Year 6, Day 120: Lamentations 3

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Abide

• Abide: This is a moment, day, or even a season when we focus on God.  It is a time when we are rejuvenated by God.  It is the time for us to gather up what we will need for the coming growth after a season of pruning.  However, abiding is not the end.  We abide so that we can grow, bear fruit, prune, and abide again.

For me, I think that this is one of the most powerful chapters in the book of Lamentations, and perhaps any book written by a prophet.  This chapter seems to start out so negatively.  Jeremiah’s spirit seems so broken.  But let’s remember what has happened to him.  He was called by God to proclaim a difficult message to a people who had little interest in listening to him.  He was imprisoned.  He was mocked.  He was starved.  People wanted him dead.  He was kidnapped.  He saw people reject the message of God.  No wonder he sounds broken and beaten down!

However, what I love about this chapter is that after Jeremiah bears his soul, Jeremiah asserts that his soul is not staying in the misery.  His soul belongs in the hands of the Lord.  Even after everything that he endured, Jeremiah knows that God’s mercy never ends.  He knows that God’s love is never lost.  God’s presence is always capable of being with us and ministering to us.

That’s what abiding is really all about.  Abiding is finding those moments in life where we need to rest in God’s hands and let Him fill us back up.  Abiding is about looking to God and imitating His goodness and kindness and mercy in spite of our circumstances.  Jeremiah is an incredible model of godliness in this passage.

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Year 6, Day 119: Lamentations 2

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Guidance, Protection

• Guidance: God grants us His guidance.  Sometimes this guidance is God leading us away from temptation.  Sometimes this guidance is helping us to follow in a direction for which He has chosen.  Our default position should be to wait for God’s guidance and then follow when it comes.
• Protection: In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray that God might deliver us from evil – even the Evil One.  Sometimes we need God’s protection from the sin around us.  Sometimes we need protection from the sinful people around us.  Other times we need protection from the sin that lies within ourselves. In any case, Jesus’ point is clear.  We need protection from the Father to make it through each and every day.

This is a very bleak chapter.  Then again, the book is called Lamentations, after all.  We should expect a bleak chapter.

As I read through this chapter, I couldn’t help focusing on what it must have felt like to see your very own God taking steps to bring about your subdual.  Imagine watching holy people slaughtered in the very temple of God.  Imagine watching the people left in Jerusalem survive only by cannibalism.  Imagine watching foreign people invade your land and shake their head in awe at the destruction of what once was considered one of the most beautiful cities.  Imagine realizing that this is all happening because God has decided to righteously judge your nation.

Can you imagine what it would be like to live without God’s protection?  Can you imagine what it would be like to live without God’s guidance?

Of course, God did not abandon His people eternally.  Even when we are reaping the consequences of our sin, God does not abandon us eternally.  His guidance is always there for us when we are willing to receive it.  His eternal protection is always available to us.  Thanks be to God.

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Year 6, Day 118: Lamentations 1

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Obedience

• Obedience: Genuine and satisfying obedience comes out of our identity.  Our true identity comes only from our Father.

If you haven’t studied the symbolism in the very way that the book of Lamentations is written, please read my blog post from three years ago.  I link to it above.  There is some really neat symbolism as well as evidence of some very skilled craftsmanship on the part of Jeremiah.

Looking beyond the symbolism, let’s analyze the point of the first chapter.  Lamentations 1 is about the people and their response to the captivity.  Allow me to lift out some of the quotes that we find in this chapter.

• Lamentations 1:18 “The Lord is in the right, for I have rebelled.”
• Lamentations 1:20 “My heart is wrung within me for I have been very rebellious.”
• Lamentations 1:22 “You have dealt with me because of all my transgressions.”

I don’t know a single person who likes to be found doing something wrong.  For those of us who try to be moral, it is embarrassing.  For those who don’t care about morality, it is still frustrating to be caught.  None of us enjoy having to face ourselves and our actions when we are in the wrong.

However, the reality is that we are all sinners.  We all transgress.  We all make mistakes.  We all are guilty.  This is our reality.  What we need to ask ourselves is whether or not we are obedient in our response to the moment when our sinfulness is revealed.  Are we obedient in the moment of judgment or not?

The obedient one is humble.  The obedient one accepts what they’ve done and the consequences that go with it.  The obedient one knows that correction and consequences help us fix our mistakes and allow us to not do them anymore.  When God comes to us and punishes us because of our sinfulness, we have two choices.  We can reject God and rebel even more.  Or we can humble ourselves in obedience and bring ourselves into His will.

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Year 6, Day 117: Hebrews 13

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Up, In, Out

• Up: Up is the word we use for what we worship.  If we are following God’s will, God will occupy the Up position.  Our life, our identity, our mission, our family on mission is all derived from Up.  This is why God needs to be in our Up position.
• In: This is the word we use to express our relationships with our spiritual family.  These are often the people who hold us spiritually accountable.  They are the ones to whom we typically go for discussion and discernment.  These are the ones with whom we learn to share leadership.  They are the ones with whom we become family on mission.
• Out: This is the focus of our mission.  These are the people to whom God has called us to go.  These are the people into whom we are focused on attempting to speak God’s truth.

