This month I wanted to encourage you with how Elizabeth and Mary embraced their God-given roles and found joy leading up to the first Christmas.
Over the next few months I’ll be writing devotionals from the book of Esther in celebration of the release of my latest study, Esther: Daring Faith For Such A Time As This, coming November 1st. There’s so much encouragement in her story. In God’s story.
When You Don’t Know, Do What You Do Know
Esther 4:14b “Who knows, perhaps you have come to your royal position for such a time as this.”
The phrase, “for such a time as this” is a familiar one in the Book of Esther. What we don’t often focus on is that the verse begins with “who knows.” Because we typically want to know, right? We want to know who our child will end up marrying, what will happen with the diagnosis, whether or not we’ll get the job, what school our child belongs in. We love a “thus sayeth the Lord,” when it comes to life’s biggest decisions.
But when Mordecai pleaded with Esther to put her life on the line on behalf of the Jewish people he didn’t have a direct command from the Lord. Mordecai believed that God would work out deliverance, but he didn’t know how. When it comes to significant outcomes in my life, I very much like to know “that” it will happen and “how.” But it’s precisely the latter that God doesn’t usually share with us. Sometimes all He asks us to do is to take the first step of obedience. And then the next.
As I write, I have a stirring in my heart for something I’m not quite sure about. The Lord has asked me to take a practical step of obedience but I don’t know where it’s leading. It it leads where it could, it would be life-changing. But the path could also just as realistically not be life-changing at all. Who knows? But here’s the thing… well, two things: 1. God knows all things and 2. we know a few things.
God knew exactly how He would deliver His people because He knows all things. But Mordecai knew a few things. We can assume he knew of God’s general will for His people, the Jews. We can assume he knew of passages like Deuteronomy 4:31 which says, “For the LORD your God is a merciful God; he will not abandon or destroy you or forget the covenant with your ancestors, which he confirmed to them by oath.” In other words, Mordecai knew that God would keep His covenant with His people even when they had been driven into faraway places. He knew enough to know that God would not fail the Jewish people now. Even though they were seemingly a million miles from the land of promise, and Esther was queen in a pagan Persian palace, and Mordecai had angered a chief rival of the Jews by not bowing down to him, somehow, someway, God would keep His promise to preserve His beloved people. Mordecai wasn’t exactly sure if or how Esther would be used, but He believed God would deliver His people one way or another.
The same is true for us. When we study Scripture, we discover what God has called us to generally: Love others, speak kindly, walk humbly, worship Jesus, take care of the orphan and widow, live generously, trust God and don’t worry, and we could go on and on. Those are the “few” things we know to do. God knows the bigger picture. And He delights in our trusting Him, even when we don’t know the specifics of how He will work out His plan.
Esther and Mordecai had the confidence to courageously step up, not because God told them how things would turn out but because they knew that fighting for the Jewish people was in accordance with His will. What do you know to do that is God’s will? You may not have all the details, but how can you obey now? What practical step can you take?
Romans 8:28 says, “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (NIV). Many things in life are not good. And bad things don’t always work together for good. However, what we can bank on is that in all things it is God who is working for our good!1
Be obedient to Christ. Make choices according to what God has revealed to you in His Word. Trust Him. Though you can’t know how it’s all going to work out, take heart that it will. In His time, in His way, always for your good.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not rely on your own understanding; in all your ways know him, and he will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6
Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you at the proper time, casting all your cares on him, because he cares about you. 1 Peter 5:6-7
It’s that time of year again where we swap our vacation schedules for back-to-school supplies and routines. But it’s not all bad. I like the somewhat predictability of a schedule and the chance to start afresh with some new habits. Fall is the perfect time to jump into Bible study. I could give you countless reasons why, but I thought this month I would let the author of Psalm 1 convince you (The Psalm is provided at the end for reference).
