Earth Is Crammed With Heaven-Live Barefoot!

 Today's Thankful in All Things   verse is Psalm 119:71  "It is good for me that I was afflicted, that I might learn your statutes." ESV Earlier today as I scrolled Facebook while waiting for my doctor to log onto my Telehealth appointment, there was a post that caught my attention by Ben Bennet  that used several slides to point out the different types of people often mentioned in Proverbs, and how by categorizing people by these three characteristics, we will know how to engage.  But what if we also took a look at ourselves and assessed how often we fall into these same categories.  The three descriptors he used are: the wise, the foolish and the wicked. It was the verse from his slide on the foolish person that I thought of alongside my verse in Psalm 119 today.   This led me to go back to the book of Proverbs and look at some definitions I had written in the margins for the three different people listed in the beginning of the 1:21 says,...

  Today's "Thankful in all things" (pinned on my page) verse is Job 1:20-22 "Then Job stood up, tore his robe, and shaved his head. He fell to the ground and worshiped, saying: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will return. The LORD gave, and the LORD has taken away. Blessed be the name of the LORD.” In all this, Job did not sin or charge God with wrongdoing." This is what Job proclaimed right after losing all the things he had spent his life working to achieve. The culmination of his life's ambition, goals, and even his future legacy, in the death of all his children. All that remained was his home, his unbelieving wife, and a handful of servants. Job is one of my favorite books. I comprehend it best whenever reading it in the NLT or even the NiRV. After losing all of that, then his health is attacked. He has to endure all this internal suffering, (because even whenever our faith is great, even whenever we view God as supreme and sovereign, ...

 An online Bible study/marking group that I'm in has been giving us prayer prompts lately stemming from a word thread post we used earlier on the word darkness . Each day the moderator will post a verse from that thread to prompt us to use in order to pray Scripture. Today the verse was Luke 11:35, "Make sure that the light you think you have is not actually darkness."  I have meditated on this verse most of the day. I even took a nap and dusted a few trinkets I keep in my windowsill, before the Spirit brought to mind something I had learned earlier this year and that is the idea of Satan in the ancient near east mindset, as the Shining One. Paul, a Hebrew of Hebrews, wrote in 2 Corinthians 11:14, "Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light".  What's interesting is the verses surrounding my prompt verse in Luke 11 speak of vision, and the importance of having a "good eye" vs a "bad eye" or that your vision be "healthy" vs ...

 Back in mid-April , during my Bible study time, the Spirit impressed upon my heart, that in my reluctance to accept and be content with my new dietary restrictions because of my intestinal dysmotility and gastropareses, I was essentially being like the Israelites in Num 11 & 21.  Not only does this medical issue cause me a limited diet, or else face painful consequences. It also requires new habits, like walking. A lot. Like 4-5 miles a day to help food move through my system. My walking pad that I purchased in January bit the dust, so it's back to walking outside, in this oppressive heat. Much like the desert the Israelites wandered, I'm sure.  I've recently began listening to Billy Graham sermons as I walk and today one of his sermons was on accountability and what transpired in Genesis 3. As I listened, the Spirit again impressed on my heart that Eve's sin was discontentment. She was in paradise. She could eat of any tree but that of the tree of the knowledge of...

 Sunday, June 15, 2025 Prayer - "Call to me and I will answer you and will tell you great and hidden things that you have not known." Jeremiah 33:3 The word for "call" used here in Hebrew is Strong's 7121, qara' (קָרָא), and carries the idea of reflecting on His name. In Hebrew a name (shem) is a one-word summation of the totality of a person. Qara' is first used in Gen Chapter One where we see God "called" the light day, the darkness night, the expanse heaven and the dry land earth. He brings the animals before Adam to see what he might "qara'" them. To qara' serves as a declaration of purpose or function, of identity.  I find it interesting that the preceding verse here in Jeremiah also directs us back to God's role in creation. "Thus says the LORD who made the earth, the LORD who formed it to establish it --the LORD is His name (shem)." There are two places in Exodus where God reveals His name to us. In Exodus...

