20-20 Blog

Today’s Bible Reading: 2 Samuel 11; 2 Samuel 12; Psalm 51; Matthew 23 (The Message)

Scripture Focus:

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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Today’s Bible Reading: 2 Samuel 4; 2 Samuel 5; Psalm 139; Matthew 16 (The Message)

Scripture Focus:

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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Today’s Bible Reading: 2 Corinthians 7, 8, 9, 10

Scripture Focus:

2 Corinthians 10:18 For not he who commends himself is approved, but whom the Lord commends.

Observation:

We can start to think we’re doing pretty well until we stop to look at things from God’s perspective. It’s amazing what a difference that makes!

Application:

Stop to look at your day from God’s perspective. What does he see? Ask him for his viewpoint, his take on things. What does he want you to do today?

Prayer:

Father, I know that if you ask me to do something, you will provide the grace, the strength, and the power to see it through, so please show me what you want me to focus on today.

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Today’s Bible Reading: Ezekiel 29, 30, 31, 32; Revelation 11

Scripture Focus:

Revelation 11:15 Then the seventh angel sounded: And there were loud voices in heaven, saying, “The kingdoms of this world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ, and He shall reign forever and ever!”

Observation:

God allows the kingdoms of this world to function. Nations believe themselves to be autonomous, but let there be no mistake. God is in control of nations. All of today’s reading in Ezekiel points to the same fact. Egypt, the nation that ruled for centuries, was prophesied against by Ezekiel that it would be dispersed, and though God would allow it’s people to return after 40 years, it would never be the once proud nation that it was.

God is in control of the rise and fall of nations. They play into his eternal purposes.

Application:

Our nation, only a couple hundred years old, seems unconquerable. Not so. It is like any other nation, under God’s rule. If we cease to follow God’s laws and principles, we will also be judged. And we are rapidly becoming a nation that doesn’t know God.

Prayer:

Father God, help me to be a light in the darkness of a generation that doesn’t know you.

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Today’s Bible Reading: Ezekiel 25; Ezekiel 26; Ezekiel 27; Ezekiel 28; Revelation 10

Scripture Focus:

Ezekiel 28:17 “ Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty;
You corrupted your wisdom for the sake of your splendor;
I cast you to the ground,
I laid you before kings,
That they might gaze at you.

Observation:

Over and over in Scripture we read the end of those who are lifted up with pride. It corrupts judgment. It makes a person feel like God. This is something God does not tolerate. He will have no other god before him, so beware when pride appears, for a fall is coming for sure.

Proverbs 16:18 Pride goes before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall.

Application:

Remember what Jesus taught—that humility and servanthood is the mark of true might. It’s the opposite of the world’s definition and goes against human thinking, but I’d rather think God’s way!

Prayer:

Father God, give me a nudge with your Spirit when prides creeps in so I can root it out.

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Today’s Bible Reading: Ezekiel 17, 18, 19; Revelation 7

Scripture Focus:

Revelation 7:13 Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, “Who are these arrayed in white robes, and where did they come from?”
14 And I said to him, “Sir, you know.”
So he said to me, “These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 15 Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple. And He who sits on the throne will dwell among them. 16 They shall neither hunger anymore nor thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any heat; 17 for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to living fountains of waters. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”

Observation:

I think it was yesterday that I read about the martyrs in Revelation. Today we read about those who went through the great tribulation and washed their robes in the blood of the Lamb, a picture of Jesus washing away their sins. In both cases, God has a special place for them in heaven.

Application:

There are those who have suffered great atrocities, and have even been murdered for their faith. While no one would ever desire such a thing, it is nice to know that God sees and cares about the persecution of believers.

Prayer:

Father God, may I remember those who are being persecuted—remember to pray for them and help them when I can.

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Today’s Bible Reading: Ezekiel 15, 16; Psalm 70; Revelation 6

Scripture Focus:

Ezekiel 16:8 “When I passed by you again and looked upon you, indeed your time was the time of love; so I spread My wing over you and covered your nakedness. Yes, I swore an oath to you and entered into a covenant with you, and you became Mine,” says the Lord GOD.

Observation:

I love how God uses the picture of marriage to show his love for his people and how we should love him back. In this case, it’s an unequal marriage. We come to naked and needy, and he covers our nakedness and enters into a covenant with us.

The verses that follow tell how God lavished his favor and riches on his beloved, but she trusted in her own beauty and played the harlot.

Application:

God has done so much for me! May I be like a good and faithful wife to him, all the days of my life. I believe God wants intimacy with each of his children, for he is our husband.

Prayer:

Father God, thank you for loving me when I was poor and needy. Thank you for lavishing your goodness upon me.

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Today’s Bible Reading: Jeremiah 33, 34; Psalm 74; 1 John 5

Scripture Focus:

Jeremiah 33:2 “Thus says the LORD who made it, the LORD who formed it to establish it (the LORD is His name): 3 ‘Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’

1 John 5:14–15 Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.

Observation:

In various places in the Bible God invites us to ask him for petitions, wisdom, help, whatever we need. He always promises to answer. Sometimes, like here in Jeremiah, he hints at even greater blessing when we ask—such as showing us great and mighty things that we don’t know about, so could not even ask about.

It’s almost like God is so excited about what he knows that he’s almost begging me to call on him.

Application:

Who can resist such an invitation to carry on a conversation with God Almighty? Yet do I take the time to stop and call on him? And listen?

Prayer:

Father God, thank you for making yourself so available to me.

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Today’s Bible Reading: Jeremiah 31, 32; 1 John 4

Scripture Focus:

Jeremiah 32:27 “Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh. Is there anything too hard for Me?”

Observation:

We need to be reminded once in awhile that God can do anything. Does something seem impossible? What is that to God!

Application:

I have an impossible situation in my life right now. It seems impossible, but I can ask God to bring it to pass. If he wills to do it, it will be impossible NOT to happen.

Prayer:

Father God, please show your great power in my impossible situation! Thank you!

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Today’s Bible Reading: Jeremiah 10, 11, 12; John 14

Scripture Focus:

Jeremiah 10: 6–7 Inasmuch as there is none like You, O LORD
(You are great, and Your name is great in might),
Who would not fear You, O King of the nations?
For this is Your rightful due.
For among all the wise men of the nations,
And in all their kingdoms,
There is none like You.

Observation:

Jeremiah just got through talking about the idols of the nations, how they were worthless to do either good or bad, since they were carved from trees and made with metal, but Jehovah, on the other hand, is living and powerful and able to act on behalf of his people.

Application:

I just had a huge answer to prayer today—one that I thought would truly take a miracle to accomplish. All I can say is, “My God, you are very great! Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

Prayer:

Father God, you are so awesome. Remind me of this answer to prayer the next time I doubt your ability to work on my behalf! Help me to trust you in other areas, such as to further your kingdom.

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