To Be Blessed
Immersing ourselves in God’s Word brings blessing. The interesting thing here is that the Psalmist doesn’t use the more common word for blessed, rather he uses one that describes “the good life,” in a sense. In other words, delighting in the Lord’s words is the best way to live. It’s the flourishing, successful, plentiful way of life. It’s the “wise” way, which we’ll get to in a minute.
To Be Rooted and Flourishing
The person who delights in God’s Word, and thinks about it throughout the day, leads a full and prosperous life. I love to be settled. You wouldn’t necessarily know this about me for as much as I travel for work, but I relish the security of home. I love spending my free time with close friends and family. So I’m immediately drawn to this image of a tree planted by flowing streams of water. I love the predictability. I’m drawn to the peaches or apples or pears—or whatever is your favorite—dripping from its branches in the proper season. I appreciate that its leaves don’t wither up. (Which, side note, my fiddle leaf plant in my bedroom just dropped another leaf because I, unlike the flowing streams in verse 3, am terrible about remembering to water.)
Delighting Even More Than Doing
To study the Word of God, to enjoy it, to mull it over is to be like this healthy tree that is constantly supplied by living water. Notice the Psalmist isn’t even talking about doing what’s required in Scripture but delighting in it. Yes, we’re absolutely to obey it but the emphasis here is on enjoying it. Being in a regular Bible study helps us treasure its life-giving words. We then get to test those truths out in real life and our experience leads to further enjoyment of God and His ways.
The Wise Way
To live the “good life” means to avoid walking with people who have no regard for the ways of Christ. It means avoiding the “mocker” (v. 1). This word is specifically used in wisdom literature which tells us that that is what kind of Psalm this is. It’s a Psalm that explains the wise way of living. The smart way. The prosperous way. This means not standing in solidarity with those mock the Lord because before we know it we may end up settling in with them. You can see the progressive pattern of walking, standing, sitting. These “mockers” are not rooted. They’re not secure. They will blow away, or fall to the ground like the leaves on my fiddle leaf. But the Lord watches over the way of the righteous. What a promise. What security.
Choose a Bible study this Fall. Old Testament or New. Get into God’s Word. Plant yourself beside its waters. I’ll leave you with the words of Jerome who wrote in the fourth century, “I beg you, my dearest [sister], to live among these [sacred books], to meditate on them, to know nothing else, to seek nothing else. Does not this seem to you to be a little bit of heaven here on earth?
Psalm 1 (NIV)
1 Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
or sit in the company of mockers,
2 but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
and who meditates on his law day and night.
3 That person is like a tree planted by streams of water,
which yields its fruit in season
and whose leaf does not wither—
whatever they do prospers.
4 Not so the wicked!
They are like chaff
that the wind blows away.
5 Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the assembly of the righteous.
6 For the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked leads to destruction.
I was awake at 3:30 in the morning. My mind racing as it’s been doing non-stop the past few weeks or so. Certain realities of life that have mostly felt concrete, prior to very recently, are suddenly gone or simply up in the air. Where will it all land? We don’t know, is what the professionals keep saying.
As my mind flitted about from one worry and prayer to another the sound of birds relentlessly pecked at the door of my thoughts. Why are the birds chirping at this hour? I moaned while fluffing my pillow for the countless time. Don’t they know it’s the middle of the night!
Scientists call this early morning bird singing the dawn chorus, which is most noticeable in spring when birds are migrating or mating. The name dawn chorus sounds so delightful except when you’re trying to sleep in the middle of a worldwide pandemic. And, yet, maybe this is the point: singing in the middle of a storm, reaping during a time of scarcity, staying on mission. Maybe the birds have something to teach us after all, I mused.
Before I could complete the thought I realized it’s not actually the birds but Jesus who has something to teach us through the birds. The comforting lesson found in Matthew 6:25-26 that Jesus delivered over 2,000 years ago about the birds of the sky feels particularly meaningful right now.
