In time, the girls simply grew tired of bullying me and stopped. In the months that followed, whenever I’d enter school fearful of the torment that lay ahead, I’d pray, “Jesus, protect me.” I’d feel stronger and calmer, knowing He was watching over me. I remember the first time I read the name “Jesus.” Somehow, I knew that this was the name of Someone who loved me.
#Our daily 2 series
So during recess, I’d take refuge in the library, where I’d read a series of Christian storybooks. Some girls were bullying me by subjecting me to cruel pranks. With the wind of the Spirit at our backs, let’s sail toward them with the good news of Jesus.Īs a child, there was a time I dreaded going to school. He loves our enemies and wants to save them.
God loved Israel’s enemies and wanted to save them.
Jonah was understandably offended that Assyria might be forgiven.īut Jonah was more loyal to the people of God than to the God of all people. They’d harassed Israel in the past, and within fifty years they would carry the northern tribes into captivity where they would vanish forever.
I appreciate why Jonah hated the Assyrians. So God sent a whale-sized fish to get his attention. When God told Jonah to preach in Nineveh, he caught a boat going the other way. Unlike Michael, who was caught by accident, Jonah was swallowed because he hated Israel’s enemies and didn’t want them to repent. Jonah was swallowed by “a huge fish” (Jonah 1:17), and he stayed in its belly three days before being vomited onto land (2:1, 10). Amazingly, Michael had no broken bones-only extensive bruises and one whale of a story. But whales don’t prefer lobstermen, and thirty seconds later the whale spit Michael into the air. He pushed back in the darkness as the whale’s muscles squeezed against him. Michael was diving for lobster when a humpback whale caught him in its mouth. This will cause us to be light in a dark, divided world. Today, when heightened tensions threaten to divide people who are otherwise united, such as our families and fellow believers, God can give the wisdom and strength needed to keep unity with one another through the help of the Spirit. In view of this truth (see Ephesians 3), Paul offers this instruction to believers in Jesus: “Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace” (4:3). Though made up of people from various backgrounds, together we’ve been reconciled to God (and each other) through Jesus’ death on the cross (vv. In principle, that’s what the household of God is designed to be (Ephesians 2:19). If a divided house can’t stand, the opposite is true-an undivided house stands unified. He used this metaphor “so it would strike home to the minds of men in order to rouse them to the peril of the times.” Lincoln felt it was important to use the “house divided” figure of speech which Jesus used in Matthew 12:25 because it was widely known and simply expressed. It caused a stir among Lincoln’s friends and foes. On June 16, 1858, as the newly nominated Republican candidate for the US Senate from Illinois, Abraham Lincoln delivered his famous “House Divided” speech, which highlighted the tensions between various factions in America regarding slavery.
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