Author: Dave Dishman (Page 322 of 459)

I listened closely as one of my favorite writers shared his life verse. Slightly embarrassed, he smiled as he explained to us that while he studied the Bible carefully and took seriously the injunction to rightly divide the Word of Truth (2 Timothy 2:15), he actually took his verse out of context!

I thought of him this morning when I read the verse he referenced, I will make you a threshing sledge, new and sharp, with many teeth. You will thresh the mountains and crush them, and reduce the hills to chaff (Isaiah 41:15).

The passage refers to the Lord’s redemption of Israel. But these same words motivated a humble man to communicate in powerful and effective ways. This leader devoted his life to destroying the arguments of the enemy of our souls, and pointing people to the Lord.

Maybe a little out of context, but certainly in the spirit of the text. A couple lines earlier Isaiah wrote, I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, Do not fear; I will help you.

The Lord waits to take our hand, to calm our fears, and to help in our times of need. But don’t forget that beyond all that, the Lord stands ready to create threshing sledges out of his humble followers.

Pretty good life verse, even out of context.

Isaiah 41 in week thirty-six of reading the Bible cover to cover

Photo by Robert Wiedemann

As a kid, I loved church potlucks. Being in the Ozarks, someone always brought fried chicken, someone always brought jello with fruit (which I considered then, and still today, a salad), and most everyone brought a dessert. A plate full of fried chicken and jello salad laid the foundation for a similar-sized plate of desserts. That holy bliss of fats and sugars hangs in my memory.

The church members in Corinth also joined together for shared meals, but they apparently didn’t get any training on potlucks. When together, instead of sharing their food equally, the rich took more and the poor received less. Some even went home hungry—hard to imagine at a church potluck.

Paul hammered the selfish church members—you despise the Church of God by humiliating those who have nothing. Paul seemed frustrated and embarrassed for the less privileged members.

As I read 1 Corinthians, a theme emerges. As Paul instructs this young church, he continually labors to move the members of the body from getting to giving.

Perhaps the most fundamental and profound step of living out our Christian faith involves moving from getting to giving. Do I look to my faith only for what I receive, or do I also look to serve others? Do I reach out and meet someone obviously new at church, or do I slip by with a nod? Do I respond to appeals for help, or assume someone else on the email thread will take care of it?

Getting to Giving. The crux of discipleship.

So I must ask myself—would I share my heaping plates of fried chicken and jello salad and desserts? As a junior high boy, no chance. But as an adult, and hopefully more mature follower of Jesus, I believe I would.

Maybe.

1 Corinthians 11 in week thirty-six of reading the Bible cover to cover

Photo by Tim Cooper

I cannot read Isaiah 40 without thinking about the movie Chariots of Fire, featuring the story of Eric Liddell, the British olympian and missionary to China. Here Liddell reads a section of Isaiah 40, and if you’ve never seen the movie, or watched it in a long time, it’s well worth the effort of punching those keys on your remote.

I also find the words of Isaiah encouraging for those of us non-olympian types. In a couple of weeks my wife and I will walk a section of the Camino de Santiago, a pilgrimage in Northern Spain. Covering 70 miles in 6 days, the hopefulness—they will walk and not be faint—stands out to me. Sore feet and achy muscles go with the experience, a long walk in the same direction.

A long walk in the same direction also represents our life of faith. Which makes these words from Isaiah especially significant:

He gives strength to the weary and increases the power of the weak. Even youths grow tired and weary, and young men stumble and fall; but those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint.

Amen. Let’s hope in the Lord, and renew our strength.

Isaiah 40 in week thirty-six of reading the Bible cover to cover

Photo by Rachel McDermott

As we approached the ancient marble bust, my tour guide nodded to the head and instructed me to do the same. After I nodded he said, “you have now prayed to Shiva, would you like to pray some more?” I said “no thank you,” out loud, and silently shot up my own prayer—“Lord, I really didn’t mean to pray to Shiva.”

When I told my friend, “Hey, I really didn’t mean to pray to Shiva,” he replied in his understated way, “Well, it sure looked like you were praying to Shiva.” Lord forgive me, led astray by a kind little tour guide.

This incident of alleged idol worship occurred several years ago in Calcutta, India, a city with shrines and representations of deities on every corner. Paul wrote to the Corinthian church about similar issues they faced as they navigated a society filled with gods.

Paul addressed the question of eating food formerly offered to idols. Not surprisingly, the gods never ate any of their presents, so before going bad, the pagans sold these delicacies at a good price. Many Christians, hankering for a choice cut of meat, enjoyed the bargains. But some of their fellow church members struggled with the practice.

Which brings me to Paul’s argument. Pauls said they could eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience. But he also said that while I have the right to do anything, not everything is constructive. No one should seek their own good, but the good of others.

Seeking the good of others trumps a great sale on beef. I’m to consider the good of others in my decision-making, my consumption of goods, and my life-style. Yes, I have a right to most anything as a follower of Jesus (it’s really quite freeing), but I must couple my rights with my obligation to fellow believers.

Paul preached an other-centered life. Paul subjugated his rightful desires in order to build up the faith of others—for I am not seeking my own good but the good of many, so that they may be saved.

I’m to consider the same thought. How do my actions benefit, or harm, my fellow believers? Sometimes hard to remember, and certainly to practice, but I must think about more than just myself.

I Corinthians 10 in week thirty-six of reading the Bible cover to cover

Photo by PK