Psalm 51:10-12, ‘Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. Restore to me the joy of your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit.’ This picture was a request from one of …
Job 9:23-24, ‘When disaster brings sudden death, He mocks at the calamity of the innocent. The earth is given into the hand of the wicked; He covers the face of its judges—if it is not He, WHO then is it?’ In this post, I’m not commenting on Job’s evaluation of the situation, only on the …
Colossians 3:22-23, ‘Whatever you do, work from your [very] soul, as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance.’ [author’s translation] Though these words are written to 1st century bondservants, they remain applicable to any Christian who works under the authority of someone …
Luke 14:33, ‘…any one of you who does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple.’ V.33 is the summarizing statement for vs 25-33…and these are hard words. ‘So every one of you who does not renounce / send away / take leave of all the things he possesses cannot be my disciple.’ …
Isaiah 40:11, “He will tend His flock like a shepherd; He will gather the lambs in His arms; He will carry them in His bosom, and gently lead those that are with young.” The One who mercifully shepherds His people is also the One who humbles the world by His might (v.10), and the hands …
Romans 2:16, “…on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.” How does God judge the secret things of human hearts “by Christ Jesus”? I think there are at least two ways. First, there is a day of judgment appointed for all human beings. On …
3 John 11, “Beloved, do not imitate the evil but the good. The one doing good is from God; the one doing evil has not seen God.” In the context of 3 John, John is contrasting Gaius and Diotrephes. “Doing good” means—like Gaius—to generously receive and to love other believers for the sake of …
Philippians 3:12-14, “…I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me His own…forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.” I’m not reading in Philippians right now, …
Job 1:21, “the LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.” I started reading Job this morning and was freshly struck by the words of Job 1:21…scripture is often like a mold, forged by God, into which He invites us to pour the molten anguish of …
John 17:3, “And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.” John 17:3 is one of the most paradigmatic verses for me in all of scripture….it overflows with implications for all of life and informs pretty much everything I do and create…So with …
John 14:1, “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me.”
2 Corinthians 4:6, “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness’, has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” The Spirit-wrought work of regeneration causes us to see the crucified Christ and say, “my Lord and my …
Proverbs 21:26, “…the righteous gives and does not hold back” At the cross, this Proverb is supremely fulfilled when the Righteous One Himself gives all and holds nothing back.
2 Peter 1:2, “May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.” The experiential grace and peace that are ours by the Spirit multiply to us as we know more of God’s glory in Christ through the Spirit.
Psalm 139:23-24, “Search me, O God, and know my heart! And see if there be any grevious way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting!” Of all people the Christian should hide nothing….especially from God! Our debt was paid at the cross, so may the Lord search our souls to the marrow and …
Proverbs 28:26, “Whoever trusts in his own mind is a fool, but he who walks in wisdom will be delivered.”
Galatians 5:16-17, “But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the desires of the flesh are against the Spirit, and the desires of the Spirit are against the flesh…” May an overriding desire for Christ, granted by the indwelling Spirit, drive us to …
Hebrews 11:1, “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.”
Proverbs 1:7, “The fear of YHWH is the beginning of knowledge.” Our mind truly knows, only if our heart truly fears…And apart from a heart that has been pierced with this blood-bought fear of YHWH, human knowledge of the universe is like an F22 sealed in a cave….impressive, but pointless.
Exodus 28:29, “So [the high priest] shall bear the names of the sons of Israel in the breastpiece of judgment on his heart, when he goes into the Holy Place, to bring them to regular remembrance before the LORD.” Hebrews 8:1, “We have such a high priest…”
