Tag Archives: scriptures

Biblio por summer

colossians 3.16 www.jeanierhoades.com
I am a little behind on my schedule.  Not woefully.  Just a little.

I am about halfway through 2 Corinthians.  There are moments when I am tempted to think: perhaps I should have just read the Psalms for summer.  But since the Word of God is life-giving, living and active: wow, I need that in me.  The more Word, the better!

More importantly, I still, with busyness of life and love, relationships and aggravations, the intensity of the exciting before and after of Heaven Fest over the next month and a half, wasted time and way-too-jammed-packed time, too – well, sometimes there isn’t a place for the Word to live, inhabit and dwell as it deserves.  So it isn’t even the reading of it, just making sure it gets “done,”, it is the doing/the meditating on/the rich possession of the Word I must work on.

Like, you can’t just buy a packet of seeds and hope for a harvest.  You must turn and prepare the soil.  You must nurture it with rain and sunshine.  And while it is still a tender shoot, you must protect it in your heart, for the strong winds and storms and the hail will come.

You can’t just read it and walk away – back into life without knowing that it needs a place to be rooted in your heart.

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.  James 1.22-24 NIV

So, maybe, as I enter week 6 of 14 (are the rest of you hanging in there with me??), I will be able to give the Word of Christ the home it deserves in me.  And what a benefit to me in the process.

When your words came, I ate them;

they were my joy and my heart’s delight,

for I bear your name,

LORD God Almighty.  Jeremiah 15.16 NIV

They feed me, Your words do, LORD.  They nourish my spirit.

All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God[ may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.  2. Timothy 3.16-17 NIV

Your Word, LORD, equips me, trains me, corrects me, gets me ready for all this fun, crazy-good Kingdom work You let me participate in.  I mean – I NEED that!  Thank-You, Lord!

For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.  Hebrews 4.12 NIV

Alive and active?  Then I want that in ME!  Yes, please!

More than good life lessons and moralizing, greater than wise words printed on a page, not just historical teaching or religious guideline, His Word is an ongoing-active-sharp-surgical-white-hot-purifying-judging-healing-clarification-bringing double-edged sword.  Cut me through, LORD!

THIS WEEK,  God willing and the creek don’t rise (and I am pretty sure He is willing),  July 10 – 16:  Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians;  Psalms 59 – 70

Also known as the Go Eat Pop Corn section of the New Testament.  Years ago some one told me the way they remembered the order of these Pauline Epistles was to give them this acronym.  Thus Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians became Go-Eat-Pop-Corn, or for some people “God’s Electric Power Company.”  It is funny because I think it is really just easier to remember Galatians-Ephesians-Philippians-Colossians.  But I do still have to quick-sing the Books of the Bible song I learned as a girl when I am trying to get to a minor prophet in the O.T. super fast.  *smile

New Testament and Psalms, www.jeanierhoades.com

May the Word of Christ dwell richly in you this week, and in me, too!

 

Summer Reading Plan

2 Timothy 3.16-17 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

For fun and for LIFE, here is where I will be this summer.  Want to join me?

Reading the New Testament and Psalms through this summer.

This is reading 410 chapters of Bible over the course of June, July, August and wrapping up the week of Labor Day.  It averages to slightly more than 4 chapters a day, or more  specifically, 2-3 chapters of NT daily, plus almost 2 of the Psalms each day of the week.  That is just averaging.

I know summer seems a weird time to pick up a “plan,”to start somthing that you are committing to when we usually see this time as our “lazy days,” (although who has time to be lazy ever these tdays??).  But don’t you also hate getting to the end of a “season” and find that it was wasted, that you didn’t get everything from it you could have?

The busier I am, the more I need the life-giving Word of the Living God to be in me, to actually live in me…

Colossians 3.16  Let the Word of Christ dwell in you richly.

 

Russian sage.

Ideas on fitting it in

  1. Get up an hour earlier.  This is my plan.  The cool of the morning is a lovely time for the Word.
  2. Skip the summer reruns  on TV and take that last hour before sunset to sit outside and read and refresh.
  3. Raed the NT through the week and drink up the Psalms on the weekends.
  4. Read aloud.  You are supposed to read to your kids anyway.  How about reading the scriptures aloud to them?  Faith come by hearing and hearing by the Word of God, don’t be surprised when you actually start to be increased in faith by your own reading.  Preach it! 
  5. Listen to the audio Bible on the way to work, or during a walk.  www.biblegateway.com has it for free.  www.youversion.com, too.  The Bible is readily available free of charge!
  6. Schedule it in like everything else we do for the summer: play dates, ball games, vacation days, picnics, small group.

