Tag Archives: study

Have you ever been to a diamond mine? (John 5:41-47), February 2, 2017

Today’s Podcast

Thanks for joining me today for “A Little Walk with God.” I’m your host Richard Agee.
When you find a diamond in the field, it’s not such a thing of beauty. So why does everyone want diamonds in the first place?
Scripture
1. John 5:41-47
2. This kind of glory does not come from mortal men. And I see that you do not possess the love of God. I have pursued you, coming here in My Father’s name, and you have turned Me away. If someone else were to approach you with a different set of credentials, you would welcome him. That’s why it is hard to see how true faith is even possible for you: you are consumed by the approval of other men, longing to look good in their eyes; and yet you disregard the approval of the one true God. Don’t worry that I might bring you up on charges before My Father. Moses is your accuser even though you’ve put your hope in him because if you believed what Moses had to say, then you would believe in Me because he wrote about Me. But if you ignore Moses and the deeper meaning of his writings, then how will you ever believe what I have to say?
Devotional
1. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to a diamond mine or any place where you can find raw gems in the ground, but it is a fascinating experience. The first time you go there, you might expect to see something very different that what you will really see
  1. Expect to see shiny, glimmering, jewels
  2. Really find lots of dirt and a few rare off colored dull pieces of something
  3. Might think it is broken, discarded glass
2. Jeweler sees something different
  1. Sees potential after polishing and cutting
  2. Studies the stone for hours before first cut is made
  3. Angles facets just right to capture light throughout the stone and cause it to reflect within itself adding brilliance to the stone
  4. Dull misshapen piece of rock becomes a flawless, priceless jewel after much study, careful work, long hours
3. Same way with scripture
  1. Might just see a bunch of rules and laws from Moses and the prophets
  2. Dos and don’ts we must keep
  3. Study, careful work, long hours brings out the beauty and richness of God’s word
  4. Helps us capture the inner beauty of what He wants us to know about Him
4. Aim to please men and we’re left with just lumps of dirt, aim to please God but put no effort in it and we have those dull bits of colored rock, give our all to Him and work tirelessly to please Him and we find diamonds in life each day
If you want to learn more about my church, you can find us at SAF.church. If you like the devotional, share it with someone. If you don’t, tell me. I hope you’ll join me again tomorrow for “A Little Walk with God.”

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved. In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

What does McDonald’s and the Post Office have to do with our spiritual walk? (Luke 24:41-49), January 17, 2017

Leave a reply

Today’s Podcast

Subscribe in: iTunes|Download

2017-01-17-devotional-What does McDonald’s and the Post Office have to do with our spiritual walk? (Luke 24:41-49)

Thanks for joining me today for “A Little Walk with God.” I’m your host Richard Agee.
We have developed a real problem today when it comes to building a relationship with God. Our problem is related to McDonald’s, Intel, and the Post Office. Stick around and see why those things cause us problems in our spiritual walk.
Scripture
1. Luke 24:41-49
2. Jesus: Do you have anything here to eat?

They hand Him a piece of broiled fish, and He takes it and eats it in front of them.

Jesus: I’ve been telling you this all along, that everything written about Me in the Hebrew Scriptures must be fulfilled—everything from the law of Moses to the prophets to the psalms.

Then He opens their minds so they can comprehend the meaning of the Hebrew Scriptures.

Jesus: This is what the Scriptures said: that the promised Anointed One should suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, that in His name a radical change of thought and life should be preached, and that in His name the forgiveness of sins should be preached, beginning in Jerusalem and extending to all nations. You have witnessed the fulfillment of these things. So I am sending My Father’s promise to you. Stay in the city until you receive it—until power from heaven comes upon you.

Devotional
1. How impatient have you become in this technological age?
  1. TR 80
  2. Apple iiC, 128 kb memory
  3. Transmissions measured in bytes per second, not megabytes or gigabytes
  4. Open programs, get coffee
  5. Now complain if more than 15 – 20 second start-up
2. Fast food grew up with McDonalds and Wendy’s and Kentucky Fried Chicken
  1. No long waits in restaurants
  2. Short menus
  3. Already mostly cooked
  4. Warmed up and served
  5. Not very nutritious, not very good, but fast
  6. Happy because we don’t wait
  7. Complain if it takes five minutes to get food
3. Complain about speed of delivery
  1. Used to expect seven days for a letter
  2. Ten to fourteen days for a package
  3. Now expect not more than two day delivery, even on weekends and holidays
  4. Can’t wait that extra day for delivery even though it’s something you probably never had before and don’t really need
4. Need to get over our impatience when it comes to knowing God
  1. Stay until
  2. Pray until
  3. Wait until
  4. Until what
5. You are as close to God as you want to be. How long does it take to get as close as you want to be to Him?
If you want to learn more about my church, you can find us at SAF.church. If you like the devotional, share it with someone. If you don’t, tell me. I hope you’ll join me again tomorrow for “A Little Walk with God.”

