Bible in 90 Days- David and Bathsheeba

Today's reading included the story of David and Bathsheeba.  I'm always impressed by several things in this story, but this is what spoke to me today.  It is in 2 Samuel 12:     ²⁴David comforted Bathsheba his wife, and went to her and lay with her; and she bore a son, and she called his name Solomon. And the Lord loved [the child];

    ²⁵He sent [a message] by the hand of Nathan the prophet, and [Nathan] called the boy's [special] name Jedidiah [beloved of the Lord], because the Lord [loved the child].

Now David had sinned with Bathsheeba, committing adultery and then murdering her husband.  Their's was not a relationship established on very good things.  But, out of their union- not from any of David's other wives comes Solomon, the son of wisdom, the son through whom the kingly line would continue.  And his special name was Jedidiah, beloved of the Lord.  

God can take our frailties and failings and carry out His plan and His purpose.  That's good news!

Week 4 of Reading Through the Bible in 90 Days

Today is the 21st day of reading through the Bible in 90 days and the beginning of our fourth week.  We'll be covering 1 Samuel 16-2 Kings 25 this week.  I think that the time period of the kings was a sad one for the country of Israel.  So many kings were bad and led Israel in abandoning God and running after idols.  These kings that Israel was asking Samuel for in our reading this week really led to the continued downfall of God's people.

If you are still reading along with us, please take a moment to leave me a comment here.  Let me know if I can pray for you specifically this week.  May God bless you reading as you continue on.

Lessons from Judges- Bible in 90 Days

Yesterday's (1-25-12) reading was day 17- Joshua 15:1-Judges 3:27.
Today's (1-26-12) reading was day18- Judges 3:28-15:12.

The book of Judges holds so many interesting lessons.  Every time I read it, I am struck anew with the behavior of the Israelites and with God's grace and mercy to them again and again.  Now, we just left off in Deuteronomy where Moses was reminding the people of God's laws and warning them not to forsake God.  Then in Joshua, God miraculously fought for His people again and again.  At the end of Joshua's life, he once more reminds the people of God's laws.  And they collectively assure Joshua that they will serve the Lord.  Fast forward not too many years to the book of Judges.

Judges 2: ¹⁰And also all that generation were gathered to their fathers, and there arose another generation after them who did not know (recognize, understand) the Lord, or even the work which He had done for Israel.

    ¹¹And the people of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord and served the Baals.

    ¹²And they forsook the Lord, the God of their fathers, Who brought them out of the land of Egypt. They went after other gods of the peoples round about them and bowed down to them, and provoked the Lord to anger.

    ¹³And they forsook the Lord and served Baal [the god worshiped by the Canaanites] and the Ashtaroth [female deities such as Ashtoreth and Asherah].

My first thought is: Are you serious?!  In only one generation, the people did not know God and forsook Him to worship other gods.  What a convicting thought for me as a parent.  It is not enough for me personally to know God, I must pass that on to my children or they will be the generation that comes along that doesn't know the Lord.  

Then, after that convicting thought, comes the realization that God can use messed up, imperfect people to carry out His plan.  Barak argued and wouldn't go to war without Deborah the prophetess.  Gideon was so afraid that He tested the Lord numerous times and still sneaked out in the night to topple the altar to Baal because he was afraid of his family.  Jephthah was the son of a harlot who made a rash vow.  Samson had problems with his temper and specifically disobey God on many occasions.  But, God used all of these men to be judges who delivered His sinful, unfaithful people again and again.

Judges is an awesome picture of God's plan being fulfilled despite our imperfections!

Week Three of Reading Through the Bible in 90 Days

We are heading into week three of reading through the Bible in 90 days.  I am currently caught up in my reading; although I must admit that I have a hard time reading through the books of the law.  I'm glad that we're headed out of Deuteronomy and into Joshua this week.  I enjoy biblical history and always look forward to those books.

Please check in on this post if you can.  Let me know you're still reading along.  If you have any specific prayer requests for the week.  I pray that God is blessing  your reading and that you are learning more about Him through this.

Bible in 90 Days- Day 13; Numbers 32:20-Deuteronomy 7:26; Saturday January 21

Today's reading contains one of my favorite Bible passages.  These are our theme verses for our homeschool.
Deuteronomy 6: ⁴Hear, O Israel: the Lord our God is one Lord [the only Lord].