Then?

Meditate on it throughout the day.  At the end  of each week (or on Sunday), write yourself a few quick notes of what God’s Word did in your heart the past week.

Jeremiah 15.16   When your words came, I ate them;  they were my joy and my heart’s delight, for I bear your name, LORD God Almighty.

The plan.

WEEK OF

June 5 Matthew 1-14; Psalms 1 – 11

June 12 Matthew 15 – 28; Psalms 11 – 22

June 19 Romans; Psalms 23 – 34

June 26 1 & 2 Corinthians; Psalms 35 – 46

July 3  Mark; Psalms 47 – 58

July 10 Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians; Psalms 59 – 70

July 17 1 & 2 Thessalonians, 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus and Philemon; Psalms 71 – 82

July 24 Luke 1 -12; Psalms 83 – 94

July 31 Luke 13 – 24; Psalms 95 – 106

August 7 Acts 1-14; Psalms 107 – 118

August 14 Acts 15 – 28; Psalms 119 – 124

August 21 Hebrews, James, 1 & 2 Peter; Psalms 125 – 133

August 28 John, 1, 2 & 3 John, Jude; Psalms 134 – 142

September 4 Revelation; Psalms 143 – 150

Hebrews 4.12  For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

It is about 20 minutes a day, I’d say, reading at a leisurely pace (I just meandered through Matthew 1-5 and Psalm 1-5 in about 30 minutes).  Just think what a great meal we’ll have enjoyed in the next 90 days!

This .jpeg can be saved to your computer desktop for reference

Want to join me?  Want to?  Come on.  You know you do! 

Ready?  Set.  GO!

Biblical Butt-Kicking

I shoulda started Joshua yesterday and been finishing it and starting in on Judges today.  That’s where I shoulda been, since I decided to jump into the 90-Day read-through-the-Bible plan during this busiest summer ever.  I learned about this deal through the Denver Post, a June 1-August 31 thing and thought I’d give it a try.

I have read through the Bible in a year, but not that many times, frankly.  For 3 years in a row I read the OT through once and the NT through twice. I enjoyed getting more New Testament during that plan.  But I have also taken a lot longer and though I don’t get the mark on my scoreboard, I really enjoy the Word.  Time in the Word is time with the Word…

Some people keep track of how many times they have read the entire Bible through in a year like they are gathering up Super Bowl rings or something.   My preference would be to relish the Word, study deep and meander through it.  And sometimes I just don’t read it often enough.  Let’s be honest. 

But here I am – attempting this marathon read-through.  I started a couple of days late and totally lost control while I was in Kentucky.  I am in  Numbers.  I should be reading the end of Joshua.

Will she make it?  Will she know Him more by the end?

Lord, I don’t just want to do this to say I have done it, but I want to hear You and know more of You and learn to be like You.  May Your Word do a work in my heart this summer.  Help me to hide Your Word in my heart, to meditate on Your precepts and laws.  Your Word is eternal and established and is my delight.  This summer as I feast on this living Word, I will also obey it, Lord.  Teach  me, change me…

For Keeps

psalm 121

I lift up my eyes to the hills –

Where does my help come from?

My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.

He will not allow your foot to slip or be moved.

He who KEEPS you will not slumber.

{He who watches over}

He who KEEPS [His people] will not sleep.

The LORD is your KEEPER.

{the LORD watches over you}

The LORD is your shade on the right hand (the side not carrying a shield).

The sun will not harm you by day, nor the moon at night.

The LORD will KEEP you from all evil.

{the LORD will keep you, guard you from all harm}

He will KEEP {watch over} your life.

The LORD will KEEP {watch over/guard} your coming and going

from now until forevermore {for always…}.

The question:  What does it mean to be “kept”?

