Category: Scripture Journal

HIGHLIGHT

Luke 6:12 (ESV): 12 In these days he went out to the mountain to pray, and all night he continued in prayer to God.

EXPLAIN

This chapter begins with two Sabbath controversy stories. Then, we are told that Jesus went to a mountain to pray all night, after which he called his disciples and chose twelve of them to mentor more deeply, calling them apostles.

Following this, Jesus stood on a level place and preached what is referred to as the Sermon on the Plain, very similar to the Sermon on the Mount, and possibly was a different recording of the same event. Or, it could have simply been Jesus preaching a similar message in a different location.

APPLY

Jesus’ example shows us the priority he placed on prayer. Before any big decision, he spent much time in dedicated, passionate prayer.

Since the beginning of this year, I have felt that a deeper prayer life should be my focus. However, I do not feel like I have progressed as I should.

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, help me to develop the discipline of prayer, especially passionate, submissive prayer for your will. May I grow in my relationship with you through the fellowship of prayer. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

Luke 4:28 (ESV): 28 When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath.

EXPLAIN

Jesus had just begun his earthly ministry. He traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in the synagogues. Now, he had returned to his hometown of Nazareth.

On the Sabbath day, he went to the synagogue, and he was given the privilege of reading the scripture for the day and making comments.

Jesus read the prophecy of Isaiah that God had anointed him to proclaim good news. Jesus told the people that this scripture had been fulfilled that day before them.

The people’s response initially was favorable. They recognized him as from their hometown. Jesus then anticipated the objections they would later have. He noted that no prophet is acceptable in his hometown.

He gave as examples Elijah going outside of Israel to find food during the great famine and Elisha healing only the Syrian leper, Naaman.

It was this that riled the anger of the people. But it was not so much that Jesus suggested that they would challenge his authority as a prophet.

Rather, the people perceived Jesus was making an unwanted political statement by saying only foreigners were receptive to God’s moving in their midst.

APPLY

We must be extremely careful not to allow our personal prejudices, political preferences, and petty ideas to blind us to God’s presence and power.

Jesus did powerful miracles throughout Israel, but in his hometown he did little. The reason was not some failure on his part, but the refusal of the people to believe.

Do we pass up miracles today because our minds and hearts are so closed that we cannot see or hear God at work in our midst?

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, help me to receive you with open ears, open eyes and a receptive heart. May I be characterized by simple, large trust in you. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

1 Chronicles 21:24 (ESV): 24 But King David said to Ornan, “No, but I will buy them for the full price. I will not take for the Lord what is yours, nor offer burnt offerings that cost me nothing.”

EXPLAIN

These words of David come at the climax of a very strange story. 1 Chronicles 21:1 says that Satan incited David to number Israel. But in 2 Samuel 24 which tells the same story, we read that the LORD was displeased with Israel and incited David to conduct this census.

This seeming discrepancy is resolved when we understand the ancients’ worldview that God caused all things to happen – so they might attribute this census to God when the idea actually came from Satan.

Yet we should also consider that God allowed Satan to incite David because he was displeased with the people.

Regardless, after the census was conducted, minus Levi and Benjamin, God gave David three alternatives for punishment. David chose to fall into God’s hand – three days of pestilence upon the land.

70,000 men died in those three days, and God sent an angel to destroy Jerusalem, but then God relented. At the same time, David who was praying saw God’s angel at the threshing floor of Ornan the Jebusite. David asked that God punish him, not all of Israel.

God sent word through Gad, a prophet, that David should raise an altar at this threshing floor. So, David asked to buy the site. Ornan offered to give it all to him, but David responded with the highlighted text.

This site is where the Temple was later constructed by King Solomon.

APPLY

Our offerings to God should not be cheap, costing us little or nothing. Rather, we should give generously, knowing that God has given so much more for us and to us, and therefore we truly owe God our everything.

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, may I not be miserly and calculating in my love for you. Rather, may I serve you willingly, humbly, sacrificially. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

Mark 15:23 (ESV): 23 And they offered him wine mixed with myrrh, but he did not take it.

EXPLAIN

This is the story of Jesus’ crucifixion. Mark adds a detail that is not necessarily shared by the other gospel writers. Mark says that before Jesus was crucified, they offered him wine mixed with myrrh.

Then, as noted by other gospel accounts, in Mark 15:37 after Jesus had cried out in agony asking the Father why He had forsaken him, someone put a sponge with sour wine or vinegar to Jesus’ lips, which he rejected after tasting.

It would seem that offering wine or sour wine was a small concession made for criminals being crucified so that their ordeal could not be as torturous. But Jesus determined to fully suffer on the Cross, as he bore our sin upon his shoulders.

APPLY

Jesus suffered willingly and fully out of his love for us. How much are we willing to suffer for him?

Do we seek to escape the rigors of discipleship, the way of the Cross? Or do we willingly take up our cross each day to follow Jesus?

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, thank you for your love for us that did not spare your only begotten Son. Jesus, thank you for suffering fully and dying for me, to buy my pardon but also to demonstrate the love and commitment I should have for you. I choose to take up my cross and follow you each day. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

Mark 14:36 (ESV): 36 And he said, “Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.”

EXPLAIN

It was only a short time before Judas Iscariot would arrive with soldiers to arrest Jesus. Jesus had led his disciples to the Garden of Gethsemane again and prepared to pray. He begged the disciples, especially Peter, James and John, to pray with him.

