PSA Bible Reading Challenge 2023-2024

We find mentioned for the first time the name of the northern country that is going to come down and take over Jerusalem and all of Judah and lead its people into captivity.  The name of that nation is Babylon and the name of the ruler, who is also mentioned, is Nebuhadnezzar.  

At the beginning of this chapter we have the classic metaphor of the potter and the clay and the ability for God to use the clay as he sees fit because He is, after all, the potter and we are the clay.  It is well within God’s ability and right to use the clay in any way shape or form that God wants to use the clay.  

We find the scene of Jeremiah arrested and beaten by the officer of the gate.  When Jeremiah is finally released he tells the officer that one day he and all of his family will go into exile in Babylon and they will experience the same thing that Jeremiah had just undergone.  

Twice we read Jeremiah tell the rulers of Judah what God wants them to do.  So it is not focused so much on obeying God and God alone, which is the primary command of God, but also, and this is important and mentioned twice in these 5 chapters: “Do what is just and right, rescue from the hand of his oppressor the one who has been robbed.  Do no wrong or violence to the alien, the fatherless or the widow and do not shed innocent blood.”  This list of moral imperatives seem to follow the people of God both in the Old Testament as well as the New Testament.

I can’t help but feel a bit depressed as we make our way through Jeremiah.  He continues his consistent message of laying out the deception and the infidelity of Judah all the while promising that the day will come when the people will be either destroyed or carried off to the North to a foreign land.  Throughout these chapters we read Jeremiah prophesying against the people of God.

We do find a bit of a caveat in chapter 17 where Jeremiah is now no longer speaking to the people about the destruction to come, but rather starting in vs.14 where he asks God for help and not to be included in that number to whom he is preaching.  He is asking for help to not be destroyed or carried off like everyone else.  It then ends with a reminder about the Sabbath.

Remember when Jesus enters into Jerusalem after the triumphal ride on a donkey and the first thing that he does is go into the temple and clear it and he says there:  “It is written, my house will be called a house of prayer, but you are making it a den of robbers.” Matthew 21:13.  Well, that comes from Jeremiah 7:11, the whole den of robbers thing.  He is warning the people of Judah that they are not to try to take refuge in the temple as if God would somehow save them from the destruction that is to come. They have already chosen other idols and it is too late to ask for God to come and save them.  They have already made the temple something other than what it was intended.

You have probably heard about the balm in Gilead as well?  Well, we find that in Jeremiah 8:22 that asks the rhetorical question whether there is going to be healing or not.  The Balm in Gilead was supposed to be able to heal all things.  But the land is too sick to be healed.  There is then a plot against Jeremiah in 11, but the good news is that God said that not a one of them will survive.  So Jeremiah had that going for him.  Thought you might want to hear the hymn: There is a balm in Gilead.

We quickly find out why Jeremiah is called the weeping prophet.  He is given the task to speak to the people of Judah, the southern kingdom.  God tells him specifically that he is given the task to: “uproot, tear down, destroy and overthrow.”  That’s not very comforting.  Jeremiah is given the task to be a prophet of the Lord right at the time when Jerusalem is about to be overthrown, which is literally the worst thing that could happen to the nation both politically and spiritually.

I love the calling of Jeremiah where he states that he is too young.  God rebukes him and tells him that he had been chosen from even before he was born to carry out this task.  The Providence of God always wins out over our own reasoning and thinking.  As in most of these prophecies what God is most angry over is the fact that his own people have turned their back on him and have taken up in worship the gods of the surrounding nations.  They have completely been unfaithful to him.

He tells the nation of Judah, the southern kingdom, that disaster is going to come from the north.  We end in chapter 6 with the siege of Jerusalem.

This Scripture in Timothy is one of the most powerful and one that I will be preaching on on Sunday.  It speaks of Paul’s legacy and especially in 4:6-8 where Paul reflects that he has fought the good fight, he has finished the race, he has kept the faith.  He reminds his “son” Timothy that no one should ever be ashamed of the Gospel or of Paul in chains in 1:8.  

