Voice of the Lord – Praying Pint

16.j. “Your grumbling is not against us but against the LORD.”

Philippians 2:14 Do all things without grumbling or disputing.

Exodus 16:8   Your grumbling is not against us but against the LORD.”

Numbers 14:27   “How long shall this wicked congregation grumble against me?

Psalms 106:25    They murmured in their tents, and did not obey the voice of the LORD.

James 5:9     Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged; behold, the Judge is standing at the door.

1 Peter 4:9     Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.

Jude 1:16    These are grumblers, malcontents, following their own sinful desires; they are loud-mouthed boasters, showing favoritism to gain advantage.

In Philippians 2:14, Paul said, “Do all things without grumbling or disputing.” Now, that’s convicting, isn’t it? Grumbling isn’t an outward, loud complaint. Instead, it’s that under-the-breath murmuring you do at your job, in traffic, or in church. Make no mistake about it: God hates grumbling.

Why does God hate grumbling so much? One reason is that grumbling is a sign of ingratitude toward God. In Exodus 16:8, Moses said to the Israelites, “Your grumblings are not against us but against the Lord.” When you complain, you are really saying, “God, You don’t know what You’re doing. I could do a lot better job if I were in charge.” Another reason God judges grumbling is that it robs other Christians of their joy when they listen to your complaints. Grumbling spreads like a disease. When Paul said, “Do all things without grumbling or disputing,” he was talking about your job. He was talking about your homework. He was talking about your chores. He was even talking about your ministry in the church. What is the benefit of doing all things without grumbling? Paul said in Philippians 2:15-16, “So that you will prove yourselves to be blameless and innocent, children of God above reproach in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom you appear as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life.” The reason God wants us to live obediently is so we can stand out in this dark world that has lost its thirst for God.

You may remember the children’s song, “This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine.” That song is cute, but it’s misleading. The word in verse 15, “lights,” is not a little light. It literally means “luminary.” God wants our witness for Christ to be a big, shining light–like a star or a planet–not to illuminate ourselves, but to illuminate God. That’s why Jesus said in Matthew 5:16, “Let your light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven.” That’s what happens when we live obediently. When we live a distinctive life, it causes God to be glorified. (Robert Jeffress)

15.w. “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?”

John 6:22 On the next day the crowd that remained on the other side of the sea saw that there had been only one boat there, and that Jesus had not entered the boat with his disciples, but that his disciples had gone away alone. Other boats from Tiberias came near the place where they had eaten the bread after the Lord had given thanks. So when the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they themselves got into the boats and went to Capernaum, seeking Jesus.

When they found him on the other side of the sea, they said to him, “Rabbi, when did you come here?” Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, you are seeking me, not because you saw signs, but because you ate your fill of the loaves. Do not work for the food that perishes, but for the food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give to you. For on him God the Father has set his seal.” Then they said to him, “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.”

Deuteronomy 5:27    Go near and hear all that the LORD our God will say, and speak to us all that the LORD our God will speak to you, and we will hear and do it.’

Jeremiah 42:3-6    Then they said to Jeremiah, “May the LORD be a true and faithful witness against us if we do not act according to all the word with which the LORD your God sends you to us.  Whether it is good or bad, we will obey the voice of the LORD our God to whom we are sending you, that it may be well with us when we obey the voice of the LORD our God.”

Micah 6:7-8    Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”  He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

Acts 2:37    Now when they heard this they were cut to the heart, and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?”

Acts 16:30    Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?”

Those who questioned Jesus seemed sure that if only Jesus told them what to do, they could please God by their works of God. For these people, as with many people today, pleasing God is found in the right formula for performing works that will please God. The sense behind their question seemed to be, “Just tell us what to do so we can get what we want from You. We want Your miracle bread and for You to be our Miracle King; tell us what to do to get it.” If we want to do the work of God, it begins with trusting Jesus. The first work is to believe in Jesus whom God sent. This is first. Some people stop with this. They say they believe but, beyond these words is nothing to indicate any kind of change in their lives. They seem to forget “obedience”. Belief/faith/trust is the foundation for works that are done for the sole purpose to honor and glorify Jesus Christ. Without faith in Jesus Christ first, our works turn into what we trust to be right with God. Our works easily become our false sense of security. Our works are not out of obedience but rather out of self-reliance. No work of ours will wash away our sins. No work of ours will remove the stain of sin. No work of ours will result in eternal life. No work of ours will give lasting peace, joy, and refuge.

