Bible 365: Week 34

Happy Monday!!  How was y'all's weekends?  We did make it out the house and to the park.  Not the one on our block, but a different park with a bigger jungle gym.  Anyways, I got so caught up cooking dinner, cleaning, dealing with the kids and stuff that I almost forgot about my Bible 365 post.

This week we finished up the books of Hosea, Joel and Amos.  As has been the case with most of the Old Testament, these books talk about the Israelites and how they continued to wander from God's grace.  In these books, at times it appears that God is torn between punishing the Israelites and turning a blind eye to them for good or blessing them and giving them the land of milk and honey.  He's tried for many generations to give the Israelites chances to redeem themselves, but for some reason they keep going back to worshiping idols, human sacrifices, adultery and other bad habits. Below are a few scriptures that stood out for me in Week 34.

1-"Fear not, O land; be glad and rejoice, for the Lord has done marvelous things!" (Joel 2:21)  This is exactly why I do my Thankful Thursday posts.  It's so easy for to get like the Israelites and forget that God does and has done marvelous things for us and our loved ones.

2-"And it shall come to pass that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved." (Joel 2:32)  Often times we're waiting on God to rescue us from our current circumstances.  However, we have yet to call on Him for help.  While He is a mind reader, we still need to call on Him directly and let Him know His help is needed.

3-"They hate the one who rebukes in the gate, and they abhor the one who speaks uprightly." (Amos 5:10)  When you're trying to live right and do the right thing, you'll find that not everyone is going to like you.  You're going to have people who will hate on you for no reason other than you're trying to do the right thing and live positively.  It's just part of the territory that comes with being a good person.

Again thank you to everyone who continues to read, share and comment on my Bible 365 posts!  I have just a little over 500 pages left of reading before I will have read the entire Bible!!  Yes, it's getting close.  I'm sure that if I really wanted to I could knock out these 500 pages in two weeks, but I'm sticking to the plan and stretching it out until the end of December.

Week 35 Readings

8/26: Obadiah 1

8/27:  Jonah 1-2

8/28:  Jonah 3-4

8/29:  Micah 1-2

8/30:  Micah 3-5

8/31:  Micah 6-7

9/01:  Nahum 1-3

Bible 365: Week 33

Happy Monday!  Hope that everyone had a lovely weekend.  It was super rainy here.  So, nothing interesting to report.  We stayed indoors and enjoyed movie nights.  I did spend some time in the kitchen with Moo experimenting on a few recipes.  More about those later.

Anyways, Week 33 is down.  We finished up the books of Ezekiel and Daniel and got started on Hosea.  If you've never read the book of Daniel, I would suggest that you do.  It's a book of reassurance that proves that when you are truly for God, no weapon or trickery from your enemies will prosper.  Trust me.  It seemed like every time Daniel turned around somebody was trying to betray him or frame him for something to cost him his life.  However, God had his hand on Daniel and let no harm come to him.

The perfect example of this can be found in the story about Daniel in the Lion's Den in Daniel 6.  You see Daniel had God's favor and it was definitely visible.  This made a lot of the Chaldean governors and administrators jealous.  They felt more than a bit threatened by Daniel's success and talents. So, they tricked King Darius into signing a decree saying that if anybody in the kingdom prayed or worshipped any other god or man besides King Darius that they would be thrown into the lion's den.

Well, of course they knew Daniel worshipped God.  And they waited outside of his place and when they saw him praying they took him to the king to have him thrown in the lion's den.  King Darius tried his hardest to make an exception to this decree for Daniel but the men had made King Darius promise to not go back on his word.  So, off to the lion's den Daniel went.

King Darius had faith though and told Daniel that "Your God, whom you serve continually, He will deliver you" (Daniel 6:16).  And so, the king didn't sleep well that night worrying about his friend.  He woke up early that next morning and went to see if God had indeed spared Daniel's life.  To his relief and God's credit, Daniel was in fact still alive.  Daniel was lifted up out of the lion's den and King Darius ordered the men who had set Daniel up to be thrown in the lion's den along with their entire families.

Afterwards, King Darius made the decree that "in every dominion of my kingdom men must tremble and fear before the God of Daniel" (Daniel 6:26).  He had seen what God had done for Daniel and knew right then and there that there was only one true God!  So, the next time you feel like your enemies have thrown you under the bus or into the "lion's den" just have faith that God is going to deliver you and protect you.

Week 34 Readings

8/19:  Hosea 6-10

8/20:  Hosea 11-14

8/21:  Joel 1-2

8/22:  Joel 3

8/23:  Amos 1-2

8/24:  Amos 3-6

8/25:  Amos 7-9