John the Baptist

love reading the Bible, I am so sure that most of you know that.  I read through the Bible each year, usually using a different translation so I don’t get bored. You see, reading the same translation year after year seems like I stop comprehending because I know it from former readings.  So, this year I am reading the New Living Translation.  Easy reading and easy to understand.  This works for me because February of 2025, I had a TIA.  Although I continued on with life more or less as usual, I realized that I had some brain issues…focusing, comprehension to an extent, exhaustion, difficulty in reading…most people around me never even noticed.  Even my doctor said I was sharp, for my age, but I know differently.  Thus, I am just starting to write again.

This morning I read Luke 2-3.  Since this is my 39^th time of reading through the Bible, you know that I’ve read this many times before but today…John the Baptist’s words made me want to write—to share the importance of what I read.

“You brood of snakes! Who warned you to flee the coming wrath?  Prove by the way you live that you have repented of your sins and turned to God.” (Luke 3:7b-8a)

“Yes, every tree that does not produce good fruit will be chopped down and thrown into the fire.” (Luke 3:9b)

Chapter 3 of Luke tells us the importance of John the Baptist.  As he was baptizing the people, he assures the people that he is not the Messiah.  He lays the requirements (not sure that’s the right word) out “people should be baptized to show that they had repented of their sins and turned to God to be forgiven.” (Luke 3:3b)

What must we do to have eternal life?  Show that you have repented by being baptized.  Repent and turn to God.  Proof of repentance is a change in your heart shown by the way you live.  We must produce good fruit!  That can only come about by doing God’s will.

And how do we know what God wants us to do? By reading the whole Word of God daily, year in and year out.  Hiding His Word in your heart and mind.  Bible Studies are good and you grow from that study.  Your pastor’s sermons are good and you are challenged.  But, I’m telling you, reading the Bible daily will change you in ways that you never thought possible!

Do you know the best part about what John the Baptist is teaching here?  We find this idea of turning from sin and turning to God, Who is so willing to forgive us, and this will be evident by how we act!  Of course, James points out “faith is dead without good works.” (James 2:26b) 

Many of us know the Ephesians 2:8-10 passage, “God saved you by His grace when you believed.  And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God.  Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.  For we are God’s masterpiece.  He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago.”  Isn’t that powerful?  When we repent, turn away from our old ways and to God, Jesus is there to walk us through a whole new life.  A life, led by the Holy Spirit, to want to submit to what we are being called to do. 

As we read the Bible, that same Holy Spirit guides each of us towards the direction that He can use us.  The direction that He’s leading me may not be the direction that He’s leading you.  But it will never go against God’s precious Word. 

So, if you say you belong to Jesus and that He lives in your heart, you are a new person in Christ Jesus, that old life of drinking, drugs, smoking, swearing, addictions, and so on, is in the past and you are called to a new life in Christ.  I can guarantee you, it’s not easy, we have to work, letting go of our former self.  We have to seek the Lord day in and day out, for He speaks to us through His Word. 

My desire for this coming year, 2027, is to challenge as many people as I can to read through the Bible in 2027.  Will you take the challenge?  I want you to know that I am here to cheer you on.  When you can hardly read another page of genealogy, or you feel like you are reading the same history over and over, please remember that I and many others have been there.  You can contact me by email at manager@afaeoriginal.com or for those who have my phone number, please call.  I can not begin to tell you how much I want each of you to experience the love of reading the Bible like I experience. 

The change in my heart and life over all these years.  To experience the Love of the Father and His grace as I have gone to Him in repentance.  Yes, I want that for each of you. 

God’s Promises Are for All Time

In Genesis the Lord God calls Abram to “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you”.  Abram was just an ordinary person, just like you and I.  Yet, in obedience he did as the Lord told him, at 75 years old.  God gave him a promise, “I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great and you will be a blessing.  (Gen 12:2) and just a little further in verse 7, “The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land”. 

