×
A devotional bible commentary
in partnership with
Join Us!
Join Us!

Today’s Reading

Devotional: Psalm 144

Verses 12-14 of Psalm 144 picture an idyllic situation in the land: sons and daughters multiplying and healthy, barns filled with produce, cattle filling the fields, trade flourishing, military defenses secure, freedom from some regional superpower, basic prosperity and contentment in the streets. What will bring about these conditions?

The answer is summarized in the last verse: “Blessed are the people of whom this is true; blessed are the people whose God is YAHWEH” (Ps. 144:15). This last line means more than that these people happen to have preferred a certain brand of religion. It means, rather, that if this God — the one true God — owns a people — a people who in confessing him as their God trust him and worship him and obey him — that people is blessed indeed. And because this last verse is a summarizing verse, the unpacking of this notion is found in the rest of the psalm.

The psalm opens in praise to “the LORD my Rock” — a symbol that is evocative of absolute stability and security. This God trains the hands of the king for war: that is, his providential rule works through the means of supplying and strengthening those whose responsibility it is to provide the national defense, while they for their part rely on him and do not pretend their military prowess is somehow a sign of innate superiority (Ps. 144:1-2). Far from it: human beings are fleeting, nothing but passing shadows (Ps. 144:3-4). What we must have is the presence of the Sovereign of the universe, his powerful intervention: “Part your heavens, O LORD, and come down; touch the mountains, so that they smoke” (Ps. 144:5). When the Lord takes a hand, David and his people are rescued from danger, oppression, and deceit (Ps. 144:7-8). What this evokes is fresh praise “to the One who gives victory to kings, who delivers his servant David” (Ps. 144:10). When God takes a hand, the result is the security and fruitfulness described in verses 10-15.

Here is a balance rarely understood — still more rarely achieved. It applies every bit as much to, say, revival in the church, as it applies to the security and prosperity of the ancient nation of Israel. On the one hand, there is a deep recognition that what is needed is for the Lord to rend the heavens and come down. But on the other hand, this generates no passivity or fatalism, for David is confident that the Lord’s strength enables him to fight successfully. What we do not need is an arrogant “can do” mentality that tacks God onto the end, or a clichéd spirituality that confuses passion with passivity. What we do need is the power of the sovereign, transforming God.

Devotional: Jeremiah 5

Here I shall briefly reflect on a number of elements of the depravity to which the citizens of Judah had succumbed (Jer. 5):

(1) God challenges Jeremiah to find a single honest man on the streets of Jerusalem (Jer. 5:1), anticipating the search of Diogenes in the Greek world. Even one such person would have been enough, according to God, to forestall judgment on the city. But of course that is another way of saying how slippery the moral life of the city had become, how extensive the sin was, how insincerity and moral corrosion had damaged the city’s children.

(2) Initially Jeremiah thinks that perhaps the negative results of his search could be laid at the door of the disadvantages of the lower classes. Of course, even the poor were supposed to know and keep the Law of God, but it is compassionate to make allowances. So Jeremiah goes off to examine the sophisticated, the privileged, the articulate—and finds no less moral rot there than elsewhere (Jer. 5:4–5). Intelligent sinners use their intelligence to sin; sophisticated sinners concoct sophisticated reasons for thinking sin is not sin; upper-crust sinners indulge in upper-crust sin. “But with one accord they too had broken off the yoke and torn off the bonds” (Jer. 5:5).

(3) The common stance toward God is that he is absent or ineffective (Jer. 5:12); the common stance toward genuine prophets is that they are windbags (Jer. 5:13). So God will bring about catastrophic judgment to show his power, and he will speak to the people in the words of a foreign language (Jer. 5:14–17). They so much love to serve foreign gods in their own land; they will henceforth serve foreigners in a land not their own (Jer. 5:19).