Robert Lowry got it right. This is from the hymn he wrote.

What can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

For my pardon, this I see,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
For my cleansing this my plea,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Nothing can for sin atone,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
Naught of good that I have done,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

This is all my hope and peace,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus;
This is all my righteousness,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

12.z. Haggai

Haggai 1:1 In the second year of King Darius, on the first day of the sixth month, the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai to Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua son of Jozadak, the high priest: This is what the Lord Almighty says: “These people say, ‘The time has not yet come to rebuild the Lord’s house.’” Then the word of the Lord came through the prophet Haggai: “Is it a time for you yourselves to be living in your paneled houses, while this house remains a ruin?” Now this is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways. You have planted much, but harvested little. You eat, but never have enough. You drink, but never have your fill. You put on clothes, but are not warm. You earn wages, only to put them in a purse with holes in it.” This is what the Lord Almighty says: “Give careful thought to your ways. Go up into the mountains and bring down timber and build my house, so that I may take pleasure in it and be honored,” says the Lord. “You expected much, but see, it turned out to be little. What you brought home, I blew away. Why?” declares the Lord Almighty. “Because of my house, which remains a ruin, while each of you is busy with your own house. Therefore, because of you the heavens have withheld their dew and the earth its crops. I called for a drought on the fields and the mountains, on the grain, the new wine, the olive oil and everything else the ground produces, on people and livestock, and on all the labor of your hands.” Then Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, Joshua son of Jozadak, the high priest, and the whole remnant of the people obeyed the voice of the Lord their God and the message of the prophet Haggai, because the Lord their God had sent him. And the people feared the Lord.

In the difficult years of the return from exile God spoke to His people through the prophet Haggai. Haggai is also mentioned twice in the Book of Ezra, the priest who oversaw the work of rebuilding the temple. We learn that the prophecy began in September, 520 B.C.This makes Haggai the first among the post-exilic Minor Prophets. Of the 12 Minor Prophets, the first 9 spoke before Judah was carried away captive, exiled to Babylon. The last 3 Minor Prophets (Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi) each spoke to those who returned from the 70-year exile. “Gone was the glory of the former kingdom and temple. Gone was the great population. All that was left was the rubble of Jerusalem, the remnant of the people, and the task of restoration.” In 538 B.C. Cyrus King of Persia allowed the exiled Jews to return to Jerusalem after 70 years in captivity. Two years later (536 B.C.) construction on the temple began, led by Zerubbabel. The work stopped after two years (534 B.C.). After 14 years of neglect, work on the temple resumed in 520 B.C. and was finished four years later in 516 B.C. (Enduring Word)

11.d. “Can I forget any longer the treasures of wickedness”

Micah 6:9 The voice of the Lord cries to the city—and it is sound wisdom to fear your name: “Hear of the rod and of him who appointed it! Can I forget any longer the treasures of wickedness in the house of the wicked, and the scant measure that is accursed? Shall I acquit the man with wicked scales and with a bag of deceitful weights? Your rich men are full of violence; your inhabitants speak lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their mouth. Therefore I strike you with a grievous blow, making you desolate because of your sins. You shall eat, but not be satisfied, and there shall be hunger within you; you shall put away, but not preserve, and what you preserve I will give to the sword. You shall sow, but not reap; you shall tread olives, but not anoint yourselves with oil; you shall tread grapes, but not drink wine. For you have kept the statutes of Omri, and all the works of the house of Ahab; and you have walked in their counsels, that I may make you a desolation, and your inhabitants a hissing; so you shall bear the scorn of my people.”

1 Kings 16:25 Omri did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, and did more evil than all who were before him.