“Therefore I tell you: Don’t worry about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Isn’t life more than food and the body more than clothing? Consider the birds of the sky: They don’t sow or reap or gather into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Aren’t you worth more than they?”
Some translations say look at or observe the birds. The Greek word means to look intently. In other words, we’re to reflect on them, really think about how they go about their lives, and then listen to what Jesus is telling us about our own, and about our heavenly Father’s provision. We notice from Jesus’ teaching that the birds don’t sow, reap, or store, which are have to do with our ability to plan.
Yesterday I sowed seed in my backyard garden and I checked the seed packet for the section that says, days to maturity. This tells me when I can reap the lettuce, kale, and spinach I planted. Sadly, my little raised beds don’t produce enough for me to store anything in barns (I’ll let you know when I’ve reached that level), but if I could store, I would. Planting, reaping, and harvesting require reason and foresight.
Point being, we humans have the faculties to plan, save, invest, freeze the ground beef until we need it in a few weeks. The birds cannot do this! They live day to day, meal to meal, worm to worm (ne’er was there a pleasanter thought). And still they are fed. Still, they are nourished. Still they have enough for their chicks.
How can this be? Jesus wants us to ask ourselves. He quickly answers. Because we have a heavenly Father who feeds them. And that heavenly Father isn’t just the Father of the birds; He is your heavenly Father. And how much more are you worth to Him than the birds? The answer is clear: infinitely more.
During this season where what you sowed might have just disappeared, or what you reaped is no longer enough to be stored into barns, or what you had in your barns was supposed to be for tomorrow but now needs to be for today, you can have confidence your Father will take care of you. This is not pie in the sky theology, but an evident truth seen in the fabric of nature of which God is the Creator.
It’s natural to think, well, what about those who are homeless? Those in poverty? Those who go hungry? Part of what Jesus is demonstrating is a general principle that stems from God’s generous care of creation found in Genesis 1–2. Jesus reminds us of this care by pointing to two everyday examples, birds and flowers.
Generally speaking, the birds of the air have food, and the flowers of the field are beautifully clothed. Through them we see the fundamental goodness of God, His care for creation, and the ways we can witness this in everyday life. Jesus wants us to remember that we’re infinitely more valuable to Him than birds and flowers and that He will provide for us in even more abundant ways.
In addition, if we go back to Matthew 5:13-16, we see that Jesus calls us to be salt and light, and to do “good works” for others, which can also be understood as “tangible deeds of mercy.” And if you go back to Matthew 6:19-24, Jesus teaches radical generosity. We can look to countless parts of Scripture where God clearly calls His people, His church, to meet the needs of the hungry, hurting, and homeless.
While God is generous in His care for us through creation, we as the church are part of His answer in meeting the needs of the world around us. We are part of God’s generous provision for others.
[click_to_tweet tweet=”While God is generous in His care for us through creation, we as the church are part of His answer in meeting the needs of the world around us. We are part of God’s generous provision for others.” quote=”While God is generous in His care for us through creation, we as the church are part of His answer in meeting the needs of the world around us. We are part of God’s generous provision for others.”]
You may be in a time of need where you’re trusting God and His provision. Or you may be in a time of abundance and He’s calling you to give to others. No matter what season you’re in, my prayer is that in the middle of the night, in the middle of unprecedented times, when we hear the birds chirping with purpose and delight, we will remember the words of Jesus and so add our hallelujahs to the dawn chorus.
The post Consider the Birds appeared first on LifeWay Voices.
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This month I wanted to encourage you with how Elizabeth and Mary embraced their God-given roles and found joy leading up to the first Christmas.
Over the next few months I’ll be writing devotionals from the book of Esther in celebration of the release of my latest study, Esther: Daring Faith For Such A Time As This, coming November 1st. There’s so much encouragement in her story. In God’s story. When You Don’t...
It's that time of year again where we swap our vacation schedules for back-to-school supplies and routines. But it’s not all bad. I like the somewhat predictability of a schedule and the chance to start afresh with some new habits. Fall is the perfect time to jump...
