DAILY, WEEKEND, AND HOLIDAY INTERNET EVANGELIZE TO THE WORLD MINISTRY

January 23: Pride in Disguise Genesis 37 ; Matthew 26:57–27:31 ; Ecclesiastes 9:1–6 Sometimes recognizing our sin for what it is can throw us into deep shame. In Matthew , we find that two of Jesus’ disciples experience this moment of remorse—Judas after he betrays Jesus , and Peter when he denies Jesus . From their responses, we learn what true repentance looks like. Judas is remorseful when he realizes the enormity of his betrayal. But he doesn’t move from remorse to repentance. He tries to absolve his guilt by returning the payment he received for betraying Jesus —an attempt to buy back his innocence. And when the “blood money” is refused and he is unable to eliminate the guilt, Judas hangs himself ( Matt 27:5 ). Peter, the disciple with an impulsive, childlike loyalty to Jesus , denies his Lord when questioned by a mere servant girl. When Peter remembers J esus’ prediction , he leaves, “weeping bitterly.” However, the Gospel of John tells us that Peter glorified God in...

January 22: Be Vigilant Genesis 35:16–36:43 ; Matthew 26:14–56 ; Ecclesiastes 8:10–17 Faith doesn’t always come to bear until we are faced with our own fallibility. When we “enter into temptation,” it often means we haven’t been vigilant—that we’ve stopped pursuing the God who has pursued us. In the aftermath of temptation, we recognize our spiritual laziness. We become wise—but remorsefully. Vigilance and complacency are illustrated in the garden of Gethsemane. In His last moments , Jesus requests that His closest disciples stay awake with Him ( Matt 26:38 ). But while He repeatedly prays, they fall asleep. What seems like a request for moral support gets defined a few verses later: “Stay awake and pray that you will not enter into temptation” ( Matt 26:41 ). Staying awake is associated with spiritual awareness. And their sleep is costly. Because of their spiritual sleepiness, they’re not prepared for His end , even though He had repeatedly prepared them for His death...

January 21: Power, Authority, and Its Result Genesis 34:1–35:15 ; Matthew 25:14–26:13 ; Ecclesiastes 8:1–9 “For there is a time and a way for everything, although man’s trouble lies heavy on him. For he does not know what is to be, for who can tell him how it will be?” ( Eccl 8:6 ). We all struggle with the future and the vast uncertainty it creates in our minds. It’s rarely the present that keeps us awake at night; it’s our concerns about what will happen if the present changes for better or worse. But unlike other places in the Bible when we’re told not to worry, the words of Ecclesiastes 8:6 are set in the context of a request to obey the king of the land. This is not because the king is offered as a solution to the problems, although he could potentially help, but because like many other things, there is nothing that can be done about him. Why worry about that which you cannot change? This situation is equated to life and death itself: “No man has power to retain th...

January 20: While You Are Waiting Genesis 32–33 ; Matthew 24:29–25:13 ; Ecclesiastes 7:22–29 Jesus’ instructions to His disciples about His return have inspired many to incorrectly predict His second coming . But if we read His parables, we find that they’re not so focused on the future. Jesus prepares His disciples for His absence , and for the end times, because He wants them to be hopeful, expecting His return . He wants them to be ready and watchful. But He wants them to do all of these things by being fully engaged in the present, readying His kingdom. Jesus’ parable of the Wise and Wicked Servants demonstrates this attitude. While the faithful and wise servant provides for the master’s household during his absence, the wicked servant uses the time flippantly: carousing and beating his fellow servants. When the master returns, the faithful servant is promoted for his service, and the wicked servant is punished. The parable presses the disciples to use their time w...

January 19: The Million Dollar Question Genesis 31 , Matthew 23:37–24:28 , Ecclesiastes 7:13–21 “Why do bad things happen to good people?” This is an ancient question, though often asked as if it’s new. The Preacher in Ecclesiastes says, “There is a righteous man who perishes in his righteousness, and there is a wicked man who prolongs his life in his evildoing” ( Eccl 7:15 ). Answers to this age-old question do exist, the simplest is that since people gave into temptation near the beginning, havoc—caused by humans and by evil spirits—has taken hold. The time between now and when God takes full control of the world again is just grace; the moment He does is the end for all evil, including those who have not chosen Christ as their Savior . The only way to fix the world is to rid it of all evil, but the Preacher doesn’t offer this deductive explanation. Instead, he notes that life is a series of balancing acts, and he uses hyperbole to make his point ( Eccl 7:16–17 ). The ...

