20-20 Blog

Scripture Focus:

Isaiah 25:1 God, you are my God. I celebrate you. I praise you.

Isaiah 26: People with their minds set on you,
you keep completely whole,
Steady on their feet,
because they keep at it and don’t quit.
Depend on God and keep at it
because in the Lord God you have a sure thing.
Those who lived high and mighty
he knocked off their high horse.

26:11 You hold your hand up high, God,
   but they don’t see it.
Open their eyes to what you do,
   to see your zealous love for your people.

Hebrews 13:16 Make sure you don’t take things for granted and go slack in working for the common good; share what you have with others. God takes particular pleasure in acts of worship—a different kind of “sacrifice”—that take place in kitchen and workplace and on the streets.

Hebrews 13: 19—21
May God, who puts all things together,
      makes all things whole,
   Who made a lasting mark through the sacrifice of Jesus,
      the sacrifice of blood that sealed the eternal covenant,
   Who led Jesus, our Great Shepherd,
      up and alive from the dead,
   Now put you together, provide you
      with everything you need to please him,
   Make us into what gives him most pleasure,
      by means of the sacrifice of Jesus, the Messiah.
   All glory to Jesus forever and always!
      Oh, yes, yes, yes.

Observation:

There were so many great reminders in the Bible reading today. I don’t know how to choose the “best” one to comment on, so I’ll let them stand for themselves.

Application:

Claim your God—celebrate and praise him each day.
He is zealous with love for me!
He takes particular pleasure in acts of worship that are tangible.
He will put me together and make me whole through the sacrifice of Jesus.

Prayer:

Father God, what a wonderful, glorious God you are!

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Hebrews 12:28-29 Do you see what we’ve got? An unshakable kingdom! And do you see how thankful we must be? Not only thankful, but brimming with worship, deeply reverent before God. For God is not an indifferent bystander. He’s actively cleaning house, torching all that needs to burn, and he won’t quit until it’s all cleansed. God himself is Fire!

Observation:

Reminds me of the passage that says our works should be of things that last, gold and silver, not wood, hay, and stubble, for all of that will burn. God is the Fire!

Application:

How am I living? What will last for eternity?

Prayer:

Help me know the difference between wood and gold in my life.

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Isaiah 8:11–13 “Don’t be like this people,
always afraid somebody is plotting against them.
Don’t fear what they fear.
Don’t take on their worries.
If you’re going to worry,
worry about The Holy. Fear God-of-the-Angel-Armies.
The Holy can be either a Hiding Place
or a Boulder blocking your way.

Observation:

People have a propensity to worry, but Isaiah lets us know that we’re worrying about the wrong thing. He says we should worry about what God thinks because God can either be a Hiding Place for us or a Boulder blocking our way.

Application:

Is it possible to live life without worrying? Could I simply trust God like a little child and live with a constant attitude of thanksgiving rather than worry? I would like that. If I could really do that. Then, I believe, God would be my Hiding Place and not a Boulder blocking my way.

Prayer:

Father God, trust starts today, not tomorrow. Thank you for this day and all it will bring. You are my Hiding Place!

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Titus 2:12 We’re being shown how to turn our backs on a godless, indulgent life, and how to take on a God-filled, God-honoring life.

Observation:

God wants us to live as though he exists, a God focused, God-honoring life. The opposite of that is a self-indulgent life, one that focuses on me and totally ignores God.

Application:

It’s fairly easy to go through a day with hardly a thought of God, making choices that are self indulgent and don’t take into account God’s presence or commands. I must choose to live a God filled, God-honoring life. It doesn’t come naturally.

Prayer:

God, I invite you to be the focus of my day today. I choose to walk with you today and honor you.

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Proverbs 16: 3 Put God in charge of your work,
then what you’ve planned will take place.

Proverbs 16: 9 We plan the way we want to live,
but only God makes us able to live it.

Observation:

God is available to be the boss of my work and of my life. If I let him be in charge, then what I plan will take place. God is the one who enables my plans to succeed.

Application:

I can feel like everything depends on me in my business and forget that God is willing to take charge and make sure my business plans will succeed. Why is it so easy to forget that God is the boss and begin to take on all the responsibility and stress of being the boss myself?! He’s much better at the job, so let Him do it!

Prayer:

Father God, you’re the boss. Please show me what I need to do today—and give me the grace and will to do it!

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Proverbs 10:22 God’s blessing makes life rich;
nothing we do can improve on God.

