July 14: 1 Chronicles 16:37 – 18; Psalm 10:10-18; Proverbs 19:8-9; Romans 2:1-24



Overview

            1 Chronicles: David left the Levites that were to minister before the Ark in all the different duties they were to perform and those that were before the tabernacle in Gibeon to offer sacrifices. The people went home and so did David.
            David told Nathan that he wanted to build a house for the Lord because the Lord had dwelled in a tent and David had a house. Nathan told them do what was in his heart because God was with him. But the Lord told Nathan to go back to David and explain that he had never asked anyone to build him a house. He was to tell David that God had brought him from being a shepherd to being prince over Israel. God had been with him and cut of his enemies and he will make David famous. Israel will not be disturbed and God will build David’s house (posterity) and establish his throne forever. However, David’s son will build the house and his kingdom will be established forever. Nathan then told David.
            David went before the Lord and prayed. He was overwhelmed with the thought that God would do all this and he praised the Lord because there is none like him. He made a great nation our of Israel, taking them from Egypt and driving out the nations. And now, he is going to establish David’s house forever. He asks that it will be done as God has said.
            David then defeated the Philistines, Moab, Zobah-Hamath, and Syrians. He brought the spoil back to Jerusalem. Tou, king of Hamath, was pleased that David had defeated their common enemies so he sent his son and all sorts of articles of precious metals. David dedicated these things to the Lord along with the plunder.
            A list of David’s officials is then provided.
            Psalm: This is a continuation of the deplorable deeds of men who belive there is no God and that they won’t be held accountable. They do evil according to their desires because they don’t think God will see it. David calls on the Lord to arise and not forget the afflicted. He knows that God does see all the evils and God is the defenders of the helpless. He asks God to punish the evildoers and call them into account.
            He declares the Lord is king forever while the nations perish. He hears the desires of the afflicted and strengthens them. He executes justice so that evil men will not inflict terror again.
            Proverbs: If you love yourself, then you better get some sense and get understanding that leads to finding good. Repeat from Proverbs 19:5: A person who gives false testimony and one who continually lies will both be held accountable.
            Romans: If we judge someone, then we admit that we know what is right and wrong. That condemns us when we do wrong. We know that God judges those wrongs and we won’t escape. We shouldn’t presume that God will excuse us because we haven’t already seen his judgment. The reason we haven’t seen it is because God is patient and wants us to repent. If we don’t, God’s wrath is being stored up for the day of judgment.
            At the judgment, God will take care of those who were repentant, doing good and looking for glory and immortality. But those who reject the truth will suffer his wrath and fury. This applies to both Jews and Gentiles.
            You can’t rely on being a Jew and the law to spare you. Even if you know all of what is right and teach others, you are most likely breaking it yourself. When you do, you dishonor God and cause others to blaspheme God’s name among the Gentiles.

What Stood Out

            1 Chronicles: “When your days are fulfilled to walk with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, one of your own sons, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for me, and I will establish his throne forever” (1 Chron 17:11-12).
            Psalm: “You will bring justice to the orphans and the oppressed, so mere people can no longer terrify them” (Ps 10:18 NLT).
            Proverbs: “Whoever gets sense loves his own soul” (Prov 19:8).
            Romans: “Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?” (Rom 2:4).

Insight

            1 Chronicles: Prophecy in the Bible is not always simple. Today’s reading is an example of this. The Lord promised David that his son would build a temple and the God would establish his throne forever. From a worldly standpoint, that is just crazy talk. While we know that Solomon built the temple, so that appears to be a reasonable prediction. But, how can David’s son’s throne be established forever? That would mean the son would have to live forever. Solomon died and I’m sure that David didn’t understand this to mean that Solomon would live forever. So, the prophecy gets a little complicated. David probably understood this to mean that Israel would always exist as a nation and that one of his descendants would be king.
            Since we know that Israel ceased to exist as a united kingdom after Solomon and then both Israel and Judah ceased to exist as a nation with a king after Assyria and Babylon took them captive, even this part of the prophecy stopped. Somewhere along the line of Jewish scholars, they figured this out and realized that the Lord was talking of a future kingdom. Thus, the concept of the Messiah was established from this and other prophecies.
            They were also wrong in that they believed and still believe that the Messiah would first come and establish his kingdom on earth subjecting all nations under him. Those of us who believe in Jesus understand that the Messiah had to come first to bring forgiveness of sins and reconcile us with God by becoming the sacrifice for sin. That was accomplished by Jesus on the cross. The future of this prophecy is yet to come when Jesus will come back and reign on David’s throne over all Israel and the world. Yet there are people who say that this is only spiritual and applies to the church. It is not a physical promise. So, you see, a short prophecy to David wasn’t simple. It had much more in it than David and those who wrote it down understood. I’m sure that we will still see the day when David’s son, Jesus will be on the throne over Israel and all the earth – forever.
            Psalm: It seems as though the Lord doesn’t care for the downtrodden of the earth when evil people get away with terrorizing people. David affirms that it isn’t all over yet. He lets us know that there will be a time when the nations will perish because God reigns forever. (Perhaps he understood the prophecy about his throne lasting forever better than we think because he assures us that the Lord will execute justice.) The promise that the Lord will avenge the downtrodden so that evil men will no long terrorize people is something that gives us hope in a world that appears to be getting crazier and meaner all the time. Of course, we need to trust Jesus for our salvation or we will be one of those that experience his vengeance.
            Proverbs: A person with common sense is a person who loves his soul. This isn’t the kind of self-love that results in selfishness and doing everything possible to avoid pain and doing everything possible to have pleasure and comfort. The ultimate in getting sense is looking to eternity and believing and acting in accordance with what the Lord wants. Self-hate would be described as a person knowing that their eternity would end up in hell while knowing that the gift of eternal life is in Jesus Christ (Rom 6:23). Loving your soul is doing what is needed to make sure that you accept that gift of eternal life and then living for God’s kingdom because it is eternal (Matt 6:33). Having your treasures in heaven where they are secure is common sense.
            Romans: Paul turns from the irreligious people of chapter 1 to focus on the religious people, Jews and Gentiles. His main theme in these first few verses is that when we judge someone as a sinner, then we don’t have an excuse for our sins. We may know that these things are sins because of God’s Law as the Jews know. They can’t depend on the Law to save them because it just points out that they are sinners when they break the Law. This applies to us who know the Bible as well. Whenever we sin and the world that is watching knows we’ve sinned, then God’s character is blasphemed because of our sin. We may think that our sin doesn’t matter because we haven’t seen God punish or disciple us, but that is only because he is patient waiting for us to repent.
            For those who don’t believe in God, it is the same as the Psalm where the wicked don’t think God even sees their actions. But the truth is that God is simply saving his wrath for the day of judgment. That is the day when we better have Jesus as our Savior or we will not survive God’s wrath. With Jesus as our Savior, we won’t even see that judgment. But that doesn’t mean we can do whatever we want.

Application

             I need to be conscious of the way I live because I’m a Christian. When I mess up and sin, the world sees it and that gives the name of Christ a bad name.

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