1 Kings 16:30 And Ahab the son of Omri did evil in the sight of the LORD, more than all who were before him.

Do you ever think about what “counsel” you are walking in? What counsel is guiding your thoughts and actions? What counsel do your heart and mind listen to? Where are you finding direction for your life? In the times of Omri and Ahab, the people took counsel from their king even though what the king was doing was wrong in the sight of God. They blindly followed and eagerly joined in. Such is what happens when the Word of God is neglected, abandoned, disregarded, undervalued, unappreciated, and replaced by the counsel of the wicked. It is not as though you made a conscious choice to seek wick counsel but you did make a conscious choice to stay out of His Word. In the absence of God’s Word, what is it that fills our hearts and minds? I can tell you, it is worldly counsel. Counsel void of God’s Word. When there is this void, mankind will fill it with whatever seems right in their own eyes. Do you ever wonder how long God should wait until He calls into account all who have shunned Him and disregarded His Word? Godly counsel will fill a hunger in your soul. Godly counsel from God’s Word will revive your heart and soul. Godly counsel from God’s Word, that is obeyed, will bless your heart, mind, and soul. God’s Word is counsel to the wise and foolish to those who reject it. Spend time in His Word.

10.f. “I will fix my eyes upon them for evil and not for good.”

Amos 9:1 I saw the Lord standing beside the altar, and he said: “Strike the capitals until the thresholds shake, and shatter them on the heads of all the people; and those who are left of them I will kill with the sword; not one of them shall flee away; not one of them shall escape. “If they dig into Sheol, from there shall my hand take them; if they climb up to heaven, from there I will bring them down. If they hide themselves on the top of Carmel, from there I will search them out and take them; and if they hide from my sight at the bottom of the sea, there I will command the serpent, and it shall bite them. And if they go into captivity before their enemies, there I will command the sword, and it shall kill them; and I will fix my eyes upon them for evil and not for good.”

Deuteronomy 28:15 But it shall come to pass, if you do not obey the voice of the Lord your God… And it shall be, that just as the LORD rejoiced over you to do you good and multiply you, so the LORD will rejoice over you to destroy you and bring you to nothing; and you shall be plucked from off the land which you go to possess.

Leviticus 26:23 And if by these things you are not reformed by Me, but walk contrary to Me, then I also will walk contrary to you, and I will punish you yet seven times for your sins. And I will bring a sword against you that will execute the vengeance of the covenant.

This was God’s way of telling Israel that they could run, but they could not hide from Him and His judgment. Even if they tried to dig into hell or climb up to heaven, they could not escape their responsibility before God. A high mountain (Carmel) or the bottom of the sea could not hide them from judgment. I will set My eyes on them for harm and not for good: An essential part of the Old Covenant was the promise of blessing or cursing based on Israel’s obedience. If Israel was in chronic, systemic disobedience, they could expect that God’s eye toward them would be for harm and not for good.

How much better is it to live under the blessings of God? Who would choose to take harm over good, and yet we do this every day we choose to walk paths disobedient to what it means to honor, glorify, follow, trust, and obey Jesus Christ. Walking each day with Jesus Christ is an intentional choice to deny self and live for Him. Life has a way of capturing our focus and it does it very subtly. Soon we find ourselves adopting things into our lives that are not honoring Jesus Christ or to our benefit. Keep a deep hunger and thirst for not only honoring Him but for growing in wisdom and understanding of His Word>

4.e. “Separated themselves from all foreigners and stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers”

Nehemiah 9:1 Now on the twenty-fourth day of this month the people of Israel were assembled with fasting and in sackcloth, and with earth on their heads. And the Israelites separated themselves from all foreigners and stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. And they stood up in their place and read from the Book of the Law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day; for another quarter of it they made confession and worshiped the Lord their God.

Leviticus 26:39-40    And those of you who are left shall rot away in your enemies’ lands because of their iniquity, and also because of the iniquities of their fathers they shall rot away like them.  “But if they confess their iniquity and the iniquity of their fathers in their treachery that they committed against me, and also in walking contrary to me,

Psalms 106:6-7    Both we and our fathers have sinned; we have committed iniquity; we have done wickedness.  Our fathers, when they were in Egypt, did not consider your wondrous works; they did not remember the abundance of your steadfast love, but rebelled by the sea, at the Red Sea.

