For a description of the (Y2) reading plan, see the “About” page.
Acts 14
How did Paul encourage the new believers to remain true to the faith? How do you respond to the hardships you experience? The distinction between those who are drawn to signs and wonders and those who are drawn to the message of Jesus is still jumping out at me for whatever reason. In Acts 14, Paul and Barnabas were “speaking boldly for the Lord, who confirmed the message of His grace by enabling them to perform signs and wonders.” (Acts 14:3b). The signs and wonders were never intended to be the main point. They were given as confirmation of the main point. The message was and is always redemption by grace through Jesus Christ.
When Paul healed the lame man in Lystra, the crowd went wild. It was all Paul and Barnabas could do to stop the people from making sacrifices to them. Talk about missing the point!! The trouble is that those who fail to look past the miracles tend to jump from one shiny object to the next. Their foundation is shifting sand and they crumble at the slightest disturbance. This crowd that was ready to offer sacrifices to Paul and Barnabas is the same crowd that later stoned Paul and left him for dead outside the city. If we need the signs and wonders, we have not fully embraced the message of Jesus Christ. Such is not a faith the holds. As Paul and Barnabas said, “We must go through many hardships to enter the kingdom of God”. (Acts 14:22b). Without Jesus as our foundation, we will never survive the hardships.
Ex. 25-26
Who was to participate in the offering for the tabernacle? How does your heart prompt you to give? God had very specific plans, using a very specific list of materials, for the construction of His Tabernacle. One of these specific materials, listed in verse 5, caught my eye. The NIV translates it as “another type of durable leather”, with a note that this could possibly be the hides of large, aquatic mammals. Some other translations go along with that thought by translating this “leather” as porpoise or dolphin skins. Why did this catch my eye? Because these materials were donated by the Israelite people. You know, the people who were wandering around in the middle of the wilderness. Yeah – those people. Where on earth did such a people come up with dolphin skins, let alone enough to cover a large, portable Tabernacle?!?
The thought that immediately followed that question in my mind is how amazing God’s provision is. God knew He was going to require the Israelites to build this Tabernacle. And I remember how God set things up so that when the people left Egypt, their Egyptian neighbors gave them all sorts of stuff. As it says in Exodus 12:36, “The Lord had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and they gave them what they asked for; so they plundered the Egyptians”. I can’t say that dolphin skins would have been high on my list of things to request for an excursion into the wilderness, but I imagine that God must have moved some of the people to ask for it. He then later prompted those people’s hearts to offer it, along with all those other materials, for the construction of the Tabernacle. What an amazing God we serve!