    ⁵And you shall love the Lord your God with all your [mind and] heart and with your entire being and with all your might.

    ⁶And these words which I am commanding you this day shall be [first] in your [own] minds and hearts; [then]

    ⁷You shall whet and sharpen them so as to make them penetrate, and teach and impress them diligently upon the [minds and] hearts of your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down and when you rise up.

What an awesome responsibility for parents to constantly be teaching their children the things of the Lord.  I think homeschooling has been such a great way for us to do this because we are with our children so much that we have many opportunities to teach them all along the way.

As many times as I have read through the Bible, I still see new things each time I read.  Today I noticed this in Deuteronomy 1:  ²It is [only] eleven days' journey from Horeb by the way of Mount Seir to Kadesh-barnea [on Canaan's border; yet Israel took forty years to get beyond it].  A journey that should have taken 11 days took 40 years because of Israel's disobedience!  How many times do I settle for less than God's best for me and have to learn the hard way because of my disobedience?  Ouch!

Bible in 90 Days- Day 10- Leviticus 26:27-Numbers8:14

Today's reading (and indeed all of Leviticus and Numbers) is difficult reading for me.  I must confess to not understanding much of the Levitical law and why God gave it to us in His Word.  There are just some of the laws that I don't understand.  And, why do still think it necessary to follow some of those laws today but not all of them?  How do we choose?

What I do get from the books of the law in the Old Testament is that God wants His chosen people to be holy and set apart.  The laws that he gave are all designed to set apart His chosen people, to ensure that they act differently form the pagan nations around them.  And that is a principle that I think we can hold on to now, despite the confusion of the books of the law.  We can remember that God does want us to be holy and set apart for Him.  We aren't to "blend in" with everything around us in the ways we act and live and think.

Here is a good article by John Piper explaining the relationship of law and grace.  And, here is another article about why God gave the law.  Even though I still don't fully understand, these articles help me to have a grasp on the law.

Week Two of Reading Through the Bible in 90 Days Check In

I hope you've gotten off to a great week of reading through the Bible.  If you didn't see the terrific resource that Amy from Mom's Toolbox shared earlier in the week, you can find it here.  It is a terrific set of pages that help you to see exactly what is going on in the part of the Bible that you are reading.

I hope you are all caught up with your reading, but I must admit that I am a day behind right now.  I often find myself missing my Saturday reading and reading extra on Sunday.  I broke my own rule by playing on the computer and reading for fun before I finished the day's reading.

It's a good time to talk, though, about what to do when you get behind.  When you are reading 11-16 chapters a day, how can you catch up?  Just read.  Don't worry about reading two whole days at a time if that overwhelms you.  Instead read some extra each day until you are caught up.  Read in bite sized amounts throughout your day.  It can be done.  If I can waste away an hour or more stalking Facebook and Pinterest, I can surely read my Bible that long!

If you can, please check in on this post and let me know how you are doing.  I'd be glad to pray for any specific requests you have also.

Bible in 90 Days: A great resource!

One of the best things about reading through the Bible quickly in this program is that you get a really good picture of when things happened.  If you've never read through the entire Bible, however, this can be a little confusing.  This resource from the creator of the Bible in 90 Days program provides background information to help the reader see exactly where in the Bible (and history) you are.  If you're a timeline buff like myself, you will be especially enamored of these great pages!  Amy at Mom's Toolbox shares them with us, and they are in handy PDFs if you want to print them out. :-)

Bible in 90 Days- Day 3 (1-11-12): Genesis 28:20-40:11

Today's reading from Genesis continues to follow the family of Jacob as he journeys to find his wife (wives).  We read about Jacob's wives, concubines, and many children.

I'm always impressed when I think that this is the line through which God was planning all along to bring His son, the line that God chose to be His special people.  Can you imagine any more dysfunctional family? Jacob and his mother lied and deceived his father, so he had to flee for his life before his brother killed him.  Jacob's new father-in-law deceived him on several occasions.  Jacob's wives lived in continual disharmony and jealousy fighting over who had the most children and bargaining for sexual intimacy.  When Jacob finally left his crooked father-in-law, his favorite wife stole the family idols and lied about it.  Jacob, not learning from his own family's mistakes, favored one of sons over all others, leading to the brothers plotting to kill the favored son and eventually selling him into slavery.

