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.

2 Samuel 22-23:23

     Today’s passage starts with a song that David’s song of victory. It is a song of praise to the Lord. David’s song of victory was a song of praise to God. He did not speak of how successful he was, or of his armies or his mighty men. He praised God and gave credit to God for the victory. This is something that we need to do, recognize that God is responsible for our successes and give Him praise for granting them to us.

“The Lord lives! Praise be to my Rock!
Exalted be my God, the Rock, my Savior!”
All of my successes are from God. He is my rock and my refuge. When the trials of this life start to overwhelm me, I turn to Him and He provides me succor.

Acts 2:1-47

     I am actually studying this passage on Sunday, June 3rd. This is important because the sermon in our worship service this morning was partially on this passage from Acts. The preacher this morning pointed out that the Jewish holiday that we know as Pentecost was a celebration of Moses receiving the Law on Mt. Sinai. This made it a rather important Jewish holiday. In addition, he pointed out that at the end of the Gospel of Luke, Luke told us that the disciples spent all their time in the Temple praising God. This means that on Pentecost, the disciples would have been gathered in the Temple. Finally, the description Luke gives of what preceded the disciples being filled with the Holy Spirit is very similar to the description of what happened at Mt. Sinai before Moses went up the mountain to receive the Law. With the Law, God lived first in His tent (the tabernacle) and then later in His house (the temple). With the coming of the Holy Spirit on this Pentecost that Luke describes, God is moving from the House of God to live within the people of God. When the Holy Spirit came upon the disciples they were not huddled off someplace by themselves. They were out among the people as a group. We, also, should await the coming of the Holy Spirit in the public square. If we as Christians today were to do that, the Holy Spirit would come upon us in a manner which would cause those around us to be cut to the heart and ask us, “Brothers, what shall we do?” When we get that answer, our answer must be that of Peter, “Repent and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ.” We must remember that repenting means that we change the behavior of which we are repenting.

Psalm 122:1-9

     This psalm begins with the psalmist saying that he will rejoice with those who say, “Let us go to the house of the Lord.” Now that God lives within His people, we should rejoice whenever we spend time with our fellow believers. There are two questions we need to ask ourselves. First, do we rejoice when we spend time with our fellow believers? Second, do our fellow believers rejoice when they spend time with us? If the answer to either of those questions is no, we need to do some serious soul searching.
     Later in this psalm the psalmist instructs us to pray for the peace of Jerusalem. He tells us to do so for the sake of the House of God. So, now that God resides within His people rather than within the Temple in Jerusalem, is this instruction still valid? Should we as Christians be praying for the peace of Jerusalem? I will say that many of the conflicts in this world today are connected to the strife over Jerusalem. In order for Jerusalem to have peace, most of the world’s conflicts would need to be resolved. I do not believe that most of those conflicts can be resolved by resolving the conflict over Jerusalem, but if those other conflicts were resolved, the conflict over Jerusalem would also be resolved. So, perhaps we should be praying for the peace of Jerusalem. I will certainly add that to my prayer list.

Proverbs 16:19-20/a>

     This proverb tells us that those who strive for power and wealth face difficulties that those who are willing to live simply with those with little material possessions never experience. This does not mean that all paths to wealth lead to unhappiness, just that sometimes people are willing to pay to high of a price for material possessions. The second of these two proverbs tells us that the path to success is to accept instruction rather than being prideful as the first points out that many who seek wealth are. Finally, it tells us that the path to joy is through trusting the lord. I will certainly attest to that. I experience the most joy when I put my fears and concerns in the Lord’s hands and allow Him to deal with them. His solutions bring me greater joy than any I could come up with on my own.