One Year Bible - November 15

EZEKIEL 31:1 - 32:32                                                                                                    

PHARAOH AND FRIENDS:  Babylon had destroyed the Assyrians, and Egypt was next!  So great would be Pharaoh's destruction that it would scare everyone else.  Pharaoh is an allegory to us of Satan or the Man of Sin (carnal mind).  His end was (31:15-18) "in the midst of the uncircumcised", "down to Hell",  descended into the pit".  The proud Egyptian thought he was a LION, but God said he was a sea monster in a net.  God would turn his world to DARKNESS, putting out the sun, moon and stars (not literal - but knowledge, wisdom and understanding would be closed off to them and no one would know what to do.)  All Egypt's friends will die and to go hell with him.  They lie in the bed of the whore.  Judgment is inescapable.  It comes at God's hand.  It was HIS Sword in the hand of Nebuchadnezzar.  (Do you realize that Ezekiel could see beyond what was actually happening?)  God's judgment is very real.  When we are corrected, it is tempting to blame the human agent, but the sword is God's sword.  Correction and chastisement are for God's elect, punishment is for the rebel. 

WEEPING FOR THE RUIN OF SINNERS:  Ezekiel was told to lament for the fall of Pharaoh and his allies.  Pharaoh had troubled others and will now himself be troubled.  Weep!  He is ruined.  When others see it, it will fill them with fear.  We weep as Egypt is thrown into its grave.  As he enters hell and is greeted by those God deposed ahead of him.  Pharaoh will see them "and be comforted" (32:31). 

RESPONSE:  Egypt's greatness did not save her.  Her might and power didn't help her.  Her proud fame couldn't stop judgment from coming.  Those who oppose God are so blasphemous!  Hell is full of those who died "by the sword".  They were bloody, violent people and are regarded by God as no different from wild beasts who prey on the weak.  Their resources will dry up - only God can be counted on.  And what good does it do to "be in the same boat" with someone, when that boat is in hell? 

HEBREWS 12:14-29                                                                                               

PURPOSE:  We come to the crux of the matter.  All thru Hebrews we see the contrast being drawn between Reality and Shadows, or New Covenant ratified by Jesus Christ, and Old Covenant brought thru Moses in the OT.  The New Covenant is shown to be "better" because it deals with Reality, with what all the OT shadows were representing.  Look back on Hebrews so see all the "better" things that are inherited by faith in Jesus Christ. 

WHAT IS REALLY AT STAKE?  There are five warnings in the book of Hebrews about what may cause us to lose out on our inheritance (NOT OUR SALVATION), which has ALWAYS been "the Land" - which Hebrews chapters 3 and 4 tell us is "God's Rest".  "The Land" never was and never will refer to Heaven.  To obtain God's rest we must "live by faith" (Heb 11:38), or live as if God is present and visible, trusting Him with all our outcomes.  We are told here that faith is the "substance and evidence"  that the invisible Realities exist and have authority over the visible, temporal world.  The MEANS by which we operate by faith is GRACE (our "birthright").  The five warnings refer to our failure to live by grace, and to default to living by law and our own efforts.

CONTRASTS IN HEBREWS 12:
Reality brought by Jesus Christ                          Shadow                                   

Brings life                                                                  Ministers death

Draw near                                                                 Back off in fear
God-conscious                                                         Sin-conscious
Mt. Zion                                                                      Mt. Sinai
Eternal                                                                       Shaken & removed
Grace (empowerment)                                            Law - takes self-effort

(NOTE: Heb 12:28 "....let us have grace"..)

PURPOSE OF GOD'S DISCIPLINE:  Punishment is for rebels.  Discipline is for "sons", and is not to punish, but to correct and teach, with the end result being "holiness",  "peaceable fruit of righteousness", and "life".  Vs 12-15 tells us that discipline (God's Word and God's Spirit) comes to "make straight paths for your feet" - He brings correction so that we walk in grace, not wobble in attempting to walk by law.  God's discipline brings "profit" (v.10) and "life" (v.9).  When we REFUSE to accept the grace offered to us, even if it means submitting to Reality in a way that hurts, then the result is our own bitterness, which is a big disqualifer for "Rest". 

EXAMPLE OF ESAU:  Our "birthright", what makes us different and separate from the people around us, is grace (Exod 33:16).  We "fall from grace" (Gal 5:4; Heb 12:15) when we haven't been in the Word for training and correction, with the result that we lose our respect for spiritual things (Reality).  That is what it means to be "profane". 

