Technology Word-snatch

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Mark 3-4; Psalm 96

TO CHEW ON: "The sower sows the word. And there are the ones by the wayside where the word is sown. When they hear, Satan comes immediately and takes away the word that was sown in their hearts" - Mark 4:14-15


Jesus' parable describes the ancient practice of sowing but the modern process of snatching. On reading Jesus' explanation of the Sower Parable, something inside me says, the things He's describing—the sown word immediately taken away, the no-root, the preoccupation with the cares of this world, riches and other things—is very familiar. It is how I often feel especially since the coming of the Internet, email, Facebook blogging, twitter, and the smart phone. Something is always vying for my attention—and it isn't usually the Word!

Tim Challies writes about technology and a Christian's response to it in The Next Story. He says:

"Here is one of the greatest dangers we face as Christians: With the ever-present distractions in our lives, we are quickly becoming a people of shallow thoughts and shallow thoughts will lead to shallow living. There is a simple and inevitable progression at work here:

Distraction —> Shallow Thinking —> Shallow Living

All of this distraction is reshaping us in two dangerous ways. First we are tempted to forsake quality for quantity, believing the lie that virtue comes through speed, productivity and efficiency ... Second, as this happens, we lose our ability to engage in deeper ways of thinking—concentrated, focused thought requires time and cannot be rushed" - Tim Challies, The Next Story, Kindle Location 2037.

Isn't that what Jesus is talking about here—letting God's words, thoughts and principles land, penetrate, germinate, sprout, grow, and produce fruit in our lives? We do that as we think deeply and at length about what the Bible says, relating its teachings to our ways of being and acting.

Though our outward ways of relating Jesus' teachings and the Bible to our lives may be different from how people would have done it in the first century, our motivations and trip-ups are so similar. God's word snatched away, shallowly rooted, and choked is something of which we need to be vigilant more than ever!


PRAYER: Dear God, this ancient warning about distracted living is modern. Help me to discipline myself to turn off my devices and listen to You and let Your words preoccupy me. Amen. 

PSALM TO PRAY: Psalm 96


The Bible Project VIDEO: Mark (Gospel Series)



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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Does God detest anything in your life?

Time Magazine cover - June 19, 1972.

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Deuteronomy 17-20; Psalm 59

TO CHEW ON: "For all who do these things are an abomination to the Lord, and because of these abominations the Lord your God drives them out before you." Deuteronomy 18:12

What a strong word—abomination—Moses uses here to warn the Israelites against compromise and syncretism.

[The word abomination is translated from the Hebrew word towebah. It is also rendered detestable and loathsome.]

What are the things that God names an abomination (detestable, loathsome)? Deuteronomy 18:9-11 names:

• sacrificing children to idols.
• practicing witchcraft.
• acting as a soothsayer or one to interprets omens—a sorcerer.
• conjuring up spells.
• acting as a medium or spiritist.
• calling up the dead.

It's a list of not altogether unfamiliar activities because our society, despite how "advanced" and technological it is, yearns for spiritual connection. If we have rejected God, we will look somewhere else for it. The scary thing is that sometimes these practices make their way into the lives of Christians and so enter the life of the church. Tim Challies in his book The Disciplines of Spiritual Discernment says:

"It should come as no surprise that even though we are called to live within the culture, the culture itself hates God and seeks to destroy those who love him. And yet this culture has influenced the church, perhaps more than the church has influenced the culture. There are at least four cultural influences that have led to a decline in discernment among Christians."

He goes on to name (and elaborate on) 1] a secular worldview; 2] a low view of scripture; 3] a low view of theology; and 4] a low view of God, as reasons for the church's slump into compromise.

Let's ask God by His Spirit to point out any abominable practices and involvements in our lives. And then let's denounce and forsake them. For:

Can two walk together unless they are agreed?" - Amos 3:3

Jesus spoke to the people once more and said, “I am the light of the world. If you follow me, you won’t have to walk in darkness, because you will have the light that leads to life.” - John 8:12 NLT

Take no part in and have no fellowship with the fruitless deeds and enterprises of darkness, but instead [let your lives be so in contrast as to] expose and reprove and convict them." - Ephesians 5:11 AMP

PRAYER: Dear God, please give me a discerning heart to recognize the practices and involvements that are loathsome to You. Then help me to be quick to denounce and forsake them. Amen.

