Tag: Doing what God says

Morning Musing: Exodus 40:1-33

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“The Lord spoke to Moses: ‘You are to set up the tabernacle, the tent of meeting, on the first day of the first month’. . . .Moses did everything just as the Lord had commanded him. The tabernacle was set up in the first month of the second year, on the first day of the month. . . .Next Moses set up the surrounding courtyard for the tabernacle and the altar and hung a screen for the gate of the courtyard. So Moses finished the work.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

What does God want from us? More than anything else, He wants a relationship with us. He wants us to be in a right and proper relationship with Him. How do we know when we have that? Because we do what He says. Our faithful, willing obedience is the first and best sign that we understand who He is, who we are, and are willing to accept those two truths wholly. Our obedience is the best proof that we are right with Him. In this final description of Moses’ work with the tabernacle, this is where the emphasis lies: that Moses did what God said. Let’s talk through what we see here and about why this is a good pointer to something that is still true for us today.

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Morning Musing: Exodus 14:15-16

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“The Lord said to Moses, ‘Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to break camp. As for you, lift up your staff, stretch out your hand over the sea, and divide it so that the Israelites can go through the sea on dry ground.'” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Prayer is important stuff. Vitally important. One of the things I find myself telling my congregation more and more frequently lately is that prayer is one of the three essential things you need to be pursuing regularly and intentionally if you want to grow in your faith (the others are engagement with the Scriptures and a local body of Christ). I have several times heard messages about prayer that rightly remind folks that prayer is not a substitute for doing something. In many cases, it is the something we most need to be doing if we want to see positive changes come to a hard situation. Prayer is essentially for getting God involved in a situation to make things happen. What we see here, though, brings a much needed balance to all of this. Let’s check out God’s response to Moses and the Israelites’ panicked cries to Him when they spotted the Egyptian army bearing down on them.

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Morning Musing: Jonah 3:1-3a

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“The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: ‘Get up! Go to the great city of Nineveh and preach the message that I tell you.’ Jonah got up and went to Nineveh according to the Lord’s command.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

One of the parenting books I read early on in this journey was Have a New Kid by Friday by Kevin Leman. Leman is a good writer and his sense of humor made it a fun read, but there was one idea that has really stuck with me over the years. The principle goes like this: B can’t happen until A does. The idea is that, if you’ve asked your kids to do something you want or need them to do (A), they can’t do whatever it is they might want to do (B) until they’ve accomplished A. We see a bit of this on the display in Jonah’s life right here.

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Digging in Deeper: 2 Samuel 6:3-4

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“And they carried the ark of God on a new cart and brought it out of the house of Abinadab, which was on the hill. And Uzzah and Ahio, the sons of Abinadab, were driving the new cart, with the ark of God, and Ahio went before the ark.” (ESV – Read the chapter) ‬‬

When God gave Moses instructions for building the ark as recorded in Exodus, He was really specific about it. Every single detail of how it was to be made and what it was to look like was spelled out exactly as God wanted it. He even gave them instructions for how to make the materials (gold-covered poles) with which the ark was to be transported. These poles were the only things that were to be used to move the ark. And nobody was to touch it. Ever. Read the rest…