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| Jun 06, 2024
THE BIRTH of a newborn is a momentary event, taking place in a matter of hours, but at that moment, life has only just begun. Growth and maturity occur steadily and gradually as a child develops from infancy to young adulthood.
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| Jun 05, 2024
WHEN GOD paid His visit to Sodom and Gomorrah, these twin cities controlled a lush, fertile valley through which ran the Jordan River.
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| Jun 04, 2024
LIKE MANY PEOPLE, I approached prayer simplistically when I first learned how to pray. Ask God for what you want. If you ask Him correctly or impress Him sufficiently, He just might grant your request. Or not.
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| Jun 03, 2024
NEARLY TWENTY-FIVE years had passed since the Lord first spoke to Abram in Ur. Since then, his spiritual roots had pushed deep into the soil of faith in his God. At long last, he trusted in the Lord’s promise and rested in His sovereign will.
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| Jun 02, 2024
THIRTEEN YEARS passed, and Abram didn’t hear anything from God. There was no vision. There was no voice. There was no visit. Only silence. Try to imagine: complete silence on God’s part for thirteen years.
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| Jun 01, 2024
BY THE TIME Ishmael arrived, Abram had turned eighty-six. If we skip ahead to read about the birth of Isaac, the true son of Abram’s covenant with God, we’ll see Abram was one hundred years old then.
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| May 31, 2024
WHEN LOT was making a decision about which land to choose, he didn’t consider God as a factor in shaping his future. He made all his calculations based upon the potential influences of nature and humanity.
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| May 30, 2024
MOST OF US rise to meet adversity with our best character. However, our true character comes out when things go really well. It’s easy to become arrogant, self-sustaining, conceited, greedy, and condescending at such times.
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| May 29, 2024
ABRAM LIED to Pharaoh to save his own skin, telling him that Sarai was his sister. In doing so, he put her in jeopardy. But where he failed to protect his wife, the Lord overwhelmingly succeeded in doing so.
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| May 28, 2024
FOR ABRAM, this season of hunger represented a major test. While God didn’t cause the famine, He certainly used it as an instrument in the development of Abram’s faith.
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| May 27, 2024
AFTER SPENDING much of his life—perhaps from birth—in Ur of the Chaldeans, Abram was instructed by God to go to a place to be disclosed later.
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| May 26, 2024
GOD’S CALL of Abram began with an imperative—a clear command. God told him to leave his country for a land that He would show him . . . sometime later.
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| May 25, 2024
Even though I have known people like this, still, I cannot fathom Saul's perspective. How can anyone be so clueless?
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| May 24, 2024
Saul's disobedient actions involved at least three major errors. First, kings weren't supposed to offer sacrifices on behalf of the community. Kings could offer sacrifices for themselves, but never for the nation.
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| May 23, 2024
When the people located their new king, they celebrated. And why not? This was a glorious day. Saul was tall, strong, modest, and had the full support of his nation. From a human point of view, this was a beautiful start to a new era.
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| May 22, 2024
From the time that Joshua died until Saul took the throne of Israel, the Hebrew government was not a monarchy like most surrounding nations. Theologians refer to it as a theocracy—"God-rule."
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| May 21, 2024
The temptation of any child of vocational Christian ministers is to see the work of the ministry as just another thing, just another religious occupation.
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| May 20, 2024
Eli was a great preacher, a fine priest. As the high priest, he was responsible, once each year, to enter the Most Holy Place and offer an atoning sacrifice on behalf of the nation. No one else had that privilege.
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| May 19, 2024
Eli and Samuel were probably taking their turn sleeping in the tabernacle to keep the lamp lit. They slept in little rooms or closets near that special area of God's presence.
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| May 18, 2024
The setting is Israel before the glory days of King David. There has been a long period—a couple hundred years—of intermittent warfare, cycles of events during which Israel would suffer invasion followed by famine.
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