PSALM TO PRAY: Psalm 59

The Bible Project VIDEO: ME'OD: Strength (Shema Word series)



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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked AMP are taken from the Amplified® Bible, Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission." (www.Lockman.org)

A life of balance

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Proverbs 23:15-25

TO CHEW ON: "Do not mix with winebibbers
or with gluttonous eaters of meat
For the drunkard and glutton will come to poverty,
And drowsiness will clothe a man with rags." Proverbs 23:19-20

There are lots of reality shows these days that expose peoples obsessions and the fallout from them. I usually avoid them. Perhaps that's because I don't like to face what people are (I am) capable of.

The Bible speaks a lot about two common human obsessions: drunkenness and gluttony—problems we still face today, along with many others.

One of our newer obsessions is with our electronic devices. Go to any place people gather and you'll most likely see a lot of people interacting with their smart phones or tablets instead of the folks around them. Some experts have described this new phenomenon as an addiction.

Naturally not all addictions are equal. But we can learn from the Bible's warnings about excess in any form:

• Amos describes how false trust leads to a preoccupation with satisfying oneself and losing sight of what's really important (Amos 6:1-6).

• Isaiah talks about a habit of excess (in his case drinking wine) becoming an end in itself, stealing ambition and drive (Isaiah 56:12).

• Isaiah also describes how drunkenness can make leaders ineffective by blurring vision and stumbling their judgment (Isaiah 28:7).

• Proverbs describes how drunken son brings shame on parents (Proverbs 28:7). 

• Jesus scolds the scribes and Pharisees for their obsession with living outwardly flawless lives while they neglect their inner thoughts and attitudes (Matthew 23:25).

• He also warns against being "weighed down" with drunkenness (and the cares of life) and so being unprepared for His second coming (Luke 21:34).

• The end of a life ruled by obsession is tragic. Further down in Proverbs 23, the writer lists the consequences of pursuing alcohol (which fit well with other addictions too) in a series of rhetorical questions: "Who has woe … sorrow … contentions … complaints … wounds without cause … redness of eyes? Those who linger long at the wine. Those who go in search of mixed wine" - Proverbs 23:29,30.

• In His story of the prodigal son, Jesus depicts how a life driven by appetite is vulnerable (Luke 15:11-14).

• Finally, Paul warns that some practices (drunkenness and revelry among them) will disqualify people from the Kingdom of God (Galatians 5:21).

It's a sobering picture. I myself have experienced how the virtual world of Facebook, Twitter, email, blog comments etc. can hijack my attention, demand increasingly more of it, as it takes my focus away from what's really important.

How much better to be obsessed and full of the Holy Spirit, leading to all things life-giving and lasting (Ephesians 5:18)!

PRAYER: Dear God, please help me to heed the Bible's warnings about unbalanced living and avoiding things that will enslave me. Amen.

MORE: Wise use of technology

In his book The Next Story: Life and Faith After the Digital Explosion, author Tim Challies talks about the many aspects of technology and how it impacts modern life.  He says:

"Our task then, is not to avoid technology but to carefully evaluate it, redeem it, and ensure that we are using it with the right motives and for the right goals" - Tim Challies, The Next Story, Kindle Location 437.

If you are struggling with technology's hold on you, Challies' book would be a great one to read.

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

The foundation of wisdom

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Psalm 111:1-10


TO CHEW ON: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;

A good understanding have all those who do His commandments. His praise endures forever." Psalm 111:10

When people ask, what would you like to be remembered for after you die, as in what would you like written on your tombstone, my mind always gravitates toward wisdom. I would love to be remembered as someone who was wise. In Psalm 111:10, the writer reveals the foundation of true wisdom. It is the fear of the Lord.

What is this fear? Tim Challies in The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment describes it:

"Wisdom is the application of the fear of God to life; it is living in such a way that we esteem God above all else. A man who is wise is first a man who fears God. This is not a terrified, horrified fear, as in the fear of a child for a monster or an abusive father, but a fear based on a realistic understanding of the infinite gap between God and man in holiness and knowledge" - page 55.

The phrase "the fear of the Lord" (or "the fear of God") occurs often in the Bible. As we track some occurrences, we see that this fear impacts many areas of life.

1. To fear God is a requirement for God's people - Deuteronomy 2:25; Joshua 4:24.

2. The fear of God involves doing away with anything that would vie with Him for first place in our hearts - Joshua 24:14.

3. God alone is to be feared in this way - Isaiah 8:13.

4. God is worthy of our fear because only He has power over life and death - Matthew 10:28.

5. God is worthy of our fear because only He can see through our actions and judge us righteously - 1 Peter 1:17; Revelation 14:7.