Hebrews 13 is packed full of goodness.  In truth, I could probably study Hebrews 13 for a full month and not honestly get through every point that I could make.  That being said, I decided that I couldn’t narrow it down to less than three points.

First, we start with Out because this is where the author of Hebrews starts.  Notice what he says.  Continue your hospitality.  Be with people who are imprisoned.  In other words, continue your mission.  Keep reaching people.  Keep showing love to your neighbors.  Keep demonstrating the nature of God to the people with whom you come into contact.

The author of Hebrews then moves into the In.  Remember your leaders.  Remember those who speak faith into your life.  Remember those who train you in the faith.  Imitate them.  Don’t be led astray from their foundational teaching.

The author then moves us into the place where we should both begin and end: In.  Remember Christ.  Through Jesus we have an invitation to a feast to which we have no right to go.  (Of course, recognize that after talking about Christ the author of Hebrews brings us once more through a focus of Out and In.)  But then we have the conclusion of God.  God brings us peace.  God is our Shepherd.  God equips us.  He deserves our praise.  He deserves our worship.  He should be our focus.

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Year 6, Day 116: Hebrews 12

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Challenge

• Challenge: God does not merely wish us to be in relationship with Him as we are.  He challenges us to grow, stretch, and transform as we take on the mantle of being His representatives to this world.

There are two passages that I find hyper-challenging today, and I am a person who really appreciates a good challenge.  If challenge is your thing, keep reading.

Hebrews 12:4 says this, “In your struggle against sin you have not yet resisted to the point of shedding your blood.”  This is a not so subtle reminder.  God knows that He asked His own Son to die for the sake of others.  God has not yet asked the same thing of me.  This keeps me humble.  Am I willing to give to God what He asked His Son to give for me?  I hope so!

At the end of this chapter we have another challenging thought.  We should approach God with a reverence that is highly deserved.  He gives us the ability to accept His grace and love and mercy and we don’t deserve it.  We deserve to be forced to wander the desert forever without His love and mercy.  We deserve to be shaken to our very foundation.  But instead He extends His grace and love and mercy and desires to be with us.

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Year 6, Day 115: Hebrews 11

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Identity

• Identity: Our true identity comes from the Father.  Only when our identity comes from God can we be obedient in ways that satisfy our person to our core.

It’s rather easy to hear that faith is the central concept of this chapter.  All of the people mentioned in this chapter lived by faith.  They lived knowing the promise of a future.  They lived as sojourners looking for a new home.  The lived by faith.

But today I am really struck by the verse that poignantly reminds us that they also died by faith.  Did Abraham see the generations that would number like the stars in the sky?  Did Joseph die knowing his return to the Promised Land?  Did Moses die seeing the people in power in the Promised Land?  Did David die seeing his descendant on the throne eternally?  Of course not.  All of those people died knowing that God would fulfill the promise – even if He didn’t fulfill it while they were alive.  Now that’s faith!

I also think there is a great place for identity.  Do we worship God for what He will do for us now?  How many times to we try and bargain with God, promising present faithfulness for immediate gain?  Yet these people of faith lived a life of present faithfulness in exchange for future gain.  Of course we know that is the higher choice; but it is often the harder choice.  Our identity should be a people who are content to live in faith now in exchange for a future revelation of God’s eternal promise.

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Year 6, Day 114: Hebrews 10

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Calling

• Calling asks whether or not God has called the person to the particular work at this point in their life.

Hebrews 10 ends with a great string of verses regarding our calling.  Here we find challenge.  We should not throw away our confidence.  We must endure to do the will of God.  We should surely not shrink back.  We must have faith.

When I hear these verses, I cannot help but to think that the author of Hebrews is returning to the point that he has made several chapters back.  At one point we were children in the faith.  At one point we were young and just learning.  But now we are mature.  We should not go back to the spiritual milk we once required when we are capable of spiritual meat!

When we are called by God, we do need the support of the system.  Spiritual people pour themselves into us for a time.  But that circumstance should not continue!  We should not continue to be a drain on the system.  We should be creators and innovators who bring newness to the church!  We should be ministers who find new places to bring the grace of God.  We should not be people who constantly need to be fed; we should be people fed by God and capable of feeding others!  We must persevere.  We must continue on.  We must not shrink back.

