Jeremiah 18
You may have looked at the title of this blog and went, huh? In case you’ve never worked with pottery before, doing what Jeremiah describes in the beginning part of this chapter is known as throwing a pot. “Then I went down to the potter’s house, and behold, he was working at the wheel. And the vessel that he was making from clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so he made it over, reworking it into another vessel as it seemed good to the potter to make it.” (vs 3-4)
Jeremiah 16
I was somewhat bemused as I started reading this chapter of Jeremiah. It seems God had some very interesting instructions for His prophet: “Then the word of the Lord came to me: ‘You must not marry and have sons or daughters in this place’… For this is what the Lord says: ‘Do not enter a house where there is a funeral meal; do not go to mourn or show sympathy, because I have withdrawn my blessing, my love and my pity from this people,’ declares the Lord… ‘And do not enter a house where there is feasting and sit down to eat and drink.’” ( vs 1-2, 5, 8 )
Jeremiah 11
There is a church in town that operates under the slogan, God is still speaking. I like that. A lot. I think it’s so easy for church organizations (denominations) to become set in their ways, stagnant, and no longer open to the progressive understanding of truth. It’s easier for us to believe that we “know all the truth” than it is to believe that God is still speaking.
Isaiah 50
When we talk about God, one of the first things that comes to mind is light. Jesus is described in the Gospels as the Light of the World (Jn 8:12) and the true light that gives light to every person (Jn 1:9). In fact, the Bible begins with God saying, “Let there be light!” (Gen 1:3). So, that’s why it seemed a bit odd to come to the end of this chapter and discover that, sometimes, those who follow the Lord walk in the dark:
Isaiah 42
When I was growing up, I was sometimes accused of having a fresh mouth. And I must admit, I have a sincere appreciation of sarcasm. But when I say that God is always fresh, I don’t mean that He has a fresh mouth (although He is very adept at sarcasm). What I mean is that He is always moving forward, never stuck in the past, always doing something new.
Isaiah 22
In the last part of this chapter, Isaiah wrote about Eliakim, who was going to become the chief royal steward: “I will clothe him with your robe and fasten your sash around him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live in Jerusalem and to the people of Judah. I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open.” (vs 21-22)
Ecclesiastes 1
The last time I studied this book in a Bible study group, someone thought that Solomon would have been diagnosed with severe depression if he was living in today’s world. Certainly, someone could read Ecclesiastes 1 and get that impression! But I’m not so sure. There’s part of me that thinks Solomon—far from having a view of life that was skewed by depression—actually got it.
Psalm 149
I find it interesting that in the Bible’s hymnal, the next to the last song would begin, “Praise the Lord. Sing to the Lord a new song, his praise in the assembly of his faithful people.” (vs 1) The book holds 150 of the greatest praise songs of all time, yet the psalmist says we should always be looking to sing “a new song.”
Psalm 137
This is a very sad psalm. Not only was it written when the Israelites were in Babylonian exile, but you can almost feel their despair as they are mocked by their captors: “By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept when we remembered Zion. There on the poplars we hung our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs, our tormentors demanded songs of joy; they said, ‘Sing us one of the songs of Zion!’” (vs 1-3)
Psalm 13
After I got pregnant the first time, my husband bought a T-shirt that epitomizes the kind of father he hoped to be (and that I can report he is—most of the time). On the background of this shirt is the same bit of dialogue repeated over and over:
“Are we there yet? . . . No.”
“Are we there yet? . . . No.”
1 Chronicles 15
After a few months, David went back to (once again) retrieve the Ark of the Covenant and bring it back to Jerusalem. This time, however, he had a different method in mind: "Then David summoned... the priests... and the Levites. He said to them, 'You are the heads of the Levitical families; you and your fellow Levites are to consecrate yourselves and bring up the ark of the Lord, the God of Israel, to the place I have prepared for it. It was because you, the Levites, did not bring it up the first time that the Lord our God broke out in anger against us. We did not inquire of him about how to do it in the prescribed way.' So the priests and Levites consecrated themselves in order to bring up the ark of the Lord, the God of Israel. And the Levites carried the ark of God with the poles on their shoulders, as Moses had commanded in accordance with the word of the Lord." (vs 11-15)
1 Chronicles 13
King David wanted to do a very good thing. He wanted to bring the Ark of the Covenant back from its exile. He realized that, during the reign of Saul, the Lord had basically been ignored, and he wanted to change that. Unfortunately, after accusing Saul of not "inquiring" of the Ark, David did the same exact thing.
2 Kings 20
Once again, we encounter the subject of death, and I thought Hezekiah’s reaction on the news of his impending fate was telling (and quite familiar): "Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the Lord, 'Remember, Lord, how I have walked before you faithfully and with wholehearted devotion and have done what is good in your eyes.' And Hezekiah wept bitterly." (vs 2-3)