6. The fear of God motivates us to do away with evil - Proverbs 3:7; 14:16.

7. Fear of God influences our respect for life. When Abraham came to Gerar, he was afraid that King Abimelech, who didn't fear God, would have no qualms about killing him in order to get attractive Sarah for the royal harem - Genesis 20:11.


8. The fear of God can operate on the national level. Moses and Joshua predicted that the Canaanites would be filled with the fear of God as they heard about and saw the miracles God did for Israel - Deuteronomy 2:25; Joshua 4:24.

9. Lack of the fear of God leads to backsliding - Jeremiah 2:19.

And so I ask, is my hope to be remembered as wise, realistic because it is foundationed on the fear of God? Wisdom built on any other thing will not last.

PRAYER: Dear God, please expand my vision of Your holiness and knowledge. May the awe and respect in which I hold You impact all I do. Amen.

MORE: Fear of the Lord--the foundation of wisdom

"The fear of the Lord - Reverence for God; respect for his law, his will, his government, himself; the fear of offending him, which will lead us to do right. This fear is not that of a slave; it is not mere dread; it is not terror. It is consistent with love, and springs from it. It is consistent with calmness of mind, and promotes it. It does not produce terror, but rather delivers from it, and preserves the mind from alarms.

The word here rendered "fear" is a noun of the same origin as the word rendered "reverend" in Psalm 111:9 ("reverence" - Amplified). The suggestion to the mind of the psalmist that the "name of the Lord" was "reverend," or was to be venerated, introduced this thought that such reverence is the very foundation of wisdom" - Barnes Notes on the Bible.

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Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Online integrity

TODAY'S SPECIAL: 1 Peter 2:1-12

TO CHEW ON: "Therefore laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking, as newborn babes desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby." 2 Peter 2:1-2


I love the guileless, transparent picture of the ideal Christian Peter paints for us here. It sounds so simple to live that way and probably would be if our lives weren't full of other people — people we don't like or we wish liked us; people we are trying to impress or are trying to impress us; people who bug us or bore us, intimidate us or are mean to us; people who talk too much or too little; people we think are wrong and people with whom we agree; people to whom we impute ulterior motives or whom we admire immensely. We meet up with these and how quickly the game-playing begins!

A new challenge to the integrity of our relationships is interacting with people through technology. The non face-to-face aspect of these interactions (through e-mail, cell phones, text messages, Facebook, blogs, comments, forums, etc.) makes us more vulnerable than ever to manipulate who we are and to be someone we're not to serve our own ends.

Tim Challies in his book The Next Story: Life and Faith After the Digital Explosion says:

"In all the ways we communicate today, we may use our technologies to destroy relationship instead of foster it, to tear down instead of build up....Through the Bible God calls us to speak truth in love. Truth and love are the twin pillars that should uphold all our communication" p. 85.

Then he goes on to give four measures to implement in our online life which will help us foster truth and love:

" Be visible. If anonymity can be an enemy and a refuge, then visibility can work to keep us from slipping into sinful patterns of living and communicating...


Be accountable....Let friends or family know what you are doing online; invite them into your digital world ....


Be real. Don't fabricate for yourself an identity online that is vastly different from your real-world identity....


Be mature. To sum it up, you will need to act like a mature Christian. Paul draws a clear connection between maturity and the ability to speak truth in love....


And always distrust yourself. It may sound harsh, but be willing to doubt your motives, your heart. Take a moment to pray before answering an antagonistic e-mail; bounce your ideas and articles off trusted friends before posting them; be slow to speak (or type) and quick to listen" - p. 86.

What great advice to us in what has become a technology-medicated generation.

Of course on top of this, we would do well to be closer followers of Peter's second bit of advice, to "desire the pure milk of the word" above all the trillions of online words.

PRAYER: Dear God, please change me at a heart level so all my relationships and communications, no matter how they are conducted, are free from malice, deceit, envy and evil speaking. Help me to feed on Your words more than the multitudes of others' words available to me. Amen.

MORE: Challies.com

Tim Challies, the author of The Next Story is an Ontario resident who blogs at http://challies.com. For insightful book reviews, commentary on the Christian faith, and observations about life from a Reformed perspective, his blog is a great resource.

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 Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Our actions seen and weighed

TODAY'S SPECIAL: 1 Samuel 2:1-11

TO CHEW ON: “Talk no more so very proudly;
Let no arrogance come from your mouth,
For the Lord is the God of knowledge;
And by Him actions are weighed." - 1 Samuel 2:3

Tim Challies in his book The Next Story reminds us of how the internet and wireless technology has made much of our lives traceable. Search engine data, email, telephone and text message records, our twitter stream, not to speak of what we write on blogs and comment on web pages can all be cobbled together to form a picture of who we are. Of course, if we have nothing to hide, we don't worry a lot about this, relying on the improbability that anyone will actually take the time and effort to sleuth it all out and join the dots.

