join the Facebook community and join the conversation by clicking here. We'd love to meet you. Be a guest among the Christians who meet on Livingston Avenue. Click here to find out more. Michael Eldridge sang all four parts of our theme song. Find more from him by clicking here.   Thanks for talking about the text with us today.________________________________________________If the hyperlinks do not work, copy the following addresses and paste them into the URL bar of your web browser: Daily Written Devo: https://readthebiblemakedisciples.wordpress.com/?p=18606The Christians Who Meet on Livingston Avenue: http://www.christiansmeethere.org/Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/TalkAboutTheTextFacebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/texttalkMichael Eldridge: https://acapeldridge.com/ 

How to Support the Rob Skinner Podcast.  If you would like to help support my mission to multiply disciples, leaders and churches, click here:  https://www.buymeacoffee.com/robskinner   Transcript for "Raise your activity level, don't lower your goals"   I was looking forward to the final message of the evangelism conference.  Christians from all over the world were gathered for a conference meant to inspire and unify our family of churches.  The final speaker was someone I've always respected and is one of my favorite preachers.  I was waiting for a massive call to action.  A dream casting lesson that set our vision on winning this lost world.  In past seminars and conferences, the final lesson is usually one of the best and is typically preached by one of the most gifted leaders.  That slot summarizes the primary points from all the classes and channels them into a call for massive action on the part of the participants.  As the speaker began, I was waiting for that call.  Instead, I heard a lot of stories about family and parenting.  It was a long, meandering lesson and what I heard from it was that we are not going to win the world in one generation, therefore let's pass the torch on to our kids and let them do it.  I left deflated.  Instead of getting pumped up to return to my home church ready to change my city, I had seen a hero of my faith pull out the white flag of surrender and slowly wave it in front of the gathering of over ten thousand followers of Jesus.  Looking back, I understand what he meant.  We do need to pass on what we've learned, our convictions and passion for God and the lost people of this world.  I recognize that there will be millions of lost people long after I'm past.  I know that the work will continue on until Jesus returns.  However, the tone of the lesson was, “It's never gonna happen so let's not stress about it and let's just focus on the next generation.”  It felt very much like a call to lower expectations and to get satisfied with maintaining what we had rather than multiply what God had given us.  As people filed out on their way home, I sat there thinking to myself, “I'm not ready to surrender, settle or be satisfied yet.  I'm not dead yet.  Yes, I want to pass my faith on to my children, but as long as I have breath, I want to advance the Kingdom as far as I can.” Every generation has to decide how they will face the challenges God has placed before them.  During the Exodus, Moses called the Israelites to explore the land they would enter and see what they were facing, both good and bad.  In Numbers 13:17 it is written,  17 When Moses sent them to explore Canaan, he said, “Go up through the Negev and on into the hill country. 18 See what the land is like and whether the people who live there are strong or weak, few or many. 19 What kind of land do they live in? Is it good or bad? What kind of towns do they live in? Are they unwalled or fortified? 20 How is the soil? Is it fertile or poor? Are there trees in it or not? Do your best to bring back some of the fruit of the land.” (It was the season for the first ripe grapes.)  Twelve tribal leaders led the scouting expedition.  Their evaluation is found in Numbers 13:26, “26 They came back to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the Desert of Paran. There they reported to them and to the whole assembly and showed them the fruit of the land. 27 They gave Moses this account: “We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit. 28 But the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large. We even saw descendants of Anak there. 29 The Amalekites live in the Negev; the Hittites, Jebusites and Amorites live in the hill country; and the Canaanites live near the sea and along the Jordan.” 30 Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, “We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.” 31 But the men who had gone up with him said, “We can't attack those people; they are stronger than we are.”  Ten leaders saw the land and said, “We can't.”  Two leaders, Joshua and Caleb, said “We can.”  Those two men were some of the few who made it into the promised land.  The other ten were put to death by God for their lack of faith.  The Israelites were condemned to wander for forty years for their lack of trust in God.  All the leaders saw the same thing.  The same land, the same fruit, the same enemies and the same challenges.  The facts were identical, but the faith couldn't have been more different.  Every generation has the same command to obey, “Go and make disciples of all nations.” (Matthew 28:19).  We face open fields, difficult fields, persecution and blessings.  This lost world has both opportunities and challenges for us individually and as a Christian family.  However, we have to decide how we will respond.  Will we say with Caleb, “We can!” or with the forgotten and doomed ten leaders, “We can't.”  If you want to be a multiplying Christian, you have to consciously decide that you will be a “We can!” Christian.  It may be difficult, and there will be giants and fortresses to face down, but with God, we can.  One of the biggest traps many Christians fall into is lowering their expectations to when faced with spiritual challenges.  Instead of increasing activity, faith, intensity, focus, they begin to spout the language of those who say, “we can't.”  