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.

     Today’s passage continues describing the duties that were assigned to various groups of the Levites. We learn that David assigned the Levites tasks involving governing the Kingdom of Israel, not just tasks involving Temple worship. The passage then goes on to tell us that David divided his army into 12 units of 24,000 men which each served for one month a year. Each unit had its own commander. We are then told who the leaders of each of the tribes was while David was king. Finally we are given a list of miscellaneous officials of David’s kingdom.

     In today’s passage, Paul reiterates that Abraham received the promise of God, not because of his adherence to the law of God, but because of his righteousness that came to him through his faith in God. He tells is that if following the law makes one an heir of Abraham than faith has no value and God’s promise is worthless, because no one can fully keep the law and thus receive the promise. Paul extends his logic to show that God’s promise to Abraham applies to those who share Abraham’s faith in God, not just those who are biologically descended from Abraham.
     Paul tells us how Abraham had faith in God’s promise that he would be the father of many nations, even though he and Sarah were beyond child-bearing years. Despite his and Sarah’s age, Abraham believed in God’s power to provide him with a son. It was this belief (in God’s power to fulfill His promises) that was credited to him as righteousness. Paul tells us that the Scripture does not record the words “it was credited to him” for Abraham’s sake alone. Those words were written for us as well. Those of us who believe that Jesus died for our sins and was raised again to life may know that our faith will be credited to us as righteousness, just as Abraham’s faith was.
     Our faith allows us to have peace with God. Paul tells us that we can rejoice in our hope of the glory of God. We can also rejoice in the suffering we experience because suffering trains us to persevere, or as the King James Version puts it, to have patience. Perseverance helps us develop good, strong character. Good character inspires us to have hope. And God will not leave us to hope in vain.
     Today’s passage is a great example of what a blessing it is to have access to the Bible on line. In order for me to fully follow what Paul was saying here, I switched back and forth between different translations. I often will switch between translations when studying a passage because I want to see if some of the connotations I take from one translation can be supported by the way another translation chooses to translate a passage. But for today’s passage I found it necessary to look at various translations to fully see how to express my thoughts on what the passage meant.

     The psalmist tells us that only fools declare that there is no God. He tells us that the truly wise will seek God. But he further tells us that no one really does, that we all turn away from God and do what is wrong. Despite our sinfulness and rejection of God, he will rescue us from evil and offer us the opportunity to be made right with Him. How appropriate that this psalm is part of my daily devotion while I am also reading Romans.

     There are several ways to look at this proverb. The first is straightforward. Helping the poor is lending to God. Surely we believe that God will repay His debts? If we believe that God will repay His debts, than we know that anything we give to the poor will come back to us with interest. There is another way to look at this proverb. Since everything we have is given to us by God, how can we even think twice when He asks us to give it to another?
     There are those who look at passages like this and see it as evidence that God will reward faithfulness with great worldly wealth, and sometimes He does. However, those who read these passages and see them as blueprints for acquiring worldly wealth miss out on an opportunity to gain gifts from God of much more value than worldly wealth.