Proverbs reminds us of the age old truth that “rich and poor have this in common; the Lord is the maker of them all”.  And Psalm 48 gives us this wonderful phrase: Great is the Lord, and most worthy of praise.  

So, today’s Scripture is eerily similar to yesterday’s.  I think we made a mistake in our Bible Reading Challenge and repeated it.  I looked it over to make sure that we didn’t skip anything as a result, and we seem to be all good moving forward.  Hope you had a good day.

Since we only have to cover three Psalms might a well say something about each of them.  Psalm 64 is a Psalm of David, probably when he was in hiding from Saul, and it is a Psalm asking for protection from enemies.  David asks for protection in a way that kind of guarantees the fall of his enemies.  Not something I would recommend in our prayer lives.

Psalm 88 gives us a long introductory title that has everything to do with how this is to be presented musically.  It is said to be “according to mahalath leannoth” which means literally: “The suffering of affliction”.  It could be the title of the song or the psalm as we have titles today.  It is fairly self-explanatory, then what the psalm will cover.  David kind of accuses God of placing him in a state of suffering by taking away everything that is important to him.  It should remind us a bit of Job.  

Finally Psalm 130, which is very short, is entitled a song of ascents, which means that it was sung by the pilgrims as they made their way toward Jerusalem.  It is a song of hope and promise, based upon the knowledge that God will provide all things.  “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope.”  That’s a great place to end.

We once again are challenged to read through a whole book of the Bible.  Timothy is someone that Paul calls mys on, even though we know that it is not his biological son.  But there is that type of relationship that  allows Paul to teach  and to mentor and we benefit from that bond.  He is teaching Timothy how to run a church, basically.  He talks about who can and who can’t be a leader in the church.  The list is daunting and one that no one can fulfill.  I read it every time we ordain and install officers  at their training so that we can see the bar after which we ought to strive.  Look at chapter 3 and you’ll see the list there.

It is also in Timothy where we read that the love of money is the root of all evil.  The pursuit of anything for its own ends is evil, but while this may be true, this is not what he says.  We continue in 6:10 – “Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.”  That whole chapter gives some great advice on finances.  It continues in 6:17 – “Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth.”  

He ends very simply: Grace be with you.

For today we only have Psalm 47 since we have already read together James 1-5.   Ironically, providentially, by God’s grace, I find myself today here at Universal Studios at a Starbucks enjoying some quiet time as the kids are off with the leaders doing their leader things.  But Psalm 47 is without a doubt one of the most powerful and energetic of Palms of praise.  “Shout to God with cries of joy.”  That’s what we are doing pretty much all week this week.  What a trip it has been.  Every single day the kids have shown resilience, hard work, determination, not a word of complaint or anger.  We have a group that is absolutely amazing and have done some significant work, to the point where those with whom they have worked have remarked on their cohesion and their work ethic.  

Praise be to God for them, their parents who raised them that way, and for the leaders who are instilling in them a desire to love and follow God with all of their heart, mind, soul, and strength.

We come to the end of another one of Solomon’s books.  He also wrote Proverbs and probably wrote Song of Solomon, hence the name of the book.  But this book of the Bible really focuses on not putting too much weight on your own planning for the future.  The verse that really struck me in this reading can be found in 9:11ff – “Again, I saw that under the sun the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, nor bread to the wise, nor riches to the intelligent, nor favor to the skillful; but time and chance happen to them all.  For no one can anticipate the time of disaster.  Like fish taken in a cruel net, and like birds caught in a snare, so mortals are snared at a time of calamity, when it suddenly falls upon them.”

We can prepare all that we want, but like Job, we can never predict what will happen in the future.  Our clean living does not translate into blessings of protection.  Solomon does encourage the young to rejoice in their youth.  The book then ends with this somewhat ominous, but true, saying.  “For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil.”