Move into deeper water (Luke 5:4) September 24, 2016

Leave a reply

Today’s Podcast

Subscribe in: iTunes|Download

Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Acts 1-2

see the whole year’s plan [here](http://www.bible-reading.com/bible-plan.pdf)

Today’s Devotional

Luke 5:4
Jesus: Move out into deeper water, and drop your nets to see what you’ll catch.

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

Simon was a fisherman and knew about fishing. That’s how he made his living. He and his family probably fished for years. They supplied their village with fish. They sold their catch in the markets and earned a pretty good living. So much so that they had several boats, lots of nets, hired other workers. Simon had a pretty good business catching fish, so he knew what he was doing.

But Jesus asked him to launch out into deeper water and see what he would catch. Jesus was a carpenter by trade. He knew a lot about wood, but not so much about fish, you’d think. He understood what wood you should use to make the boats Simon used, but how to use those boats to catch fish? Folks wouldn’t have bet money on His knowledge of fishing. But Simon pushed out into deeper water and dropped his nets and if you know the rest of the story, you know all those nets he had been mending started breaking with the weight of the fish he caught.

But I thought about something else as I read those words today. Jesus asks us to move into deeper water, too. What does He mean by that? I think we get so consumed in the shallowness of life that we forget that Jesus want us to launch out into the deep. He wants us to get past the shallow things of life and dig deep. But into what?

Maybe into His word first of all. We can’t expect to learn much about what He wants from us if we don’t read His instruction manual. We can’t understand much about who He is and what He wants to do in our lives if we don’t get into His word and see what He says to us about His purpose, the life He lived and the more abundant life He promises.

That understanding doesn’t come from just casual reading or just listening to someone else read God’s word every once in a while. It’s important that we move into deeper water. Take a passage of scripture and let it work on you. Figure out what God says to the people the words were originally written to and the culture in which they heard those words. Then apply those words to your culture and your life. How does God want to speak to you within the framework of your culture and your life?

What does God want you to change or what does He want you to do because of what you’ve learned from a deeper study of His word? That’s what this moving deeper is all about. It’s like getting married. When you first get married, you think you know a lot about each other. You dated for a while before you were engaged. And then once engaged, you really got to know each other. You talked about all your plans for life together. You talked about money and kids and careers and places to live. You talked about everything you could think of to talk about. You thought you knew each other well.

Then you got married. Suddenly, you figure out you didn’t know each other quite as well as you thought you did. Those little habits and idiosyncrasies you never saw pop up when you are in each others company all the time. Not that they are good or bad, it’s just new stuff that you find out that you didn’t know. Maybe it’s little things like which side of the bed she prefers to sleep on. Or does he shave first or brush his teeth first? Does he leave his dirty clothes on the bathroom floor or put them in a hamper? Does she save the dishes until there is a decent amount to wash or wash them as soon as your through eating?

You see, it takes a while to really get to know someone. We learn more about our husband or wife each day. We move deeper in love as we get to know each other. I’m afraid most of our divorce problems today are because we don’t appreciate what it means to move deeper into a relationship. We want to stay on the surface. We want to keep that shallow infatuation that brought us together and don’t want to spend the time or effort to really get to understand each other beyond that. That’s one of the reasons divorce is so rampant.

But Jesus invites us to move deeper with Him, too. Get closer, learn more about Him, get to know His habits and idiosyncrasies. He wants us to really know Him. It’s the only way we can really figure out what He wants us to do and what He wants us to be. He has a purpose for each of us and we can find it when we move into deeper water with Him. You never know what you’ll catch when you do.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

Know your scriptures (Luke 4:12) September 21, 2016

Leave a reply

Today’s Podcast

Subscribe in: iTunes|Download

Today’s Bible reading plan:

Read it in a year – Psalms 111-113

see the whole year’s plan [here](http://www.bible-reading.com/bible-plan.pdf)

Today’s Devotional

Luke 4:12
Jesus: Yes, but the Hebrew Scriptures also say, “You will not presume on God; you will not test the Lord, the one True God.”

What do Jesus’ words mean for us today?

