Believe or not

Brittany and Heather,  your posts are great.   The idea that complete trust in God means that we just do because He said so is so accurate.   Either we believe God or we believe satan.   It goes back to Eve.  She chose to not believe what God said and look what happened.   The same is true for Joshua and all of Israel.  Whenever they believed and trusted God, they succeeded.  When they did not, they failed.   Today we do the same.  We think that we know best and justify going against God's Word because it feels right, or seems good, or sounds best, etc.   We need to be obedient simply because it is what God says.  After all He is God and I am not.   Good comments.  

Joshua 1-5

Chapter 2 gave me the impression that there are still good people in the world. Rahab was willing to help the Israelites who were spying out the land. She was willing to protect them from the king of Jericho. She was brave to do what she did and in the end she was rewarded. She was told to tied the scarlet cord in the window. This means her family and herself would be saved from the killings as long as the family members were in her house otherwise they would be killed too.

The main thing I got from Chapter 4 was the they were supposed to gather stones to remind the children of was the Lord did for them. He allowed them to cross the Jordan on dry ground instead of going through the water. At the end of Chapter 4, the Lord again reminds them of what the stones are suppose to represent.

Joshua 1-5

The Lord promises so many blessings to His people. Still, we live as though we doubt that He will fulfill them. The complete and total faith that Joshua and his people put in the Lord just astounds me! They followed every instruction the Lord gave them to a T. They did not stop to ask why or ponder the idea of this all being for nothing. Their automatic response was to go, simply because the Lord told them to. If the Lord promised He was going to do something, then without a doubt, that would be the inevitable end result. I desire to have a faith like that of Joshua and his men. Firstly, however, we must acknowledge that everything we have, God has given to us. We did not earn any of it. The Lord was their everything and they acknowledged that all they possessed came from the Lord. The Lord wants to be our everything, but it begins with our complete and utter trust and obedience in even EVERY seemingly miniscule detail (Joshua 1:7-8). The fear of the Lord is necessary to the obedience that is required of us (Joshua 4:24). If we do not fear the Lord, He can not entirely work through us because we still rely on ourselves. The Lord desires to do great things through each and every one of us, just as He did through Joshua and his people. In order for that to happen, we must dedicate our lives FULLY to Him (Joshua 3:5). We must not only follow God for ourselves, but also to show others what the Lord will do if we allow Him to be our constant necessity (Joshua 2:8-11). It is difficult to place and keep God as our number one reliance. Once we do, I know that God will work through every single one of us for His glory. Joshua and his people are fantastic proof of that fact. Once you try God by fully relying on Him to be your all in all; then and only then will you receive blessings to the fullest extent that He has promised us.

My constant reminder: Faith in and fear of the Lord is interwoven with the meeting of every single one of our needs. Strength, courage, hope, blessings and faithfully kept promises all come when we give of ourselves in thoroughgoing obedience to the Lord.

"No one will be able to stand up against you all the days of your life. As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you nor forsake you."
~Joshua 1:5~

Joshua 1-5

Good Morning.   Joshua was to fill some big shoes and God promised to bless him as He did Moses but to be sure Joshua followed the commandments.   In the first chapter God told Joshua 3 times to be strong and courageous.   The Jordan river stopping and creating a wall, walking across on dry ground, the way fear had already overtaken Jericho, and the following of God's word by Joshua-being brave and strong.  Wow, what an awesome God we serve.  But, he does expect us to do our part.  I feel like we are going into battle everyday and all God wants is for us to be brave, strong, and follow His commandments.  In todays terms we need to have faith and do what His Word says.
Everyone is making great responses to the readings already.  Thanks, I am learning from you guys and I love that.   Have a blessed day.

Days 1&2

I missed out on talking about Romans yesterday because my computer was on the fritz so I'm going to talk about both Romans and Genesis. I apologize in advance for any typos or points that didn't really go anywhere, its late, I'm tired and this is just what happens.

For me one of my biggest junctures in my walk with God is I justify the grey areas. I like to play the whole "Well the Bible doesn't say its wrong" so for me Romans was the sucker punch from God I'd been looking for. Romans 1:18-32 just goes to show God knows what your doing and it is on you to deny yourself and follow him. There is no excuse, scripture says;

"For it is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous. (Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts sometimes accusing them and at other times even defending them.) 16 This will take place on the day when God judges people’s secrets through Jesus Christ, as my gospel declares."
Romans 2:13-16

Even if its not in the Bible or we haven't seen it in the Bible we know the difference between right, because we all have the spirit of God in us. Therefore we have no excuse for justifying our sinful nature. Its wrong, you know its wrong, and everytime you do it you are choosing yourself OVER God.

It surprised me but I got a similar message out of Genesis, granted that may be because its what I'm looking for but it helped all the same. In the Garden of Eden the serpent said to Eve "Did God realllllly say not to eat from that tree?" and Eve knew she was wrong but she did it anyway and what happened? Her and Adam HID from God. They knew they were wrong and they ran from God. But God knew what they did, yet in his grace he stilled asked "Who told you that you are naked?" That, along with the rest of Genesis was very humbling. I really enjoyed just sitting and reading about the creation of the Earth. Because after every milestone God saw that it was good. He didn't just throw it all together, God made sure what he did was good and done right. Then just to think that he made US in that image, that makes it alot more encouraging to make sure that the next time I go to work at the end of the job I stop to see that it is good.

The first chapter of Genesis reminds me of how the world was created and that we work for six days and rest on the seventh. The second and third chapters reminds me that God create man and created woman from the rib of Adam.

Things could have been different if Adam and Eve had listened to the instructions that God gave about the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Things changed when Eve was tempted by the serpent to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. I think thing became worse when Adam took the fruit from Eve and ate. Firstly Eve should have refused to eat the fruit. Since she ate the fruit secondly Adam should have refused to take the fruit from Eve. But because of their choices we live in the world we live in now. We have to make choices that will be pleasing to God.

Genesis 1-3

Always love reading Genesis. I feel the majesty and power of God as He creates. It feels like I'm there and I'm forming this picture in my head. But as is usually the case when we see God at work it's impossible to fathom what must have been going on. For instance when I read in Chapter One on Day 1...He created light and called it day I was thinking our sun had just been created. Later I find out He did that on the fourth day so what light was created on the first day.

Then we get to Eve in the garden. It appears that it was so easy for her, then Adam, to disobey God. I think we're the same way. We so casually sin sometimes, like it's no big deal. We elevate ourselves above God. We put self before God and then try blame God or someone else. Eve made me do it, the serpent made me do it etc.

Finally, it shows me a just God, a merciful God, a loving God. He knew we were going to sin and He made us all anyway and gave us a way out. The gospel message is already showing up in Chapter 3.

I'm done.