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Year 6, Day 113: Hebrews 9

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Forgiveness

• Forgiveness: Forgiveness is when our sins are absolved by God.  We do not deserve this forgiveness, but God grants it to us anyway.  We cannot earn forgiveness, but God gives it to us anyway.  As we are forgiven by God, He also asks us to forgive others.  In fact, Jesus Himself teaches us to pray for our forgiveness in the Lord’s Prayer when He says, “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

This chapter in Hebrews is a classic chapter.  I remember reading it for the first time as an adult.  I remember reading it for the first time and suddenly realizing what Christ did on the cross.  I have always known that Jesus died on the cross for our forgiveness of sins.  But beyond that, Christ’s death does in the sacrificial system instituted under the Law.  Animals no longer need to be sacrificed; Christ covered that.  There are no longer special priests who can enter into private places; the curtain was torn and we are all now high priests in Jesus Christ!  We don’t need to keep offering sacrifices to God because Jesus offered up the sacrifice to God once and then ascended into the presence of God forever.

Jesus changes so much in life.

I think it is really worthwhile spending a day focusing on everything that the life and death of Jesus changes.  We can live with confidence in our relationship with Christ because we are forgiven.  We can live righteously without fear of the mistakes that inevitably creep into our life because we are forgiven.  We who are sinful can share this good news with others because forgiveness and restoration is based on the character of Christ, not our character.

What’s more is that one day Christ will come back.  He will return to claim those of us who wait for Him.  That is one of the best examples of forgiveness.  Each of us has sin.  Each of us deserves condemnation.  But we will experience forgiveness.  We will experience a God who wants to come back and claim each of us, not because we deserve it but because He desires to forgive us.

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Year 6, Day 112: Hebrews 8

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Invitation

• Invitation: God is always inviting us into relationship with Him. He desires that we know Him and that we know His desire for us.

I love how the author of Hebrews brings this passage all together.  We’ve been building up to Christ as the high priest.  Here in this chapter the author of Hebrews tells us that Christ and the grace that comes through Him is superior to the covenant of the Law that was given through Moses.

Why can we hear this claim?  Christ was raised from the dead.  Christ is no longer here on earth as a model of godly living.  Christ is in heaven at the right hand of the Father proving that He was God’s New Covenant.  He is superior because God brought Him up to Heaven to be with Him as proof of His superiority.

So what does this have to do with Invitation?  God invites us into this New Covenant.  He wants us to know grace.  He wants us to understand our sinfulness through the Law, but He wants us even more to know that His grace is sufficient to overcome the judgment of the Law.  He invites us to be a part of this new thing that He is doing.  Even though we don’t deserve it, He wants us to come anyways.

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Year 6, Day 111: Hebrews 7

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Character

• Character: Having the interior life that is necessary to support the work that God sets before a person.  It is hearing from God and obeying.  It is doing the right thing when nobody is looking.

Before we can understand the comparison of Jesus to Melchizedek, we need to understand Melchizedek.  He is a virtual unknown who makes a meteoric rise to fame because of this chapter in Hebrews. 

1. As the author of Hebrews says, Melchizedek literally means “King of Righteousness.”  He was a God-fearing priest.  He was righteous in a land before the Hebrew people ever came.
2. He was the King of Salem, the town which eventually becomes known as Jerusalem.  Salem is the word for “peace.”  Melchizedek was a king whose place of ruling was known as “peace.”
3. He comes to us with no genealogy.  Certainly he had a father and mother; we just don’t know who they are!  His coming and his going isn’t important; what is important is how he reflected God while he was here.

We know that he was a priest in God’s eyes.  When David becomes king of Salem, and renames it Jerusalem, he becomes a priest in the order of Melchizedek.  This means that Jesus can be a priest even though he comes out of the lineage of Judah and not out of the lineage of Levi (Aaron).

What I love about this is the display of character that we see in Melchizedek.  He is a righteous man when the world around Him does not demand it or even teach it.  He is a man who seeks peace with his fellow man and His God; much like Jesus teaches us about God’s peace that He desires to have with us.  Melchizedek is a man of character.  He made his own name for himself and in his faithfulness to God he made it a good character.

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Year 6, Day 110: Hebrews 6

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Bear Fruit

• Bear Fruit: We bear fruit after we grow.  Bearing fruit is ultimately the goal of abiding and the goal of being called into the Kingdom of God.  However, while bearing fruit is our calling, it is not the end.  We bear fruit so that we can then prune, abide, grow, and bear more fruit in another season.  Bearing fruit is not the end, but rather only a portion of the whole rhythm of life into which God has called us.

We’ve spent the last three days taking a good long look at salvation.  In Hebrews 4 we hear the author focus on a concern that people fail to obtain the promise of salvation.  In chapter 5 we hear that the author is concerned that people are failing to mature.  In Hebrews 6 we hear that the author is fearful that some are falling away from faith.

In some respects, I think all of these issues are interconnected.  We fail to obtain the promise if we don’t see the value or if we see more value in something else.  We fail to mature when we do not value growth, leadership qualities, hard work, and the calling of the Lord.  We fall away when we fail to put these things into action.  We fall away when we completely cease bearing fruit.  We fall away when we start bearing fruit in another area of our life in place of bearing spiritual fruit.

