There are many ways that are available nowadays to help us read through the entire Bible in one year.  I would really like to emphasize that reading it all the way through is such a blessing.  Sometimes it’s hard to stick with it when there seem to be endless laws and genealogies.  However, when you come to the end of the year, you can clearly see that God had a plan all along.  Each dispensation was a step along the long road towards His ultimate goal, to live here on earth with His children.

You can see that after sin happened, there had to be a process of salvation.  God first needed to find a man that had enough of God’s life in him to be salvaged from the evil that had exploded on earth.  He found such a man in Noah.  Then, He needed to find a man of complete faith.  He found Abraham.  The story moves on from there.  We read about sins, overcomings, famines and then the move to Egypt.  Then came slavery and finally emancipation through God’s servant Moses.  God gave ten commandments and seemingly endless laws.  These laws were meant to guide mankind back to God, not to become a god of themselves.  We read about judgments and blessings along with battles with losses and victories.  Finally, there were some ready to meet God’s Son, Jesus.  Jesus fulfilled the law and brought the way to salvation to a higher level.  We now have His example to inspire and guide us through the midst of this portion of earth’s history.

When you read the Bible from start to finish, you can see for yourself that it is not just the story of one nation, but it is our story.  God has been bringing mankind up from the pits of sin since the days of Adam and Eve.  Not everyone cooperates with God’s plan.  After all, there is such a thing as free will, but He is always hoping that each one will choose Him.  Although it’s the story of mankind’s salvation, it’s not just mankind’s story.  It’s my story, the story of God’s salvation road for me.  And for you.  God needs to find individuals that have enough God in them, a genuine love for His goodness to start on the road towards salvation.  Then He is looking for the man of faith in us to listen to His voice and obey.  We start with the simple commandments and learn to cooperate with them.  Then we move on to spiritual battles between our sin nature and the God nature in us.  We have losses and victories along the way.  Finally, we come to a point where we fall completely in love with our Savior, Jesus.  We each have our spiritual battles to fight.  God leads us along the way, from battle to battle, victory to victory.  Sometimes the way seems tortuous, and other times we can feel almost giddy with the happiness of victory.

In the last two chapters of Revelation, God speaks of a great and beautiful city.  One day, that city may or may not be actual, but it is surely a correspondence of what will be in our hearts when we overcome.  Our earth will become a place of great beauty and our humanities will be filled with God’s life and glory, either here on earth or in the next life.

Take heart.  Continue on this long uphill climb.  I really do recommend reading for yourself this wonderful life guide that our loving Father left for us, to guide us and uplift us, His holy book, The Bible.  You can even listen to it online in whatever version you prefer.  The Daily Audio Bible is one online Bible (but there are others) that is read cover to cover in one year.  It just takes about 20 or 30 minutes a day.

But He answered and said, “It is written, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”” Matthew 4:4

And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 8:32

If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed.  John 8:36

In our house, my dear husband turns lights on, looks at or does something in the room and then leaves the room without turning the lights off.  Then I go around the house turning lights off.  The most recent electric bills urge me on with my mission to eliminate lights in empty rooms.  With this scenario in mind, this morning I was in the bathroom determined to keep the lights off.  It was just before dawn, so it was still dark both outside and inside my little bathroom.  Nevertheless, with the help of the nightlight, I was able to get ready for work.  Strange, but as I got ready, I noticed that it got easier to see things around me even though the sun still had not come up.

It struck me that it could be compared to the situation of the frog that hops in a pot of cool water and doesn’t even notice that it is heating up.  He simply falls asleep and then that’s the end of him.

We live in a dark world.  As I am of a certain age, I remember a time when things were, in some ways (not all), more simple.  Life seemed to flow at a leisurely pace.  Stores were closed on Sundays.  Church parking lots were full.  Most men were providing for their families and many women stayed home with the children.  The children played outside freely after a full day of school where they either respected their teachers or they were in trouble with their parents.  My sisters and I had time to do our homework, knit our own hats and mittens, sew our own clothing and still have time to either go outside or help our mother in the kitchen.

Time has eroded the simplicity of life.  Like the frog in the pot, our world, and our lives in it, has gotten darker without our noticing.  As our world gets darker, we get used to it.  Perhaps we rationalize it and see the changes as just a fluke, or even as progress.  However, bit by bit, even stealthily the darkness has increased.  The drug situation has killed thousands, homelessness is endemic, mass shootings more common and our police force stretched thin.  Churches are nearly empty and if a child disrespects his or her teacher, it’s the parents who call, not to make the child apologize, but to upbraid the teacher.  We live in a dark world.  Don’t let the light go out.

Matthew 5:16  Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

John 12:35  Walk while ye have the light, lest darkness come upon you: for he that walketh in darkness knoweth not whither he goeth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9q-08aTNh8

 ^“I say then, Have they (speaking of the Jews) stumbled that they should fall?  God forbid: but rather through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy.”  (Romans 11:11)

What provokes one person to be jealous of another?  Normally, that one has something the other wants.  What could Christians have that would provoke the Jewish people to jealousy?

The answer is: sometimes nothing.  Sadly.  Sometimes Christians are miserable sad sacks, complaining and depressed.  Other times, Christians don’t believe they can overcome sin, and so the world goes on, continuing its sad descent downwards.  In my lifetime, I have seen things that I never even dreamed of when I was young.  To see the problems that we have in the world these days, it is often clear to a Christian of a certain age that satan has taken hold of our planet and is quickly taking total control and dragging it down to hell.  Many people are just following along with the crowd like little lost lambs.

As we, being Christians, watch these things happen, verses from the Holy Scriptures come to mind.  In His amazing kindness, God  gave us descriptions of these times and explanations of what is actually going on.  We read the following verses from Revelation 12:

“And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him. And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.”

In heaven, Michael and his angels won the battle with satan and his angels.  So, now that the old devil is on earth, we are stuck with it.  What are we going to do?  Go along with the whole world, all of whom are deceived by him?  That would be a complete travesty.  No! We MUST use the blood of the Lamb and the word of our testimony.  How so?  The blood of the Lamb is his life.  Our testimony is our life lived.  What are we doing with the life of Jesus?  Are we living according to the principles that he taught us?  He died a supremely cruel death in order to leave us the testimony of his life.  Are we supposed to think that we are forgiven and saved and therefore just look for blessings?

We have to live the life that Jesus taught and lived himself.  He had requirements of his early disciples.  We can find out what those requirements are. That battle that was fought and won in heaven is now raging on earth. We have to continue the battle.  Yet, it’s not us battling, but Jesus in us.   It’s his life, his words, his testimony, but if we don’t live it, how are we any different from the rest of the world?  We would be heading down the same path as them.  The New Testament emphasizes that we have to overcome.  When we do, and when people meet us and FEEL Jesus’ life, then they will wonder, “what’s so different about this person?”  “Why do I feel so different when he/she is around?”  That’s what provokes a person to jealousy.  That’s what makes that person we met want whatever it is that we have.  That’s what overcomes this world.

Let’s allow Jesus’ life to live through us.  Let’s provoke others to jealousy, not because of the nice car or the super house we have, or even because we can sing and praise God more loudly than the next guy, but because of the life we are living, proof positive that Jesus’ life works!