Daniel 9:3-10     Then I turned my face to the Lord God, seeking him by prayer and pleas for mercy with fasting and sackcloth and ashes.  I prayed to the LORD my God and made confession, saying, “O Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps covenant and steadfast love with those who love him and keep his commandments,  we have sinned and done wrong and acted wickedly and rebelled, turning aside from your commandments and rules.  We have not listened to your servants the prophets, who spoke in your name to our kings, our princes, and our fathers, and to all the people of the land.  To you, O Lord, belongs righteousness, but to us open shame, as at this day, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and to all Israel, those who are near and those who are far away, in all the lands to which you have driven them, because of the treachery that they have committed against you.  To us, O LORD, belongs open shame, to our kings, to our princes, and to our fathers, because we have sinned against you.  To the Lord our God belong mercy and forgiveness, for we have rebelled against him  and have not obeyed the voice of the LORD our God by walking in his laws, which he set before us by his servants the prophets.

1 John 1:7-9    But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin.  If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.  If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

When we come to God’s word with a desire to know Him and gain understanding and wisdom we will become aware of His Holiness and our sinfulness. We will see self-centered sin. We will see worldly sin. We will see how far we have departed from honoring and glorifying Jesus Christ. God’s word will become vital and active in our life. We will see the need for confession and change. We will no longer be blind to His handiwork or deaf to His leading. We will be changed and our lives will be changed because we will know the truth of our sinfulness and the steadfast grace, mercy, and love of Jesus Christ. It is in this truth that we confess and rely on forgiveness. It is in this truth we are being filled with the power of the Holy Spirit. It is in this truth we can come before God in confession and thanksgiving.

168. Your own mouth condemns you, and not I; your own lips testify against you.

1 Kings 20:30 Ben-hadad also fled and entered an inner chamber in the city. And his servants said to him, “Behold now, we have heard that the kings of the house of Israel are merciful kings. Let us put sackcloth around our waists and ropes on our heads and go out to the king of Israel. Perhaps he will spare your life.” So they tied sackcloth around their waists and put ropes on their heads and went to the king of Israel and said, “Your servant Ben-hadad says, ‘Please, let me live.’” And he said, “Does he still live? He is my brother.” Now the men were watching for a sign, and they quickly took it up from him and said, “Yes, your brother Ben-hadad.” Then he said, “Go and bring him.” Then Ben-hadad came out to him, and he caused him to come up into the chariot. And Ben-hadad said to him, “The cities that my father took from your father I will restore, and you may establish bazaars for yourself in Damascus, as my father did in Samaria.” And Ahab said, “I will let you go on these terms.” So he made a covenant with him and let him go. And a certain man of the sons of the prophets said to his fellow at the command of the Lord, “Strike me, please.” But the man refused to strike him. Then he said to him, “Because you have not obeyed the voice of the Lord, behold, as soon as you have gone from me, a lion shall strike you down.” And as soon as he had departed from him, a lion met him and struck him down. Then he found another man and said, “Strike me, please.” And the man struck him—struck him and wounded him. So the prophet departed and waited for the king by the way, disguising himself with a bandage over his eyes. And as the king passed, he cried to the king and said, “Your servant went out into the midst of the battle, and behold, a soldier turned and brought a man to me and said, ‘Guard this man; if by any means he is missing, your life shall be for his life, or else you shall pay a talent of silver.’ And as your servant was busy here and there, he was gone.” The king of Israel said to him, “So shall your judgment be; you yourself have decided it.” Then he hurried to take the bandage away from his eyes, and the king of Israel recognized him as one of the prophets. And he said to him, “Thus says the Lord, ‘Because you have let go out of your hand the man whom I had devoted to destruction, therefore your life shall be for his life, and your people for his people.’” And the king of Israel went to his house vexed and sullen and came to Samaria.

Job 15:6    Your own mouth condemns you, and not I; your own lips testify against you.

Matthew 21:41-43     They said to him, “He will put those wretches to a miserable death and let out the vineyard to other tenants who will give him the fruits in their seasons.”  Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures: “‘The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone; this was the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?  Therefore I tell you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people producing its fruits.

Matthew 25:24-27   He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed,  so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’  But his master answered him, ‘You wicked and slothful servant! You knew that I reap where I have not sown and gather where I scattered no seed?  Then you ought to have invested my money with the bankers, and at my coming I should have received what was my own with interest.

