I am using One Year Bible Online for my daily Bible study. For today, One Year Bible Online links here. I have found that by writing this daily blog of what I see when I read these scriptures, I get more out of them. I hope that by posting these ruminations others may get some benefit as well. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them. I hope that the Spirit is moving in others through these posts as the Spirit has definitely been convicting me.
Today’s passage begins with a description of how the garments for the priests were made. Once these were completed the preparations for the Tabernacle were finished. All of these items were brought before Moses for his inspection. God then gave Moses instructions on how to set up the Tabernacle. He was to start with the Most Holy Place and work his way out, placing the furnishings for each part within it before starting to set up the next section. Once Moses had completely set up the Tabernacle and consecrated Aaron and his sons as priests the glory of the Lord filled the Tabernacle.
There is a message here on how we should align our lives with God starting in our inner being and working out to our public lives, but I cannot quite put the words together to describe how this works. If we start to present our outer life as aligned with God before we have set up our inner life in alignment with His will, we appear as self-righteous hypocrites. It is however possible to use this as an excuse to make changes to our lives that God is calling us to make, which is the part that makes it hard for me to express the lesson I see hear.
The Gospel of Mark begins by telling us that John the Baptist preached as one calling on people to prepare the way for the coming Messiah. He preached repentance of sins and when his listeners confessed their sins, he baptized them. In addition John preached that one was coming after him who was so much greater than he that he did not feel worthy to untie His sandals. Mark tells us that Jesus came to John to be baptized. At the moment of His baptism, Jesus saw the heavens split apart and the Holy Spirit descend upon Himself like a dove. At the same time He heard a voice from heaven saying “You are my dearly loved Son, and you bring me great joy.” For the longest time I thought this passage described something witnessed by many people, but there is nothing in the passage which suggests that this was witnessed by anyone other than Jesus (although the passage also does not say that no one else saw it). After His baptism, Mark tells us that Jesus spent forty days in the wilderness, where angels cared for Him. The passage implies that Jesus went into Galilee and began His ministry after John was arrested. This suggests that Jesus spent some time among the disciples of John.
Once Jesus began His ministry in Galilee, He began calling disciples. The passage tells us that as He was walking along the Sea of Galilee He saw Simon and Andrew fishing and called them to follow Him. He told them that He would send them out to fish for people. Often times when we read this today, we envision fishing the way we do it today as a hobby, casting out a line and drawing in fish one at a time. That would not be the way that Simon and Andrew heard it. They were professional fisherman and they threw nets into the water and drew fish in by the hundreds or thousands at a time. Perhaps it is time that we rethink how we spread the Gospel and start throwing out nets rather than trying to bring people to Christ one at a time. I believe that there is a place for both types of fishing for people to follow Jesus, but I think that in the Church today we place to much emphasis on “catching” followers for Jesus one at a time.
The psalmist calls on the Lord to fight against those who oppose him. He asks God to humiliate them and bring them down. The psalmist justifies asking for God to bring them down because when they were sick, or otherwise troubled, he had striven to ease their suffering. My take away from this psalm is that we can count on God to fight for us and defeat our enemies when we treat them, and everyone else, as our neighbors and love them as ourselves. If we behave in that way then God will act on our behalf to defend us against those who speak maliciously about us or otherwise try to cause us harm.
If we choose to follow the wise course of action, we will longer than if we do not. If I choose the wise actions, it is I who will benefit. If I choose to reject the wise actions, it is I who will suffer.