WHEN I PRAY:  Starting with 12:22 there is a list of those who occupy God's throne room.  When we pray, we go thru the veil and into God's Presence, where all these dignitaries are.  NOTE:  We do not address them, we do not attempt to communicate with them, they do not speak to us.  But we stand in a royal company before God's face!  And while we are there, we become aware that the "Blood of Jesus" has a voice"  Abel's blood cries out to be avenged (Gen 4:10).  Jesus' Blood causes heaven and earth to shake, reversing the curse, and making God's grace available!  (Heb 12:24-28).  God's shaking makes us stable!  And the closer we get to God's throne, the hotter the fire:  all that is shaken loose is burned, bringing stability to what is birthed by God in us. 

RESPONSE:   I have been guilty of thinking that my "real world" in the one I can see and touch; including my work, my home, my loved ones, my experiences, my circumstances, my hungers and so on.  I lived like Esau for the present moment and to feed my hungers.  It took a lot of shaking to dislodge that old thinking, and to realize that the "Real World" - the one that will never be shaken, never pass away, never fail me - is actually spiritual realities.  This means that I can LIVE the Christian walk, ONLY by faith.....anything else is really a practical denial of all that Jesus has already done in making His Grace and Truth available to me.  (John 1:17)  Living by faith is the ONLY way to access Rest.  "Heaven", "heavens", and "heavenly" are used 16 times in Hebrews in referring to the call to access God's Rest.  Do you think it might be important?  We are warned five times not to "fail", "fall short", or "fall from" REST - or GRACE.  Whenever I am tempted to whine and complain, get resentful of my circumstances, do things without including Jesus, --- THAT is when I think about ESAU - who gave so much ground that he couldn't get it back!  In fact, Moses didn't inherit either, and his offense was that he "spoke unadvisedly with his lips" (Psa 106:33; Num 20:8-13).  In fact, this disqualification was the one thing that the Apostle Paul was afraid of: (1 Cor 9:27).  We should be grateful when God disciplines us.  It is one thing to KNOW the Scriptures, and it is another thing to UNDERSTAND BECAUSE OF EXPERIENCE. 

PSALM 113:1 - 114:8                                                                                                 
This is one of the "Deuteronomy" Psalms, making it about "Living by faith, resting in God's grace.  (the Land). I love this last section of Psalms, because it tells me how to think and what to say so I can rest, and believe and behave by faith.  We can rejoice in the Lord by reading Psa 113 out loud.  God is great, and nothing will ever change that!  "Praise the Lord" is actually "Hallelujah" in the original language, and is used 3 times in the first verse and ends with another one in v. 9.  Just reading this Psalm out loud will give you a lift!  Just look at verse 7-8!  PSA 114 is given as proof of God's greatness and goodness.  The Exodus from Egypt is a "shadow" of the spiritual reality of our deliverance from spiritual death when we were saved or born again.  It says here that the earth shook and the hills and mountains hopped and skipped - it is such a glorious event!

PROVERBS 27: 18-20                                                                                                   

Even a gardener gets to eat some of his crops.  So a servant who serves with his heart will be rewarded. 

I think many business teachers of how to manipulate sales pitches talk about "mirroring" behavior to curry favor.  Now I know where they got it!  Prov 27:19!  When I want students to take notes, I hold a pen in my hand while I teach.  Look at married couples: Are they wearing same colors? Is their posture similar? (folded arms, crossed legs, etc.)  Those are clues to unity. 

Unsatisfied hungers are compared to cemeteries that never fill up - ugh!  Come to think of it, those hungers can really drive a person into terrible places. 

One Year Bible - November 14

EZEKIEL 29:1 - 30:26                                                                                                       

EGYPT (Chap 29-32): Egypt represents the world we came out of when we were called by God. It represents bondage, servitude to sin and death, living on substitutes for God without hope of deliverance (the mind of the flesh, the SELF-life).  It was always a snare to Israel.  This section of Scripture began shortly BEFORE Jerusalem fell (and 15 years before Nebuchadnezzar invaded Egypt) and ended AFTER.  In Ezekiel's time there was constant tension between the empires on the Nile and the empires on the Euphrates, and Judah got caught in the middle.  Egypt, the crocodile, was reduced to a second-rate kingdom.  Pharaoh, like Satan, is called "the great dragon".  God gave Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar as payment for destroying Jerusalem!  The transference of countries from one king to another is in God's power.  The battle for world dominion will end in disaster for Egypt and even the "mighty dragon" cannot prevent the destruction of Judah nor the captivity of the Jews.  The "great dragon" shall end up in the Pit of Sheol.

THE DAY OF THE LORD:  Judgment of the NATIONS.  Again, we see the "sword of the Lord".  The "Sword of the Lord"  is symbolic of God's assertion of power and authority in judgment of the Nations.  He sends one nation against another, deciding the outcome ahead of time.