However, there is One who doesn't need Google's search engine records to know what kind of person we are: "The Lord, the God of knowledge." He is the One who knows us in an all-inclusive Psalm 139 way and will eventually weigh our actions.

Our focus verse today is part of a prayer, offered by Hannah after keeping her promise that if she would have a son, she would give him back to the Lord.  It's interesting that later in the chapter of today's reading, after Hannah has finished praying and gone home, probably in blissful ignorance of the tainted environment in which she's left Samuel (barely out of toddlerhood) the writer begins  the story of Eli's sons. They turn out to be a living illustration of what she has just prayed.

He begins the story about them: "Now the sons of Eli were worthless men. They did not know the Lord" - 1 Samuel 2:12. Then he describes how they were flaunting the rules of handling the sacrifices, and ends: "Thus the sin of the young men was very great in the sight of the Lord" - 1 Samuel 2:17.

Whether the people knew Eli's sons were sinning or not isn't clear, and isn't the issue. What mattered was that God saw and His evaluation counted.

I take two challenges from today's passage.

1. I need to realize that God knows even my most private moments. Despite the digital trail I leave with my daily actions, I may be able to maintain a comfortable degree of privacy from others. But I can't hide anything from Him. He not only sees my actions, but knows how to weigh them — interpret the motivations from which they come.

2. I want to live in such a way that if someone actually took the time to piece together the digital bits I leave behind, that trail would glorify Jesus.

PRAYER: Dear God, help me to live each moment with the consciousness that You see. And help me to gain the wisdom to weigh my actions with the scales that You use. Amen.

MORE: Hannah's prayer
You would imagine that at such a wrenching time for a mother,  Hannah's thoughts could have been of self-pity or wishing she could go back on her promise. But no. Her prayer is anything but selfish. It is a grand peon of praise to God and considered one of the twelve great prayers of the Old Testament. Walter Brueggemann says of her prayer:

"She sings of a surprise in gratitude. She sings that her family will continue. She sings that her people will have a future. She sings that through this little boy named 'asked' there will soon be newness for the poor and needy and hungry and feeble. She sings in the way singing is possible only among those who have felt the powerful invasiveness of YHWH's newness where no newness was possible. She sings of the God who 'brings life' She sings to the God who raises up. This is the God who lifts the needy. Hannah is the voice of all those who still have ashes in their hair and in their throats, who find themselves on the way to royal banquets and safe places" - Walter Brueggemann, Great Prayers of the Old Testament,  p. 32.

How do we keep the Lord's Day?

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Mark 2:23-3:6

TO CHEW ON: "And He said to them, 'The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath. Therefore the Son of Man is also Lord of the Sabbath.'" Mark 2:27-28.

We don't make much of Sabbath-keeping (or Sunday-keeping) in our church culture, let alone in society at large. How much that has changed even in the last several hundred years was brought home to me when I recently read the Puritan Jonathan Edwards' 73 Resolutions and came across #38:

"Resolved never to speak anything that is ridiculous, sportive or matter of laughter on the Lords Day" - from "The Resolutions of Jonathan Edwards in Categories."

In our reading today the Pharisees twice confront Jesus about his non-keeping of their Sabbath rules. First they butt heads over whether it is okay to do the work of harvesting heads of grain to feed themselves (Mark 2:23-28). Then later, in the synagogue when Jesus heals the man with a withered hand, that act steels the Pharisees' determination to destroy Him (Mark 3:1-6).

So what is appropriate Lord's Day-keeping behaviour? Should we as 21st century Christians be concerned at all with Sabbath/Sunday/Lord's Day-keeping? Here are some principles we find as we look at Scripture:

• God set aside one day in seven as a day of rest as early as creation (Genesis 2:2).

• God told the Israelites the Sabbath was to be a day they kept holy or separate from work (Exodus 31:15) and to Him (Deuteronomy 5:12).'

• A heart-felt keeping of the Sabbath came with the promise of a rich reward (Isaiah 58:13,14).

• Jesus and Paul observed the Sabbath by attending places of worship (Luke 4:16; Acts 17:2).

• Some of the activities that happened at "church" on the Sabbath were:

- Prayer (Acts 16:13).
- Getting acquainted with fellow believers (Acts 16:13).
- Reading Scripture (Luke 4:16).
- Teaching (Matthew 6:2).
- Apologetic reasoning from the Scripture with the goal of persuading people to put their faith in Christ (Acts 17:2; 18:4).