Luke 19:22     He said to him, ‘I will condemn you with your own words, you wicked servant! You knew that I was a severe man, taking what I did not deposit and reaping what I did not sow?

“So shall your judgment be, you yourself have decided it”, “your own mouth condemns you”, “the Kingdom of God will be take away from you.”, “I condemn you with your own words”, “Your own lips testify against you” What are we to expect when our walk with God is lukewarm at best? What are we to expect when we are complacent and neglectful with God’s word? What lies do we believe that convince us that living with our heart living for what the world has to offer and only giving lip service to God? What are we doing or not doing that is testifying against us? How will we know? I’ll tell you when we spend more time in His word with a desire to honor and glorify Him. When we seek more to know and do His will rather than self-satisfying acts resulting from blindly going through life as though we have no need to change, repent, be renewed. Do we need to be struck by lightning or something else to make us committed with our full heart, mind, and soul? God’s word will only have an impact on a heart, mind, and soul that is intentionally choosing God over self. Without a heart deep desire to humbly serve, honor, glorify, follow, obey, trust, and rely on God I fear we will end up going through life with our own lips and actions testifying against us while we are blind to it.

106. Warning them persistently, even to this day, saying, Obey my voice.

1 Samuel 15:22 “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams.

Psalms 51:16-17     For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; you will not be pleased with a burnt offering.  The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

Proverbs 21:3    To do righteousness and justice is more acceptable to the LORD than sacrifice.

Isaiah 1:17   learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; bring justice to the fatherless, plead the widow’s cause.

Jeremiah 7:22-23     For in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, I did not speak to your fathers or command them concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices.  But this command I gave them: ‘Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people. And walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.’

Hosea 6:6    For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

Micah 6:6-8     “With what shall I come before the LORD, and bow myself before God on high? Shall I come before him with burnt offerings, with calves a year old?  Will the LORD be pleased with thousands of rams, with ten thousands of rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?”  He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?

Ecclesiastes 5:1      Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. To draw near to listen is better than to offer the sacrifice of fools, for they do not know that they are doing evil.

Jeremiah 11:7    For I solemnly warned your fathers when I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, warning them persistently, even to this day, saying, Obey my voice.

God is clear about obedience. Obey My voice, I desire steadfast love and knowledge of God, love justice, love kindness, walk humbly with God, draw near, guard your steps, broken spirit and contrite heart. He says obedience is far and above sacrifice. So how do we know if we are being obedient????? This is a good question to ask and a good question to answer.

To understand how to be obedient we should know how God speaks into our life. He speaks through His word. Hebrews 4:12; “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And no creature is hidden from his sight, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.” He gives the Holy Spirit to indwell those who believe in, trust in, cling to, and rely on Jesus Christ. John 14:16 “And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever.” And He speaks through what He has shown and continues to show us Romans 1:19 “For what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse.”

His word brought our heart and mind to the place of knowing sin, repentance, and forgiveness so that may know we have been saved from the judgment of sin and have been given eternal life through Jesus Christ. This is given to all who believe and is rightly called being born again. Born not of flesh and blood but of God. John 1:13 “who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.”

The first step of obedience has 4 parts, first is belief, second confessing sin, third is repentance, fourth is trusting in/relying on/clinging to Jesus Christ and the sacrifice He made on the cross. This initial act of obedience led to a new birth and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.

A life of obedience is a desire/choice to listen, a desire/choice to follow, a desire/choice to act/obey. There is little chance of obedience when there is little desire for His word in your life. There is little chance of being influenced and directed by the indwelling Holy Spirit when there is little desire for His word in your life. We cannot honor Jesus Christ without desiring to be obedient. Without His word and a deep desire to know, understand, and humbly serve, honor, follow, and obey Him we deceive ourselves into thinking we are obedient. His word is to be the bread of life, living water, and the air that we breathe. I fear our society/culture has influenced us to the point we cannot see that we are starving, dehydrating, suffocating, and either dead or close enough to being dead that the depth of His word has no place in our heart, mind, and soul, and the understanding of obedience has been diluted to non-existence.

An obedient life must have a continual daily desire to be in, listen too, and act on His word for the sole purpose of humbly serving, honoring, glorifying, following, and obeying Jesus Christ. Live obediently. Seek and desire His word each day with a heart seeking to honor Him.

98. Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain.

Deuteronomy 8:5 Know then in your heart that, as a man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you. So you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and by fearing him. For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land,

Deuteronomy 8:17 Beware lest you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.’ You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day. And if you forget the Lord your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, I solemnly warn you today that you shall surely perish. Like the nations that the Lord makes to perish before you, so shall you perish, because you would not obey the voice of the Lord your God.

Psalms 127:1-2   Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.  It is in vain that you rise up early and go late to rest, eating the bread of anxious toil; for he gives to his beloved sleep.

Psalms 33:16-18    The king is not saved by his great army; a warrior is not delivered by his great strength.  The war horse is a false hope for salvation, and by its great might it cannot rescue.  Behold, the eye of the LORD is on those who fear him, on those who hope in his steadfast love,

Proverbs 21:30-31    No wisdom, no understanding, no counsel can avail against the LORD.

1 Corinthians 3:7     So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.

1 Chronicles 28:20    Then David said to Solomon his son, “Be strong and courageous and do it. Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed, for the LORD God, even my God, is with you. He will not leave you or forsake you, until all the work for the service of the house of the LORD is finished.

1 Corinthians 3:9-15    For we are God’s fellow workers. You are God’s field, God’s building.  According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it.  For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.  Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw—  each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done.  If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward.  If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.

It is by God’s very hand that we live. It is by His very blessings we have life. In Him, we are made whole. Apart from Him, we are chasing wind of every desire that is influenced upon our heart and mind. If we don’t find hope, peace, and refuge in Him our daily foundation is built on something that will not stand. In fact, it will fail us time and time again. Finances, employment, and relationships, outside of God’s leading and provision are worthless, though they seem satisfying.

If our view of this world and what it has to offer comes from the world our heart and mind will be darkened and our ears will become deaf to His calling and our eyes will be blind to His leading. If all we have to hope is what we can glean from this world we will go through life with a sad existence. His word is the breath of life, water for our soul, food for our mind, and in His word we find purpose and meaning for today, tomorrow, and eternity.

Do you want satisfaction for your heart, mind, and soul? Do you want to have meaning and purpose every day? Do you want to honor and glorify Jesus Christ for His sacrifice on the cross? Do you want to live in forgiveness or needing to be forgiven?

All of these questions can be answered faithfully in a life that is intentional in humbly serving, honoring, glorifying, worshipping, following, and obeying what is revealed in and through His word. There is no better time to be intentional to stay in His seeking and desiring to be led by God.

69. “They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways.”

Joshua 5:6 For the people of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness, until all the nation, the men of war who came out of Egypt, perished, because they did not obey the voice of the Lord; the Lord swore to them that he would not let them see the land that the Lord had sworn to their fathers to give to us,

Numbers 14:32-34     But as for you, your dead bodies shall fall in this wilderness.  And your children shall be shepherds in the wilderness forty years and shall suffer for your faithlessness, until the last of your dead bodies lies in the wilderness.  According to the number of the days in which you spied out the land, forty days, a year for each day, you shall bear your iniquity forty years, and you shall know my displeasure.’

Psalms 95:10-11    For forty years I loathed that generation and said, “They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways.”  Therefore I swore in my wrath, “They shall not enter my rest.”

Hebrews 3:11    As I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest.’”

Hebrews 3:18-19   And to whom did he swear that they would not enter his rest, but to those who were disobedient?  So we see that they were unable to enter because of unbelief.

Matthew 11:28-29     Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.

Wandering in the wilderness for forty years seems like a severe punishment in todays standards. We would look at this and call it harsh, unreasonable, and definitely not from a loving God. We are good at that, putting our human twist onto God’s work. We exalt our limited wisdom, understanding, and knowledge of God. In this exaltation of self knowledge and understanding we are actually saying “If I were God” and would do things differently.

The key take away from these verses is to intentionally choose to walk by faith, believing in and walking in obedience to God. Without this intentional choice to honor and serve God you will certainly go astray in your heart. Without His word in your daily life you will go astray in your heart. Keep it close, cherish it, and seek to know how to honor and serve Him more and more each day.