Don’t you love it when someone argues scripture with you? I know I do. Yeah, right! But scripture says, this is okay. But scripture says I shouldn’t do that. But scripture says… And that’s exactly what Satan did to Jesus that day in the wildernes.

Hey, Jesus. You’re the Son of God. Scripture says, angels will watch after you so that you can jump off of this temple and they won’t let you get hurt. Give it a try and see if it works. Let’s see if you really are who you think you are. Maybe you’re just dreaming and your mom was just feeding you a line all these years to cover up that pregnancy story. Go ahead and jump. You’ll be okay. Angels will catch you.

And Jesus knows they would have. He knows His true Father. He’s talked to Him every day for years. He’s learned His words. He heard the story of His birth and saw the fulfillment of those obscure Messianic scriptures in His life from the time He was just a youngster. He knew who He was and also knew the path He would take to the cross at the bequest of His Father. He also knew Satan’s words were true that angels would come to His rescue and would not let Him be harmed before it was time for His execution.

There was a problem with Satan’s request, though. Satan wanted Jesus to violate a more important aspect of God’s word – obedience to His will. Jesus knew what would Him feel good for the moment. He knew would might fuel His human ego, but He also knew what would give His heavenly Father the most glory and that is what He wanted most. He wanted to satisfy His Father’s will more than His own. And that’s the point.

A verse or two taken out of the context of the whole Bible can let you do just about anything you want to do. There is justification in God’s word for all kinds of things. There are stories of violence, murder, vengeance, sex, adultery, theft, embezzlement. Pick a vice or crime or just about any sin you want to commit and it has been done and is recorded in God’s word. Just pick a few of the verses around that sin and you can figure out how to justify whatever you want to do. But that’s not God’s will.

So what is God’s will? What does the Book really tell us? It’s the story of God’s plan for our redemption. It’s His will that everyone would come to Him for the forgiveness of sin and follow His commands. It’s His will that all would recognize that He is the one and only true God and would worship Him as such. It’s His will that we would love Him with our whole heart, soul, mind, and strength; and love our neighbors and we love ourselves. That’s the message of the Bible.

It’s pretty simple. Sometimes not so easy to do, but pretty simple to remember. Just love. That’s it. Jesus showed us how. He didn’t let Satan distract Him from that simple mission or the simple message His Father gave Him to deliver to the rest of the world. Satan tried his best, but it didn’t work. Why? Because Jesus understood the message of the Book. He wasn’t about to let Satan use one little piece of it to persuade Him to do something that contradicted the message of the whole Book.

That’s where we get messed up today. Someone shows us something in scripture that tickles our ears and shows us where we can get what we want, but it doesn’t fit with the rest of God’s word. The problem is we don’t read it enough to understand the whole message. We let those little snippets that we like overpower our emotions and our will and forget we are supposed to be doing God’s will.

So how do you figure out what the Bible is about so you don’t end up falling for one of Satan’s tricks? First, you need to give your whole self to God. Let Him be Lord of everything in your life. Let Him take control of all of it. Family, job, money, everything. Then, read His instruction book. He tells us how we are to live. We just don’t like what we read and don’t do what it says most of the time. Or we just don’t read it and don’t know what it says and go about our merry way.

Jesus knew scripture. His example shows us that if we expect to stand up to the schemes Satan will use against us in this world, we should know them, too. No matter what your age, there is no better time than today to start seriously reading and studying His word. You never know when you might need just the passage you read this morning.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.

Experts in following God (Hosea 14; Hebrews 5), July 8, 2015

Leave a reply

Today’s Podcast

Subscribe in: iTunes|Download

Today’s Scriptures

Today’s Bible reading plans include:

