When you stop learning you start losing knowledge. No one ever knows so much that they cannot improve by learning even more. Even if that was possible our minds are built so that when we stop adding to our knowledge we start to forget the things we already knew.
If we serve God He will arm us for the battles He wishes us to fight. When our enemies are God’s enemies they will fall before us and no one will answer their cry for help. We do not need to seek revenge against our enemies because God will repay those who harm us. God will hold us safe and subdue those who fight us because we serve God.
The first phrase of this passage is a great conclusion to the subject Paul has been covering for the last few days. I have been talking about how Paul tells us that if we sin we are allowing our sinful nature to control us and if our sinful nature controls us the Spirit is not in us. And yet, who among us has the strength to resist temptation day in and day out. So, here Paul tells us that the Spirit will help us in our weakness. Paul uses the example of prayer, but the help the Spirit will give us extends to helping us resist temptation. If we allow the Spirit, He will help us overcome other temptations as well. We just need to listen to the Spirit’s prompting and do the things which He tells us we should be doing. As we do the righteous things which the Spirit tells us to do we will find that we do not have time to do the things which our sinful nature tells us to do.
Using his example of how the Holy Spirit helps us pray, Paul then transitions to a new topic. He tells us that we often do not know what to pray for and about. However, the Spirit knows and helps us do so. There are times when we just need to cry out to God and allow the Spirit to convey our needs. God knows our hearts and knows what the Spirit is saying on our behalf. We can be confident that God will listen to this pleading on our behalf and know that He will cause all things to work together for the good of those who love Him. So, if God is working to make all things work together for our good (we do love the Lord, don’t we?), then what do we have to fear from others? After all, if God is for us, who can be against us? (Yes, I know, lots of people, but they can do nothing which God does not allow.)
God has made us right with Him. He has taken the actions necessary to bridge the divide between us caused by our sin. He did this because of His great love for us and there is no power on earth, in heaven, or anywhere else which is capable of separating us from God’s love. I will conclude this with Paul’s statement on the issue: “Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love.”
After the northern tribes rebelled against Rehoboam and made Jeroboam their king, the priests and Levites all moved south. They did this because Jeroboam replaced them with priests of his own choosing. The result of Jeroboam’s actions and the actions of the Levites was that those people in the Northern Kingdom who genuinely wanted to worship and serve God moved to the territory controlled by Rehoboam.
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.
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.
When Rehoboam returned to Jerusalem he mustered the fighting men of Judah and Benjamin in order to regain control of the Northern Tribes. However, the prophet Shemaiah told Rehoboam and the gathered troops that God had said not to fight against their relatives, the rest of Israel. As a result, the troops went home. It is not clear from the passage whether Rehoboam listened to the prophet and sent the troops home, or if the troops refused to fight when they heard the prophet’s words, or some combination of the two.
There are two things mentioned after this that are often overlooked. The first is that in addition to the tribes of Judah and Benjamin, all of the priests and Levites living in the lands of the Northern Tribes moved into the territory controlled by Rehoboam because Jeroboam replaced them as the ones to lead worship and care for the centers of worship. The second is that everyone who sincerely wanted to worship the Lord from all of the tribes of Israel followed the Levites into the territory controlled by Rehoboam.
Once Rehoboam had consolidated his control over Judah and Benjamin he abandoned the Law of the Lord and led all of his people into sin. The passage tells us that as a result, God allowed King Shishak of Egypt to conquer much of Judah. When Shishak was besieging Jerusalem, the prophet Shemaiah told the leaders of the kingdom that because they had abandoned God, God was abandoning them to Shishak. The leaders responded that God was right to do what He was doing. In response to the people of Judah humbling themselves by restraining Shishak and causing him to withdraw after looting Jerusalem.
After the death of Rehoboam his son, Abijah, took the throne. Shortly after doing so war broke out with Jeroboam. Abijah mustered his army and had about 400,000 men. Jeroboam mustered his army and had about 800,000 men. When the armies met, Abijah called out to the men of Israel saying that Jeroboam had abandoned the worship of God, while the people of Judah were still worshiping the Lord. He continued that the army of Judah being led by the priests of God and that by fighting against them the men of Israel were fighting against God. If they went up against God, they would not succeed. In the meantime, Jeroboam had sent part of his army around behind Abijah’s force. When the men of Judah realized that they were being attacked from the front and the rear they cried out to God for help. Despite the fact that Jeroboam outnumbered Abijah’s force and had managed to outflank it, his troops were defeated soundly in the ensuing battle. Abijah followed up his victory by capturing several towns from Jeroboam. Jeroboam never regained sufficient power to challenge Abijah again.
Paul tells us that God has given us the Holy Spirit to help us in our weakness. One example of how the Holy Spirit will help us is when we do not know how to pray according to God’s will. The Spirit will intercede for us with God. God who knows our hearts, knows the mind of the Spirit and thus will understand how what we are pleading for fits into His will and will answer accordingly.
