9/2/2011 8:25:05 AM
SPIRITUAL DIARY
My Worship Time Focus: The goodness of God PT-2
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Nehemiah 9:19-22
Message of the verses: “19 You, in Your great compassion, Did not forsake them in the wilderness; The pillar of cloud did not leave them by day, To guide them on their way, Nor the pillar of fire by night, to light for them the way in which they were to go. 20 "You gave Your good Spirit to instruct them, Your manna You did not withhold from their mouth, And You gave them water for their thirst. 21 "Indeed, forty years You provided for them in the wilderness and they were not in want; Their clothes did not wear out, nor did their feet swell. 22 "You also gave them kingdoms and peoples, And allotted them to them as a boundary. They took possession of the land of Sihon the king of Heshbon And the land of Og the king of Bashan.”
In today’s SD I will look at the second sub-point under the second main point of Dr. Wiersbe’s commentary on Nehemiah. He entitles this sub-point “Leading the nation,” and it will cover the verses written above.
The verses above tell of how the Lord took care of the children of Israel while they were in the wilderness, wandering for forty years because of the unbelief of the first generation that came out of Egypt. This was the generation that saw all the miracles that God did in order to bring them out of slavery which they were under while in the land of Egypt. God gave these unbelieving people the Spirit to teach them and a cloud to protective them from both the heat and the cold, He gave them manna to eat, and water to drink, their clothes did neither wear out, nor did their feet swell from all the walking that they did. God did all of this because of His goodness, which is one of His attributes that are part of who God is. This may be a good time to say that a study of the attributes of God is a wonderful study to undertake, and one all believers should do so that they can get to know God better. A. W. Tozer has written a number of books that tell of the attributes of God. “The Knowledge of the Holy” is a book that is written by Tozer which speaks of the attributes of God. Chip Ingram read that book so many times that he actually wrote a book on the attributes of God, “God as He Longs for You to See Him” is the title of Ingram’s book. Then there is the classic book written by J. I. Packer called “Knowing God” that also tells about the attributes of God. All of these books are well worth reading.
I have mentioned that the people of Israel were slaves in the land of Egypt while they were there for over four hundred years. God took a family of seventy people to Egypt and made a nation out of them, a nation that would one day bring the Messiah to the earth in the person of Jesus Christ. This was one of the purposes of why God chose the nation of Israel as His own. When God brought the children of Israel out of the nation of Egypt He did it through a series of ten miracles, very powerful miracles that can be read about in the first few chapters of the book of Exodus. This generation of Israel had been involved in the salary under the Egyptians and knew the harshness of it yet when they were released from this slavery through the goodness of God and ran into some hard times, which were tests that God was giving them, they wanted to return to slavery. When we read this we wonder why they wanted to do this, and yet when we read in the NT the words of the Lord Jesus Christ in the eight chapter of John’s gospel we see that everyone who has been born on this earth is a slave to sin: “31 ¶ So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, "If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free." 33 They answered Him, "We are Abraham’s descendants and have never yet been enslaved to anyone; how is it that You say, ’You will become free’?" 34 Jesus answered them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. 35 "The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son does remain forever. 36 "So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed.” All of us who have been born again through the Spirit of God have now become son’s of God, we are no longer slaves to sin, and yet just like the children of Israel who had a desire to go back into slavery in Egypt we sometimes have a desire to go back to being slaves of sin thus we should not be too hard on that generation that came out of Egypt but learn from them and not make the same mistakes that they made.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: Going along with the last portion of this SD that had to do with sin and being a slave to sin I want to think about a passage in the eleventh chapter of the book of Hebrews, a chapter that some call “God’s Hall of Fame, or Faith. In this chapter we read about the faith of some of the OT believers who had a tremendous amount of faith. We find Moses in this chapter and this is what it says about Moses, “24 By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, 25 choosing rather to endure ill-treatment with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin, 26 considering the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt; for he was looking to the reward.” This highlighted portion of verse twenty-five tells why it is not so hard to be lured into going back to being a slave of sin, for it says that sin brings pleasure, yet it is a passing pleasure, a pleasure that does not satisfy the very heart and soul. I suppose that we could call this pleasure “fools gold” for whenever I desire to go back and sin I surely am being a fool.
My Steps of Faith for Today:
1. I do not want to act foolish today.
2. Continue to learn contentment.
9/2/2011 9:20:07 AM
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