For today, One Year Bible Online links here.
Many times people do wicked things in order to avoid something they dread. What they fail to realize is that the very actions they take to avoid that thing will bring it to pass. The righteous, on the other hand, are willing to sacrifice their desires in order to do what is right. Yet, they often receive their desires anyway, or if not what they originally desired, something they enjoy more than what they desired.
Read today’s psalm. I cannot express it nearly as well. I know, I say that a lot about the psalms. Clap your hands and shout to God with joyful praise. Don’t be afraid to attract attention to yourself. I want the whole world to know that I worship a wonderful God who brings me joy. No, more than that. I want everyone to experience the joy I get from serving God.
The religious leaders had been offended and angered by Jesus’ actions driving the merchants and their customers out of the Temple. So, they challenged Him by asking Him where He got the authority to do that. In response Jesus asked them whether John’s authority to baptize came from heaven, or was merely human. The religious leaders were afraid to answer that either way. Because they would not answer His question, Jesus refused to answer theirs. By refusing to answer Jesus’ question the religious leaders made it clear that they were not seeking an answer to their question. They were merely seeking something to use against Jesus.
Later, other religious leaders approached Jesus with another question in an attempt to trap Him. Jesus answer to this question gives further insight into the lesson from yesterday’s passage where He drove the merchants (and their customers) from the Temple. Those who had been doing business in the Temple, whether buying or selling, had not been giving to God what was God’s. Between these two passages we see how easy it is to allow ourselves to put competing claims ahead of God’s.
In this passage the tribes were joined together into units for when they were camping and when they were marching. By doing this they had to develop the ability to coordinate their actions between tribal groups. There are some really good lessons on our interactions with God as a body of believers in the substitution of the Levites for the first born of the rest of Israel, but I can not put together a lesson on it today.