If you’re anything like me over the past few weeks you’ve been vacillating between a confident trust in God and waves of panic and fear. For those of us who are Christ followers we want to trust the Lord but we get tripped up on wondering what exactly we can trust Him for—can we count on Him to spare us from looming hardship and make sure everything turns out okay on our terms? We know He’s bigger, greater, higher, stronger, but what does that mean for the very real and ominous threats we’re facing?
I’ve been reflecting on the account of Jesus calming the storm that threatened to overtake His disciples in Matthew 8:23-27. Since I think we can collectively agree we’re in a pretty big storm right now, I think this a timely passage that helps solidify what Jesus has promised us.
“As [Jesus] got into the boat, his disciples followed him. Suddenly, a violent storm arose on the sea …” (vv. 23-24).
Right away we find it’s possible to be a follower of Jesus who follows Him straight into a storm. This is something we don’t talk enough about. The context is also important. Right before this story Matthew tells us of two other “disciples” who wanted to follow Jesus but who either didn’t count the cost of following Him or didn’t count the value. Regardless of their hang-ups, those two were safe on the shore while the true Christ followers were scrambling for their lives in the storm tossed boat.
[click_to_tweet tweet=”My fears get the best of me when I believe that God delivering me from the storm is more valuable than His presence with me in it.” quote=”My fears get the best of me when I believe that God delivering me from the storm is more valuable than His presence with me in it.” theme=”style6″]
But—and this changes absolutely every single detail of the story—the disciples who were in the storm were also the ones who were in the boat with Jesus. My fears get the best of me when I believe that God delivering me from the storm is more valuable than His presence with me in it. We don’t know what today or tomorrow holds, but we can lean into the unshakable reality that He is with us and promises to never leave us. He is able to comfort, speak, guide, and offer peace in tumultuous times.
We’ve often used this story to assure others and ourselves that God will calm the storms in our lives. And He certainly can, no question! He’s done it over and over in my life. But I think there’s more to the story here. I appreciate what Dr. Craig Blomberg says, “…the focus of this passage remains squarely Christological—on who Christ is, not on what he will do for us.”1
In Psalm 89:8-10 the psalmist describes Almighty God as the One who is able to rule the raging sea and still the surging waves. The disciples would have known from the Old Testament that the only One who had power over nature was The Lord of Hosts. By rebuking the wind and the waves Jesus was showing His disciples that He is God!
This doesn’t mean that Jesus won’t do mighty things for us during uncertain and troubling times. Of course He will. But what we can absolutely count on during the trials in our lives is that Jesus is God Himself. He alone holds the power over storms, viruses, stock market crashes, and our personal health and finances. It brings me great comfort to remember that just as He brought the wind and waves under His control, so any other storms He rebukes must also obey.
The other night I read this story out of a children’s Bible to my 9-year-old nephew, Will. He said, “If I was in that storm I would have woken Jesus up and asked Him to read me a bedtime story, because I would know everything was going to be okay since Jesus was there.” And Will’s not wrong. But the question he will wrestle with later in life is, what does it mean for everything to be okay?
My prayer is that he will continue to understand that in Jesus everything will ultimately be okay because of the enduring hope we have in Him. And because of Jesus’ ultimate power over death, sickness, and evil, one day all will be made right and we will dwell with Him forever. In the meantime, He is present in us and through us now to bring redemption here on earth.
We hear this ring of hope in Jesus’ question to His disciples, “Why are you afraid, you of little faith?” (vs. 26.) I think Jesus was trying to communicate to His followers, though not yet in full, that they were ultimately safe because He had come to conquer the storm of sin through His death and resurrection. He had them once and for all whether He stilled the immediate storm of the moment or not. And He has us both now and forever.
1 Blomberg, C. (1992). Matthew (Vol. 22, p. 150). Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.
The post The Nearness of God in Uncertain Times appeared first on LifeWay Voices.
