July 30, 2009

John 4.46->

Then he came again to Cana in Galilee where he had changed the water into wine.

Now there was a royal official whose son lay ill in Capernaum. When he heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went and begged him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death.

Then Jesus said to him, "Unless you see signs and wonders, you will not believe."

The official said to him, "Sir, come down before my boy dies."

Jesus said to him, "Go, your son will live."

The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and started on his way. As he was going down, his slaves met him and told him that his child was alive. So he asked them the hour at which he started to recover, and they said to him, "Yesterday at one in the afternoon the fever left him."

The father realized that this was the hour when Jesus had said to him, "Your son will live." So he himself believed, together with his whole household.

Now this was the second sign that Jesus did after coming from Judea to Galilee.

Genesis 19.12-29

Then the men said to Lot, "Have you anyone else here? Sons-in-law, sons, daughters, or anyone you have in the city--bring them out of the place. For we are about to destroy this place, because the outcry against its people has become great before the Lord, and the Lord has sent us to destroy it.

So Lot went out and said to his sons-in-law, who were to marry his daughters, "Up, get out of this place, for the Lord is about to destroy the city." But he seemed to his sons-in-law to be joking.

When morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, "Get up, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or else you will be consumed in the punishment of this city."

But he lingered, so the two men seized him and his wife and two daughters by the hand (the Lord being merciful to him) and they brought him out and left him outside the city. When they had brought him outside, they said, "Flee for your life; do not look back or stop anywhere in the Plain;. Flee to the hills, or else you will be consumed."

And Lot said, "Oh no, my lords; your servant has found favor with you, and you have shown me great kindness in saving my life, but I cannot flee to the hills, for fear the disaster will overtake me and I die. Look, that city is near enough to flee to, and it is a little one. Let me escape there--Is it not a little one?--and my life will be saved."

He said to him, "Very well, I grant you this favor too, and will not overthrow the city of which you have spoken. Hurry, escape there, for I can do nothing until you arrive there." Therefore the city was called Zoar. The sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar.

Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of Heaven; and he overthrew those cities, and all the Plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. But Lot's wife, behind him, looked back and she became a pillar of salt.

Abraham went early in the morning to the place where he had stood before the Lord, and he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the Plain, and saw the smoke of the land going up like the smoke of a furnace.

So it was that, when God had destroyed the cities of the Plain, God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot our of the midst of the overthrow, when He overthrew the cities in which Lot had settled.

July 20, 2009

John 4.43-45

When the two days were over he set out for Galilee; for Jesus himself declared that a prophet is without honor in his own country.

On his arrival in Galilee, the Galileans gave him a welcome, because they had seen all that he did at the festival in Jerusalem; they had been at the festival themselves.

Genesis 19.1-8

The two angels came to Sodom in the evening, and Lot was sitting in the gate at Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them, and bowed down with his face to the ground. He said, "Please, my lords, turn aside to your servant's house and spend the night, and wash your feet; then you can rise early and go on your way.

They said, "No, we will spend the night in the square."

But he urged them strongly; so they turned aside to him and entered his house; and he made them a feast, and baked unleavened bread, and they ate.

But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both young and old, all the people to the last man, surrounded the house; and they called to Lot, "Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, so we may know them."

Lot went out of the door to the men, shut the door after him, and said, "I beg you, my brothers, do not act so wickedly. Look, I have two daughters who have never known a man; let me bring them out to you, and do to them as you please; only do nothing to these men, for they have come under the shelter of my roof."

July 12, 2009

John 4.1-42

A report now reached the Pharisees: "Jesus is winning and baptizing more disciples than John"; although in fact it was only the disciples who were baptizing and not Jesus himself. When Jesus learned this, he left Judea and set out once more for Galilee. He had to pass through Samaria, and on his way came to a Samaritan town called Sychar, near the plot of ground which Jacob gave to his son Joseph and the spring called Jacob's Well.

It was about noon, and Jesus sat down by the well. The disciples had gone away to the town to buy food. Meanwhile a Samaritan woman came to draw water. Jesus said to her, "Give me a drink."