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This passage suggests to me that perhaps we should strive less to spell out the details of what we are praying for and strive more to allow the Spirit to make our requests in accordance with the will of God.
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Paul goes on to tell us that God causes all things to work together for the good of those who love Him. He has known us before we knew Him and chose us to be transformed into the likeness of His Son. If God is for us, what concern is it to us if some are against us? If God, the ultimate judge, justifies us, who can bring credible charges against us? Not only do we have God justifying us, but we have Christ interceding for us before His throne. Who or what has the power to separate us from God’s love against God’s will? Paul answers that with one of the Biblical truths that we should always hold close to our hearts: “And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
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No matter what troubles we face in this life, we need to remember the truths which Paul expresses in today’s passage. The first is that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him. Not just in some things, in all things. God is working in every aspect of this world to bring good to those who love Him. From there we can see that we have no need to fear anything that happens in this life, whatever happens we should rejoice because it is the work of God to deliver good into our lives. How can anything, or anyone, do anything to thwart God’s plans for us? If we truly believe that God loves us, we have nothing to fear. For not only will God act for our good out His love for us, but no one and nothing is capable of interfering or reducing that love.
Wine berries ripening
I started reading today’s psalm and had trouble seeing a message that fit where my thoughts were today. Part of that is because it is a continuation of a Messianic theme begun earlier in this psalm that I read on previous days. However, then I came to verse 46-48:
The Lord lives! Praise to my Rock!
May the God of my salvation be exalted!
He is the God who pays back those who harm me;
he subdues the nations under me
and rescues me from my enemies.
You hold me safe beyond the reach of my enemies;
you save me from violent opponents.
And for whatever reason, I saw how this fit with what I read in Romans 8 today. I went back and re-read verses 37-45 and saw how that they fit right with “If God is for us, who can stand against us?” We need have no fear of those who make themselves our enemy. The psalmist tells us that God will give us victory over our accusers, because God has justified us.
Hostas in flower
If you stop listening to those who offer you instruction you will not only stop learning more, you will gradually lose the understanding that you already possess.
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.
After the Northern Tribes chose Jeroboam as their king rather than Solomon’s son Rehoboam, Rehoboam returned to Jerusalem and prepared to make war against them to gain control over them. The prophet Shemaiah received a word from the Lord that they should not fight against the rest of Israel and the warriors of Judah and Benjamin chose to listen to this advice. Instead of going to war against the Northern Tribes, Rehoboam fortified towns and strengthened the defenses throughout Judah. The priests and Levites that had been living among the Northern Tribes moved to the area controlled by Rehoboam because Jeroboam would not allow them to serve as priests. Jeroboam appointed his own priests to serve at shrines he created where they offered sacrifices to goat and calf idols Jeroboam had made. Jeroboam’s decision to create shrines to idols led many Israelites to move from among the Northern Tribes to the area controlled by Rehoboam.
Rehoboam spent some time consolidating his control over the territory he still controlled. In addition to fortifying towns and stationing troops in them he gave his sons administrative authority and stationed them throughout in some of those towns. Unfortunately, once Rehoboam has firmly established himself, he stopped trusting in God and turned away from Him. When God brought the Egyptians up to attack Jerusalem, Rehoboam and the leaders of Judah turned back to God to save them from the Egyptians. We are told that the Egyptian Pharaoh ransacked the treasuries of Jerusalem, but left Rehoboam as king.
Rehoboam was succeeded by his son Abijah. Abijah and Jeroboam went to war against each other. Abijah mustered 400,000 troops and Jeroboam mustered 800,000. When the armies faced off against each other, Abijah told Jeroboam’s forces that Judah continued the practices of worshiping God, while Jeroboam had driven off the priests of God and replaced them with priests to pagan gods. Abijah told Jeroboam’s army that they were fighting not just against the army of Judah but against God Himself. Jeroboam outflanked Abijah’s army and attacked from the front and the rear. The army of Judah called on God and was victorious.
Paul writes that the Holy Spirit will help us in our weakness. We do not know what to pray for, but the Spirit will intercede for us as we lay before God our concerns. God will search our hearts and the Spirit will intercede for us so that our needs and wants become aligned with God’s will. Paul tells us that all things work together for good for those who love God. Paul goes on to say that if God is for us, who can stand against us? If we fully rely on God, there is no reason to fear any power on earth or in supernatural realms because none of them can stand against God. Even when we face trouble, calamity and/or persecution we should know that God will still work to bring about good for us. Nothing can separate us from God’s love. He will continue to love us no matter what our circumstance and we should strive to return that love. We must always strive to remember these two things no matter what our circumstance. First, God will work in all things for the good of those who love Him. Second, nothing is able to stand against God and separate us from His love. No matter what hardship or trial we face we can have confidence that God is using it to bring about good for us.
We are never too old to learn. There should never come a time in our lives when we are unwilling to take instruction from those who know things that we do not.
