Thursday, January 15 Readings

Good Morning!

Your Bible readings for the day are:

Genesis 31: 17- 32:12
Matthew 10:24- 11:6
Psalm 13: 1-6
Proverbs 3:16-18

I am really enjoying these daily readings. I'm so proud I'm keeping up! (I'd love to know how many youth are doing it. Let me know if you're reading it!)

All of the readings were really good for today, although I am constantly amazed by the dysfunctional families in the Genesis stories (I guess it can make me feel good about the craziness in mine sometime too! lol). But the Matthew passage is what jumped out at me today.

Two excerpts especially made me think:

32"Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. 33But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.

I listen to a lot of sports talk radio and one of the main topics of conversation lately has been about Tim Tebow and how outspoken he is in his faith. People are becoming really critical of him, questioning why he has to talk so much about his beliefs. Why does he always have to thank Jesus first whenever he gives a speech? they are asking. While certainly we can show our faith by how we act and live--and many other athletes and "normal" people do that all the time--Tebow thinks that his best way to serve Christ is to share Him with others through his words.

The Bible says that if we acknowledge God in front of others, He will acknowledge us. It sounds like God wants us to be bold in how we show our faith--in both words and actions.

And then this second passage--

37"Anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; 38and anyone who does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

This has always been a really tough couple of verses for me. Christ wants us to love Him more than our parents, our children, our friends, our jobs, our families, ANYTHING. How often do I show that I love Christ more than any of these things? It is a challenge, that's for sure!!