Ready – Hosea 14; Hebrews 5

Set – Hosea 14; Psalms 102; Hebrews 5

Go! – Hosea 13–14; Psalms 100,102; Hebrews 5

Hosea 14; Hebrews 5
¹ Return, Israel, to the Eternal, your True God.
You’ve stumbled because of your wickedness.
² Think about what to say, and come back to the Eternal One.
Say to Him, “Forgive all our sins, and take us back again.
Bring us into Your good grace so we can offer You praise and sacrifice,
the fruit of our lips.
³ We admit that Assyria can’t save us, nor can riding horses and chariots into battle.
We’ll never again say to idols made with our own hands, ‘You’re our gods!’
We know You’re merciful because You take care of orphans.”
⁴ Eternal One: I’ll heal their apostate hearts so they won’t turn away from Me again;
I’ll love them freely because I won’t be angry with them anymore.
⁵ I’ll be like dew that waters Israel. She’ll blossom like the lily.
She’ll put down roots like the stable cedars of Lebanon;
⁶ She’ll send out shoots until her beauty is like the olive tree
and her fragrance like the cedars of Lebanon.
⁷ The people will return from exile and sit in My shade once again;
they’ll flourish like grain; they’ll send out shoots like the vine.
And their fame will be like the wine of Lebanon.
⁸ Ephraim, what do I have in common with deaf and blind idols?
I’m the One who responds to your pleas and cares for you.
I’m like a flourishing juniper tree; I provide life year-round.
⁹ The wise will understand these things;
the perceptive will know them.
For everything the Eternal One does is right,
and the righteous follow His ways.
But those who turn against Him will stumble along His path.

¹Remember what I said earlier about the role of the high priest, even the ones chosen by human beings? The job of every high priest is reconciliation: approaching God on behalf of others and offering Him gifts and sacrifices to repair the damage caused by our sins against God and each other. ² The high priest should have compassion for those who are ignorant of the faith and those who fall out of the faith because he also has wrestled with human weakness, ³ and so the priest must offer sacrifices both for his sins and for those of the people. ⁴ The office of high priest and the honor that goes along with it isn’t one that someone just takes. One must be set aside, called by God, just as God called Aaron, the brother of Moses.
⁵ In the same way, the Anointed One, our Liberating King, didn’t call Himself but was appointed to His priestly office by God, who said to Him,
You are My Son.
Today I have become Your Father,[a]
⁶ and who also says elsewhere,
You are a priest forever—
in the honored order of Melchizedek.

⁷ When Jesus was on the earth, a man of flesh and blood, He offered up prayers and pleas, groans and tears to the One who could save Him from death. He was heard because He approached God with reverence. ⁸ Although He was a Son, Jesus learned obedience through the things He suffered. ⁹ And once He was perfected through that suffering He became the way of eternal salvation for all those who hear and follow Him, ¹⁰ for God appointed Him to be a High Priest in the order of Melchizedek.
¹¹ I have a lot more to say about this, but it may be hard for you to follow since you’ve become dull in your understanding. ¹² By this time, you ought to be teachers yourselves, yet I feel like you want me to reteach you the most basic things that God wants you to know. It’s almost like you’re a baby again, coddled at your mother’s breast, nursing, not ready for solid food. ¹³ No one who lives on milk alone can know the ins and outs of what it means to be righteous and pursue justice; that’s because he is only a baby. ¹⁴ But solid food is for those who have come of age, for those who have learned through practice to distinguish good from evil.

Today’s Devotional

From today’s background scripture God might say:

Too many people learn their life lessons through intense suffering. Unfortunately, More never learn life lessons at all because they just never take the time to figure out what got them into the mess they find themselves. The passages you heard from Hosea and Hebrews points out the importance of stopping and reflecting on where you are in life and what your goals are for the coming years.

The Israelites finally woke up and discovered the enemy at their door was a result of their abandonment of Me. They forgot how they came to this land in the first place. Finally, they listen to My prophets, came to their senses and began to pray. When they did, I listened.

The writer of Hebrews brings his readers to the same conclusion in the verses you heard today. Too many of My followers content themselves with dabbling in My word. Just getting enough of Me to satisfy their guilty conscience but never delving into the riches I have for you. I want you to grow up. I want you to tackle the meat in My word. I want you to study what I tell you.

Learning about Me is different than knowing Me. Think back to your school days. Until you dug into your school work and began to put all of those elementary skills to work building on each other, you couldn’t compose sentences or paragraphs or ideas into meaningful essays. You couldn’t get beyond adding simple numbers or understand how higher math could ever be useful in life. But ask a mechanical engineer about calculus and how he uses it to test the tensil strength of materials. He’ll tell you the importance of the math he learned years ago.

Some have said it takes 10,000 hours of active practice to become an expert in any skill. Have you given 10,000 hours to the active practice of seeking and following Me? That doesn’t mean just saying you’re a Christian or going to church. That means active practice – studying, praying, seeking Me with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.

You don’t have to say anything, we both know the answer. Is it time to work toward becoming an expert in following Me? There’s no time like the present to start.

The Voice Bible Copyright © 2012 Thomas Nelson, Inc. The Voice™ translation © 2012 Ecclesia Bible Society All rights reserved.
In accordance with the requirements for FTC full disclosure, I may have affiliate relationships with some or all of the producers of the items mentioned in this post who may provide a small commission to me when purchased through this site.