And then the journey begins.  Abram escaped to Egypt when there was a famine in the land that God gave him.  Then the situation with Lot and Abram has to go rescue his nephew.   In this we are presented with the principle to “give a tenth of all you have to God”, see Genesis 14:20b. 

When you don’t think things could get any worse, Abram still hasn’t gotten a son from his dear wife, Sarai.  As women often do, Sarai presented a solution to Abram but in the end, it led to much worse problems and we are introduced to Hagar who has Abram’s son, Ishmael. 

It is only later, when Abram is given a new name of Abraham, and receives the Covenant of Circumcision that God gives a conditional covenant “you must keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you for the generations to come…Every male among you shall be circumcised.”

Later, Abraham and Sarah (her new name) have seen the angels, pleads for even ten righteous people to be spared, that these angels promise that Sarah will be pregnant and give birth to a son.  In their unbelief because of their age, God asks, “Is there anything too hard for the Lord?”

Abraham is asked to send Ishmael away and later is tested as God asks Abraham to sacrifice Isaac as a burnt offering.  Of course, I am leaving large amounts of the story out but I want you to get the picture that once Abraham was called by God, things were not an easy road.  “God Himself will provide the lamb…” (Gen 22:8)

So far, we see that God provided Abraham with the promised son, Isaac, who had 12 sons and Ishmael, who also had 12 sons.  This is the beginning of the hostility that we see today in the Middle East.

We continue to look at God’s promise… “I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land.  I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you.” (Gen 28:15)

You must have this foundation in order to have a better understanding of the history of Israel before Christ.  Yes, the Israelites were disobedient and “did what was right in their own eyes”---just like you and I.  But God promised Abraham that the land he was sent to was his “seed” for all generations.  So, although God punished the Israelites, He always left a remnant that would follow the bloodline from the promise to Jesus.  And I am so thankful that I see His promises kept for without that, I would have no hope!  I am not any different than the Israelites, I often go my own way…and whether you want to admit it or not, you do too. 

It is for this very reason that we should be so thankful for Jesus.  First, that God kept His promise to Abraham and always preserved the “seed” to would one day bring us our Savior Jesus. 

We need to be so thankful for the blood that Jesus sheds for us.  When we are proud because we are not acting like those Israelites…may the scales fall off your eye and know that we are just like them.  God didn’t make a mistake and put that history in the Bible to make us prideful.  Oh no, it was to humble us. 

As for modern Israel, even though most are atheist, we must remember they are God’s people and one day every knee will bow down to recognize Jesus and every tongue will confess that He is Lord!  The time is coming.

In the meantime, should you be judging the sinners of the world because you, in your pride, can point out a few Scriptures of how they should be acting?

Unless you are reading the entire Word of God daily, systematically through the Bible, you are not getting the whole of what God wants each of us to learn from His Word.  The New Testament explains much of the Old Testament and the Old explains the New…they compliment one another.  Not just bits and pieces here and there but the understanding of reading it all is eye opening.  Without it, you only know in part.  It teaches us that we all have sinned and come short of God’s glory.  It teaches us humility, and patience for all mankind, kindness and goodness, gentleness and self-control.  Myself, I am certainly not there yet but do hope that when the day comes that I take my last breath, I will be pleasing to my Lord.

Words Matter

After church this morning, I listened to Curtis Bowers “Agenda Weekly”.  If you haven’t heard of Agenda Weekly or Curtis, I would encourage you to look him up and take the time to listen to what he has to say each week.  He pretty much gives a Christian World view to what is happening in these United States and the world. 

Curtis read an email that he had gotten from a listener who thought that he used the word “stupid” too much and Curtis apologized and admitted that he needed to come up with a different word. 