The Samaritan woman said, "What? You, a Jew, ask a drink from me, a Samaritan woman?" (Jews and Samaritans, it should be noted, do not use vessels in common.)

Jesus answered her, "If only you knew what God gives, and who it is that is asking you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water."

"Sir," the woman said, "you have no bucket and this well is deep. How can you give me 'living water.' Are you a greater man than Jacob our ancestor, who gave us the well, and drank from it himself, he and his sons, and his cattle too."

Jesus said, "Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water that I shall give him will never suffer thirst any more. The water that I give him will be an inner spring always welling up for eternal life."

"Sir," said the woman, "give me that water, and then I shall not be thirsty, nor have to come all this way to draw."

Jesus replied, "Go home, call your husband and come back."

She answered, "I have no husband."

"You are right," said Jesus, "in saying that you have no husband, for although you have had five husbands, the man with whom you are now living is not your husband; you told the truth there."

"Sir," she replied, "I can see that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshiped on this mountain, but the Judeans say that the Temple where God should be worshiped is in Jerusalem."

"Believe me," said Jesus, "the time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship without knowing what you worship, while we worship what we know. It is from the Jews that salvation comes. But the time approaches, indeed is already here, when those who are real worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. Such are the worshipers whom the Father wants. God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth."

The woman answered, "I know that the Messiah" (that is 'Christ') "is coming. When he comes he will tell us everything."

Jesus said, "I am he, I who am speaking to you now."

At that moment his disciples returned, and were astonished to find him talking with a woman; but none of them said, "What do you want?" or "Why are you talking with her?"

The woman put down her water-jar and went away to the town, where she said to the people, "Come and see a man who has told me everything I ever did! Could this be the Messiah?"

They came out of the town and made their way towards him.

Meanwhile the disciples were urging him, "Rabbi, have something to eat."

But he said, "I have food to eat of which you know nothing."

At this the disciples said to one another, "Can someone have brought him food?"

But Jesus said, "It is meat and drink for me to do the will of him who sent me until I have finished his work.

"Do you not say, 'Four months and then comes harvest!'? But look, I tell you, look round on the fields; they are already white, ripe for harvest. The reaper is drawing his pay and gathering a crop for eternal life, so that sower and reaper may rejoice together. That is how the saying comes true: 'One sows, and another reaps.' I sent you to reap a crop for which you have not toiled. Others toiled and you have come in for the harvest of their toil."

Many Samaritans of that town came to believe in him because of the woman's testimony: "He told me everything I ever did!"

So when these Samaritans had come to him they pressed him to stay, and he stayed with them for two days. Many more became believers because of what they heard from his own lips. They told the woman, "It is no longer because of what you said that we believe, for we have heard him ourselves; and we know that this is in truth the Savior of the world."

Genesis 18

The Lord appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, as he sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day. He looked up and saw three men standing near him.

When he saw them, he ran from the tent entrance to meet them, and bowed down to the grass. He said, "My lord, if I find favor with you, do not pass by your servant. Let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and after that, you may pass on--since you have come to your servant."

And Abraham hastened into the tent of Sarah, and said, "Make ready quickly three measures of choice flour, knead it, and make cakes."

Abraham ran to the herd, and took a calf, tender and good, and gave it to the servant, who hastened to prepare it.

Then he took curds and milk and the calf that he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree while they ate.

They said to him, "Where is your wife Sarah?"

And he said, "There, in the tent."

Then one said, "I will surely return to you in due season, and your wife Sarah shall have a son."

And Sarah was listening at the tent entrance behind him. Now Abraham and Sarah were old, advanced in age; it had ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women. So Sarah laughed to herself, saying, "After I have grown old, and my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?"

The Lord said to Abraham, "Why did Sarah laugh and say, 'Shall I indeed bear a child, now that I am old?' Is anything too wonderful for the Lord? At the set time I shall return to you, in due season, and Sarah shall have a son."

