Need a Bible Reading Plan for 2013?

If so, you will want to check out a very comprehensive and helpful list of reading plans on the website of Ligonier Ministries. You can find it here.

A TRAGEDY AT THE BIRTH OF JESUS

Matt. 2:7-23   Sermon preached Dec. 16, 2012                                                                          

Intro -The tragic events of Friday in Connecticut have caused me to change what I had planned to preach. I was going to preach from Luke 1 and the appearance of the angel Gabriel to Mary...but from talking with some of you and knowing my own thoughts and feelings of the past 3 days...I decided to deal with another passage pertaining to the birth of Christ.  It is one we usually gloss over.

 

Matthew 2:7-20. READ.      Herod had summoned the wise men and asked them to search for this Christ child in Bethlehem. He lied to them in order to do him harm, not to worship as he had said. They go to Bethlehem and see the child and worship him and present their unique gifts. God warns them in a dream and they depart for their own country via another way.  The angel of the Lord appears to Joseph in a dream and tells them to rise and take the child and flee to Egypt since Herod is going to search for the child to kill him. Joseph and Mary and the baby Jesus do as the angel instructs and flee to Egypt.  Herod realizes he has been tricked. In his anger he sends soldiers to Bethlehem to kill all the male children who were 2 years old and younger. Matthew notes this is a fulfillment of a prophecy spoken by Jeremiah: “ V. 19 tells us that Herod died.

Today is Reformation Day. Here is a very good video about the life and ministry of John Calvin. It was released today by Desiring God Ministries. http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/after-darkness-light-video-from-geneva

A Plan for Prayer

A SUGGESTED PLAN FOR PRAYER (adapted from If God Already Knows Why Pray? By Douglas F. Kelly) After having read a daily portion of Scripture, it is time to turn the promises into prayer. This takes time, planning, and effort. Be Systematic Some believers will be able to spend an hour each day in specific prayer. For those of you that wish to try this, Dick Eastman suggests a plan to divide an hour into twelve portions of five minutes each. During each one you cover a different aspect of prayer, thus making an hour much easier to get through. For my own part, I have made an adaptation of Eastman's method into seven segments: praise, waiting, confession, scripture praying, watching, intercession, and thanksgiving. Each one is perhaps five minutes each, except for intercession, which lasts for perhaps ten to fifteen minutes. At the end of this appendix you will find several pages to assist you in organizing your time in this way, if you wish.

Need a Useful Bible Reading Plan?

A SUGGESTED PLAN FOR BIBLE READING (adapted from If God Already Knows Why Pray? By Douglas F. Kelly) This plan has been helpful to many since Puritan times and was designed to cover the Scriptures in exactly 365 days. Its special value is that it gives you a varied diet by exposing you to different parts of Scripture each day while providing continuity by causing you to return to the same section on the same day of the week all through the year.