How do we hear this from the author of Hebrews?  The author says that all will drink from the rain that comes from God.  Some of the land will drink and produce a good crop and be blessed.  Other parts of the land will drink from the same drink and bear bad fruit, thistles, and thorns.  It is important for us to learn, grow, and then put that growth into practice in a way that bears fruit into the lives of other people as God calls us.

As I finish this post, allow me to assert something that I genuinely believe and I assert that the author of Hebrews teaches here in this passage.  If a person truly has the Holy Spirit within them and is being guided by the Holy Spirit, they do not have anything to fear with respect to salvation.  A person genuinely led by the Holy Spirit will know eternal salvation.

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Year 6, Day 109: Hebrews 5

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Information, Imitation, Innovation 

• Information: This is the initial phase of become a disciple of Jesus.  Before we can do anything meaningful we must begin to understand what we are doing.  We may never gain full understanding of God and His ways, but God calls us to study Him, His Son, and His ways as the foundation of being His follower.
• Imitation: This is the second over-arching step of the discipleship process.  First we gain information, then we imitate our spiritual mentor.  Imitation leads to innovation of spirituality in our own life.
• Innovation: When we have studied God and learned to imitate Him, then we can begin to apply what we have learned and practiced into our life in new and innovative ways.  In this way we truly become the person of God that He sees us to be.

The end of Hebrews 5 is a very challenging section.  The author of Hebrews really doesn’t pull any punches with what he says.  He looks at the witness of the people and tells them that aren’t pulling their own weight.  They’ve become dull.  If you want to know why they’ve become dull, the reason is simple.  Keep reading.  They are dull because while they should have developed into teachers they’ve continued to stay students.  They should be feasting on spiritual meat but they only want the spiritual milk.

This is a problem with human beings.  We like to be comfortable.  We also like for people to care for our needs.  We like to be the student, the mentee.  Being the teacher is far more difficult work.  Being the mentor is far more taxing.  But it is when we start to apply our faith, practice what we preach, and pour our faith into the lives of the others that we suddenly find ourselves growing and feeding off of spiritual meat.

What the author of Hebrews is talking about is this idea of information and imitation – and even eventually innovation into ministry.  Everyone needs to learn the basics.  But we all need to grow beyond the basics.  We need to practice what we’re taught.  Then we need to teach what we’ve learned to others.  We grow stale if we always stay the student.

I love the way that this passage ends.  Solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.  Solid food is for the people who are putting their faith into practice.  It is for those on the front lines of the spiritual battle for souls and relationship with God.  It is not for those being sheltered by others for all of their life.

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Year 6, Day 108: Hebrews 4

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Provision

• Provision: God gives us what we truly need.  God knows our needs better than we can know them.  We learn to trust God to provide for us.

Every time that I read Hebrews 4 I stop and ponder this idea that the work of the Lord is done.  After all, on the seventh day, God rested.  God knew that His work was complete.  Complete means finished.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that God isn’t still at work in the world.  Of course He is!  God is working in you and in me.  God is speaking through His people.  God is calling people to Him continuously.

But the work of God is done.  Creation is done.  God knew that creation would fall, so He planned to bring His Son.  Redemption has come.  We know the whole story of salvation.  We are waiting for it to be taking into final reality, but we know the whole story.  The work of salvation is complete.  God continues to call people into that salvation, but the work itself is finished.  Forgiveness is ours if we desire to embrace it.

This really is a neat perspective on provision.  Even as God was completing the work of creation He had a plan for our provision.  Even as people were falling away from Him into sin, God was building a bridge back to Him.  This is the God we know and love and serve.  His provision is complete.  He knows what we need the most.  He knows that He needs us to make the way to Him possible.  He knows everything else we need, too.

One more point before I finish for the day.  The author of Hebrews gives us a great perspective on Christ.  God knows what we need because we have a great high priest in Christ who came and who was tempted as we were tempted.  God knows hunger.  He knows pain.  He knows abandonment.  He knows sorrow.  He knows disappointment.  He knows what it is like to deal with the sickness and death of people around us.  He can provide because He knows.

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Year 6, Day 107: Hebrews 3

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Character

• Character: Having the interior life that is necessary to support the work that God sets before a person.  It is hearing from God and obeying.  It is doing the right thing when nobody is looking.

In this chapter, the author of Hebrews talks an awful lot about the character of human beings after he talks about the nature of Christ.  He starts with the Hebrew people at the time of the exodus.  We’ll extrapolate that information and put it back upon us.

The people of the exodus were the ones who were told that they were not worthy of entering the Promised Land.  Let that sink in.  How much had the people of the Exodus seen?  They got to see all of the plagues – terrifying and amazing as they must have been.  They got to see Egypt absolutely plundered just to get rid of the Hebrew people.  They got to see the Egyptian army come after them, only to experience the miraculous crossing of the Red Sea.  They got to see Moses get the Law atop of Sinai.  They got to experience the manna from heaven.  They got to experience the water from the rock – twice even!  They got to experience the budding of Aaron’s staff.  They got to experience the pillar of smoke leading them around.  They had incredible experience after incredible experience to guide them in faith.  But they were rebellious.  They didn’t have it in them to believe.