This month I wanted to encourage you with how Elizabeth and Mary embraced their God-given roles and found joy leading up to the first Christmas.
Over the next few months I’ll be writing devotionals from the book of Esther in celebration of the release of my latest study, Esther: Daring Faith For Such A Time As This, coming November 1st. There’s so much encouragement in her story. In God’s story. When You Don’t...
It's that time of year again where we swap our vacation schedules for back-to-school supplies and routines. But it’s not all bad. I like the somewhat predictability of a schedule and the chance to start afresh with some new habits. Fall is the perfect time to jump...
I love when I learn something new, but what I appreciate even more is learning something that helps expand my capacity to learn more new things. My friend gave me a cookbook for Christmas called The Food Lab. While it has recipes in it, what the author really wants you to know is the science behind cooking so you don’t need as many recipes. If you know what types of ingredients go together and how to prepare and season them, the idea is that you can successfully cook without having to follow step-by-step recipes because you understand the basic principles of putting together a good meal.
The same is true for Scripture. When we learn basic principles like how to study Scripture, how to interpret certain texts, and what we’re looking for when we study, our capacity to learn increases. Ultimately, the goal is not for more knowledge, but for loving Jesus with more of our hearts and lives.
As we move into a season of Lent—a time when we set aside something so that something new can grow—stretching our minds in our pursuit of Jesus should be a part of our process. Maybe read through a book on the latter days of Jesus, the crucifixion, or the resurrection.
What I think directly affects what choices I make. And what I think is directly influenced by the knowledge I have.
My brother makes homemade pizzas that are better than anything in town, which is saying something. My knowledge of David’s great pizzas had a direct impact on the choice I made on Super Bowl Sunday to possibly have six slices. What I know affects my behavior. (I also happen to know that six slices makes me gain weight, which I really don’t want to do, but that’s another issue for another post.)
The more I understand about Jesus, His nature, His power, His love for us, the role He plays in history, His desire for those in my life to know Him, the more my life choices will be impacted.
For instance, knowing what Jesus says about our treasures in Matthew 6:19-24 changes what I do with my money. Listening to what He teaches about the worthlessness of worry in Matthew 6:25-34 helps me approach my fears and anxieties differently. Understanding what He says about not judging others in Matthew 7:1-6 is a constant reminder for me to look for the good in people instead of being critical.
Knowledge affects my behavior. And knowledge of Jesus not only affects my behavior, but also transforms my heart behind my behavior, especially if I’m walking in His Spirit.
While knowledge of God and His Word are encouraged throughout Scripture, we also know that knowledge can puff us up (1 Corinthians 8:1). And no one wants to be around a puffed-up person. But if we approach our studying with humble hearts learning new things in Scripture should actually make us more humble as we continue to realize how much more we don’t know. It’s like the phrase, the more I know, the more I realize how much I don’t know.
Learning more about Scripture will also make us better thinkers and teachers. We’ll have more to offer those around us by way of what we’re able to teach them, ultimately so they can grow in the “grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18).
We’ll also have more confidence when we share with others why we believe what we believe about Jesus and the Bible. We’ll teach and evangelize with humility, love, and kindness, because this is what the Bible teaches. And we’ll know this is what the Bible teaches because we’ve have studied it.
The post What Happens When You Study God’s Word? appeared first on LifeWay Voices.
This month I wanted to encourage you with how Elizabeth and Mary embraced their God-given roles and found joy leading up to the first Christmas.
Over the next few months I’ll be writing devotionals from the book of Esther in celebration of the release of my latest study, Esther: Daring Faith For Such A Time As This, coming November 1st. There’s so much encouragement in her story. In God’s story. When You Don’t...
It's that time of year again where we swap our vacation schedules for back-to-school supplies and routines. But it’s not all bad. I like the somewhat predictability of a schedule and the chance to start afresh with some new habits. Fall is the perfect time to jump...