August 10: Love, Praise, Forgiveness Isaiah 20:1–22:25; Luke 7:36–8:15; Job 5:8–16 Our praise for God is often directly connected to accepting and confessing our brokenness. Our capacity to love Him is tied to the realization of how much He has forgiven us. The woman in Luke 7 who anointed Jesus’ feet is described with one phrase: She was a sinner. We’re not given clarifying detail, but we do know her sin was notorious and, as a result, she was marginalized by society. She was not only weighed down by her sin; her public identity was grounded in it, and she could not hide it. She knew that she needed to receive forgiveness from the only one who could provide it. Her necessity made her bold: She came to Simon the Pharisee’s house to wash and anoint Jesus’ feet. Her behavior created quite a spectacle. Simon the Pharisee was quick to condemn her actions and question Jesus’ decision to show her compassion. But Jesus turned the tables on him. While the woman was aware of her broke...

August 8: Distortion Isaiah 14:24–16:14; Luke 6:1–49; Job 4:12–21 If attending church and small group or even reading the Bible and praying become activities that we do out of obligation, then we have a bigger problem than we might realize. If our hearts are disengaged, our religious motions and listless obedience serve only as a security blanket—something that makes us feel safe and good. The Pharisees faced this dilemma, but they took the error one step further. They took the Sabbath—a practice intended to point people toward God—and twisted it into a heavy burden. So when Jesus wanted to do good on the Sabbath, it’s no surprise that they seized the opportunity to trap Him. Jesus responded to the Pharisees’ accusation by telling them He is “Lord of the Sabbath” (Luke 6:5). But He also showed them the true purpose of Sabbath while at the same time exposing their hearts: “And Jesus said to them, ‘I ask you whether it is permitted on the Sabbath to do good or to do evil, to sa...

August 7: Raise the Signal Isaiah 13:1–14:23; Luke 5:1–39; Job 4:1–11 The Bible echoes with great battle cries: “Raise a signal on a bare hill, lift up your voice to them; wave the hand.… A sound of the roar of the kingdoms, of nations gathering! Yahweh of hosts is mustering an army for battle” (Isa 13:4). In this proclamation, God declares war on Babylon for their brutal and evil deeds against His people. Yet He calls for “a signal” to be raised so that the Babylonians might repent from their great wickedness. They have an opportunity to surrender to Yahweh before it’s too late—and we must do the same. We tend to see ourselves as less evil than the infamous sinners of the past, but in a way we all carry shades of Babylon in ourselves. Just as the Babylonians did, we set up and worship idols instead of loving Yahweh with our entire being. Similarly, we attack others instead of loving them the way God has loved us. If we search our hearts, we find that painting ourselves as mo...

August 6: Feeling Entitled Isaiah 10:20–12:6; Luke 4:1–44; Job 3:17–26 Familiarity breeds contempt, so the saying goes. But the line from Aesop’s fable “The Fox and the Lion” wasn’t meant to imply that we often take those closest to us for granted. Rather, the fox fails to properly acknowledge the lion—the king of all beasts—because he doesn’t know his place. His self-perception is dangerously inflated. The same is true for the fickle Nazarenes who heard Jesus interpret the Scriptures. When Jesus preached in the synagogue of His hometown, the Nazarenes were initially receptive. But when He interpreted the prophet Isaiah’s words in a way they disliked—a way that showed Him as the one who “proclaim[s] release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind” (Luke 4:18; see Isa 61:1)—they belittled Him: “Is this man not the son of Joseph?” (Luke 4:22). The Nazarenes weren’t ready to admit their need (Luke 4:23). They didn’t understand that they were blind and unrepentant. Th...

August 5: Patterns and Prophecies Isaiah 9:1–10:19; Luke 3:1–38; Job 3:1–16 Luke sees the events surrounding Jesus’ life through the lens of Isaiah. For Luke, Jesus’ life is Isaiah’s prophecy made tangible and complete. Jesus is the anticipated Messiah, prophet, and savior. Even John the Baptist’s role in Jesus’ life is based on Isaiah’s prophesy. Luke repeats the metaphor of “the wilderness” from Isaiah—used by the prophet to describe the time when the Israelites would come out from their captivity in Babylon—to cast John the Baptist as a central figure in God’s work. The wilderness metaphor doesn’t originate with Isaiah. He uses it to represent the second time God’s people entered the land He promised them (the term originally comes from the time when the Israelites roamed the wilderness after the exodus). Luke quotes Isaiah in casting John the Baptist as “the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight! Every valley will ...

August 4: In Grief Isaiah 7:1–8:22; Luke 2:22–52; Job 2:11–13 It’s difficult to know how to respond to people suffering grief. Those brave enough to speak often attempt to rationalize another’s grief with ill-timed theological truths. Those who feel inadequate or awkward about reaching out to grieving people sometimes avoid them altogether. Job’s friends are well known for misinterpreting Job’s suffering. But they aren’t often recognized for the moments when they responded to Job’s anguish with wisdom. When Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar first heard of the tragedy, they immediately came to comfort Job: “Thus they lifted up their eyes from afar, but they did not recognize him, so they raised their voice, and they wept, and each man tore his outer garment and threw dust on their heads toward the sky. Then they sat with him on the ground for seven days and seven nights, but no one spoke a word to him because they saw that his suffering was very great” (Job 2:12–13). Often we try t...