verseoftheday

Friday! Proverbs! Proverbs 8:1-4 CEB Doesn't Wisdom cry out and Understanding shout?  Atop the heights along the path, at the crossroads she takes her stand. By the gate before the city, at the entrances she shouts:  I cry out to you, people; my voice goes out to all of humanity.   Proverbs 8:1-4 CEB How often have I walked past Wisdom? Ignored it. Sidestepped it. This Proverb reminds us that God's Wisdom is available to us.  Wisdom is in our face. So what's my problem then? I want an easier path, something that makes a promise that seems more pleasant. My own heart can be deceiving about what Wisdom is, where I should be looking. My world is clamouring, telling me wisdom is contained in Instagram reels or somewhere. Somewhere else.  In something else. In what someone else has or does or something. Where am I looking? Where am I walking straight past Wisdom? What do I really need? #proverbs  #wisdom #somethingtochewon #itsaheartthing  #seeWisdomto...

Jude 1:22-23 CEB [22] Have mercy on those who doubt. [23] Save some by snatching them from the fire. Fearing God, have mercy on some, hating even the clothing contaminated by their sinful urges.   Jude 1:22-23 CEB What is Jude's big point here as he wraps up his letter? See people.  See through their collections of choices and defence mechanisms and things that they do to isolate or insulate them from their heart aches, their need of connection with God, their doubts, and to see people through the eyes of mercy.  I'm wondering seeing others through the eyes of mercy is easy for some...and not so easy for others... And what about seeing ourselves through the eyes of mercy? Maybe we need to try that... #Jude #letters #invitation #eyesofmercy  

But you,  dear friends:  build each other up on the foundation of your most holy faith,  pray in the Holy Spirit, keep each other in the love of God,  wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, who will give you eternal life.  Jude 1:20-21 CEB When there's doubters, scoffers, those offering and suggesting "better" ways of being in the world, when the world is against us, here is Jude's antidote. Community that builds each other up in our faith.  Prayer. Keep each other. Hold on to the hope that we have in Jesus. If there weren't days when our faith wavered, our hope is hard to see, when praying alone seems fruitless, Jude invites us into this picture of community, where on the days I'm wavering, struggling, dry, you're strong, clear, hope  full. We need one another. Find, seek out make, community of faith. And hold on. #Jude  #letters #invitation  #community  #hopeishere 

Jude 1:3-4, 8 NLT Dear friends, I had been eagerly planning to write to you about the salvation we all share. But now I find that I must write about something else, urging you to defend the faith that God has entrusted once for all time to his holy people.  I say this because some ungodly people have wormed their way into your churches, saying that God's marvelous grace allows us to live immoral lives...for they have denied our only Master and Lord, Jesus Christ. ... [8] In the same way, these people - who claim authority from their dreams - live immoral lives, defy authority, and scoff at supernatural beings.  Jude 1:3-4, 8 NLT From the earliest of times it seems that Christianity has been under attack, not from the outside, but from the inside. Denying Jesus as The authority Giving authority to dreams. Using Grace as a way of making things that were unacceptable acceptable. This letter from Jude uses "wormed their way in". If they came charging in, they'd be easy to...

Mark 7:30 NLT [30] And when she arrived home, she found her little girl lying quietly in bed, and the demon was gone. Mark 7:30 NLT  All was made new. Restored. Healed. Imagine this mum who has gone and found a Rabbi she had heard about, probably tried every other resource she had access to, maybe this felt like a "last resort" to find a way for her daughter and her home to experience peace. And she met Jesus. And when she got home, it was home again. Everything is OK. She must've felt that she can breathe again. And grateful! Perhaps this story is here for us for when our life seems in turmoil, that there's no "fix", that we can be sure that one day we too will see Jesus, and shalom, peace, balance, will be restored. All will be made new. All hurt unhurt. The pressures gone. The anxities gone. And we too will be left with peace and gratitude... #gospelofMark #GoodNews #weareinaBigStory #weareBeloved  #redemptivestrands #hopeishere  ##onedayallwillbemadenew

Sunday Psalms; Psalms 9:9-10, 13, 18 NLT [9] The Lord is a shelter for the oppressed,  a refuge in times of trouble.  [10] Those who know your name trust in you, for you,  O Lord,  do not abandon those who search for you. ... [13]  Lord,  have mercy on me.  See how my enemies torment me.  Snatch me back from the jaws of death. ... [18] But the needy will not be ignored forever; the hopes of the poor will not always be crushed. Psalms 9:9-10, 13, 18 NLT As we look for the redemptive strands in the Psalms they are wound in and out of this one. This song of David's declares that our God is our shelter and refuge at the same time acknowledging the realities of life. He cries out to be snatched back from the "jaws of death" means he is not yet in that place of safety. And he declares again in v18 his Faith. Faith that even as he continues to call out, he is not and will not be abandoned. Our circumstances may try to tell us something, that we are aband...

Mark 7:25-26, 30 NLT Right away a woman who had heard about him came and fell at his feet. Her little girl was possessed by an evil spirit, and she begged him to cast out the demon from her daughter. Since she was a Gentile, born in Syrian Phoenicia... ... And when she arrived home, she found her little girl lying quietly in bed, and the demon was gone. Mark 7:25-26, 30 NLT In between the 2 parts of the story here there is a dialogue between this woman and Jesus that is intriguing. Jesus makes a statement, and the woman responds to his statement that seems to show that she gets the differences between them, that she knows what she is asking. And when I "listen" to this dialogue I see a kind and inquiring Jesus. Often we see Jesus stepping over cultural and religious boundaries to meet with people, and in this account it's this woman from Syria who steps towards Jesus.  My wondering is that this story is here to get us, me, to think about what I am doing when I step toward...