In awe of the Keeper…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:    I can see He is not sleeping – so I can!  Peacefully.  He is at work on my behalf.  Makes me start singing: You dance over me while I am unaware…He is KEEPING me

Psalm 119 Meditation on a January Morning

Try this:

  • Go to www.soaking.net and click on the (instrumental) music-only pop-up player.  Cut the volume back by about half.
  • Open a new tab in www.biblegateway.com, scrolling down to “Listen to the Bible.”  Click on that and then select Psalm 119 using the drop-down boxes.

You’ll hear Max McClean’s gentle and generally un-annoying voice reading the Word about the Word (the laws, the statutes and decrees, the commands and precepts, His Word, His way) to an amazingly beautiful soundtrack of worship.  The music goes on and on.  I re-play Max reading Psalm 119 three times.  That equals about an hour of the water of the Word washing over you like a fresh brook flowing.

The first time, I listened and just let the Word do some mending, re-adjusting and healing.  The second time, I prayed it to the Lord for all I was worth, just repeating in my own words what the narrator was saying as he read.  The third time through, I grabbed pen and paper and wrote the words and phrases that stuck out to me, were illuminated, things like: You are good and what You do is good…Your decrees are the theme of my song wherever I may lodge… and …Your promise preserves my life…

This was how I spent my “Tent time” this morning (www.thetentdenver.com), joining other worshipers aound the metro-area in “creating a canopy of continuous praise.”

From Knocking at God’s Door – A Little Book of Prayers by Oswald Chambers, the January 13 prayer is:

O Lord, how excellent it is to commune with Thee in the early morning hours.  Enable me by patience to reproduce these exalted moments of calm into the activities of the day.

That Oswald could pray.  I say AMEN to that!…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  I was made to worship Him.  I was born for this – lingering, praising, bringing Him honor.  Seven times a day….

In Christ Alone

Prayers from the Word:

I am called in Christ (Romans 1.6).
I was redeemed in Christ (Romans 3.24).
I reign in life by Christ (Romans 5.17).
I have eternal life through Christ (Romans 6.23).
I am a joint heir with Christ (Romans 8.17).
I have victory through Christ (1 Corinthians 15.57).
I am a new creature in Christ (2 Corinthians 5.17).
I have liberty in Christ (Galatians 2.4).
I am crucified with Christ ( Galatians 2.20).
I have put on Christ (Galatians 3.27).
I have been blessed with spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ (Ephesians 1.3).
I have been chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world, that I should be holy and without blame before Him (Ephesians 1.4).
I have been created in Christ for good works (Ephesians 2.6).
I rejoice in Christ (Philippians 3.3).
I press toward the mark of the high calling of God on my life in Christ (Philippians3.14).
I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength (Philippians 4.13).
God supplies all my needs through Christ (Philippians 4.19).
I am complete in Christ (Colossians 2.10).
I am dead with Christ (Colossians 2.20).
I am risen with Christ (Colossians 3.1).
My life is hidden with Christ in God (Colossians 3.3).
Christ is my life (Colossians 3.4).
I have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2.16).
I have the attitude of Christ, choosing humility (Philippians 2.5-7).
I am preserved in Christ (Jude 1.1).*

Jesus: Who do you say that I am?

Peter: You are the Christ, the Son of the living God…

Jesus: Who do YOU say that I am?

In Christ Alone…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  That I may know Him…Know Him, press in to knowing Him…song: “becoming like Him in His death, so that in me there’s resurrection life…”

*adapted from the book by John Eckhardt, Prayers that Rout Demons

Footloose

“Oh, how sweet the light of day

And how wonderful to live in the sunshine!

Even if you live a long time, don’t take a single day for granted.

Take delight in each light-filled hour,

Remembering that there will also be many dark days

And that most of what comes your way is smoke.

Live footloose and fancy free-

You won’t be young forever…”

Ecclesiastes 11.7-8, 10 The Message

Some days you open your Bible and just realize how much better it is than a thousand fortune cookies!  Truth!  Life!  My delight!  Sweeter than honey to my lips.  His words are like bread – and I eat them! They cause me to break into a prayer of love to the Letter Writer~

Oh, how I love Your law, O Lord.  Your promise preserves my life.  Your words are the lyrics and melody of my song wherever I live – wherever I find myself.  I think about Your Word day and night.  Your decrees light the path I am on and help me find my way back when I am lost.  I have spent my life testing Your promises and I have found them to be true.  I love Your Word, O Lord.  (shamelessly ripping off David in Psalm 119)