(4) By and large, the people have learned nothing from God’s wise and generous providential care (Jer. 5:24). Equally they have learned nothing from the times when God has chastened them by depriving them of harvest (Jer. 5:25). Whether he is gentle or firm, whether he is generously forbearing or promptly just, they ignore him or rebel against him. What is he to do? Sooner or later he must respond to the violence, deceit, and corruption in the coinage of punishment (Jer. 5:26–29).

(5) There may be hope for the people of God when their leaders call them back to faithfulness and integrity, or when the people try to check and remove errant leaders. But what do we have here? “A horrible and shocking thing has happened in the land: The prophets prophesy lies, the priests rule by their own authority, and my people love it this way [cf. 2 Tim. 3:1–7]. But what will you do in the end?” (Jer. 5:31).

How many of these elements are playing out today?

Joshua 11

Conquests in Northern Canaan

11:1 When Jabin, king of Hazor, heard of this, he sent to Jobab king of Madon, and to the king of Shimron, and to the king of Achshaph, and to the kings who were in the northern hill country, and in the Arabah south of Chinneroth, and in the lowland, and in Naphoth-dor on the west, to the Canaanites in the east and the west, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, and the Jebusites in the hill country, and the Hivites under Hermon in the land of Mizpah. And they came out with all their troops, a great horde, in number like the sand that is on the seashore, with very many horses and chariots. And all these kings joined their forces and came and encamped together at the waters of Merom to fight against Israel.

And the LORD said to Joshua, “Do not be afraid of them, for tomorrow at this time I will give over all of them, slain, to Israel. You shall hamstring their horses and burn their chariots with fire.” So Joshua and all his warriors came suddenly against them by the waters of Merom and fell upon them. And the LORD gave them into the hand of Israel, who struck them and chased them as far as Great Sidon and Misrephoth-maim, and eastward as far as the Valley of Mizpeh. And they struck them until he left none remaining. And Joshua did to them just as the LORD said to him: he hamstrung their horses and burned their chariots with fire.

10 And Joshua turned back at that time and captured Hazor and struck its king with the sword, for Hazor formerly was the head of all those kingdoms. 11 And they struck with the sword all who were in it, devoting them to destruction;1 there was none left that breathed. And he burned Hazor with fire. 12 And all the cities of those kings, and all their kings, Joshua captured, and struck them with the edge of the sword, devoting them to destruction, just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded. 13 But none of the cities that stood on mounds did Israel burn, except Hazor alone; that Joshua burned. 14 And all the spoil of these cities and the livestock, the people of Israel took for their plunder. But every person they struck with the edge of the sword until they had destroyed them, and they did not leave any who breathed. 15 Just as the LORD had commanded Moses his servant, so Moses commanded Joshua, and so Joshua did. He left nothing undone of all that the LORD had commanded Moses.

16 So Joshua took all that land, the hill country and all the Negeb and all the land of Goshen and the lowland and the Arabah and the hill country of Israel and its lowland 17 from Mount Halak, which rises toward Seir, as far as Baal-gad in the Valley of Lebanon below Mount Hermon. And he captured all their kings and struck them and put them to death. 18 Joshua made war a long time with all those kings. 19 There was not a city that made peace with the people of Israel except the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon. They took them all in battle. 20 For it was the LORD's doing to harden their hearts that they should come against Israel in battle, in order that they should be devoted to destruction and should receive no mercy but be destroyed, just as the LORD commanded Moses.

21 And Joshua came at that time and cut off the Anakim from the hill country, from Hebron, from Debir, from Anab, and from all the hill country of Judah, and from all the hill country of Israel. Joshua devoted them to destruction with their cities. 22 There was none of the Anakim left in the land of the people of Israel. Only in Gaza, in Gath, and in Ashdod did some remain. 23 So Joshua took the whole land, according to all that the LORD had spoken to Moses. And Joshua gave it for an inheritance to Israel according to their tribal allotments. And the land had rest from war.

Footnotes

[1] 11:11 That is, setting apart (devoting) as an offering to the Lord (for destruction); also verses 12, 20, 21

(ESV)

Psalm 144

My Rock and My Fortress

Of David.