What can we take from this?  First of all, faith is not based on the things we experience.  So often we think that if we would just see more of God’s miraculous power that we would believe more easily or more fervently.  That’s just not true.  Faith is a result of our character’s response to God’s action, not our experiences.  Faith is a gift from God coming through who we are; not something we make within ourselves based on what we see and do.

The second thing that we can pull from this is that our character is incredibly important.  It is important to build that character so that we are reliable regardless of our circumstances.  We will all experience discouragement.  If our character is weak, discouragement will turn us away just as the rebellious nation in the desert rebelled.  All of us will experience temptation.  If our character is weak, discouragement will turn us away just as the rebellious nation in the desert rebelled.

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Year 6, Day 106: Hebrews 2

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Imitation

• Imitation: This is the second over-arching step of the discipleship process.  First we gain information, then we imitate our spiritual mentor.  Imitation leads to innovation of spirituality in our own life.

Why did Christ come to earth?  Of course, the grand answer to this is so that redemption might come to creation.  Without Christ, there is no eternal forgiveness of sin.  Without Christ, relationship with God is simply not possible.  He came to die so that we might live.

Yet, in coming to die, He came so that we might have an example.  He came so that we could imitate Him.  He came so that we could become like Him.  He came so that we could see God’s power and love and not just follow Him but allow Him to change us so that we are like Him.

He became like us so that we might become like Him.  It is really that simple.  Why wouldn’t we be willing to imitate a person who gave up everything including life itself so that we could live a life more closely related to God?

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Year 6, Day 105: Hebrews 1

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Identity, Calling

• Calling asks whether or not God has called the person to the particular work at this point in their life.
• Identity: Our true identity comes from the Father.  Only when our identity comes from God can we be obedient in ways that satisfy our person to our core.

As we are called to imitate Christ, we should take a good long look at this chapter.  Yes, this chapter is all about the supremacy of Christ.  But this chapter is also a great example in how identity can translate into calling.  If we are doing it right, our calling should naturally come out of our identity in God.  Let’s look at Christ and see how this works:

• Jesus Christ is the last and final voice of God.  God spoke creation into existence at the beginning of the world.  Now God has sent the last, final, and ultimate voice into the world.  He sent Jesus to be the true unveiling of God.  That is His identity.  How does this translate into calling?  Jesus’ identity as the last and greatest voice of God allows Him to speak final words of repentance, justice, grace, mercy, and forgiveness.
• Jesus Christ is also the Heir.  How does this translate to calling?  If Jesus Christ is the heir, then everything of the Father will be the Son’s.  Everything will be under the dominion of Christ.  Jesus lived His life as though everything was under His dominion.
• The glory of God radiates from Him.  To radiate means that something comes from within.  To radiate can also mean to reflect something external.  How does Christ’s calling reflect this identity?  He certainly reflected God’s glory to the world.  He also had God’s glory within Him as it shone out of Him.
• Jesus is the one who sustains creation.  The only reason creation continues and doesn’t literally tear itself apart is because Christ has become a part of it.  How does this identity translate into calling?  Christ literally sustains us.  He is the only reason that we can continue to exist as we are.  We can be in relationship with each other because Christ came as was in relationship with us.
• Christ is the Redeemer.  He is the one who purifies creation from its sinful nature. I think it is pretty easy how Jesus put this identity into calling.  He is the one who laid down His life so that others might live.
• Finally, we see that Christ is king.  How does this identity translate into calling?  Jesus taught with the authority of a king.  People were amazed at His authority.  Furthermore, Christ has sat down at the right hand of God.  Christ has ascended to be with the Father to the place that was prepared for Him.  He has proven His superiority – superiority over death and even the angels!  There is none like Him!

We can learn much from Christ.  All that He did came out of His identity in the Father.  We should strive to have the same said about us.

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Year 6, Day 104: Jeremiah 52

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Protection

• Protection: In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us to pray that God might deliver us from evil – even the Evil One.  Sometimes we need God’s protection from the sin around us.  Sometimes we need protection from the sinful people around us.  Other times we need protection from the sin that lies within ourselves. In any case, Jesus’ point is clear.  We need protection from the Father to make it through each and every day.

Protection may seem to be an interesting topic to choose on the day that we hear a recap of the destruction and deportation of the Hebrew people.  Certainly the topic of the deportation, Jeremiah’s kidnapping, and the destruction of the temple is not a chapter that sounds like God is watching over His people.  I get that.

However, notice how this book ends.  After all of the bad things – the judgment due to Judah – happen, we see that the king of Babylon releases Jehoiachin from prison and Jehoiachin is treated nicely by the king.  In fact, we are told that Jehoiachin is treated more favorably than any other vassal king under Babylon.  What God is showing in this action is that if God can spare a single person in Jehoiachin, the rest of the people can look forward to redemption as well.  God typically starts with one person as an example before bringing His action into the greater context.

