Day 340 Bible Reading

Proverbs 29: 25

“The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe.”

This line from Proverbs 29 struck me as very profound. Is fear a snare? Sometimes it appears to be. Fear of whatever can you lead some very interesting and sometimes dark paths. One begins to imagine one scenario and then another until it becomes a continuous fear loop. Perhaps some of the scenarios to be fearful of are justified, but other scenarios seem to stem from one’s imagination or often borrowed from other past traumas that have nothing to do with the present fear. Fear truly sems like a snare swing you from fear to fear without rhyme or reason.

But if you trust God, then he’s like that brilliant award winning movie/theater director on the live stage that is your life who yells “CUT”. God then comes over to talks to you and says “What was that about? What made you go there? Does that action have anything to do with the person you are now?” So instead of swinging dangerously from fear scenario to fear scenario, where you could fall into depression, anxiety, addictive impulses, etc; you stop and think “God is right. Let me rethink my fear scenario exploration.” And you remember that God loves you because you are amazing person, you are a child of God, and with him, you can conquer your fear and the world.

Day 339 Bible Reading

1 John 5: 4

“For everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith.”

I love this line from 1 John 5. We are all born of God, but it is faith that helps up to overcome the world. When I look at how I have overcome any challenge in my life, I always needed faith to do it. Sometimes it was a little faith, but other times I needed as much faith as I could muster to overcome the difficult challenges in my life. And Jesus was my role model for faith. Jesus had so much faith in himself and his disciples. He never gave up. He kept on going even though there wasn’t any physical evidence to back him up. His faith never wavered.

 Day 338 Bible Reading

I John 4: 7

“Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.”

I have heard this line from 1 John 4 many times, but today it struck me because as a believer in Christ God is our role model for how to love. We read of many examples in the Bible of how God loves his people, even though they often disobeyed him and did not follow his laws. God’s nature in the Bible is shown to be forgiving and generous. He sees our faults, but in the end he still loves us anyway. God seems to let his people do what they want, so they have free will to follow their desires. He then watches his people to see what we will do with our free will and free choices. Like a good parent or a good marriage partner, God’s love never wavers even when we make mistakes and make bad choices.

 Day 337 Bible Reading

1 John 4: 2-3

“By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God.”

I like this passage from 1 John 4 because I am sometimes reminded that the friends whom I can rely on the most have the same love of Christ that I have. There always seems to be a sympatico between myself and another person who believes in Christ. We speak the same the same language, have the same values, and look at life in similar ways. I do have friends who do not follow Christ, but our friendship does not seem to go as deep as with my friends who do believe in Jesus Christ. Belief in Jesus Christ adds a very deep and profound layer to any friendship and maybe it has something to do with the Bible passage from Matthew 18:20; “For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” When there is a friendship between two believers of Christ, he is always there between them.