Proverbs 11: 28 A life devoted to things is a dead life, a stump;
a God-shaped life is a flourishing tree.

Proverbs 12:2 A good person basks in the delight of God

Observation:

There were so many good Proverbs that it was hard to pick one! I love the emphasis on focusing on God rather than things.

Application:

Life is short. Eternity is long. Does it make sense to focus so hard on the things of this world that are temporary and give God the leftovers of my life?

Prayer:

Father God, I want my life to be a tree of life, not a stump. Only you are the source of a flourishing life.

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Romans 4:18 When everything was hopeless, Abraham believed anyway, deciding to live not on the basis of what he saw he couldn’t do but on what God said he would do.
Vs 19 Abraham didn’t focus on his own impotence and say, “It’s hopeless.

Observation:

Abraham encountered a hopeless time where it looked like things would NOT work out. So what did he do? Even though he had no power to do anything, he still believed that God would do what he said he would do.

Application:

Don’t focus on the hopelessness of my situation. Focus on the power of God to act on my behalf.

Prayer:

Father God, I’m looking to you today to perform great and mighty things in my life and through me, as I trust you to do it.

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Romans 3:25–26; 27–28 God sacrificed Jesus on the altar of the world to clear that world of sin. Having faith in him sets us in the clear. God decided on this course of action in full view of the public—to set the world in the clear with himself through the sacrifice of Jesus, finally taking care of the sins he had so patiently endured. This is not only clear, but it’s now—this is current history! God sets things right. He also makes it possible for us to live in his rightness.

What we’ve learned is this: God does not respond to what we do; we respond to what God does. We’ve finally figured it out. Our lives get in step with God and all others by letting him set the pace, not by proudly or anxiously trying to run the parade.

Observation:

Jesus’ sacrifice—his death on the cross—clears us of blame before God. That’s good news! But it doesn’t stop there. “He also makes it possible for us to live in his rightness.” We do this by letting God lead us rather than deciding ourselves what God would like. When we follow God’s leading, we’ll be in harmony with God AND with other people.

Application:

This sounds like a Utopian world! A place where I am totally in step with God and with others, in harmonious communion with God and others. That is a place I long to be. Jesus makes that possible, but how do I walk in that every day?

Perhaps I should start by thanking God first thing in the morning for letting me into his inner circle, his family, his community. Then I could acknowledge God’s leadership and ask him what he’s up to today and how I can become a part of his great work for this very day!

Prayer:

Father God, I’m listening to your Spirit, wanting to follow your leading at any given moment, whether in small or great things.

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Matthew 23:28 People look at you and think you’re saints, but beneath the skin you’re total frauds.

Observation:

Wow! Today’s Scripture reading was pointed and convicting. God knows the truth about me. Everything. I may totally have other people fooled, but God sees everything, knows everything I do, and knows the motive behind it.

First I read from 2 Samuel 11 & 12 about David and Bathsheeba, and then in Matthew 23, Jesus tells the Pharisees their real character, the one nobody else sees.

Application:

All I can do is say with David in Psalm 51 (also today’s reading):
God, make a fresh start in me,
shape a Genesis week from the chaos of my life.
Don’t throw me out with the trash,
or fail to breathe holiness in me.
Bring me back from gray exile,
put a fresh wind in my sails!

Prayer:

Father God, help me live with the knowledge that you are WITH me at every moment, knowing all I say, do, and think. May that be a comforting thought. May that knowledge be like a plumb line that keeps me walking in your ways today. God, make a fresh start in me, shape a Genesis week from the chaos of my life.

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Psalm 139:15–16
You know me inside and out,
you know every bone in my body;
You know exactly how I was made, bit by bit,
how I was sculpted from nothing into something.
Like an open book, you watched me grow from conception to birth;
all the stages of my life were spread out before you,
The days of my life all prepared
before I’d even lived one day.

Observation:

These words that tell about God’s intimate knowledge of me can be either comforting or terrifying. Perhaps a bit of both! God knows all the good, the bad, and the ugly about me. There’s nothing hidden from his sight.

But mostly these words are comforting. God cares about me enough to pay attention to me, to be interested in me, to lay out my life before me—prepare every day from the moment of conception, maybe even before.

Application:

I don’t have to fear the future. It’s been planned by God. He already knows what’s going to happen, so nothing is a surprise to him. And I can rest in the knowledge that my days are in God’s hands.

Prayer:

Thank you, beloved Father, for your tender loving care for me. I’m so touched by your love today!

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