144:1   Blessed be the LORD, my rock,
    who trains my hands for war,
    and my fingers for battle;
  he is my steadfast love and my fortress,
    my stronghold and my deliverer,
  my shield and he in whom I take refuge,
    who subdues peoples1 under me.
  O LORD, what is man that you regard him,
    or the son of man that you think of him?
  Man is like a breath;
    his days are like a passing shadow.
  Bow your heavens, O LORD, and come down!
    Touch the mountains so that they smoke!
  Flash forth the lightning and scatter them;
    send out your arrows and rout them!
  Stretch out your hand from on high;
    rescue me and deliver me from the many waters,
    from the hand of foreigners,
  whose mouths speak lies
    and whose right hand is a right hand of falsehood.
  I will sing a new song to you, O God;
    upon a ten-stringed harp I will play to you,
10   who gives victory to kings,
    who rescues David his servant from the cruel sword.
11   Rescue me and deliver me
    from the hand of foreigners,
  whose mouths speak lies
    and whose right hand is a right hand of falsehood.
12   May our sons in their youth
    be like plants full grown,
  our daughters like corner pillars
    cut for the structure of a palace;
13   may our granaries be full,
    providing all kinds of produce;
  may our sheep bring forth thousands
    and ten thousands in our fields;
14   may our cattle be heavy with young,
    suffering no mishap or failure in bearing;2
  may there be no cry of distress in our streets!
15   Blessed are the people to whom such blessings fall!
    Blessed are the people whose God is the LORD!

Footnotes

[1] 144:2 Many Hebrew manuscripts, Dead Sea Scroll, Jerome, Syriac, Aquila; most Hebrew manuscripts subdues my people
[2] 144:14 Hebrew with no breaking in or going out

(ESV)

Jeremiah 5

Jerusalem Refused to Repent

5:1   Run to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem,
    look and take note!
  Search her squares to see
    if you can find a man,
  one who does justice
    and seeks truth,
  that I may pardon her.
  Though they say, “As the LORD lives,”
    yet they swear falsely.
  O LORD, do not your eyes look for truth?
  You have struck them down,
    but they felt no anguish;
  you have consumed them,
    but they refused to take correction.
  They have made their faces harder than rock;
    they have refused to repent.
  Then I said, “These are only the poor;
    they have no sense;
  for they do not know the way of the LORD,
    the justice of their God.
  I will go to the great
    and will speak to them,
  for they know the way of the LORD,
    the justice of their God.”
  But they all alike had broken the yoke;
    they had burst the bonds.
  Therefore a lion from the forest shall strike them down;
    a wolf from the desert shall devastate them.
  A leopard is watching their cities;
    everyone who goes out of them shall be torn in pieces,
  because their transgressions are many,
    their apostasies are great.
  “How can I pardon you?
    Your children have forsaken me
    and have sworn by those who are no gods.
  When I fed them to the full,
    they committed adultery
    and trooped to the houses of whores.
  They were well-fed, lusty stallions,
    each neighing for his neighbor's wife.
  Shall I not punish them for these things?
      declares the LORD;
    and shall I not avenge myself
    on a nation such as this?
10   “Go up through her vine rows and destroy,
    but make not a full end;
  strip away her branches,
    for they are not the LORD's.
11   For the house of Israel and the house of Judah
    have been utterly treacherous to me,
      declares the LORD.
12   They have spoken falsely of the LORD
    and have said, ‘He will do nothing;
  no disaster will come upon us,
    nor shall we see sword or famine.
13   The prophets will become wind;
    the word is not in them.
  Thus shall it be done to them!’”

