Wednesday, Aug. 14
Genesis 4:1 – 5:28 Read it here
With Chapter 4 of Genesis, life starts to look kind of familiar. People marry, have children, and work.
We also see the first example here of people’s understanding of God, which ought to be a unifying force, instead leading to division.
The Bible doesn’t tell us why God preferred one offering over the other, just that he looked with favor on Abel’s offering and not on Cain’s. Cain became angry at this.
As in yesterday’s reading, we again see evil personified as a force trying to trip people up: “But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must master it.”
The readings from Proverbs that we are using in the daily meditations often reflect the same theme of the human being torn between two opposing forces, with one calling us to faithfulness and one to sin. Jesus will speak of the same thing, even incorporating it into the Lord’s Prayer with, “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.” Paul will also address the struggle, and it will still be playing itself out in the drama of Revelation.
We’re only three days into reading the Bible, and the conflicts we’ll see all the way through are already taking place.
– Rev. Mark Fleming
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Wednesday meditation
Proverbs 1:10-19
My son, if sinful men entice you, do not give in to them.
If they say, “Come along with us; let’s lie in wait for innocent blood, let’s ambush some harmless soul; let’s swallow them alive, like the grave, and whole, like those who go down to the pit; we will get all sorts of valuable things and fill our houses with plunder; cast lots with us; we will all share the loot”—my son, do not go along with them, do not set foot on their paths; for their feet rush into evil, they are swift to shed blood.
How useless to spread a net where every bird can see it!
These men lie in wait for their own blood; they ambush only themselves!
Such are the paths of all who go after ill-gotten gain; it takes away the life of those who get it.
Prayer focus
Pray for God to reveal to you the points where your life is most open to temptation, and to give you strength to resist. Also, pray for those around you who face overwhelming temptation each day, that they too may see the nets that threaten to ensnare them.