Matthew 5:21-48; Exodus 30-32; Proverbs 14
In my faith life, it is not always about the big stuff. Little things like being friends with people that are hard to like, or keeping my thoughts pure, or controlling my anger—these little things can make a big difference. The standard is Jesus and that is what I need to be pursuing.
The Israelites in Exodus believed that something had happened to Moses; they put their faith more in him rather tha God. And so when he didn’t return right away or do as expected, they turned to something else for comfort. And Aaron, instead of standing up for right in his position of honor, caved to the will of the people. People often put their trust in other people. People are going to let us down. That is just a fact. God won't. That is also a fact.
Love and pray for my enemies. How can I love them? How can I pray for them? How can I care for people who do such terrible things? And how can humans be so destructive? It is because Satan and sin are slippery and sneaky and our culture and has been lead to believe that certain actions are ok. We need a total transformation of our culture: our views on sex, money, love, success, power, all need to change. We need a re-forming of our belief on how destructive prostitution, sex trafficking, and pornography really are. We need to rethink what love actually is and means. We need to redefine what our culture labels as 'success.' Some of his is so destructive and could cause terrible things for the future of our country. It has to be stopped. People need to return to the truths of God's word so that our country is not destroyed by sin.
Sometimes scripture is hard to understand, like how could these men run through camp killing their neighbors after they had all sinned? I don’t understand how they could do such a thing or how God could command such a thing. In Matthew it talks about cutting out my eye if it causes me to sin, and perhaps this is the same concept These people performed a terrible sin, and so they were being cut out of the community Had they just been scolded, God knew that things would have gotten worse. These Levites obeyed God above their love for their families—that is true obedience. We need to take sin seriously. No, I seriously doubt God will every ask us to kill our neighbors. But, we need to obey The Lord more than anything else and remove sin from our lives as completely as possible.
Lord, I pray that when future storms hit that Austin and I would have wisdom to keep our family together. I pray that we will avoid foolishness, stupidity, and sin. Give us wisdom to see the truth, to help people, and to try and reach out to them. Give me patience and love for Austin so that I can serve him and love him the way he needs. Lord, help us to be cautious concerning our future and our decisions, to pay attention and know where we are headed, to make wise decisions and live right.
Lord, help us to remember that it is smart to be patient, but stupid to lose our temper. I pray that we are kind and gentle, self-controlled and wise. Teach us to be more like Jesus.
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