The Lord Proclaims Judgment

14   Therefore thus says the LORD, the God of hosts:
  “Because you have spoken this word,
  behold, I am making my words in your mouth a fire,
    and this people wood, and the fire shall consume them.
15   Behold, I am bringing against you
    a nation from afar, O house of Israel,
      declares the LORD.
  It is an enduring nation;
    it is an ancient nation,
  a nation whose language you do not know,
    nor can you understand what they say.
16   Their quiver is like an open tomb;
    they are all mighty warriors.
17   They shall eat up your harvest and your food;
    they shall eat up your sons and your daughters;
  they shall eat up your flocks and your herds;
    they shall eat up your vines and your fig trees;
  your fortified cities in which you trust
    they shall beat down with the sword.”

18 “But even in those days, declares the LORD, I will not make a full end of you. 19 And when your people say, ‘Why has the LORD our God done all these things to us?’ you shall say to them, ‘As you have forsaken me and served foreign gods in your land, so you shall serve foreigners in a land that is not yours.’”

20   Declare this in the house of Jacob;
    proclaim it in Judah:
21   “Hear this, O foolish and senseless people,
    who have eyes, but see not,
    who have ears, but hear not.
22   Do you not fear me? declares the LORD.
    Do you not tremble before me?
  I placed the sand as the boundary for the sea,
    a perpetual barrier that it cannot pass;
  though the waves toss, they cannot prevail;
    though they roar, they cannot pass over it.
23   But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart;
    they have turned aside and gone away.
24   They do not say in their hearts,
    ‘Let us fear the LORD our God,
  who gives the rain in its season,
    the autumn rain and the spring rain,
  and keeps for us
    the weeks appointed for the harvest.’
25   Your iniquities have turned these away,
    and your sins have kept good from you.
26   For wicked men are found among my people;
    they lurk like fowlers lying in wait.1
  They set a trap;
    they catch men.
27   Like a cage full of birds,
    their houses are full of deceit;
  therefore they have become great and rich;
28     they have grown fat and sleek.
  They know no bounds in deeds of evil;
    they judge not with justice
  the cause of the fatherless, to make it prosper,
    and they do not defend the rights of the needy.
29   Shall I not punish them for these things?
      declares the LORD,
    and shall I not avenge myself
    on a nation such as this?”
30   An appalling and horrible thing
    has happened in the land:
31   the prophets prophesy falsely,
    and the priests rule at their direction;
  my people love to have it so,
    but what will you do when the end comes?

Footnotes

[1] 5:26 The meaning of the Hebrew is uncertain

(ESV)

Matthew 19

Teaching About Divorce

19:1 Now when Jesus had finished these sayings, he went away from Galilee and entered the region of Judea beyond the Jordan. And large crowds followed him, and he healed them there.

And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.” They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?” He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”1

10 The disciples said to him, “If such is the case of a man with his wife, it is better not to marry.” 11 But he said to them, “Not everyone can receive this saying, but only those to whom it is given. 12 For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven. Let the one who is able to receive this receive it.”

Let the Children Come to Me

13 Then children were brought to him that he might lay his hands on them and pray. The disciples rebuked the people, 14 but Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven.” 15 And he laid his hands on them and went away.

The Rich Young Man

16 And behold, a man came up to him, saying, “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?” 17 And he said to him, “Why do you ask me about what is good? There is only one who is good. If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” 18 He said to him, “Which ones?” And Jesus said, “You shall not murder, You shall not commit adultery, You shall not steal, You shall not bear false witness, 19 Honor your father and mother, and, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 20 The young man said to him, “All these I have kept. What do I still lack?” 21 Jesus said to him, “If you would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.” 22 When the young man heard this he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.

23 And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. 24 Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God.” 25 When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished, saying, “Who then can be saved?” 26 But Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” 27 Then Peter said in reply, “See, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have?” 28 Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, in the new world,2 when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. 29 And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name's sake, will receive a hundredfold3 and will inherit eternal life. 30 But many who are first will be last, and the last first.

Footnotes

[1] 19:9 Some manuscripts add and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery; other manuscripts except for sexual immorality, makes her commit adultery, and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery
[2] 19:28 Greek in the regeneration
[3] 19:29 Some manuscripts manifold

(ESV)