RESPONSE:   God has broken the power of Pharaoh and of Egypt.  I don't HAVE to be arrogant and self-serving.  I can submit and obey God.  Violence and bloodshed in the OT is to kill the flesh! To break every bondage. To crowd us back into God's Presence. To rid us of our substitutes. And so that everyone will "know that I(God) am the Lord." 

ASIDE: The "enemies" that are killed, destroyed, and plundered in the OT are a TYPE AND SHADOW to be understood as FLESH (the self life).  This is deduced by the settings, and by knowing that we don't "kill" devils; human in the world are not our enemies; only the flesh is said to be "mortified" - killed.

There is no security or safety in depending on the world system and their "fixes".  I don't even pray to have things go "my way" any more, because I don't always know what God really wants. Real faith is trusting God with the outcomes!  When I pray for others, even my grown children, I pray that they'll do the "right thing", which is the will of God.  I used to tell my children that there are only two ways of doing anything: God's way or the wrong way.

HEBREWS 11:32 - 12:13                                                                                                    

CONTINUITY OF THE LIFE BY FAITH, AND CHARACTERISTICS OF FAITH:  Men have gone after and obtained God's rest, by walking with God in faith. Faith is living as if God were present and visible. Faith is trusting God with the outcomes.  If our peace is interrupted with strife, if we feel ashamed or guilty, if we are discontent or depressed, then we are not in God's Rest - we have actually "fallen from grace" (Gal 5:4).  The cause, according to Hebrews, is unbelief: the sin that "so easily besets us".  Our outward circumstances may be defined as above, but they are NOT the Truth.  Faith calls us to live according to "the unseen world", NOT the "visible and tangible things of the world".  However, faith does not guarantee that we won't have troubles!  HOWEVER,  Moses (among others) has testified that even our troubles are better than the riches in the world without God.  In fact, there are so many witnesses to the "better" things listed in Hebrews that are ours when we live by faith, that Hebrews doesn't even try to list them all!  The OUTCOMES vary.  Sometimes we are martyred in some way and triumph in the resurrection,  sometimes we triumph in this life.  Sometimes we lose everything; sometimes we have it all - but rest assured, our losses are not eternal.

"BETTER RESURRECTION":  I've always assumed resurrection came after physical death. That is just ignorant because the Scriptures don't teach that for the believer.  We are resurrected already - without even dying! (Rom 6:4; Eph 2:6; John 11:26, et al)  When we were "saved", we were taken out of the kingdom of darkness and placed into the kingdom of light, we passed from death into Life. (John 5:24; 1 Jo 3:14; Col 1:13; et al)  The "better resurrection"  referred to, I believe, is when our bodies resurrect (1 Cor 15:41) and we no longer wage war in the earth.

"A GOOD REPORT" VS "THE PROMISE" (11:38-40):  It helps to know the setting of these statements: the Temple is about to be destroyed, and all "the old-time religion" of Judaism and the Law was supposed to be destroyed with it. The people listed in Hebrews 11 found the secret of living by faith rather than trying to keep the Law.  Hebrews PROVES once and for all that living by faith is the "better way" because we don't live by just SHADOWS AND TYPES (Law, self-righteousness, self-effort, etc), but we live by God's grace.  With Jesus' resurrection and passage into the heavenly Holy of Holies, He opened the way for us to live by faith, the way that was "better" than all the "shadows" of the OT.  Jesus is the "substance" of all those "shadows",  and therefore everything available to us is "better". THAT IS THE DIFFERENCE.

"THE PROMISE" - THE FINISH-LINE OF THE RACE: The goal we are pressing for is "perfection of our faith", or  "being made perfect" (11:40).  Reaching "perfection" means we are mature, grown-up, adult believers - not because we have learned to TRY harder, but because we have matured in our practice of living by faith.  "Perfection: is also the goal of discipline and correction (not punishment, like some think.).  All of Hebrews has been leading up to this because whenever these Hebrews fell from grace or backslid, they "started over" with salvation again, instead of picking themselves up, learning from their sin, and going on toward maturity.  Mature believers live in "the LAND" - which is interpreted by Hebrews to mean "God's rest" of faith.  IF we strive at all, it is to get "in faith" - to overcome our emotions by focusing on God's goodness and God's greatness. We do not strive to overcome sin (Jesus already did that), we strive to get into God's presence and stay there, connected to our Life-source.

