I am trying something different now. Previously, I have always placed my comments on the passage in the order of Old Testament passage, New Testament passage, Psalm, Proverb. For the near future I am going to post them in the order in which I prepare the comments. This is likely to be the reverse of how I was doing it previously, but I foresee changing it up depending on what strikes me first. Please let me know what you think of this change.
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. In order to make that possible I read the passages and write my thoughts a day, or more. in advance. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them.
The proverb writer reminds us of the importance of remembering what our parents taught us. It does not matter whether we had good parents (which, by God’s grace, I did) or bad parents, there were things they taught us that will help us live a better, happier life.
This is a psalm where I like the NIV take on it better, especially the first verse:
The Lord is my light and my salvation—
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life—
of whom shall I be afraid?
I will seek one thing and one thing only, to dwell in the house of the Lord for all of the days of my life. With such a dwelling place, I have nothing to fear.
It has been done to death, but in today’s passage Jesus asks the Pharisees whose image is on the Roman coin. When they reply “Caesar’s”, He tells them to give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s. There are many things to be said about this and how it applies to our lives. However, today the thing that strikes me, not for the first time, is that in Genesis we are told that God made man in His own image. So, while our money may have been made by Caesar with his image on it, WE have been made by God with His image on us. Let us give to God what is God’s, Caesar can have the rest.
God saved the Israelites in dramatic fashion and they praised His name. Then a short time later they were complaining because the water they came to was too bitter to drink. Moses went to God and He told Moses how to make it drinkable. Then they traveled a little further and began complaining because they did not have good food to eat. So, God sent them manna from heaven to eat. Then they came to a place where there was no water to drink, and once more they complained. And once more God provided for their needs.
Notice the pattern here? Time and again they were in a difficult situation and rather than trust God to bail them out, they complained and accused God and Moses of leading them to their deaths. Time and again, God showed that He was faithful a performed a powerful act to relieve their difficulty. Do we see ourselves in their actions? Can we learn to trust God? God is faithful and He will provide for us.