daily prayer

    Good morning! How are we faithing? In studying the Bible in it's entirety one discovers many principles that many people have been disseminating incorrectly. I Had always heard that the old testament was just a book of rules and the new testament was about love. The old testament was a book of punishment and revenge while the new was utopian in that all people are loved and the rules no longer apply. What crap. The old testament told us how to live but as humans left to our own devices, we could not. The New testament explains the old and tells us of grace and salvation through messiah Jesus the Christ. Don't believe me? Check this out;

Lev 19:18
Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself: I am the LORD.

Heard that before? Out of the hardness of the peoples heart did all the punishment come down on them. Remember Moses as he was up on the mountain getting the ten commandments, the people thought he might have been killed so they fashioned a golden calf to worship? After the red sea miracle? One would think that one event would last a life time but no, they fashion that cow and ticked Moses and God off. Even in the face God and his power they still fell back into self abasement. So that verse above told the people how to live and had they payed attention they would have avoided a whole lot of woes. Jesus later was questioned;

Mat 22:36-40

  Master, which is the great commandment in the law?   Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.  On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. 

The Pharisees asked the question of Jesus knowing the Levitical verse and yet they were not living it. Jesus lived how we ought to. Jesus is the example that the old testament people couldn't get. The old law still works for a legitimate society but for those who follow Christ are not judged by that law and those following Jesus example do not enforce those laws. No longer is it "an eye for an eye". No longer do we extract revenge. No longer do we hat someone regardless of what they did to us. Think about that today.

Heavenly Father,

  Thank you for the wisdom in your Word. Help our hearts to stay soft to your ways and not get hardened by this world. Help us love as you have loved. Help us be wise and not judgmental. In Jesus name, amen