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Sep 25, 2023 06:00am

The Bible Recap: Days 190-196

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(The following are reflections from the writer’s personal journey through The Bible Recap by Tara-Leigh Cobble – a Bible reading plan to read the Bible chronologically in one year. To learn more about The Bible Recap, visit thebiblerecap.com. Find more posts from this series at lifeword.org/thebiblerecap.)

Days 190 & 191: Read Isaiah Chapters 1-8

My Takeaways:

We are now in the book of Isaiah. It’s heavy. It’s long. And it’s sad. It’s shows us the heart of God, who is grieved and angry at the wandering of His kids.

It doesn’t feel so long ago those kids were wandering in the desert for 40 years, dreaming of the days they would have the land of milk and honey God had promised them. After getting disciplined for a generation, they were ready to believe God! They sought Him and He gave them courage and victory to take that land by force—and they did! They did the impossible!

And He reminded them to not forget him in their blessing…and they didn’t. For a generation.

When Joshua died, they drifted from God and wandered into idolatry. They lost their first love and turned their backs to Him. He wooed them back, time and time again. And they were loyal…for a time, always struggling to stay faithful to their first love, the Lord. King after king mislead them and now, after generations of God warning them, they are now reaping what they have sown: discord, strife, and rejection.

In these chapters of Isaiah, we feel the heart of God when He says, “I have raised children and brought them up, but they have rebelled against me.” (Isaiah 1:2).

God even uses analogies of how loyal oxen and donkeys are to their owners, and yet, His kids don’t get it!

He’s tired of disengaged hearts amid the sacrifices, prayers, and festivals. His kids have lost sight of all of those things—it’s the heart behind these acts that God is after! It’s like going to church, just to “be there” without engaging the heart. It’s like praying the same ole prayer just to say “I’ve prayed about it” without engaging the heart.

God calls us all to cleanse ourselves and start living out His commands. We are called to love God most of all and to live that love out. We are called to walk in the light of God and walk in His paths.

And you know what? God promises to cleanse us with repentant hearts: “Though your sins are scarlet, they will be white as snow…” (Isaiah 1:18).

For the people who abandoned God, He promised that they would be broken.

May we be like Isaiah and realize our unworthiness and sin—and humble ourselves under God’s mighty hand. May we be willing to let Him use us by saying, “Here I am, Lord. Send me!” May we receive the love, grace, mercy, and forgiveness our Abba offers us each and every day.

My God Shot today was how much God yearns for His kids to accept His agape love and how much sin grieves Him. Like any of us who are parents, we all want our kids to listen to us and not live life the hard way. I am struck by God’s patience over the generations of waywardness. His people have lost their fear of the Lord…and they are about to get some stark reminders of this. Oh friends, may we never lose our fear of God!

Days 192 & 193: Read Amos Chapters 1-9

My Takeaways:

I am so happy I am on Team God!

Oh friends, this reminds me that God is a God after our own hearts and He is so patient with us when we are immersed in sin, but if we aren’t willing to turn from that sin and seek Him, He disciplines us. Like all of us parents, the goal of discipline is to change our kids hearts from those things/people that can lead us down the wrong path.

Can’t you hear the pain behind God’s words? Yes, He is love. Yes, He is compassionate. Yes, He is long-suffering with us. And yes, He is a God of justice. Sin must be punished.

I love how Tara-Leigh said this: “Does sin require a punishment? Yes. Does it seem unfair? Absolutely. And the most unfair thing of all is that we will never receive the punishment ourselves because Jesus took it for us.”

In these chapters, God reminds Israel of all their sin, and how they are deserving of punishment. He also reminds them of who He is. And He begs them to stop seeking evil and to start seeking Him! Isn’t this a theme God has been teaching His kings?! And yet, we have seen many a king do what Israel has done: turn away from seeking God and turn to idolatry.

I am not throwing any shame their way. We can be the same. We may not be bowing down to idols, but we can bow down to those things that keep us from giving God our whole hearts. It’s easy to try to make things happen on our own—to keep striving to do it all ourselves. It’s challenging to seek God and seek His guidance in our lives…but once we get into the habit, it’s also the most freeing feeling because we can’t do it all.

Once we give up control to God, that’s when He becomes king of our hearts, and He directs our course. That’s when we become women after His own heart. Good things happen when we surrender our hearts. We step into God’s plan and purpose for our lives and we experience God’s peace. And like Tara-Leigh has said 193 times in our study: He’s where the joy is!

Day 194: Read 2 Chronicles Chapter 27 & Isaiah Chapters 9-12

My Takeaways:

Oh friends, didn’t you want to read more about King Jotham?! Finally, a godly king for Judah! He followed God throughout his reign—hallelujah!

His son on the other hand? Whew. He’s a doozy. We will get to him in the future…but, he has a story too.

And then, we get to more tough reads…people walking in darkness…people not seeking God…people enacting crooked statutes and writing oppressive laws. People rebellious against God.

It doesn’t end well for them. It doesn’t bode well for any of us in rebellion to God or for anyone who appears to follow God on the outside but rebel on the inside.

