Category: Every Day Bible

Someone has said that in war Providence is on the side of the strongest regiments. And I have noted that Providence is on the side of clear heads and honest hearts; and whenever a man walks faithfully in the ways that God has marked out for him, Providence, as the Christian says—luck, as the heathen says—will be on that man’s side. In the long run you will find that God’s Providence is in favor of those who keep His laws, and against those that break them.

—Henry Ward Beecher

I know that doing right is not a guarantee that good things will happen to us. Under the sun, the race isn’t always won by the fastest nor is the battle always won by the strongest (Ecclesiastes 9:11). However, when we do things right, generally good things tend to happen.

Sometimes people speak of “being on the right side of history.” It is embarrassing to look back and see people arguing in favor of slavery. We want our grandchildren’s children to judge that we were doing right. We don’t want to be in the wrong.

The surest way to be judged right in the end, and the path most likely to lead towards a successful life, is the path that follows the instruction of God. After all, isn’t God himself the definition of right?

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.” (Proverbs 1:7)

Humankind has a nasty tendency for dividing into groups: us and them.

The Jews hated the Samaritans. The Zealots hated the tax collectors. The Pharisees hated the “sinners.”

Hate might be too strong of a word for what normally happens.

More often our feelings are subtle. We stereotype and label. We cut “our” people more slack than “their” people.

The Jewish Christians were suspicious of the Gentile Christians and vice versa. Somehow the Greek speaking widows got neglected while the Hebrew-speaking widows did just fine in Acts 6.

The Bible is clear: “God shows no partiality, but in every nation, anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.” (Acts 10:34-35)

Humans like to divide on the basis of skin color and language, but God does not approve.

On the day of Pentecost in Acts 2, there was a beautiful mixture of Parthinians, Medes, Elamites, Mesopotamians, Judeans, Cappadocians, Cretans, Arabs, Romans, and Asians who came together to learn of Jesus.  We praise the Lamb who “ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation” (Revelation 5:9).

Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight! Christ followers must be serious about combating all of the ugly -isms that creep into our hearts. We need to make sure we are aren’t doing things—even little things—that make it harder for the body to be united like Jesus wants.  

Valentine’s Day can be tough on our singles. Unfortunately, church isn’t always an easy place for singles either.

Well-intended friends try to fix you up. Many of our activities are hosted by couples, so it’s easy to get left out or feel like a third wheel.

We have a lot of people who are afraid of saying the wrong thing so divorced people and widows find themselves alone in a crowd.

I wish I had an easy solution for the hurts and frustrations our singles have felt. I don’t. I do have an apology—I’m sorry that life is hard, and I’m sorry that we have made it harder.

In the Bible, singleness is not viewed as a defect, but as a sign of spiritual maturity:

Paul wrote, “I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has his own gift from God, one of one kind and one of another. To the unmarried and the widows, I say that it is good for them to remain single, as I am.” (1 Corinthians 7:7-8)

He continues, “I think that in view of the present distress it is good for a person to remain as he is….Are you free from a wife? Do not seek a wife…I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the things of the Lord, how to please the Lord. But the married man is anxious about worldly things, how to please his wife, and his interests are divided… I say this for your own benefit, not to lay any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and to secure your undivided devotion to the Lord.” (1 Corinthians 7:26-27, 32-35)

Singles aren’t second-class citizens in the kingdom of God. I want to make sure that I act that way!

God designed our hearts and minds to lock on to certain places.

When I walk into a room and forget what I’ve come to do, I turn around and walk back in. It’s funny how that jogs my memory.

When I drive past a cemetery, my mind almost involuntarily remembers the graveside services I’ve attended there.

When I visit Vanderbilt Hospital in Nashville, I have flashbacks to the birth of our kids.

I smile every time I see the pedestrian bridge across the Cumberland River in Nashville where I proposed to Leslie.

I cringe whenever I pass the dentist’s office.

We recognize that, in one sense, there is no such thing as “holy land.” The rocks in Israel aren’t sacrosanct—but there’s still something special about the fact that our heroes of faith lived and died there. We know that the church building is built with the same drywall and steel as the firehall, but the weddings and funerals and baptisms and worship services have a way of sanctifying it in our memory.

One thing I’ve noticed while reading through the Old Testament this year is just how prevalent the “geography of faith” is. Abraham and Jacob set up altars to remember God’s providence in specific places. Joseph was adamant that his bones not be left in Egypt, but taken back to the land of promise.

This principle could be abused and idolized, but used correctly, it’s helpful.

It’s wise to intentionally remember the times and the places when God has blessed you.

Here’s an exercise to try: draw a map of the big God-moments in your life, and let the geography of your faith remind you of the journey God has brought you on so far.

Have you ever had a plumber come to work at your house? If he has to shut off the water, it is amazing how it happens. Like clockwork, immediately everyone either needs to use the bathroom or wants a drink of water!

When I read the Bible, it is easy for me to be really hard on the people in the stories.

The Israelites whine and complain.

The apostles argue amongst themselves.

Everyone misses the point.

I like to pretend that I would have done so much better! (Yeah, right!)

In Exodus 15, after the Israelites cross the Red Sea, they head into the Desert of Shur. “For three days they traveled in the desert without finding water.” (Exodus 15:22 NIV).

How many days would you travel by foot in the desert without water before you started to complain?

Maybe that was the wrong question. How many hours would you make it?

Not long at all!

If I read the text right, they only started to grumble when they got to Marah, where the water was bitter.

I’m not letting the Israelites off the hook. Grumbling is never a blessing, but the fact it took them at least three days to start doing it shows us greater faith and patience than we might have realized. Ten minutes after the plumber shuts off a faucet in my air-conditioned house, I’m thirsty. It took the Israelites three days!

Let’s make a lesson out of this: the next time I start to grumble, I’m going to ask myself, “Can I wait 3 days?” After all, in the Bible story, a lot can change in three days…

Government officials in Delhi, India, were concerned about the deadly Cobras in the area, so they came up with a simple solution: they put a bounty on them. Citizens could turn in dead snakes for money.

Initially, that’s exactly what happened, but before long, some people saw an opportunity. They began to breed cobras to turn in for the bounty! The government was frustrated by this turn of events, so they cancelled the program.

Now that the program was over, cobra breeders were out of business. What did they do? They released their inventory into the wild. By the time the program was over, there were more Cobras than ever!

What’s the moral of the story? There’s no problem that government can’t make worse? Maybe!

Many times when I try to solve a problem, I make it worse.

Do you remember Abram and Sarai? They had a problem. God had promised them children, but they didn’t have any. So they decided to solve the problem themselves. Abram had a child by Sarai’s servant, Hagar. Not only did this not solve the problem—God had told Abram and Sarai that they together would have a son—but it made it worse. Now there is a woman scorned, a boy raised in a broken home, and ultimately a new conflict that lasts throughout the duration of history.

David’s sin with Bathsheba was bad enough, but it got even worse when he tried to solve it at the expense of Uriah’s life.

Here’s some simple advice: when you mess up, do whatever you can not to make things worse!

This is the weekend set aside to honor the work of Dr. King. Let’s honor his legacy by reflecting on a few of his challenging words.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

The time is always right to do what is right.

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.

In the end, we will not remember the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

When he would preach about the parable of the Good Samaritan in Luke 10, Dr. King suggested that the priest and the Levite might have passed by the injured man because of fear. They were afraid of what they would miss out on if they stopped. They were afraid of what might happen to them if they stopped. Dr. King said the difference between them and the good Samaritan boiled down to a question. The religious leaders asked, “What will happen to me if I help?” The good Samaritan asked, “What will happen to him if I don’t?”