Mark records these words during Jesus’ first session of prayer with the Father. Jesus paused from praying to go to his disciples and he begged them again to pray. But they couldn’t seem to stay awake.

While the climax of the Cross came the next day, truly the battle of Jesus’ obedience to the Father in dying for the sins of the world appears to have been settled with his time of prayer in the night.

APPLY

The point of prayer is not to get what we think we need or want. Rather, the Father longs for relationship with us, so that he can guide us in the path he has planned for us.

It is not wrong to express our needs or desires to the Father, yet our proper posture is willing submission to the will of the Father.

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, deepen my prayer life with you. Help me to stay near you by prayer, always willingly submitting my will to yours. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

Mark 12:24 (ESV): 24 Jesus said to them, “Is this not the reason you are wrong, because you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God?

EXPLAIN

Jesus said this in the midst of numerous questions being asked him during his final week before his crucifixion.

The Pharisees first came asking about paying taxes to Caesar. The Sadducees then presented what they thought was an unsolvable riddle about the afterlife. After Jesus’ answer, a scribe questioned him about the greatest commandment of all.

Jesus’ answer to the Sadducees truly applied to all those who were questioning him. Those who opposed him did not truly understand the scriptures, nor did they understand God’s power.

APPLY

When we approach life, God and religion from our traditions, beliefs, perspectives, and desires we misunderstand God.

Instead of starting off with our preconceived ideas, we must humbly come to God, willing to listen, learn, and apply what God has to say to us.

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, help me to always approach you, willing to learn from you rather than trying to tell you or persuade you to my line of thinking and desires. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

Mark 9:37 (ESV): 37 “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me, and whoever receives me, receives not me but him who sent me.”

EXPLAIN

Jesus and his disciples were traveling to Jerusalem, where soon he would be arrested and crucified. The disciples were afraid as Jesus resolutely set his face toward Jerusalem.

Ironically, however, they began to argue who was the greatest among Jesus’ disciples. Jesus stopped them and taught them that the first must be the last and servant of all.

Jesus then took a child and placed him before them as an illustration, saying the highlighted words.

APPLY

We often think that sophistication, strength, wisdom and more are the pinnacle of success. But Jesus says we must instead recognize our weakness – become like children, recognize our lack of understanding – become like children.

In our culture today, however, our children are taught to become sophisticated, powerful, and smart. Media often pictures children as smarter than their parents.

Do we know what it means to have the spirit of a child anymore?

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, please help me to have the spirit of a child – humble, willing to learn, understanding my need of you. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

Mark 2:22 (ESV): 22 And no one puts new wine into old wineskins. If he does, the wine will burst the skins—and the wine is destroyed, and so are the skins. But new wine is for fresh wineskins.”

EXPLAIN

Both John’s disciples and the Pharisees were fasting. But Jesus’ disciples were not. People then came to Jesus with the question and complaint that his disciples were not fasting. In other words, they were not spiritual enough.

Jesus used the analogy of a wedding. A wedding is not the time to fast. So with Jesus as the figurative bridegroom, it was not appropriate for the disciples to fast.

But one day Jesus would be taken away, and his disciples would fast. But the main principle is in the highlighted text: when God is doing something new, we cannot and must not restrict it to the ways God has worked in the past.

APPLY

The challenge for every generation is to recognize how God wants to move – how God is moving – and accept, follow and cooperate with what he is doing.

The challenge, of course, is that others will charge we are unspiritual. But if we have a close relationship with Christ and are doing our best to follow his leading, we must not restrict ourselves to the old methods when God wants to work in a new way.

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, help me to follow you so closely that I always feel your presence and know your leading Help me to be willing and to trust you when you desire to work in new ways through my life. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

Mark 1:12 (ESV): 12 The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.

EXPLAIN

Mark is describing the beginning of Jesus’ ministry. Immediately after being baptized by John, the Spirit drove him into the wilderness.

Mark clearly states that Satan tempted Jesus. And he notes that Jesus fasted 40 days and nights. But he also notes that angels ministered to him during this difficult time.

APPLY

We should not overlook the fact that God sends us into seasons of difficulty at times. He does not do so to destroy us, but to prepare us to be more effectively in his service.

When God puts us in such difficult situations that are beyond our means, He also provides us help so that we can be victorious as we rely on him.

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, help me to recognize your working in times of difficulty and trial. Help me to remain faithful to you, relying upon you. Amen.

HIGHLIGHT

2 Kings 22:8 (ESV): 8 And Hilkiah the high priest said to Shaphan the secretary, “I have found the Book of the Law in the house of the Lord.” And Hilkiah gave the book to Shaphan, and he read it.

EXPLAIN

After the wickedness of various kings of Judah, but most notoriously Manasseh, Josiah became king at 8 years old. This was in the waning years of Judah before its’ destruction by Babylon.

Josiah led the people in many wonderful reforms and sought after God. One of those reforms was the repair of the Temple. Shockingly, the Book of the Law of the Lord was found in the process.

The judgments read in that book spurred Josiah to make huge reforms. God blessed him and Judah during his life.

APPLY

One wonders how God’s people could be his people and seek after him without having God’s Law to guide them. Yes, the teachings, songs and more could be passed down orally, but is it no wonder the people strayed so dramatically from God?

In the same way, we neglect God’s Word today at our own peril. It doesn’t matter how many other books, teachings, songs, etc. we have. We must be people of the Book!

RESPOND

Heavenly Father, may I be a person so immersed in Your Word that it is evident to everyone with whom I come into contact. Amen.