I am using One Year Bible Online for my daily Bible study. For today, One Year Bible Online links here. I have found that by writing this daily blog of what I see when I read these scriptures, I get more out of them. I hope that by posting these ruminations others may get some benefit as well. If you have any thoughts or comments regarding these verses or what I have written about them, please post them. I hope that the Spirit is moving in others through these posts as the Spirit has definitely been convicting me.
This is my final devotion of the year. I have been blessed through this year by doing this and I am looking for the blessings the Lord will bring me in the New Year. This year I started this in April. I am looking forward to starting at the beginning of the Bible and working through it over the course of the entire year. I would encourage everyone to read through the Bible in a year. I pray that others have been blessed by what I have written and that the Spirit guide me in my studies going forward.
The prophet tells us that God is going to send His messenger before Him. The Lord will follow His messenger and appear suddenly. He will be like the refiner’s fire or a bleaching agent. He will burn away the dross and bleach away the impurities. God will sit in judgment over those who cheat employees out of their wages, those who oppress the widow and the orphan, those who deprive outsiders of justice.
God calls on us to return to Him. He condemns those who claim that they have committed no sin and do not need God’s forgiveness. God calls on us to put Him first in our priorities, to first dedicate a share of our resources to serving Him. God condemns the people for honoring those who get rich through wickedness. I look at this section of this passage and see a condemnation of our society. There are many who say, “You don’t need God to be moral.” There are many who see people who gained fame and fortune through sin and seek to emulate them. I have failed to dedicate the first fruits of my income to God. I have been convicted over the last couple of weeks about my giving to serve the Lord. I will strive to be more faithful in the New Year.
Those who fear the Lord will talk with one another and God will take note, placing their names in a scroll (note the similarities to yesterday’s passage in Revelation referencing the Book of Life). The prophet tells us that the difference between those who serve God and those who do not will be obvious. Is it obvious to those around me that I am different? God’s day of judgment is coming and the wicked will be burned up like straw in the fire. Yet the fire that is destructive and burns the wicked will be like the healing rays of the spring sun to the righteous. This passage evoked in my mind something like a scene from a vampire movie. I see a group greeting the sunrise on a beach. Those who are righteous greet the dawn with joy and revel in the beauty of the rising sun. The evil burn up like vampires exposed to the sun, running and screaming in terror as they seek a place to hide from the coming light. In that day there will be no place to hide from the light of God’s presence. I seek to be one of those who will bask in that light, rather than one who flees it in fear.
The writer tells us that a river of the water of life will flow from the throne of God through the city. The tree of life will grow on either bank of the river bearing ripe fruit every month. There will no longer be a curse on anything. I read this as saying that there will be no Second Law of Thermodynamics in the new heaven and earth that God will create after judgment day. The Second Law of Thermodynamics is the one that tells us that everything runs down and decays. After judgment day, we will live in a new creation where nothing ever breaks down. There will be no need for the sun or lamps there because the light of God’s presence will shine on everything.
Jesus is returning soon. He will come back and bring all creation to completion. The Spirit is calling us to come and drink of the water of life. Let us call to those around us for them to come and drink of the water of life. As I look at the world around me I see many who are thirsty for the water of life, have I done enough to show them where to find it?
As we conclude this year, I will echo John’s conclusion and with him say:
We end the year with a psalm of praise. This psalm calls on us to use everything we can access to praise the Lord wherever we find ourselves. I will praise the Lord every day of my life.
I will praise the Lord on this final day of 2012 and I will start the day on the first day of 2013 praising the Lord.
How appropriate that the proverb for today reminds of the other important individual in my life. The psalm reminded me to praise the Lord, now the proverb reminds me to let my wife know how much she means to me.
but you surpass them all.
It may be nice to have a wife who is charming (and I do), but charm can be used to deceive. It may be nice to have a wife who is beautiful (and once again, I do), but beauty will fade. The wonderful thing to have in a wife is one who loves and fears the Lord. I am so thankful that along with her other attributes my wife has that as well.