Sunday, 31 July 2011

Matthew 1

Spoke briefly to my pastor at church this morning again. He found some devotional books for me and I could pick whichever I wanted the next time I met up with him. That'll be good to give me some extra questions to add on to the bible passages I read. Taking on some advice from Griffith bible study guys, I'm also reading from the New Testament at the same time.
This morning's sermon was on Joshua 11. There were so many good points that are very relevant to our Christian lives today.
On Friday I finished reading the little book Seven Reasons for Believers' Baptism  by Rev. F. B. Meyer that my pastor lent me. It was pretty good and I learnt a lot more about baptism through that.

S - Matthew 1
O  - Matthew's gospel starts off by listing the genealogy of Jesus, which is pretty interesting. It starts off with Abraham and goes through 14 generations of funny names to King David. The one that stood out to me was Salmon and Rahab were the parents of Boaz. I can understand why a guy called Amminadab would want to call his son Nahshon, who then named his son Salmon. Good thing Salmon named his son Boaz, which has got to be the coolest name ever. Rahab is the prostitute who helped cover the spies Joshua sent out in Joshua chapter 2. She's a great lady who had faith in the Lord and her whole family was spared God's judgement because of her faith.

V17 Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Messiah.


That is really amazing. God always had a plan from us. From the beginning of time (Genesis 1) to New Testament days. However, I'm not sure if I'm counting the right way or what. From David to Jeconiah (time of exile) seems more like 15 generations to me. I must be counting it wrong.

V18-24 describes the birth of Jesus Christ.
The parts that stood out to me were
v18 "...His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit."
This reminds me of the conversation I had with my pastor last Tuesday. We were talking about how we receive spiritual gifts from the Holy Spirit when we become a believer. Sometimes the Holy spirit also gives us gifts that are a one-off (Which answers the question my friend Esther had when we were discussing this..."How do you discover what spiritual gifts you are given?" "Usually, you go through a list of common gifts..." "But I don't want to confine God's gifts to us in a list"). So like Mary, sometimes we are called to do things for God in a one-off situation. God's plans for us can be surprising and unexpected, but we are to carry his will out with obedience and he will be there for us every step of the way.


v20 "...an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home as your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. 21 She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus,[f] because he will save his people from their sins.”

Jesus' purpose was to save us from our sins. That was the plan right from before he was born. Imagine having to live a life just to die for others. Woah. and the people he died for (us) are a terrible bunch who don't have a care for God....God's character never fails to amaze me. God is gracious and merciful despite our sinful nature which angers him.

23 “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel”[g] (which means “God with us”).
24 When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home as his wife. 25 But he did not consummate their marriage until she gave birth to a son. And he gave him the name Jesus.


A - Be obedient to God and be open to what he calls us to do.


P - Pray that I will continue with daily devotions and not be side-tracked.
Pray that I'll be able to do one-to-one bible reading; it seems pretty helpful. Just started reading through the book pastor gave me and pray that I will be able to learn from it and apply it to my life.

Genesis 1

I just got back from youth. It was a particularly encouraging night for me with small groups where we all shared about our own spiritual growth. It was really motivating to hear how disciplined some girls were at doing daily devotions. So here I am getting my hands in this soapy stuff before I touch any of my lecture notes. Or skype.
I am starting right from the beginning because if I allowed myself to decide which book would be better to start with, I'll probably never get down to anything.

S - Genesis 1

O - In this passage, God created the heavens and the earth. He gave the earth light, sky, land, plants and trees which bear seed and fruit, day and night and the concept of time, creatures of the sea and birds, creatures on land and man, in that order. There is a recurring motif of light over darkness.
V3-4
3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness.
God commands and it is done. He isn't like buddha who was just a human guy who sat under a tree and said "Ahh...I am enlightened" (ok I am quite biased but in essence that's it). This God is all-powerful.
The light is good and separated from the darkness, whereas in the beginning "darkness was over the surface of the deep" (v2).
From that point on, there are also repetitions of "And God saw that it was good". God seems to have  a pretty clear plan on what He's making of the earth, and he makes sure that everything was good. He brings man into the picture last, after all these good things have been created just for us to rule over it.

V16-18
16 God made two great lights—the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He also made the stars. 17 God set them in the vault of the sky to give light on the earth, 18 to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good.


Again there's this business of separating the light from the dark. It gives me the impression of separating good from evil; that God wants us to be in the light and away from the darkness. He even got the sun and the moon to "govern" the day and night. He just comes off as a really caring God that made the earth the best place for us.


When we come into the picture in v27
27 So God created mankind in his own image,
   in the image of God he created them;
   male and female he created them.



We were created in the image of God. To be like God, but not God himself. The idea is to live under our creator and be obedient to his command.


28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”


He commanded man to rule over the animals and also reproduce to sustain our kind.


29 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.


The whole system  is sustainable through this reproduction and food chain thing. God is really smart and also really kind to us. I don't even know how he has so much faith in man to rule all the creatures on earth.
He is also a really generous God, just blessing us with all these good things on earth so that we can share it all with him. He didn't have to create us and give us life and a purpose, but he did.


A - With such an all-powerful and kind God as our creator, it was always a matter of obedience on our part from the start.  I want to be obedient through getting baptised, and also the 10 commandments.


P - That this bible reading will keep going. That I will be able to apply what I've learnt in my daily life. For me not to be doubtful/nervous about baptism. For friends - I have noted but will not post about or name any names. For family - especially my brother who has returned to Sydney this morning. Pray for safety, spiritual growth, studies and future plans.
Thanking God for youth group, all my Christian friends and a lovely family.

Friday, 29 July 2011

Hello!

I created this baby to motivate myself to read the entire holy bible. I was originally tempted to create a blog entirely devoted to my stress but upon second thought that didn't seem like a particularly exciting idea.
I've been bumming around waiting to find a good devotional book which would take me through the bible. After finally asking my pastor for recommendations, and this is what he said:
"There is one good devotional book but I can't remember the name of it right now. Actually, the best way is to just read any bible passage you want and ask yourself questions."
So this is what I plan to do. He suggested using the Soap format.
S - What Scripture passage is this?
O - What Observations have you made from this passage? Which parts stand out to you?
A - What Applications can you make from this passage?
P - What can you commit to Prayer?

I will also write about other things I'm reading at the moment that are not part of my chronological devotions. It's a pretty casual affair, this blog thing. Let the reading begin!