But Sarah denied saying, "I did not laugh," for she was afraid.

He said, "Oh yes, you did laugh."

Then the men set out from there and they looked toward Sodom. And Abraham went with them to set them on their way.

And the Lord said, "Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, seeing that Abraham shall become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the Earth shall be blessed in him? No, for I have chosen him, that he may charge his children and the his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice, so that the Lord may bring about for Abraham what He has promised him.

Then the Lord said, "How great is the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah and how very great their sin! I must go down and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to me; and if not, I will know." So the men turned from there, and went toward Sodom, while Abraham remained standing before the Lord.

Then Abraham came near, and said, "Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? Suppose there are are fifty righteous within the city; will you then sweep away the place and not forgive it for the sake of the fifty righteous who are in it? Far be that from you! Shall not the judge of all the world do right?"

And the Lord said, "If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will forgive the whole place for their sake.

Abraham answered, "Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes! Suppose five of the fifty righteous are lacking? Will you destroy the whole place for lack of five?

And He said, "I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there."

Again he spoke to him, "Suppose forty are found there?"

He answered, "For the sake of forty I will not do it."

Then he said, "Oh do not be let the Lord be angry if I speak. Suppose thirty are found there?"

He answered, "I will not do it, if I find thirty there."

He said, "Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord! Suppose twenty are found there?"

He answered, "For the sake of twenty I will not destroy it."

Then he said, "Oh, do not be angry if I speak just once more. Suppose ten are found there?"

He answered, "For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it." And the Lord went his way, when he had finished speaking to Abraham; and Abraham returned to his place.

July 06, 2009

John 3.31->

He who comes from above is above all others.

He who is from the Earth belongs to the Earth and uses earthly speech. He who comes from Heaven bears witness to what he has seen and heard, yet no one accepts his witness.

To accept his witness is to attest that God speaks true--For he whom God sent utters the words of God, so measureless is God's gift of the Spirit.

The Father loves the son and has entrusted him with all authority. He who puts his faith in the son has hold of eternal life; but he who disobeys the son shall not see that life; God's wrath rests upon him.

Genesis 17

When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to Abram, and said to him, "I am God Almighty. Walk before me, and be blameless; and I will make my covenant between me and you, and will make you exceedingly numerous."

Then Abram fell on his face, and God said to him, "As for me, this is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the ancestor of a multitude of nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful; and I will make nations of you; and kings shall come from you. I will establish my covenant between me and you, and your offspring after you throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you. And I will give to you, and to your offspring after you, the land where you are now an alien, all the land of Canaan, for a perpetual holding; and I will be their God."

God said to Abraham, "As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you, throughout their generations.

"This is my covenant, which you shall keep, between me and you and your offspring after you: Every male among you shall be circumcised. You shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskins, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. Throughout your generations every male among you shall be circumcised when he is eight days old, including the slave born in your house and the one bought with your money from any foreigner who is not of your offspring. Both the slave born in your house and the one bought with your money must be circumcised. So shall my covenant be in your flesh an everlasting covenant. Any uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people; he has broken my covenant."

God said to Abraham, "As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her Serai, but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her, and moreover I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall give rise to nations; kings of peoples shall come from her."

Then Abram fell on his face and laughed, and said to himself, "Can a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Can Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?" And Abraham said to God, "Oh that Ishmael might live in your sight!"

God said, "No, but your wife Sarah shall bear you a son, and you shall name him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his offspring after him.

"As for Ishmael, I have heard you. I will bless him and make him fruitful and exceedingly numerous; he shall be the father of twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation. But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this season next year." And when he had finished talking with him, God went up from Abraham.

The Abraham took his son Ishmael and all the slaves born in his house or bought with his money, every male among the men of Abraham's house, and he circumcised the flesh of their foreskins that very day, as God had said to him. Abraham was ninety-nine years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin. That very day Abraham and his son Ishmael were circumcised; and all the men of his house, slaves born in the house and those bought with money from a foreigner, were circumcised with him.