 Yesterday as I was going through my "verse of the day" type calendars for the month of May. The one with a focus on mother's sent me to 2 Timothy 1:5 "I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well." Vocabulary and word study is predominantly what my study time is focused on. It has a way of opening up the Word of God and drawing me in as I meditate on its meaning(s). Yesterday, the word for dwell stood out to me.  Let me back up a little to say that there are certain passages of Scripture that take up permanent residence in my mind. I may not have them memorized but the topic and the teaching is there. John 15 contains one of those passages. It's the "abide" chapter, where Jesus tells His disciples (and therefore us) to abide in Him and He will abide in us. Some translations will say "remain".  Whenever I read this verse, I conn...

The Hebrew language always fascinates me with the way it breathes new meaning into old stories, making them new. For the past day or so, the Lord has had me in the early chapters of Genesis. Originally the lesson was on the Hebrew word for "name" being "shem." And how in Hebrew there's the understanding that it isn't just what someone is called, it's a " one word summation of the totality of a person " to quote Chad Bird. In Hebrew thought it was also about prophecy and how whenever a child was given a name, it would reflect their parent's hopes for the child's nature and future destiny. It's interesting the name Noah chose to give his eldest son, was simply "Shem" who was the progenitor of the Semitic people from whom God's chosen people came. Strong's says the name "Shem" is "often associated with the concept of " renown ," reflecting the importance of legacy and reputation in biblical na...

 Monday, April 14, 2025 5:00 a.m. Yesterday I mentioned that the discourse between Moses and the LORD that takes place in Exodus 33:12-34:9 has been lingering in my mind.  A few days ago, I came across an old post from Katie Davis Majors  that referenced 1 Samual 12:20 & 22 "Do not be afraid,” Samuel replied. “You have done all that is evil, yet do not turn away from the Lord with all your heart… for the sake of His great name the Lord will not reject His people, because the Lord was pleased to make you His own." So much is said here, but what caught my attention was the phrase, "for the sake of His great name." It's in Exodus 34 that the LORD tells us His name and expounds on it a bit further than what He had told Moses back in Exodus 3:14-15, "God said to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I AM has sent me to you.’ God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers, the G...

Sunday, April 13, 2025 9:30p.m. The Spirit called me to the exchange that took place between Moses and the LORD in Exodus 33 and 34 , several weeks ago (March 20th) and it has lingered there in the back of my mind ever since. This morning the Unveiling Mercy devotion dealt with the way Moses' face shone after speaking "face to face" with the Lord.  And it was no small thing then, whenever the Instagram account of Ruth de Jesus  made the connection also to this place in Scripture to Romans 3:23. Paul tells us, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." The Greek word is hustereó and it means  to lack , to fall short, to be in need , to fail.    In Exodus 34:6 we read all that we're lacking and all that we're in desperate need of when the LORD proclaims his very nature. He is, "The Lord—the Lord is a compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger and abounding in faithful love and truth, maintaining faithful love to a thousand generatio...

Thursday, April 10, 2025 10:30 a.m. The more and more I read and study God's word the more fascinating I find it, and Him.  Today my Jesus Calling devotion referenced  Psalm 40:2  "He lifted me up from the pit of despair , out of the miry clay; He set my feet upon a rock, and made my footsteps firm."  Because of the conversation I've been having with the Lord in my prayer journal, this verse called to me. Not because of personal despair, but because of intercessory prayer He's called me to offer for others.  The Hebrew language is so intriguing to me. I was thinking today about how often, my time with the Lord and in His Word, feels a little like an Escape Room. I enter into the Word but in order to find the deeper meaning I have to search for clues. There's plenty of surface information, but there's often a deeper hidden meaning, if you take the time to search it out. It's also very multifaceted, having many applications.  I'm learning that the H...