"THE RACE":  It takes faith to run this race (12:1), and fight this fight (12:4).  The Greek word for this competition is "agon" from which we get "agony".  We must strip down in order to compete against our flesh.  "every weight" refers to anything in our flesh that draws us back into the natural realm in rebellion to Truth.  "the sin that so easily besets us" is unbelief.  (We know it is by the context of the book of Hebrews. All sin boils down to unbelief.)  It is easy to see that the race itself is an automatic sifting process. For our faith to be operative, our flesh must be put to death thru obedience, and we must press thru into faith (God's rest).  KEEP YOUR FOCUS. Jesus ran ahead of us, enduring everything we face, setting our example.  Our WORST day with Jesus, is still "BETTER" than our BEST day without Him.  That is what the "cloud of witnesses" has testified to!  The "better" and "eternal" benefits are all to be found "in the Land" (God's REST of faith).  v BUT NOTE:

ENDURE VS "SURVIVE":   We are not meant to "survive" the growth and maturing process; we are meant to be changed by it.  The race we run, pressing our way into maturity, is meant to sift out the flesh, which consists of self-preservation and a murdering spirit (resentment at being opposed in our flesh).  The chastening of the Lord is NOT punishment; Jesus took all our punishment on Himself.  The chastening of the Lord has nothing to do with our sin or iniquity; Heb 8:12 and 10:17 says God does not "remember" them anymore, does not hold them against us!!!   The chastening of the Lord comes to deal with self-preservation and the resentment of having to submit and be changed.  Rather than "survive", we let the flesh die as we obey God and move forward.  Holiness is the acquisition of new habits or "defaults".  As we intentionally "strive to enter into the Rest" by staying connected to God, focusing on Jesus, THAT becomes our "default" and we are changed.  Not by trying harder, but by focusing more on Jesus.  This is why Psalms is such an important book; it gives us the words to say, the thoughts to think, to keep ourselves focused on God's goodness and greatness, which never change.

RESPONSE:   At one time, my daughter worked with a group of deaf children, preparing them to run in the "Special Olympics". Most of them were about 4-6 years old and so this was their first time. Her first day, she lined them up, dropped the flag, and they all started running.  They ran around trees, across the park, into the parking lot, back to the start line, etc.  She forgot to tell them where the goal was!  That's how I used to feel about Hebrews 12.  I was willing to run all right, but I didn't know what the goal was!  Where was I supposed to run to?  What was I fighting for?  Why was everything so hard?

I would strive, and work, and go thru things just happy to "survive", and instead of being changed, in fact I became just that much more stubborn and fleshly.  I was always asking the mature Christians to pray for me, that I was "going thru something difficult" again.  It was like working hard to climb up a ladder, only to discover that it was leaning against the wrong wall!  I wasn't supposed to survive!  I was supposed to be changed.  Instead of fighting against my circumstances, I was supposed to be pressing thru my selfishness and obsession with myself, and focus on Jesus, making Him the center of my life.  Instead of working to be a better person, I was supposed to work past my selfishness and give myself over to God, allowing HIM to be Himself IN me.

Because God loves me - He persisted in revealing Himself to me.  God is not mad at me!  He just wants me to grow up!  Quit relying on what I do to win His favor.  Quit thinking He held anything against me.  Spend more time and effort in being thankful.

PSALM 112:1-10                                                                                                              
This Psalm reveals the character traits of a "righteous man".  (1) He fears the Lord, which is the beginning of wisdom (Psa 111:10), and is the very foundation of worship.  (2) He delights greatly in His commandments - loves the Word like his very food.  (3) He is gracious - extending grace to those around him.  (4) He is full of compassion (your pain in my heart).  (5) He is righteous (by faith).  (6) He shows favor: is gracious in his dealings.  (7) He lends and trusts God for the payback.  (8) He has integrity in his dealings.  (9) He gives freely and generously where the need is.

The "righteous man" is "BLESSED".  To be blessed, is to be "empowered for success". To be blessed as a "righteous man" is to have the grace of God flow thru us.  This means  (1) He blesses others.  (2) His children, and other descendants will be "mighty" (wealthy, valorous and courageous, heroic) and will be blessed by God too.  (3) He himself will have true wealth and riches.  (4) His righteousness is by faith in Jesus ("the righteousness of God") and so it is eternal. (5) He is "light" in a dark place.  (6) He is not easily moved because his heart is "fixed" (steadfast and fearless; does not panic).  (7) He shall be remembered as a righteous man.  (8) He trusts the Lord always and that holds him steady.  (9) His heart is "established", stable, because he has formed the habit of trust in God. (10) He remains "in faith", never losing hope.  (11) The wicked gnash on him, especially because the righteous is well-thought-of by God.

RESPONSE:   I think it all boils down to the "righteous man" is a happy man. Rather than looking at himself, dwelling on his failures, thinking he will never measure up, the righteous man focuses on the Lord - delighting in God and in His Word - living to please God.

PROVERBS 27:17                                                                                                            
Some people just bring out the best in us.