This shows us that we are in God’s hands, even in a time of judgment.  Even when God is in the process of judging us and bringing us to a point of humble repentance, He is watching over us.  If we are willing to be humble, He is willing to forgive and bring us into new life.  And He is willing to watch over us and protect us through that process.  That’s why we can talk about protection even at a time when we are reading about the fall and destruction of Jerusalem.

For what it is worth, this is seen in the prophets as well.  Remember Daniel?  Daniel was brought to Babylon from Judah.  But Daniel was lifted up and protected in Babylon by God.  Even in the midst of judgment, God protects.  We can rest comfortable even as we are judged because God is in control of it all.

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Year 6, Day 103: Jeremiah 51

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Ambition

• Ambition: We all need a goal to which we can strive.  When our ambition comes from God, we find fulfillment in our obedience into that for which we have been equipped because our Out is in proper focus.  But when our ambition comes from ourselves, we find ourselves chasing after our own dreams and trying to find fulfillment in accomplishments of our own making.

Ambition can absolutely be a good thing.  We all need that drive to move forward, advance ourselves, and become better today than we were yesterday.  Ambition can absolutely be a necessary part of the human condition.

However, our ambition needs to come from God.  We cannot spend our time wanting what we want.  We cannot pursue our desire if that is all that it is.  We need to pause and humble ourselves before God and seek His will for our life.

I find this an interesting idea to focus on as we bring the book of Jeremiah to a close.  In its immediate context, we have been looking at the fall of Babylon.  They fall because they were too ambitiously human in their conquest of the nations.  In particular, they were too ambitious in the conquest of Jerusalem.  This ultimately turned on them as it became an assault upon God.

In this chapter we also hear about the restoration of the Hebrew people as the Babylonians are brought into judgment.  But let’s not forget why the Babylonians need to be restored.  This entire book is about the Hebrew people following their own desires of their own hearts and ignoring the call of God.  What we see in the Babylonians is reflective of what we’ve seen in the Hebrew people all along. 

Human beings have an issue with ambition.  The issue isn’t that we lack ambition.  The issue is that our ambition often leads us away from God.

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Year 6, Day 102: Jeremiah 50

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Calling

• Calling asks whether or not God has called the person to the particular work at this point in their life.

If we are a good student of the Bible, we absolutely must confess something when it comes to Babylon.  They were called by God to conquer Judah.  Assyria had been called by God to conquer Israel; in the same way Babylon is called to conquer Judah.  It is absolutely God’s will for Babylon to be on the scene.

However, Babylon didn’t learn from Assyria’s mistake.  God called Assyria against Israel, but they went about their job without grace and mercy.  They were brutal and cruel in their destruction.  God called Babylon to judge Assyria, but the Babylonians only learned from the Assyrians.  They were just as cruel in their domination of the region.  As God called Assyria but then had to judge them, God also called Babylon but then had to judge them as well.

Furthermore, while Babylon was called to judge Judah, Babylon was not called to attack and destroy the temple of the Lord.  It makes sense that God would take this personally.  The Babylonians attack and plunder the very place that the God who gave them the power resides!  They were called to come against Judah.  They were not called to come against God Himself.

What can we learn through all of this process? We absolutely need to pay attention to our calling.  God even gives us free will to go about accomplishing His will!  But we need to make sure that we go about our calling in a way that brings honor and glory to the Lord.

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Year 6, Day 101: Jeremiah 49

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: King

• King: This is the pinnacle of the Kingdom Triangle.  When we look towards God’s position in the universe, we acknowledge that He is an omnipotent king.  Authority comes from Him.  Power comes through His authority.  He is looking for representatives for His kingdom.

In this chapter we have God’s promise of judgment on many nations and peoples.  These nations and people span from Judah’s neighbors in Syria and Edom and Moab to people that are actually east of Babylon in Elam.  God’s judgment will sweep through the whole area.  This is part of what makes Him king.  If He wants He can judge an individual, a city, or even an individual nation.  But if He desires, He can also sweep judgment of many nations in a region.  We also know that in the future He will sweep judgment over all of creation, too.

The other part of seeing God as King in this chapter comes at the end of each section of promised judgment.  Notice that some of the nations are promised redemption.  Some of the nations are promised utter destruction.  God judges some and plans to bring them back much the same as God plans to bring back Judah.  But other nations have rebelled so badly that He simply promises to be done with them for God.  What makes God king is His ability to make this distinction and make it righteously.

God truly is in control.  God also knows what is best for humanity.  God can weigh all of these things without prejudice and remain righteous in the midst of human influence upon His creation.

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Year 6, Day 100: Jeremiah 48

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Up

• Up: Up is the word we use for what we worship.  If we are following God’s will, God will occupy the Up position.  Our life, our identity, our mission, our family on mission is all derived from Up.  This is why God needs to be in our Up position.

