For today, One Year Bible Online links here.
There never comes a time when we know so much that we cannot benefit from further instruction. When we stop learning we start forgetting.
Those who are willing to lie, or otherwise mislead, on the witness stand make a mockery of the very concept of justice. They encourage evil, which will rebound upon them.
The psalmist continues his praise of God and recounting how God will rescue those who trust in Him. God will strengthen those who love and serve Him. He will aid them against their enemies. God will not answer the cries of those who make themselves our enemies if we serve Him. Of course that also means that God will not answer our cries if we attack those who serve Him.
The Lord lives! He will pay back those who harm us. Let us praise Him with all that we are.
This is such a wonderful passage. It starts by reminding us that the Spirit will help us in our weakness. We may have trouble resisting sin’s temptation, but God’s Spirit will help us overcome. Further, there are times when we do not know what, or how, to pray. The Spirit will pray for us. Remember this when you are struggling to put together a prayer. We do not have to get the words right in our prayers. The Spirit of God, which lives within us, will convey what we are seeking and will harmonize it with God’s will.
Paul then goes on to point out that, since God is on our side, there is no one and nothing we need fear. If the Creator of the Universe is standing at our side, who or what can possibly stand against us? In all things God works for the good of those who love Him. If we love Him, everything that happens, no matter how bad it seems at the moment, will work together so that good will come to us. God loves us and nothing in this world, or elsewhere, can separate us from that love. Since God is the Creator, everything and power is less powerful than He. Let us never forget that no matter what happens, God will still love us. No matter what we have done, He loves us and will welcome us back if we turn to Him.
When Rehoboam returned to Jerusalem, he immediately mustered his army to reassert his control over the parts of Israel which had broken away. However, God sent a prophet to warn him against going to war against his fellow Israelites. It appears to me that Rehoboam had no choice in whether or not to go to war. The passage seems to indicate that the army refused to march against Jeroboam, not that Rehoboam reconsidered doing so.
The passage further tells us that the priests and Levites who lived in the lands controlled by Jeroboam moved to the areas controlled by Rehoboam. They did this because Jeroboam rejected the Levites as the intermediaries with God (which was established by the Law of Moses). For the first three years of Rehoboam’s reign, they strengthened supported him because he was faithful in following God’s commands. However, once Rehoboam became secure in his power, he turned away from following God’s commands and started to act according to his own will and desires.
When the inevitable trouble arose from not following God’s commands, God sent a prophet to call the people back to Him. Rehoboam and the leaders of Judah recognized their sin and turned back to God. Rehoboam humbled himself before God and God turned His anger aside, but Rehoboam still suffered the consequences of his earlier sins.