Bryan Richardson

Sign

Re: Verse reading– Luke 22:66-23:25 (Day Three)
“[Herod] hoped to see him perform a sign of some sort.” We’re all Herod now. To the extent that we want adventure, amazement, or a break from the wearying business of living with people, we want exactly what Herod wanted. It’s easier if we get a “sign” to reveal what we should do than it is actually to make a decision. It’s more affirming to our sense of self to receive a dramatic divine affirmation that we’re right instead of figuring out how to live in peace with someone we don’t like. We serve ourselves. Herod was stricken dead because he served himself rather than God. Therefore, if indeed this Savior has the power to give the sign that we seek, should we not rather fall at his feet like a dead man until we hear him say, “Do not be afraid?”

Way

Re: Verse reading – Luke 21:5-38 (day three)
“Not one stone will be left on another…” Everything that comes from the way of men will be overturned. The way of men is a way of impossibility, a way of limited resources, a way of temporary life, a way of fading riches. As a building is demolished, so the way of man will meet the wrecking ball. But we are not doomed: “I will give you words and wisdom; stand firm, and you will win life,” our Lord says (Luke 21:15, 19). Nothing outside of that way of Jesus will survive. Nothing. But within that way, nothing will perish.

Answer

Re: Verse reading – Luke 20:1-8, 20-26 (day three)
“Is it right for us to pay taxes to Caesar or not?” Jesus refused to answer the question, but not because he was attempting to avoid a trap. He refused to answer the question because it was not his question to answer. It was the interrogator’s question to answer. It’s your question to answer. It’s my question to answer. And therein lies the reason for astonishment at the statement Jesus made: God allows you to have say over resources. Therefore, he will not answer your question, but there’s coming a day when you will answer his.

Road

Re: Verse reading – Luke 19:1-10 (Day Three)
“Look, Lord! Here and now I give….” The road not taken by the rich young ruler is the road we find Zacchaeus beginning to travel. The former wandered down his road sad and still lost; the latter traveled the road to eternal life. Which road have you refused to walk?

Possible

Re: Verse reading–Luke 18:18-30 (Day Three)
“Who then can be saved?” This question is a good one as far as it goes, but it doesn’t go very far. Despite its passive voice, it’s still concerned with the detection of some quality, some attribute of a person that would signal his acceptance by God. The question looks for its answer among men. But it won’t find the answer among men, for that is the realm of the impossible. When we seek God, when we lay down our efforts to impress him, when we ask him to “forgive me, a sinner”, we’ve begun to turn our eyes to the realm where all things become possible.

Lesson

Re: Verse reading–Luke 18:9-17 (Day Three)
“For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled.” Why is this so? Does God do this in order to teach self-exalters a lesson? Yes, but not if by “teach them a lesson” we mean “give them their comeuppance”. The essence of these words is more about how God rules this universe and less about anticipating the fate of the proud. When we look forward to the haughty getting theirs, aren’t we exalting ourselves over them? Let us proceed with great care.

40 Days of Prayer – Sight

You’re not weary of all that holiday music playing in every store you’ve set foot in for the past six weeks, are you? Didn’t that begin sometime around Halloween? It gets earlier every year. For 2014, it will start right after Arbor Day. Mark my words. At any rate, one of those tired old songs asks this: Do you see what I see? That’s not a bad question. Especially if the Lord asks it of you.

Day 40 – What are you not seeing?

The Lord can teach us the discipline of paying attention—attention to the way suffering works for the good in our lives, attention to our need to ask forgiveness from someone, attention to how we can serve somebody. We will not see if we do not look. Here’s a prayer: What have I missed, Lord?

Re: Verse reading – Luke 14:25-35 (day three)

40 Days of Prayer – Renew

The word of God, the deeds of God, the love of God, the works of God – these are things on which the Bible admonishes us to meditate. Meditation is a dimension of prayer. How do we do it, though? We already know.

Day 33 – Where is your mind?

We are quite familiar with a form–a negative form–of meditation. It’s called worry. Consider: Worry focuses our mind on every contour of the object of our anxiety. We call to mind all conceivable scenarios of further loss, failure, and trauma. Dread expands in our minds until it crowds out all other thoughts and feelings. This is exactly how the mechanics of meditation work. Therefore, to “be transformed by the renewing of [the] mind”, we take these mechanics and put them to work as we pray and contemplate God’s goodness: We focus our mind on every contour of whatever is good. We call to mind all conceivable scenarios of all that is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, praiseworthy. And God’s glory expands in our minds until it crowds out all other thoughts and feelings. We can do this.

Re: Verse reading – Luke 10:25-37 (day three)

40 Days of Prayer – Office

If you’ve worked with the same people long enough, you might be able to describe each person in one word. We often find humor in distilling an entire life down to a single descriptor, but people are deeper and richer than that. Sadness, hope, grief, fear, joy, accomplishment, vulnerability—God knows all these things about each soul.

Day 26 – What are you saying to God about your co-workers?

When we put people in categories of “whiner” or “optimist”, it’s easier to get on with our job. But we lose souls in the process. Perhaps a “golden rule for the office” would be good: Pray for your co-workers as you would have your co-workers pray for you.

Re: Verse reading – Luke 12:13-34 (day three)

40 Days of Prayer – Complaint

Jeremiah claimed to God that God had deceived him. Jonah declared to the Lord that he had every right to be angry with God. At least one psalmist questioned God’s sense of justice. No one told these people that prayer is supposed to be nice, neat, and clean.

Day 20 – How will you struggle with the Lord?

Complaining, or lamenting, to God was often the way the work of prayer got done in the Bible. And when people voiced their grievances in times of stress, they often got much more than they expected, because their laments served as points of revelation of God’s character and work in the world. Because they struggled with God, they came to know–as we can come to know–God’s ability to sustain the exhausted, show compassion to the lost, and reassure the downtrodden.

Re: Verse reading – Luke 10:25-37 (day three)