Day 343 Bible Reading 

Zechariah 9: 9 

“Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion! Shout aloud, O daughter of Jerusalem! Behold, your king is coming to you; righteous and having salvation is he, humble and mounted on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey.” 

I love this line from Zechariah 9 since it reminds me of Jesus entering Jerusalem on Palm Sunday on a donkey. Would someone who was familiar with Zechariah have caught the significance of Jesus arriving on a donkey like a king from the Old Testament? It makes me wonder if they saw the similarity when it first happened, or later when they were remembering the event.

Day 342 Bible Reading

Jude 1: 9 (ESV)

But when the archangel Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, “The Lord rebuke you.”

This line from Jude 1 stood out for me today. I believe God is telling us that he is the ultimate judge of people. We cannot truthfully judge right from wrong and must rely on God to be the ultimate judge of what is people’s hearts. I know that I have often judged harshly the behavior of others in the past, but through prayer, I have come to see that I can only see their actions but not the truth of why a person did what they did. It is hard, but I am trying to have more compassion for people by telling myself that God will judge them. 

 Day 341 Bible Reading

Psalm 139: 16

“Your eyes saw my unformed substance; in your book were written, every one of them, the days that were formed for me, when as yet there were none of them.”

What struck about this line from Psalm 139 is how God has a plan for our lives even before we took form. He saw the plan he had for every day of our lives before they even happened. I think there is such a thing as free will because God lays out his plan before us, and yet he loves us so much that he still gives us a choice. We can choose at every moment whether to follow God’s plan for our life. I personally think God is the best game maker and strategist, who has mapped our every choice we could make and he also has a plan for every choice we might make. So no matter what choice we make, God has a plan for that choice. But I also think God had preferred choices for us, choices that will make up happy, and that if we make a wrong choice God has a plan to put us back on the right track.

I love the movie franchise “Final Destination”. It came up on my Max channel as a movie to watch before it disappears, so I watched it. I love how the writers of this movie came up with all the little ways that death eventually found the kids who cheated death, and the theory from the undertaker that death has a design.

It made me wonder if everything in life has a design, and we can either cheat the design or just go along with it. For example, I’m not feeling very well today. I’ve been on an eating junk food binge since Thanksgiving. I let myself eat whatever I wanted on Turkey day, and it’s been hard to get back on track with my very healthy way of eating.

So if I look at everything that led me to not feeling good today, the design of it all, it all started on Thanksgiving. Well, if I’m honest, t started with my September vacation. I went on vacation after Labor Day, and it was hard to keep to my normally healthy way of eating. I wasn’t at home, and I was at a conference. And when I’m on vacation, I like to indulge and take a break from my normal way of life.

So I gained 5 pounds that week. I was just beginning to lose it, when I went on my yearly camping trip in October. Camping for me is the worst place to stick to my healthy eating habits. I go camping with a group of friends, and two of our camping meals are potluck meals. And I have this thing with potlucks that I let myself eat whatever I want because it’s fun to taste the food that people cook and bring to that event. Plus, it’s a social occasion and it’s fun to eat all the food and then talk to people about all the dishes that were good to eat.

So that became another 5 pounds that I gained. Surprisingly, I managed to lose the camping weight gain very easily, but not the original 5 pounds from my September vacation. And then Thanksgiving rolled around. And then I’m like, okay, Christmas is coming up, and I’m not going to watch what I eat at all. I’ll deal with it in the new year because there are parties to go to from now until the end of the year.

Today was a party day. Went out with friends to eat and we did a cookie potluck, where everyone brings cookies to share. And I let myself taste all the cookies. BIG MISTAKE! And I’m paying for it now because I so do not feel good. Too much sugar at one time and a tasty but carbo-loaded meal.

I’m thinking about the design of it all, and a video pops up in my Youtube feed about an astronaut talking about his nutrition. It was like a sign. d a sign this morning, so I watched it. The astronaut said his nutritionist told him that the difference between two football teams who are tied at the end of the game, comes down to nutrition. Because when you’ve pushed yourself that hard for the whole game, and you now need a little more just to win the game, it’s your nutrition that is going to determine how well you play during those extra minutes.

So the design of my day, the design of my life since September has not been that great and now I feel horrible. If I had kept my good nutrition in place since September, I know I would be feeling very good right now. Instead, I feel like crap and semi-nauseous.

If there is a design to my life, the lesson is I have to design it better if I want to feel good and accomplish the things I want to do.