Jeremiah 48 is all about the destruction of Moab.  As we’ve heard in many other chapters, Jeremiah describes the rise of the Babylonian Empire.  He talks about how the Babylonians will swoop down upon Moab like an eagle.  Moab’s destruction will be swift.  None of this is new.  We’ve heard similar things all throughout this book.

The point that I heard in this chapter was actually the reason why Moab is to be judged.  Moab worships Chemoth.  Moab does not pay respect to God.  In fact, they ignore Him!  God takes it rather personally.  The Moabites have decided to put something else in their Up position other than God.

In fact, occasionally God seems to taunt the Moabites through their choice in deities.  God tells them that they will be destroyed.  But then He specifically calls out Chemoth by saying that Chemoth cannot save them.  Their god is not as powerful as God.  God has purposed their destruction and Chemoth is powerless to do anything about it.

If we are going to put something into our Up position, doesn’t it make sense that we put the most powerful being possible?  If we’re going to worship something, shouldn’t we worship something that can do something about our trials, needs, worry, doubts, fears?  Shouldn’t we worship something that can celebrate with us, too?  God deserves to be in our Up position, there can be no doubt here.

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Year 6, Day 99: Jeremiah 47

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Prophet

• Prophet: A prophet is one of the fivefold ministry categories that is used throughout the Bible and especially lifted up in Ephesians 4:11. The prophet is primarily concerned with whether or not the people are hearing the voice of God.  The prophet is also concerned about whether or not the people are responding to God’s voice.

Yes, this passage is largely about the judgment upon Philistia.  However, the chapter is short.  Philistia is a largely forgotten nation.  They were conquered by David and Solomon.  The Egypt came along and finished the job.  Just to make sure they stayed down, Tyre and Sidon kept a tight rein upon them and kept them from recovering and expanding.  Now comes the Babylonian army onto the scene.  Jeremiah prophesies that Philistia will fall under the Babylonian threat as if they aren’t even there.

As we hear about this, Jeremiah does something incredibly interesting.  Jeremiah pleads for the wrath of God to be stayed. However, he also knows that it must come in order for the righteousness of the Lord to be put on display.  Jeremiah knows that judgment isn’t fun.  Jeremiah also knows that the only way that things get better is through difficult change.  Jeremiah knows that what God is doing is righteous.  But Jeremiah mourns the painful process that the people will endure.

This is what it looks like to be a prophet.  Prophets don’t just speak messages.  Prophets care about the recipients.  Prophets mourn when needed.  Prophets deliver the messages of God while caring about the people who hear them at the same time.

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Year 6, Day 98: Jeremiah 46

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: King

• King: This is the pinnacle of the Kingdom Triangle.  When we look towards God’s position in the universe, we acknowledge that He is an omnipotent king.  Authority comes from Him.  Power comes through His authority.  He is looking for representatives for His kingdom.

Jeremiah now turns to prophesying about the surrounding nations.  Up until now, Jeremiah had only dealt with Judah.  Now that we’ve seen Judah fall in rebellion – as those who weren’t captured fled to Egypt – we turn to the rest of the world and see what God has in store for them.  It’s only fitting that Egypt goes first.  After all, Egypt has been the bane of God’s attempt to work in and through the Hebrew people.

What does God have to say to the Egyptians?  In a quick summary, God wants to tell them the following things:

• The Egyptians think they are powerful.
• The Egyptians have fled from the Babylonians, who are the people that God has raised up to judge the nations and bring His people into humbleness.
• The Egyptians will ultimately fall to Nebuchadnezzar, God’s chosen judge of the nations at this point in time.
• Basically, everything that the Egyptians think is wrong.  Everything God purposes happens.  God is far more powerful than the Egyptians.

This should absolutely sound familiar.  What was God’s point in the Exodus with Moses?  God is king, Pharaoh is not.  What is God’s point with the Hebrew captivity and Nebuchadnezzar as it pertains to Egypt?  God is king, Pharaoh is not.

God is consistent in His message.  He is consistent because He is king.

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Year 6, Day 97: Jeremiah 44-45

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Character

• Character: Having the interior life that is necessary to support the work that God sets before a person.  It is hearing from God and obeying.  It is doing the right thing when nobody is looking.

Imagine being Jeremiah.  You promised that God would bring destruction upon Jerusalem if the people would not humble themselves before God and surrender to the Babylonians.  The people didn’t.  God fulfilled His promise.  You got to see the character of the people and the character of God.

Now Jeremiah has been kidnapped and dragged to Egypt.  Once more God warns the people to obey Him.  They disregard the message and desire their own ways.  They want to live their life the way they want it.  They want to make sense of the world around them based on their own thoughts, not based on a wisdom that is beyond the typical human existence.  They find themselves in judgment one more time.  God promises destruction, even in Jerusalem.

What a great lesson in character.  The people want what makes sense to them.  Their character isn’t to look for a greater truth and live by what is good for the community around them.  They want to sacrifice to gods that they think make a difference.  They want to flee rather than be humble and submit.  Their character is flawed, and we see it again and again in their refusal to submit.