You can recognize it by: ·         Being satisfied with only a few people becoming Christians ·         Shifting focus from saving the lost to satisfying the saved ·         A critical spirit toward those bent on conquest ·         Jealousy and envy toward those who are making spiritual progress ·         Negative talk, gossip and slander toward those whose passion for the lost is still strong ·         A change of emphasis from building God's kingdom to padding our retirement ·         Faithless language like: o   “People aren't open” o   “Times have changed” o   “I've tried but…” o   “We don't have the right song service, enough money, the right people, etc.” I was reading a book by Grant Cardone called “The 10x Rule.”  He points out that so often when we don't hit our goals, we lower our expectations and our efforts.  We don't want to experience the emotional pain of failing.  Instead, he counsels people to increase your efforts ten times, or “10x.”  This principle is applicable to the world of finance, business, relationships, family or spirituality.  We all have a choice when faced with not achieving our ambitions, we can settle or we can set our minds on God and accept that our current level of faith, activity and love will need to grow to meet the challenge before us.  The difference between the man who returned with 10 minas versus the one who simply returned the mina given him by his master (Luke 19:11-27) is that the multiplying servant raised his expectations and efforts to meet the challenge and multiply what God had given him.  The wicked servant settled and became critical of the master and his expectations.  “21 I was afraid of you, because you are a hard man. You take out what you did not put in and reap what you did not sow.” (Luke 11:21)  He justified his inactivity by blaming his master for being hard and having too-high expectations. The apostle Paul faced difficulties in his ministry in Ephesus.  Take a look at Acts 19:8-10, “8 Paul entered the synagogue and spoke boldly there for three months, arguing persuasively about the kingdom of God. 9 But some of them became obstinate; they refused to believe and publicly maligned the Way. So Paul left them. He took the disciples with him and had discussions daily in the lecture hall of Tyrannus. 10 This went on for two years, so that all the Jews and Greeks who lived in the province of Asia heard the word of the Lord.”  When he faced opposition and a lack of openness, he didn't lower expectations, he changed locations and raised his level of activity.  He held daily discussions in a public location.  The result was that he was able to multiply disciples, leaders and churches in western Asia Minor.  I was reading this passage recently and challenged myself to increase my level of effort this fall.  My goal is to hold 90 “discussions in 90 days.  Anytime I am using a Bible with a non-Christian present I'm counting it as a “discussion.”  Sermons, group discussions or personal Bible studies all count.  If I'm going to reach the metropolitan area I live in, it has to start with greater activity on my part.  Yesterday, I went sharing on campus and we shared with over 100 people. Then I led three Bible studies in the afternoon and evening.  The last person I had a discussion with said he wants to get baptized right away.  I was energized and fired up at the end of the day even though it was a packed day.  I'd rather raise my intensity than lower my standards. I appreciate people like Kevin Miller, church leader from Boston.  He has a passion to reach the lost in the Boston metro area.  He could sit there and say that the church is too old, it's been this size for too long or the membership is too old or set in their ways.  Instead, he has a can-do attitude that won't settle for survival. He wants to see the church grow, multiply and do better than it ever has.  I love what Shawn Wooten is doing in Eastern Europe.  He could call it a day and retire on all the inspiring experiences and stories he's accumulated over the years.  Instead, he's driving on toward expansion of the gospel. Dr. John Oakes lifts my spirits.  Like Caleb, he is an older man.  He's retired from teaching.  However, he's determined to advance the kingdom in central California.  He planted a church in Merced, California in his late sixties.  Instead of lowering expectations, he raised his levels of effort.  He goes out on campus twice weekly to reach out and has grown his church of three Christians to over 25 in a little over a year.  He is a “We can!” disciple. Take a look at yourself.  Are you listening to the excuses and rationalizations that Satan and even well-meaning Christians are placing in your head?  Satan's lie is that when faced with difficult challenges, just lower your expectations, back off and don't try so that you won't experience disappointment, failure or defeat.  For example, if you haven't saved a soul in a while, you might be tempted to think, “I'm too old, too unrelatable, too isolated or too something…”  Take captive that thought and instead raise your activity level.  Start sharing your faith actively.  Keep a prayer list of people you can pray for, serve, show hospitality to and invite to church.  Increase your efforts ten times.  If you raise your energy, efforts and faith, you will see things begin to change.  Jesus said in Matthew 9:29, “According to your faith will it be done to you.” Just like with the exploration of the land, for every two faithful followers there will probably be ten cynical and faithless people.  Don't allow other people's negativity or spiritual issues drag you down.  If you want to do great things for God, you will get heat and reasons why it can't be or shouldn't be done.  People will say your too “old school.”  This often happens because the person is simply trying to justify their lives and low expectations.  Ignore it and do God's will.  Become a multiplying disciple.      Application: ·         In what areas have you surrendered or lowered your expectations? o   Relationships o   Evangelism o   Finances o   Purity ·         What could you do starting today to raise your level of faith and activity to see God work in that area?