Today we read John 3, the new birth chapter; you must be born again (literally: from above), the new birth is necessary to enter into the Kingdom of God; John 3:16 is the most quoted verse in all the Bible.
Genesis 4 tells of the results of original sin with the story of Cain and Abel and the beginning of animal sacrifice; Genesis 5 gives the Genealogy from Adam to Noah.
The take home for today is there are two births, the physical birth and the spiritual birth (the birth from above), the first murder, the first man (Enoch) to be carried directly to God rather than die. (because ha walked with God).
Today we read in John 2, that Jesus turned water into wine, cleansed the Temple, and when the Jews demanded a sign he gave them just one sign (which they of course did not understand).
Genesis 2 left us with the idyllic Eden, no diseases existed yet. But God created us with free will, and the fall is then described in Genesis 3 . The problem is, after eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, (not an apple tree) and in doing so we think we can build better without God.
The question to ponder is: Why did God create us with a free will? He knew the result from the beginning, and knew He would have to send His Son to redeem us back to Himself. In fact He knew it from before the beginning: “All inhabitants of the earth will worship the beast—all whose names have not been written in theLamb’s book of life, theLamb who was slain from the creation of the world.” (Revelation 13:8, NIV)
Answer: We are created in God’s image, male and female, not so much physical, but spiritual, and free will is part of the package. Without free will there is no fellowship with God, only puppetry.
Psalm 1 is a beautiful poem about righteous living, and only one person could fulfill all the conditions mentioned, the exception to ” There is none righteous, no, not one” (Romans 3: 10)
The Holy Bible is the most influential book ever written. It has been translated in its entirety into 704 languages, and the New Testament has been translated into 1160 languages. At least one part of the Bible has bee translated into 3,312 languages, and more translations are coming every year, especially from the Wycliffe translators.
Both the New Testament and the Old Testament begin with the words “In the beginning”. John1:1-18 deals with creation spiritually, and Genesis 1 deals with the physical creation, but with a spiritual emphasis, laying the groundwork for spiritual understanding of how and why we exist.
We are existing in time and space. The question is: What was there before time and space existed, before the beginning?
Answer: God, existing in three persons, God the Father, God the Son (the Word) and God’s Spirit, (the Holy Ghost).
The Three-in-one God alone are eternal, everything else, including time and space, is created.
Yesterday the word was “the heavenly realms” found 5 times in Ephesians. The King James translation renders this “heavenly places” suggesting it is a physical location. The original Greek does not mention realms or places, it simply calls it “the heavenlies”. For we, created in time and space, have a hard time getting hold of God, after all he exists since creation of both time and space. Just think, without physical matter time and space has no meaning. The apostle Matthew calls the heavenlies the Kingdom of heaven, Mark and Luke calls it the Kingdom of God. Jesus himself says in John 18:36 “My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence.“
We tend to think that what we do makes a difference. God has given us access to the spiritual dimension, or realm, or even place in the form of the Holy Spirit, and thanks to that He has given us power. No, he has given us access to the heavenlies, not in our selves but it is Christ, in the form of the Holy Spirit that lives in us. Without him we can do nothing.
Something happened to us today that has never happened to us before. After a successful shopping trip we went to a diner that serves excellent crab cakes. After finishing the meal, the server, followed by the manager, came and said, somebody paid for our meal. At first we were dumbfounded, we have heard of acts of random kindness, but why us, we don’t look that destitute, as a matter of fact, we look rather good, considering our age. We humbly thanked the server and manager for the anonymous generosity. Leaving the diner I remembered that we always pray before the meal, holding hands, giving thanks to God for what He has tone today and for the meal, all in the name of Jesus.
There is something going on, i can sense it. We are praying for a revival of Biblical proportions, and a worldwide awakening. After all, God gives more grace.
John 21 tells of the eighth miracle of Jesus. This miracle of a great catch of fish happened after Jesus resurrection and was a sign of new beginnings. Jesus reinstated Peter and told him: “Feed my sheep.”
Exodus 12 tells of how God instituted the Passover. The name comes from the action that night, when the angel of death came to kill every firstborn in Egypt, if he saw the blood of the pascal lamb om the doorposts and the lentil of the house, he would pass over that house. The chapter is fantastic, read it and marvel!