What’s neat, though, is that the people in Babylon will be the remnant.  These people who have left for Egypt will disappear into history without a trace.  What do they get for their troubles?  They get to disappear in history as Babylon and Egypt clash.  God promises to forget them, and we forget them, too.  God is raising up more faithful people away from these people who have shown a disobedient character.

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Year 6, Day 96: Jeremiah 43

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Guidance

• Guidance: God grants us His guidance.  Sometimes this guidance is God leading us away from temptation.  Sometimes this guidance is helping us to follow in a direction for which He has chosen.  Our default position should be to wait for God’s guidance and then follow when it comes.

God will always give us guidance.  The real question is what we will do with that guidance.  Will we obey?  Will we submit?  Or will we reject His guidance and go on with our own will.

Of course, this is coming off of the reality that the people reject Jeremiah’s message.  Stop for a minute and think about Jeremiah’s track record.  Everything that Jeremiah has said so far has come true.  When Jeremiah prophesies from the Lord, it happens.  He’s got a really good track record of having wisdom from the Lord.  Why do they reject Jeremiah one more time?  They reject Jeremiah because it isn’t what they want to hear.

It really says something about us when we reject the voice of other people because it isn’t what we want to hear.  It is one thing to reject someone’s witness because they are wrong or because they are using faulty logic.  But it is another thing to reject someone just because we choose to think differently.  It shows much about our character when we are so willing to reject God’s guidance because we as human beings think that God is wrong.

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Year 6, Day 95: Jeremiah 42

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Obedience

• Obedience: Genuine and satisfying obedience comes out of our identity.  Our true identity comes only from our Father.

The people who remain in Judah have much reason to fear.  Their leader has just been assassinated.  It’s highly likely that Nebuchadnezzar will take revenge.  Ammon has already proven its desire to meddle in their affairs.  All of the leaders of the country have been stripped away and dragged off to Babylon.  In this circumstance they come to Jeremiah and ask for help.

Jeremiah agrees to pray to the Lord and come back to the people with a response.  Notice that he is gone for ten days!  That’s really impressive.  How many of us would have given up after ten days?  Not Jeremiah.  Not the people waiting on Jeremiah.  Remarkably, everyone stays incredibly patient under the circumstances.  This is to their credit.

Then Jeremiah comes back with a message from the Lord.  The Lord wants the people to stay put.  The Lord promises that if they stay in the land that He will cause them to prosper.  The Lord promises protection.  The Lord promises that Nebuchadnezzar will not bring retribution against the people.  The message seems clear and good.  If the people obey this message, it will go well for them.

We’ll see what the people do tomorrow.  But for today the message for us is quite clear.  Patiently wait upon the Lord.  When we hear from the Lord, listen to Him and obey His voice.  In truth, this has been God’s point for this whole book.  Things go well for us when we are patient and obedient to the Lord’s desire.

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Year 6, Day 94: Jeremiah 41

Theological Commentary: Click Here

Discipleship Focus: Appetite

• Appetite: We all have needs that need to be filled.  When we allow ourselves to be filled with the people and things that God brings into our life, we will be satisfied because our In will be in proper focus.  But when we try to fill ourselves with our own desires we end up frustrated by an insatiable hunger.

Ishmael is clearly a man who has an appetite for world goods.  He is driven by materialism.  After all, we see him in this story as a mercenary, doing the bidding of the king of Ammon.

For a price, Ishmael betrays Gedaliah.  For a price, Ishmael destroys the Babylonian vassal-king who was finally listening to the will of God for the people.  For a price, Ishmael counters the very hand and will of God.

But Ishmael doesn’t just work as a mercenary.  Mourners come from the northern kingdom to mourn with Gedaliah at Judah’s fate.  Ishmael sees their supplies and slaughters them.  Furthermore, ten of them reveal that there is a cache of supplies that Ishmael can have if he agrees to free them.  We see Ishmael’s appetite once more as he agrees to let them live in exchange for materialistic gain.

But we still haven’t seen the appetite of Ishmael come to it full force.  Ishmael takes what remains of Gedaliah’s court and begins to march them back to Ammon.  Ishmael thinks that he can use them as prisoners of war and sell them to the king of Ammon.  He is still looking for profit and willing to use his fellow human beings to make a profit.

While it is meaningful to look at Ishmael’s appetite for materialistic gain, it is especially enlightening to look at the consequences.  Many people end up dad because of Ishmael’s appetite.  If that isn’t bad enough, it is doubtful that Nebuchadnezzar is going to respond very happily when he finds out that his vassal-king, who was promoting peaceful servanthood to Babylon, was assassinated along with the royal guard that he left to make sure Gedaliah stayed in line.  There can be little doubt that Ishmael’s appetite will bring about a harsher relationship with Babylon.  The peaceful vassal life is quickly to be traded in, all because of the appetite of Ishmael.

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