Yet, out of all of this dysfunction, God has a plan.  And, as we watch the Old Testament unfold, we will see time and time again, that God has chosen to use these faulty, broken people to bring His plans to pass.

Bible in 90 Days- Monday January 9- Day 1

Today's reading covered creation through some of Abraham's life.  I am reading from the Amplified Bible this time.  I like using different translations to get more clarity.  Today I used Biblegateway.com to read.  I like to pull up the day's reading on my computer at the beginning of the day and have it ready to read throughout the day as I have time.  One thing about this reading method is that there is not much time for in depth study.  I like to write down any questions I have, so that I can study them in more detail later.

Week One of Reading Through the Bible in 90 Days Check In Post

Woohoo.  Here we are.  Tomorrow we start our journey through the Bible in 90 days.  Please check in in the comment section below with any prayer requests you may have and just to let me know you're jumping off with us tomorrow.

This week, we'll be reading in Genesis and Exodus.  Amy from Mom's Toolbox has hosted Blogging through the Bible in 90 Days many times now and has a great page for week one telling you what to expect and linking to her daily devotional for each day's reading.  You can check it out here.

Each week, I'll try to give you a suggestion/encouragement along your reading journey.  This week's tip:  Don't read anything else for the day before you read your Bible.  This was a big help to me because I'm an avid reader and always have at least one other book going along with my Bible reading.  When I choose not to pick up another book before I read my Bible, I make it a top priority and help ensure that I complete the day's reading.

Bible in 90 Days: Ready, Set, Read

On Monday will begin our spring session of reading through the Bible in 90 days.   So, what do you need to do to get ready?

1.  Download your reading schedule here.

2.  Pray.  As you read each day, ask God for guidance and ask Him to speak to you through His word.

3.  Be prepared to read some every day.  Even if you are short on time, read something.  If you cannot finish the reading for the day, at least you will not have so much to make up the next day.  For this program, listening to the Bible will not count.  To read through the Bible in 90 days, you need to read God's Word from cover to cover.  To find out more about this, you can read this great post from Amy at Mom's Toolbox.

4.  Plan to check in here with me each Sunday.  I will have a post telling you what to expect in this week's reading and let you know how I'm doing in my reading.  Just leave me a comment on that week's post to let me know how you're doing and how I can pray for you.

5.  Let me know how to get in touch with you.  If you don't have a blog or don't blog regularly, leave me an email address.  I'd love to be able to touch base and see how your reading is going and see how I can pray for you.

6.  Grab a button if you'd like. You can put the button above on your own blog to show your followers that you are reading through the Bible in 90 days.

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What day is it anyway?

I am so utterly confused about what day it is.  It started with Christmas Eve. We watched football and went to church.  Now, that seems like Sunday.  But, the next day (which was really Sunday), we didn't go to church, and there wasn't any football until the evening.  But, Jason wasn't working, so that seemed like Saturday.  Then I have no idea what days happened between Christmas and New Years because Jason wasn't working half the time and we weren't doing school.  Then we didn't start back to school yesterday, so today was really Monday, right?  But, apparently not.  Because our Wednesday night dinners start tomorrow night.  Arrgh!

All I really know is that I am beyond ready to get into a routine.  Life is changing slightly for us.  I am going to keep a baby three days a week beginning this week.  We're very excited about having a baby around (and about making a little extra money).  I want to slow our pace down and stay home more, and keeping the baby should help with that.  I'm also hoping to get some chances to keep the little girl that I kept full time year before last.  We had her today, and at almost 3, she's lots of fun.  So, there may be some days we have a baby and a toddler here!

We're heading off into a new year.  Here we come!

Bible in 90 Days- Starts Monday, January 9

I'm still planning to begin reading through the Bible in 90 days next Monday, the 9th of January.  If you'd like to read along, please check out this post.  So far I don't have anyone signed up to read with me.

Amy at Mom's Toolbox has some great information as we head into week one.  You can check it out here.  If you'd like to read but don't have a Bible in 90 days Bible, you can download the reading schedule here.  And, if you'd like to read with a group but don't want to read with me, you can find other sites hosting a read along here.

Reading through the Bible in 90 days is a big task but one that is so worth it.  If you're thinking about it, come and join me.