Category: Year A

Psalm 121

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
            This is likely my favorite psalm.  I have read it so many times and mulled it over that it is almost second nature for me to draw from its rich theological statement of God when times are difficult.  This is a psalm meant for worship.  In other words, it is designed to be used by God’s people – to be sung, quoted together, and prayed.  A church without Psalm 121 always near to it is a church in danger.  But with it, there is a continual sense of security, confidence, and hope.  Well, enough of my comment.  Let this Contemporary English Version of Psalm 121 wash over you and grace you with God’s abundant mercy:
 
I look to the hills!
Where will I find help?
2 It will come from the Lord,
who created the heavens
and the earth.
3 The Lord is your protector,
and he won’t go to sleep
or let you stumble.
4 The protector of Israel
doesn’t doze
or ever get drowsy.
5 The Lord is your protector,
there at your right side
to shade you from the sun.
6 You won’t be harmed
by the sun during the day
or by the moon at night.

 

7 The Lord will protect you
and keep you safe
from all dangers.
8 The Lord will protect you
now and always
wherever you go.
 
Amen!

Matthew 24:23-35

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
            I live in the upper Midwest of the United States.  The summers can be brutally hot and humid.  The winters can be incredibly frigid and full of snow.  Having worked with college students for many years, every Fall there was always one of those international students, or a student from the South, that had never experienced a Midwest winter and snow.  I could tell them over and over again that they needed a sturdy winter coat before the snow flies.  But, having never known sub-freezing, let alone sub-zero, temperatures it was difficult to imagine such cold when the weather was currently so warm.  Well, you know where this is going.  I, or someone else, usually had to hook them up with a suitable coat.  Even then, they just shook all winter and never took their scarves off.
 
            It might be difficult to imagine that someday Jesus is coming back to judge the living and the dead.  That’s why Jesus told his disciples to learn a lesson from the fig tree.  When you see the tree beginning to change, know that something is about to happen.  The tree will become altogether different than how you see it now.  Sometimes, even for myself who has lived through so many hard winters, it is incredible to know that the landscape as it is right now will be completely different come January.
 
            The sky and the earth won’t last forever.  But Christ’s words will endure for all time.  It’s hard to believe that seeing everything as it is right now is not how it is going to be forever.  Yet, a time is coming when it will change.  And if we are attentive and alert we will be ready.  We won’t be left out in the cold with no warm winter coat.  We are to be ready for Christ’s return.  That means taking off the old clothes of fear, insecurity, hopelessness, and hate, and putting on the new clothes of righteousness, peace, and love in the Holy Spirit.  Winter is nearly here.  Are you ready?
 

 

            Holy God, your promises are sure and altogether just.  Help me to always do your will and follow the ways of Jesus so that I am suitably prepared for eternity.  Amen.

Psalm 124

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
 
           “Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth.”  These are the words for which I begin nearly every worship service in church.  It is a call to worship the God who is above all and sees all – and can do something about all the adversity and trouble we face in the world.  When confronted with a new day, our attention must be arrested and directed in the positive way of acknowledging God. 
 
            Our ultimate help is in the Lord.  Our fears about the future, our insecurities of what will happen, and our anxieties about all of the upcoming stuff we must face can be transformed with the biblical perspective of acknowledging our need for God.  The Lord is our most prescient support.  That meeting you have been dreading; that conversation you have been avoiding; or, that deadline that has been looming over your head; these and all situations can only find their proper perspective in light of the God who helps.
 
            I am a big believer in making daily affirmations of faith in God.  That is, affirming the truth about God, even if I don’t feel like it, each and every day so that some solid robust theology is not only at the forefront of my mind, but that the attributes of God also sink firmly into my heart.  For faith does not simply come as a result of signing off on a checklist of beliefs.  Rather, faith arises as a response to the recognition that God is good – all the time – and that he helps those who look to him.
 

 

            Creator God, you are the One who provides everything I need for life and godliness.  I need your help today and everyday so that I can confidently do your will.  I stand in confidence because I serve the Lord Jesus, who is benevolent and always does what is right and just.  Amen.

Romans 6:1-11

On By Tim EhrhardtIn Daily Bible Reading Blog, Year ALeave a comment
 
 
            It is perhaps ironic that this New Testament lesson falls on Cyber-Monday.  After all, the impulse to shop runs high in a great many Americans.  But shopping can quite easily move from necessity to compulsion.  Before you know it, we can be consuming without much restraint.  On-line shopping, especially, is just so darn easy and can trigger the brain just as much as any addiction.  There is often a very thin line between justified shopping and sinful rationalization of consumption.  So, how do we say “no” in the face of competing choices?  Whatever besetting sin is in our lives, how do we put it aside and rid ourselves of it? 
 
            One of the practical ways of approaching this answer is to read Romans 6 not from a generic standpoint, but make it very personal.  In other words, it could be quite helpful to make all of the pronouns personal and name the specific sin when sin is mentioned.  For example, it would look something like this:
 
“What shall I say, then?  Shall I go on shopping so that grace may increase?  By no means!  I died to shopping; how can I live in it any longer?  Or don’t I know that I am baptized into Christ Jesus and, so, am baptized into his death?  I am therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, I, too, may live a new life.”
 
            You can put your own besetting sin and struggling addiction into the text:  “If I have been united with him like this in his death, I will certainly also be united with him in his resurrection.  For I know that my old self was crucified with him so that shopping/gossiping/lying/overeating/alcoholism/legalism, etc. might be done away with, that I should no longer be a slave to shopping – because I have died and have been freed from the compulsive and obsessive need to shop.”
 
            I think you get the idea.  We are to count ourselves dead to all the addictions, compulsions, and activities that we use to replace the finished work of Christ.  Instead, we are to reckon ourselves alive to God in Christ.  The struggle against sin comes down to each and every day making an affirmation of faith that we belong to God through Jesus – and not to some other master.  Yes, the daily work of spiritually affirming our identity might seem mundane, but it is quite necessary to achieving practical victory.
 

 

            Holy God, you have made it possible for us to be forgiven and free in Jesus Christ.  I choose today to serve you and you alone in my quest avail myself of the provision you have given me to live above sin.  Amen.