•  Doing good on the Sabbath is allowed. Jesus lived His statement, "Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath" (Matthew 12:12) when He:

- healed a man with a withered hand.
- healed a man with a 38-year sickness (John 5:1-9).
- healed a man of blindness (John 9:6,16).

Jesus' statement here: "The Sabbath was made for man and not man for the Sabbath" makes me think. Perhaps it is saying, don't look at Sabbath/Sunday/Lord's Day-keeping as a burdensome, rule-generated obligation but as a privilege and benefit.

- It is permission to relax from work.
- It is a day to nourish relationships with God and people.
- It gives us an entire day to focus on God—the highest and best.
- It is an opportunity to demonstrate, by our lifestyle, our devotion and loyalty to God.

PRAYER: Dear God, I have not been strict with myself about observing one day in seven as holy to You. Help me to view doing this as a privilege and benefit. Amen.

MORE: A book about Sabbath-keeping

Canadian author Mark Buchanan has written a book about keeping the Sabbath: The Rest of God: Restoring Your Soul by Restoring Sabbath. I have not read the book but it seems like a worthwhile read, judging from this excerpt from Tim Challies' (4-star Amazon.com) review of it:

"Sabbath-keeping is grounded in a stark refusal we make to ourselves. We stand ourselves down. We resist that which six days of coming and going, pushing and pulling, dodging and weaving, fighting and defending have bred into us. What we deny ourselves is our well-trained impulses to get and to spend and to make and to master. This day, we go in a direction we're unaccustomed to, unfamiliar with, that the other six days have made seem unnatural to us." If the grass needs to be cut because you did not have a chance to do it on Saturday and you have a busy week approaching, leave the grass. But if the grass needs to be cut and this is one of your favorite, most relaxing chores, than by all means, cut the grass on the Sabbath."

Our actions - seen and weighed

TODAY'S SPECIAL: 1 Samuel 2:1-20

TO CHEW ON: "Talk no more very proudly, let not arrogance come from your mouth; for the Lord is a God of knowledge and by him actions are weighed." - 1 Samuel 2:3 ESV

Tim Challies in his book The Next Story reminds us of how the internet and wireless technology has made much of our lives traceable. Search engine data, email, telephone and text message records, our twitter stream, not to speak of what we write on blogs and comment on web pages can all be cobbled together to form a picture of who we are. Of course, if we have nothing to hide, we don't worry a lot about this, relying on the improbability that anyone will actually take the time and effort to sleuth it all out and join the dots.

However, there is One who doesn't need Google's search engine records to know what kind of person we are: "The Lord, the God of knowledge." He is the One who knows us in an all-inclusive Psalm 139 way and will eventually weigh our actions.

It's interesting that later in the chapter of today's reading, after Hanna has finished praying and gone home, probably in blissful ignorance about the tainted environment in which she's left Samuel (barely out of toddlerhood) the writer begins to tell the story of Eli's sons. They turn out to be a living illustration of what she has just prayed.

He begins the story about them: "Now the sons of Eli were worthless men. They did not know the Lord" - 1 Samuel 2:12. Then he describes how they were flaunting the rules of handling the sacrifices, and ends: "Thus the sin of the young men was very great in the sight of the Lord" - 1 Samuel 2:17.

Whether the people knew they were sinning or not isn't clear, and isn't the issue. What mattered was that God saw and His evaluation counted.

I take two challenges from today's passage.

1. I need to realize that God knows even my most private moments. Despite the digital trail I leave with my daily actions, I may be able to maintain a comfortable degree of privacy from others. But I can't hide anything from Him. He not only sees my actions, but knows how to weigh them — interpret the motivations from which they come.

2. I want to live in such a way that if someone actually took the time to piece together the digital bits I leave behind, that trail would glorify Jesus.

PRAYER: Dear God, help me to live each moment with the consciousness that You see. And help me to gain the wisdom to weigh my actions with the scales that You use. Amen.

MORE: What does your digital trail say about you?

Tim Challies:

"More people than ever before are watching us, keeping tabs on us through our data. They are sorting through this data to find a picture of who we are....Wouldn't it be remarkable if the "Numerati" could see a distinct difference between data trails Christians leave behind and the ones left behind by unbelievers — that our data trails made it obvious that we had been with Jesus (Acts 4:13). And wouldn't it be a shame if the data trails were nearly indistinguishable?" - Tim Challies in The Next Story, p. 187.