In Exodus 13 the feast of unleavened bread is defined and the consecrating of the firstborn to the LORD. The Hebrews have escaped from Egypt, and a proposed route is suggested.
John 20 deals with the resurrection, and Jesus was not there, only his grave clothes, strips of cloth, not the “Turin Shroud.” It was the first day of the week and Jesus showed himself to all the disciples except Thomas. He doubted their testimony, and it is from this we have the expression “Doubting Thomas.” Later, when even he saw Jesus, he bowed down and worshiped him saying “My Lord, and my God”. Jesus also gave the promise they would receive the Holy Spirit.
Exodus 10: Two more plagues, the plague of locusts and the plague of darkness. For these two plagues the LORD hardened Pharaoh’s heart.
In Exodus 11 Moses and Aaron proclaimed the tenth and final plague: The death of the firstborn. Interestingly enough the plagues of Egypt are also in the Quran, four are the same, five are different, and one is missing altogether. Guess which one!
Psalm 11 has the phrase “flee as a bird to the mountain”, which bring back memories of songs we used to sing in choir.
John 19:16b-42. I took the liberty to incorporate all the “seven words of Christ on the cross.” This requires to take passages from the Gospel of Luke, as well as from the Gospel pf Matthew or Mark. It helped me a lot to get the time-order of events as well as the completeness of Christ substitutionary sacrifice on the Cross. It is finished!
In Exodus 9 there are three more plagues, the plague of livestock, the plague of boils and the plague of hail. In the fifth and seventh plague Pharaoh’s heart remained hard, but for thesixth plague the LORD hardened Pharaoh’s heart.
John 19:1-16. The trial of Jesus continued under Pilate. He tried his best to get out of it by placing a crown of thorn on Jesus, let the soldiers mock him and hit him, hoping that would placate the Jews. But they cried Crucify! He tried and tried, but they cried “E\We have no King but Caesar” so Pilate finally gave in and handed Jesus over to be crucified.
In Exodus 7 God promised Moses to give him the words to all he must say, and Aaron was to tell it to Pharaoh. God also said he would harden Pharaoh’s heart and not let the people go. Aaron threw down his rod and it became a snake. The Egyptians duplicated it. The first plague out of ten occurred, turning the water of the Nile to blood.
Exodus 8 is very interesting. It tells of three more plagues of Egypt, the plague of frogs, the plague of gnats and the plague of flies. The Egyptian magicians had no trouble duplicating elements of the plague of frogs, but when it came to the plague of gnats they threw up their hands and said “This is the finger of God”. From then on they could not duplicate any of the plagues.
John 18:28-40 deals with the last 24 hours of Jesus life, from the trial before Annas and the Sanhedron Jesus was paraded before Pilate, seeing a way out, Pilate sent him to Herod, who sent him back to Pilate, Pilate offered to release Jesus or Barabbas and the people demanded that Barabbas be released.
In Exodus 4 God gave Moses his call. At first Moses came up with one objection after another, but God persuaded him with signs that he must go back to Egypt, face Pharaoh and lead his people.
In Exodus 5 Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and asked for a 3 day reprieve for his people so they can go and worship God. Like all dictators Pharaoh reacted to this petition by making life even more miserable for the Hebrews; he wanted them to gather their own straw and still make as many bricks as before. The Hebrews blamed Moses for stirring up trouble for them.
And in Exodus 6 the LORD (Jehovah) promised deliverance from Pharaoh and He would give them the land He had promised Abraham. The narrative continues with an interlude where the names of the heads of the clans of Israel are listed. Moses protested and did not want to talk to Pharaoh any more, so Aaron would have to do the speaking.
John 18:1-27 deals with the last 24 hours of Jesus life, the prayer in the garden of Gethsemane and the subsequent arrest of Jesus, the trial before Annas, Peter’s first denial, Jesus trial before Caiaphas, Peter’s second and third denial and the cock crowing.
Exodus 3 tells where God revealed Himself to Moses in the form of a burning bush and declared “I am that I am”. Jesus made a similar declaration in John 8:58 “Before Abraham, I am”.
In the Septuagint Psalm 9 and Psalm 10 belong together. They speak of God’s faithfulness and the only temporary victories of the wicked one.
Len Bilén's blog, a blog about faith, politics and the environment. 