I love how the scriptures set us free from self-imposed religious activity and living!  Footloose and fancy free…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF:  This must truly be a mandate for the coming year.

pictured: a “sample picture” that came with the computer – in case I didn’t know what a picture was

Prayer: Distinguish Me

On going into the very Promised Land of God, Moses said to the Lord:

“If Your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here…How will anyone know that You are pleased with me and Your people unless You go with us?   What else will distinguish me and Your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” Ex. 33.15-16

So, I pray:

Distinguish me, Lord – not by making me better at something than some one else or giving me wealth or fame or position or title or things.   Sanctify me and set me apart for Your holy will, for Your Name and Your fame, Lord, for Your acclaim on the earth.   Distinguish me  by Your Presence – that You will be seen wherever I go,  a forgiven woman, set free and  living in grace.

“Grace. The empowering Presence of God, enabling me to be what He called me to be and to do what He called me to do.” –  James Ryle  

Distinguish me as Yours…Jeanie

Free Woman

Fun activity:   Go to www.biblegateway.com  (I LOVE this site!) and choose a book of the Bible.   Turn up the speakers and let Max McClean read it to you.   Have some paper and a pen and just write the phrases (don’t take dictation) that stand out to you – words that sizzle and pop in your heart!

Today I listened to  a book with 6 chapters.   You could listen and  hear a totally different message, but you can see, for me, with a lifelong history and struggle with ‘fear of man’ (approval addiction, craving affirmation, jumping through people’s insatiable hoops, strong need to please) the power-phrases are about living to please God and God alone.   In this book, the church was being led back into bondage through the issue of circumcision, but in our day it can be a prayer meeting (people either inviting you and treating you like less of a Christian if you don’t go, or even being told there is a prayer meeting going on that you are not invited to because it is only for deep intercessors)  or your giving record  or your church attendance or serving or lack thereof, really, any psuedo-super-spiritual way one Christian  uses to make another feel less holy, condemned, enslaved.   But here, God is saying You’re free.   You’re a child and heir to the Promise, born to a free woman.   Live a life of faith expressed in love.   Receive grace and walk in the Spirit (not man-made law and control).   There is good fruit there!

Guess which book of the Bible I was hearing and receiving….

sent not  FROM men nor  BY men…grace and peace from God and Jesus…who gave Himself to RESCUE us…I am astonished…you’ve turned to a different gospel…if anybody is preaching a different gospel – let him be eternally condemned…I received by revelation from Jesus…zealous…I did not consult any man…I went in response to a revelation…sent to spy on the freedom we had…to those who seemed to be important – they meant nothing to me…recognized the grace given to me…REMEMBER THE POOR…afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision…faith IN Jesus Christ, not by observing the law…If I rebuild what I destroyed I prove I am a lawbreaker…Who has bewitched you?…Are you trying to attain your goal by human effort?…believers are children of Abraham…The righteous will live by faith…Christ became a curse for us…To Abraham and his seed – one person, Christ…the law did not do away with the promise…the law…was because of transgressions…if a law had been given that could impart life…locked up until faith should be revealed…Baptized INTO Christ…Abraham’s seed and heir according to the promise…full rights as sons…no longer a slave, but a son, an heir…WHY ARE YOU TURNING BACK TO THOSE WEAK AND MISERABLE PRINCIPLES?…What has happened to all your joy?…zealous…for no good…It is fine to be zealous provided the purpose is good…slave woman – free woman…The women represent two covenants…(Be glad, o barren woman, Is. 54)…YOU…are children of PROMISE…we are NOT children of the slave woman, but of the FREE WOMAN…it is FOR FREEDOM that Christ has set us FREE…you have fallen away from grace…the ONLY thing that counts is FAITH expressing itself in LOVE…as for those [circumcision] agitators, I wish they would go the whole way and emasculate themselves…live by the Spirit and you’ll not gratify the desires of the sinful nature…but the FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT IS…Keep in step with the Spirit…

His yoke IS easy and His burden IS light.   Just trying to keep in step with the Spirit today, joyfully, freely…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF: Lift my standards and demands off people’s necks, too, so they can stay free.   If I am requiring anything of them God doesn’t, I become the ‘bewitcher’ – the yoke-inducing controller and manipulator, the one Paul curses to eternal damnation for preaching any other gospel…

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