Category: Bible Reading & Meditation

MY LEPROSY

“A leper approached Him with a request, kneeling down as he addressed Him: ‘If You will to do so, You can cure me.’�” –Mark 1:40 Leprosy in the New Testament is sometimes symbolic of such spiritual conditions as unforgiveness, anger, bitterness, resentment, hatred, self-hatred, and other sins. Leprosy can appear as a scab (Lv 13:2). A scab is a wound that has closed and is beginning to heal. Scabs often itch. We are tempted to pick at them, re-open the wound, and lose the healing already received. Are you “picky”? Are you itching to say something to a certain someone?...

JESUS MEANS “SAVIOR”

“He will strike at your head, while you strike at His heel.” –Genesis 3:15 Satan used food to alienate the human race from the Lord (see Gn 3:6). Jesus made His flesh real food (Jn 6:55) to give us an intimate communion with the Lord in which He lives in us and we in Him (see Jn 6:56). Satan seduced Adam and Eve to sin and by this fall seriously wounded and disordered human nature. Jesus even became sin (2 Cor 5:21) and gave us a new nature (see Jn 3:3, 5) by which we can be adopted sons and...

NOT ON SPEAKING TERMS

“Now the serpent was the most cunning of all the animals that the Lord God had made.” –Genesis 3:1 Never get into a conversation with the devil. Refuse to speak to him. “He is a liar and the father of lies” (Jn 8:44); he’s a fallen angel, superior to us in intelligence. You’re a fool to talk with the accuser, adversary, and liar. That’s the mistake Eve made. The devil initiated the conversation, but “the woman answered the serpent” (Gn 3:2). It wasn’t long before Eve thought God was depriving her of opportunities. She put faith in Satan’s lies and...

WORK FORCE

“The Lord God then took the man and settled him in the garden of Eden, to cultivate and care for it.” –Genesis 2:15 Work was part of paradise. Man cultivated and cared for the garden of Eden before he sinned. We still experience glimpses of fulfillment and creativity in work. Yet, after the fall of man, work has been warped by sin, and our experience of work is often closer to Hell than Paradise. The good news is that when Jesus redeemed us, He saved every aspect of our lives, including work. We no longer must earn our bread by...

GOOD OR BAD TRADITIONS?

“That is the way you nullify God’s word in favor of the traditions you have handed on.” —Mark 7:13 The people of Jesus’ time used mere human traditions to nullify God’s Word. We do the same today. For example, God’s Word calls us all to be one as Jesus and the Father are One (Jn 17:21). Yet we’ve remained divided in our denominations for hundreds of years. It’s our tradition. In the Bible, the Lord commands us: “Your thoughts should be wholly directed to all that is true, all that deserves respect, all that is honest, pure, admirable, decent, virtuous,...