Many year ago, when I was doing quite a bit of substitute teaching, I walked into an art room one morning and saw a sign that said “Do Not use the “s” word”.  They say curiosity killed the cat but being curious, I had to ask the first class what the “s” word was…they were hesitant to say the word but I really did want to know.  As some of you probably have guess, the word was stupid.  Because of that long-ago incident, I had decided that I wouldn’t use that word as much as I did. 

When you decide to not use a word, you can get a thesaurus and see what they suggest to use instead of the word you no longer want to use.  Well, I didn’t do that.  Seems like I often stumble through life rather than go the easy way out.  But as most of you know, I have read the Bible through each year for many years and the one thing I noticed when I would read Proverbs is that the word “fool” was used to denote a stupid person.  With that in mind, I often have used food in my every day conversation or even in writing. 

After I heard Curtis say that he heeded to come up with a different word, I went to my Bible.  I am reading a little differently this year.  Rather than starting in Genesis and finishing in December in Revelation, this year I read one chapter starting in Genesis, one chapter from Psalms, one chapter from Proverbs and then go to the New Testament and started reading one chapter daily (started with Matthew).  I wasn’t sure how I would like all this jumping around but I am enjoying it immensely.  What I am really enjoying is the added Psalm and Proverb each day…getting a little bit of the heart of God and the wisdom of God each day.  It will take three months to get through Psalms and then I will start over, it only takes a month to go through Proverbs so I will (hopefully) gain a lot of wisdom this year being in Proverbs daily. 

I am using a new Bible this year but a version that I’ve read many times before.  I cannot read the same version yearly without spacing out so I do switch versions every year or so.  This Bible is kind of special in that my old New International Version was ragged and pages were falling out but I had decided half-way through last year that I wanted to use the NIV.  And do you know what the Lord did for me?  I went to a house sale late last summer just to see what they had.  There, only a few steps inside the door, was a NIV Study Bible still in its original wrappings and in a leather zipper cover for…are you ready for this?  $3.00!  Brand New!  I had my Bible for 2025. 

With all that background, I will tell you I am enjoying this Bible very much.  I haven’t used the study notes as much as I could because the other thing I do is mark my Bible up with different colors for different subjects so that’s kept my attention much of the time.   But Proverbs (now that I am in my second time of reading it this year) does allow me to now look at the study notes more often.  Anyone who knows me knows that I am not a big “word” person in that I don’t want to look up words in their Greek or Hebrew or whatever but this study Bible has some interesting notes on just plain English words. 

I would like to share some of these words with you because it might help use a different word instead of one that the world seems to use constantly. 

Fools:  those who hate knowledge (Pro 1:22), of correction of any kind (Pro 20:3) and “give full vent” to their anger (Pro 29:11), who are complacent (Pro 29:32) and who trust themselves (Pro 28:26 rather than in God (Ps 14:1). 

Mockers:  Those who are proud and arrogant (Pro 21:24), who are full of insults, hatred and strife (Pro 9:7-8; 22:10; 29:8), who resist correction (Pro 13:1; 15:12) even though they deserve flogging (Pro 19:23; 2`:11).

Simple: those easily persuaded and who “lack judgment” (Pro 9:4, 16), who are immature, inexperienced and naïve (Pro 19:7).

Ignorant:  those who ignore God (1 Cor 15:34; 2 Pet 3:16). 

Wisdom: skill in living—following God’s design and thus avoiding moral pitfalls.  A grantsman can be called a wise (skilled) man (Ex 31:3).  Proverbs urges people to get wisdom (4:5), for it is worth more than silver or gold (Pro 3:13-14).  The NT refers to Christ as “wisdom from God”  (1 Cor 1:30; Col 2:3). 

Prudence:  good judgment or good sense (Pro 15:5; 9:25).  Outside Proverbs the Hebrew word is used in the negative sense of “shrewd” or “crafty” (Gen3:1; Job 5:15). 

With this little bit of insight, I hope this will draw you ever closer to reading the Word of God daily.  It is exciting no matter if it’s your first time or your 38th time!