Bryan Richardson

Responsibility

Re: Verse reading–Ezekiel 18 (Day Three)
“I will judge each of you according to your own ways.” If that is so, are we off the hook for the kind of society we live in? Does the prophet’s declaration of the Lord’s word in fact create a public/private divide so that as long as I remain pure in my behavior, I bear no responsibility addressing what goes on around me? The Pharisees thought so. In truth, though, Ezekiel’s words do nothing of the sort. Because we are responsible for our own sin, the question is not, “Why did my ancestors get us here?” Rather, the question becomes: “What am I going to do about the world in which I live?”

Know

Re: Verse reading–Ezekiel 1-3 (Day Three)
“Son of man, stand up on your feet and I will speak to you.” God concerns himself with the likes of you and me; there are things that he wants us to know. That is evidence for love. When someone dear to us dies, we often think: Did he or she know what I thought or how I felt? We care about what our loved one knew or did not know. And so we determine to speak something to those loved ones still with us—something that will make life better. That is like God. And what we know from God not only makes life better, it makes life possible. There is something he wants you to know. Are you paying attention?

World

Re: Verse reading–Jeremiah 31-32 (day three)
“‘They will all know me, from the least of them to the greatest,’ declares the Lord.'” When they saw the future, the prophets didn’t settle for barely scraping by. They saw an entire world transformed. That’s because they served a God who has nothing less in mind than redeeming the entire universe. There is room for refusal on the part of human beings, of course, because God has created us with the ability to say yes or no. But on your most despairing days, will you turn your thoughts to a whole world that will pulse with God’s glory in every fiber of its being? God’s already there, and he gives us a glimpse through the words of the prophets.

Pause

Re: Verse reading – Jeremiah 21:1-10, 38:1-6 (day three)
“I myself will fight against you.” Are you sure you’ve set yourself against the thing that you should be fighting? Our capacity to think we’re right is mighty deep. When we measure events by our discomfort instead of the righteousness of God—the actual righteousness of God, mind you, not our interpretation of the righteousness of God—we tend to mark unpleasant things as coming from anywhere but God. Mark Twain said it well: “Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect.” Gamaliel, speaking in Acts 5:39, said it even earlier: “But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God.”

Track

Re: Verse reading – Jeremiah 29:1-14 (Day Three)
“Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile.” If it’s good, it’s from God. If it’s bad, it’s from…God? Can it be? It’s not uncommon to call things bad if they cause us discomfort. But our comfort has never been the gauge that God uses to determine whether or not something will benefit us. When things go bad, it’s often for our good, and this cannot be overstated. God has not lost track of you, even in the deepest recesses of difficulty. It is often God who in fact carried you there. And because he has not abandoned you, hope lies ahead.

Say

Re: Verse reading – Jeremiah 11:18-23; 12:1-6; 17:14-18; 20:7-18 (day three)
“Do not trust them, though they speak well of you.” Who could blame Jeremiah for wanting a little positive feedback? But God knew that if Jeremiah found contentment in the praise of others, he would use them for his own comfort instead of loving them and speaking honestly to them. There is a difference between receiving encouragement from people, and becoming addicted to the words people say. As Jeremiah withdrew from people from time to time to hear hard words from God, he regained his ability to stand and speak to people in hard, severe, yet merciful ways.

Alarm

Re: Verse reading – Jeremiah 18:1-17; 19:1-20:6 (Day Three)
“Does the snow of Lebanon ever vanish from its rocky slopes?” When streams dry up, life suffers. What is true of the physical realm is true first of the spiritual realm—not because the physical realm is merely an inferior copy of the spiritual realm. It isn’t. But before the material universe came to be, God existed. He created the universe—everything that is—to function in a certain way—and only in that way. When streams dry up, people become alarmed, because they know the hardship that’s coming. Their physical well being is in danger. What is true of the physical is true first of the spiritual. Has righteousness ceased to flow in our lives? Should we be concerned?

Ears

Re: Verse reading – Jeremiah 7:1-16 (Day Three)
“Hear the word of the Lord.” God does not waste his words. If he knows that people are still capable of turning theirs ears to him and hearing him and heeding his word, he will speak. Therefore, no matter how harsh the message, if we will hear, we have not passed beyond hope. When the scriptures speak, what kind of reception do your ears give it? Do your ears signal the need to yawn? Do your ears notify your mind to start wandering? Do your ears tell you that somebody else ought to hear this? Or do your ears tell you that you need to change course? What happens to you when the Bible says to you, “Hear the word of the Lord”?

Safekeeping

Re: Verse reading–Jeremiah 1 (Day Three)
“Today I have made you a fortified city…” God called Jeremiah to a hard life, but he did not place him at the mercy of hostile forces. God kept Jeremiah at the mercy of himself, which was the only safe place for Jeremiah to stand. Will we believe that God will do the same for us if we heed his call? Will we believe that a yes to God will only give us deeper assurance of his safekeeping? Hardships will come—and suffering, and death, perhaps. But we must decide whether we will actually believe that no matter what may befall us, God will keep us from ultimate harm. This is God’s protection, this is God’s mercy, this is God’s love—against which nothing can prevail.

What

Re: Verse reading – Luke 24:13-35 (Day Three)
“What things?” [Jesus] asked. Even after his resurrection, our Savior was the same Jesus, the same teacher who patiently walked alongside anyone who would engage him, engrossed in conversation, shepherding the curious to clarity, leading the acquiescent to alarm, bringing the sorrowful to surprise. Jesus wasn’t playing dumb when he asked the Emmaus-bound travelers to explain their dejected state. He well knew that when we tell him what is on our minds, when we converse with him, we begin to think more deeply. He leads us into the light. Jesus knew “what things.” The question is, do we?