God uses Assyria to enact justice on His people…and then He enacts justice on Assyria.

He takes down the strong proud “trees” and clears the forest of all the trees and thickets with an ax. Amid this desolate landscape of destruction, something beautiful emerges: “a shoot will grow from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots will bear fruit.”

You guys, He’s here—right in Isaiah, we begin hearing about the man who has captured our hearts: Jesus.

And the prophecy about Jesus matches up perfectly with the New Testament:

“The Spirit of the Lord will rest on him, a Spirit of wisdom and understanding, a Spirit of counsel and strength, a Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.” (Isaiah 11:2)

“Righteousness will be a belt around his hips; faithfulness will be a belt around his waist.” (Isaiah 11:5)

“He will be named ‘Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Peace, Prince of Peace.'” (Isaiah 9:6b)

“And He will lift up the banner for the nations, and gather the dispersed of Israel…” (Isaiah 11:12a)

“And on that day, they-you-we-all of us will say, ‘I will give thanks to you Lord, although you were angry with me. Your anger has turned away and you have comforted me. Indeed God is my salvation, I will trust him and not be afraid, for the Lord, the Lord himself, is my strength in my song. He has become my salvation.'” (Isaiah 12:1-2)

Amen, amen, amen!

Our God is a just God… and you know what? We need Him to be! We need Him to punish sin. Any discipline He allows to happen, is to turn our hearts toward Him, and Him alone.

And His wrath will on those opposed to Him, and His refining fires will fall upon His kids to strengthen us and to show us that He is where the joy is!

Day 195: Read Micah Chapters 1-7

My Takeaways:

Death. Destruction. Punishment.

God uses Micah not only to call out His people’s sins but to issue this warning: “Look, the Lord is leaving his place and coming down to trample the heights of the earth.” (Micah 1:3)

He also says, “Woe to those who dream up wickedness and prepare evil plans on their beds!” (Micah 2:1)

Yikes.

God evens asks the House of Jacob, “Is the Spirit of the Lord impatient? Are these the things he does? Don’t my words bring good to the one who walk uprightly?” (Micah 2:7)

But, like Tara-Leigh says, He does remind—amid all the disaster predicted—that He will preserve a remnant. This is hope for His people. God will not wipe them out.

In fact, God will bring home this remnant to Mount Zion and teach them, once again, how to walk in His light, on His path. I love this.

You know what I found scariest of all? Micah 3:4.

When God addressed the leaders of Jacob and told them that they hate good and love evil, he later said that “they will cry out to him and he will not answer them. He will hide his face from them at that time because of the crimes that they have committed.”

YIKES. I need God, you guys. I can’t imagine doing life without Him…and here you have His people choosing to live life without Him, suddenly realizing that they need Him, but He’s not there anymore. They’ve missed out on the best thing in their lives.

How in the world is Micah able to proclaim such hard messages?

In Micah 3:8, he said, “I am filled with power by the Spirit of the Lord, with justice and courage…” You guys, we have that same Spirit that empowers us to do hard things, too! I love Micah’s confidence in God here!

What would it look like if all of God’s kids had this same confidence?

One verse that was familiar to me was one that has helped me in one of the darkest times of my life: “Do not rejoice over me, my enemy! Though I have fallen, I will rise. Though I sit in the darkness, the Lord will be my light.”

We are meant to rise in confidence of our God, friends. We will all have dark seasons in life…but we’re not meant to stay there. We find the light and walk in it.

Day 196: Read 2 Chronicles Chapter 28 & 2 Kings Chapters 16-17

My Takeaways:

“They feared the Lord but….”

More evil kings. More about God’s people straying, if not flat-out rebelling. More pleading from God to follow Him.

No one is listening. Not even the priests.

Only when lions come into Israel does the conquering king, the king of Assyria, realize there’s a problem with this new land they have taken over. He sends a priest from the deported Israelites to teach them about God.

But the people (I feel like these are people from other nations?) keep making idols. (Honestly, God’s own people do, too, so I guess it doesn’t really matter). In essence, they try to worship God and their gods.

So, this makes me wonder this: Is this true fear of the Lord? To me, this is more being afraid of God than reverence to God. We already know this is spiritual adultery and is not kosher with God.

Don’t you feel God’s sadness and anger at this? Is anyone listening? Does anyone love Him? Is there anyone seeking Him anymore?

So many times, God promises His wayward children, “…but fear the Lord and he will rescue you from all your enemies!”

You guys, even though His children are in direct rebellion by worship idols, we have our God trying to win their hearts here. He doesn’t give up.

If this study has shown me anything, it shows me the pure love of God. We don’t deserve it. He could annihilate all of us and it would be deserved. And yet, amid generations of idolatry, God is still trying to demonstrate His love for His people.

And, as we will see, they don’t listen. Hundreds of years later, He will send His son to get their attention. And, we will see, even then, people’s hearts are hardened against God and the truth.

May we live in the fear of the Lord. May we find the light and walk in it, if not live in it. May God continue to show us that our idols on earth are worthless and only He is worthy of our hearts.