2 Chronicles 17:6 and Acts 16:25: I am currently reading in a devotional Bible that has daily readings from both the Old and New Testaments. These two passages appeared in one day’s reading. In the 2nd Chronicles passage we read that Jehoshaphat’s heart delighted in the ways of the Lord. As a result, he tore down the idols found in the land and sent teachers throughout the nation to teach people God’s ways. God rewared him by establishing his kingdom and keeping other nations from making war with Judah. In the Acts passage, Paul and Silas, imprisoned for proclaiming the word of God, were singing God’s praises. It reminds me that delighting in God is not tied to circumstances. When God gives great blessing, I want to respond with great gratitude and when God allows/brings trials, I want to respond with great gratitude. I think this is only possible if my focus is on him and not my circumstances. It is too easy to be complacent when life is good and too easy to grumble when life is hard, but if I maintain my focus on God, he will show me the right response to all of life.
Applying
Hope
I was recently reading in Romans and encountered three passages about hope that spoke to me. Romans 5:3-5 says sufferings produce endurance, which produces character, which produces a hope that does not put us to shame (because God’s love has been poured into our hearts). Romans 15:4 says the instruction of scripture is so we might have hope through endurance and through the encouragement that comes from scripture. Romans 15:13 is a prayer for the Romans that the God of hope would fill them with joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit they might abound in hope.
Here is how they fit together in my mind: In my experience, the way God fills me with joy and peace in believing is through his word (the encouragement of scripture) where he reveals that he is sovereign, holy, loving, and faithful. Believing this helps me to respond to life’s pressures rightly and to trust him when I am faced with stresses and pressures requiring me to endure. I am never shamed that he is my hope because I am confident of his love (poured into my heart). I do not have a minimal hope, but I abound in hope because I am not creating the hope. Instead, I am receiving hope from the Holy Spirit who gives it without bounds.
I experienced total peace while waiting for the results of a biopsy a few years ago, and I feel at peace now when so many voices are saying that stress and anxiety are normal in this time of the coronavirus pandemic. God’s love surrounds me. It is poured into my heart. It is sufficient. More than sufficient.
1 Corinthians 1
A good chunk of this book reads like Paul is telling the Corinthians they are not as great as they think they are. I find some of his message to be humbling, but at the same time to be comforting. For instance, in the first chapter, Paul says the world does not know God through wisdom and that the Corinthians should consider the fact that not many of them are deemed wise, or strong, or noble, or worthy of esteem by the world. He also tells them there is a reason for this: God wants them to boast about him, not about themselves. The humbling part of this is that it says God chose me because there’s nothing special about me—so he gets the credit for what is accomplished in and through me. The comforting part is also that God chose me because there’s nothing special about me—so I don’t have to meet a standard or pass a test to be accepted by him. I find it freeing to know God is fully aware of my inadequacies. I do not have to try and impress him (or anyone else) and I can serve him without worrying if the outcome of my work will accomplish his goals. It doesn’t mean I do less, but it means I can stress less. I should be able to take risks for God knowing that results are his responsibility, not mine. He has always known I’m inadequate for the tasks he gives to me, and he promises his grace is sufficient for what I lack.
Praying from Scripture
God never intended for the Bible to be a book we merely read. As a part of looking for how any passage I’m studying can be applied, I’ve begun to ask what prayers the passage might lead me to pray. Some choices for prayer are obvious, such as the Lord’s prayer or the prayers that Paul prayed for the Christians to whom he was writing. Some prayers are the result of scripture exposing truths about me. Sometimes I see something that makes me think, “I’d like God to do that for [person or situation I know about].”
Here are some ways scripture has influenced my prayer in the past couple of years:
Jesus tells us to ask the Lord of the Harvest to send laborers into the fields. The parable of the sower tells us laborers are needed to sow God’s word, but also implies that some work is needed to make soil receptive to the word. (Paths can be broken up, and rocks and weeds removed, for instance.) I ask God to use me to help sow his word and build good soil.
The blindness of the disciples and the Pharisees makes me aware of how I, too, can have preconceived notions of who God is and what he’s going to do, which can blind me to who he really is and what he is doing. I pray for God to remove them.
In 1 Thessalonians, Paul says that the gospel came to them in word, in power, in the Holy Spirit, and with full conviction. A few verses later he says the word has sounded forth from them. This is what I want for me and for other believers I’m connected with. So now I regularly pray that the gospel would come to us and go out from us in exactly those four ways.
In Galatians, Paul mentions sowing to the Spirit, walking in the Spirit, and displaying the fruit of the Spirit. Only the Spirit can do some of this, but what part do I play in it—especially sowing to the Spirit? I don’t want to try and do what only God can do, nor do I want to be waiting for him to do what he expects me to do, so I pray for wisdom.
Every book can offer prayer suggestions, and praying like this helps keep the lessons from that book on the front burner instead of being pushed to the back as I move on in my scripture studies.