Deuteronomy 1 – Trust and Obey

Apr11

Good evening Y’all. Welcome back 🙂

Today we begin our study on the book of Deuteronomy. I’m excited to see all that God through the Holy Spirit will teach us in this book 🙂

I’m going to share two lessons that I learnt from today’s chapter.

Be blessed 🙂

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1.) Trust and obedience–

“But the people refused to go in and rebelled against the Lord’s command. “They murmured and complained in their tents and said, ‘The Lord must hate us, bringing us here from Egypt to be slaughtered by these Amorites. What are we getting into? Our brothers who spied out the land have frightened us with their report. They say that the people of the land are tall and powerful, and that the walls of their cities rise high into the sky! They have even seen giants there—the descendants of the Anakim!’ “But I said to them, ‘Don’t be afraid! The Lord God is your leader, and he will fight for you with his mighty miracles, just as you saw him do in Egypt. And you know how he has cared for you again and again here in the wilderness, just as a father cares for his child!’ But nothing I said did any good.“They refused to believe the Lord our God” (Deut 1: 26-32 TLB)

The Israelite’s had seen God do wonders for them but when it came to obeying and going into the promised land to possess it, they just couldn’t trust God enough to see them through. Instead they chose to believe the report of the spies who said the land was too difficult to conquer. Notice God had already given them the land – it was already theirs. All they needed to do was to get up, go into the  land with God leading them and drive out the inhabitants, but they were afraid and didn’t trust God.

Do we believe God’s promises or would we rather believe what someone else has told us about our situation? Trust and obedience work hand in hand. We can’t say we trust God when we don’t obey His instructions. God is the same yesterday, today and forever. If He has done it before, He can do it again.
Lets take God at His word and trust Him to fulfill what He has promised. Numbers 2:19 tells us God is not a man that He would lie, if He has said it, He surely will do it.

2) Pride and Self Reliance –
In verse 41- 46, when the children of Israel realized they had upset God with their disobedience, they decided to go fight for the land. Moses told them not to go because God wasn’t with them.

“You spoke up, “We’ve sinned against God. We’ll go up and fight, following all the orders that God, our God, has commanded.” You took your weapons and dressed for battle—you thought it would be so easy going into those hills! But God told me, “Tell them, ‘Don’t do it; don’t go up to fight—I’m not with you in this. Your enemies will waste you.’” I told you but you wouldn’t listen. You rebelled at the plain word of God. You threw out your chests and strutted into the hills. And those Amorites, who had lived in those hills all their lives, swarmed all over you like a hive of bees, chasing you from Seir all the way to Hormah, a stinging defeat. You came back and wept in the presence of God, but he didn’t pay a bit of attention to you; God didn’t give you the time of day. You stayed there in Kadesh a long time, about as long as you had stayed there earlier.”(Deut 1:41-46 MSG)

Again they disobeyed, they thought they were strong enough to fight the Amorites. They were very quick to forget it had been God all along helping them win their previous battles. This time they decided to rely on their own strength. Needless to say they lost the battle and many of them were killed.

Are we relying on God or on our own strength? Jeremiah 17:5 tells us that “Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans, who rely on human strength and turn their hearts away from the LORD”.

I pray God will give us the grace to trust Him wholeheartedly and to continually rely on Him. Amen.

Thanks for joining today. Pls feel free to share your thoughts on the chapter.

I’m blogging through the book of Deuteronomy with Good Morning Girls. Pls check out www.goodmorninggirls.org for loads of bible study resources for Deuteronomy

Have a blessed evening 🙂

Mark 14 – What is your Jesus worth?

Mar24

Good evening y’all. Today we are studying Mark chapter 14.

Be blessed 🙂

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“Then Judas Iscariot, one of the twelve disciples, went to the leading priests to arrange to betray Jesus to them. They were delighted when they heard why he had come, and they promised to give him money. So he began looking for an opportunity to betray Jesus. (Mark 14: 10 – 11 NLT)

Judas betrayed Jesus. Not for anything else but for the love of money. He wasn’t content with what he had. He was a man who lived and walked with Jesus. He had access to everything that Jesus had, yet He wasn’t content. I am almost tempted to believe that He never loved or truly understood Jesus in the first place. He might have just been going with the flow, because if he truly knew Jesus, he would have known that all his needs are provided for in Jesus. Once you have Jesus, you have it all.

It’s interesting that when the schemes to kill Jesus was being plotted, the religious leaders didn’t go looking for Judas.  They would never had have expected one of Jesus’ disciples to betray Him. As it happened, Judas went to them and sought payment for his betrayal.

For a few minutes of personal gain, Judas chose money over Jesus….

It’s very easy for us to judge Judas and point fingers at him, but truly if we are honest with ourselves, we will admit that we do the same every now and then.

How often do we allow ourselves be used by the enemy to betray Jesus? Every time we do the wrong thing purposefully or shy away from an opportunity to tell someone about Jesus, is that not the same as what Judas did? It’s like we betray Him over and over… sending Him to the cross again — sort off.

What are we choosing over Jesus?

For the first time, since I’ve been reading the account of Judas’ betrayal, something new caught my attention. It suddenly occurred to me that Jesus gave Judas an opportunity to change his mind about the betrayal. The reason I say this is found in verse 17 – 21 of the same chapter.

“In the evening Jesus arrived with the Twelve. As they were at the table eating, Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, one of you eating with me here will betray me.” Greatly distressed, each one asked in turn, “Am I the one?” He replied, “It is one of you twelve who is eating from this bowl with me. For the Son of Man must die, as the Scriptures declared long ago. But how terrible it will be for the one who betrays him. It would be far better for that man if he had never been born!” (NLT)

Judas was at this meal with Jesus and the rest of the disciples and he still went ahead with the betrayal. If it was me in Judas’ shoes, I would have backed out asap, seeing as Jesus already knew that one of us would betray Him… “Who can say He doesn’t already know it’s me?” Those are the thoughts that would be running through my mind. I would have gone back to the priests immediately to tell them that I no longer want their money! But our brother, Judas, did not.  His heart must have been so hardened for him to sit there with Jesus and eat.
Yeah, I know that the prophesy about Jesus’ death would have had to happen, but did it have to happen through Judas? I might be wrong but I believe Judas allowed himself be used by the enemy. He took his focus off Jesus and decided to focus on money. The enemy is always looking for someone to work through and if we make ourselves available, he will come in and take over.

That’s why Jesus told them to stay awake and alert lest they fall into temptation.
“Keep watch and pray, so that you will not give in to temptation. For the spirit is willing, but the body is weak.”(Mark 14:38 NLT)

Let’s check ourselves today and identify those things that we are choosing over God and ask for grace to repent and follow Jesus wholeheartedly.

Thanks for joining today. Please feel free to share your thoughts on the chapter 🙂

Have a blessed evening 🙂

***With God all things are possible***