-
Nagging God
O Jerusalem, I have posted watchmen on your walls; they will pray day and night, continually. Take no rest, all you who pray to the Lord . Give the Lord no rest until he completes his work, until he makes Jerusalem the pride of the earth. (Isaiah 62:6 NLT 3-19-13) Did you catch that? Give…
-
Quit Whining
But I said, “I have labored in vain; I have spent my strength for nothing and vanity; yet surely my right is with the Lord , and my recompense with my God.” … He says: “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and…
-
Fear Is a Command
And the Lord said: “Because this people draw near with their mouth and honor me with their lips, while their hearts are far from me, and their fear of me is a commandment taught by men, (Is 29:13 ESV, 3-4-13) Their fear of me is a command… That’s the challenge. It stops being about experience…
-
Transformation
This is what the Lord says to the people of Judah and to Jerusalem:“Break up your unplowed groundand do not sow among thorns. Circumcise yourselves to the Lord,circumcise your hearts,(Jeremiah 4:3, 4 NIV, 2-8-13) Doing our part. When I talk about doing God’s will there is usually an emphasis on external modification, adjusting what I…
-
In the End
The prophets prophesy lies, the priests rule by their own authority, and my people love it this way. But what will you do in the end? (Jeremiah 5:31 NIV, 1-28-13) But what will you do in the end? It is the part no one talks about. What happens when I stand before God? There is…
-
Doubling Down on Stupid
David thought, “I will show kindness to Hanun son of Nahash, because his father showed kindness to me.” So David sent a delegation to express his sympathy to Hanun concerning his father.When David’s envoys came to Hanun in the land of the Ammonites to express sympathy to him, the Ammonite commanders said to Hanun, “Do…
-
Stupid
When King Amaziah returned from slaughtering the Edomites, he brought back the gods of the people of Seir. He set them up as his own gods, bowed down to them and burned sacrifices to them. (2 Chronicles 25:14 NIV, 12-31-12) Sounds stupid. Take home the gods of the people you defeated. But how often do…
-
New Places
This is what the Lord says to Israel:“Seek me and live;do not seek Bethel,do not go to Gilgal,do not journey to Beersheba.For Gilgal will surely go into exile,and Bethel will be reduced to nothing.” Seek the Lord and live,or he will sweep through the tribes of Joseph like a fire;it will devour them,and Bethel will…
-
Recaptured
Here is a list of the kings of the land that Joshua and the Israelites conquered: … the king of Bethel (Joshua 12:7, 16, 12-30-12) It’s part of a long, boring list. Just another entry in a line of conquered cities. But. It’s Bethel, the place where God met with Jacob. Repeatedly. The place where…
-
Scarecrows
Like a scarecrow in a cucumber field, their idols cannot speak; they must be carried because they cannot walk. Do not fear them; they can do no harm nor can they do any good. (Jeremiah 10:5 NIV, 11-19-12) We look down on the people in old times who believed idols could help or hurt them…
For years, I’ve produced brief devotional videos called Jumpstarts that I published in various outlets. (You can find them here, as well as the odd podcast.) The root of those videos was daily Bible journals I’ve been doing for decades.
I recently decided to take a hiatus from the videos, and instead publish excerpts from those journals here.
As you’ll soon see, they tend to be brief, normally consisting of just one main idea. They may also be a little rough. I’m not going to do much editing. You’ll get them just the way they came out of my brain, years, days, or months ago.
Find me on:
Jump In
If you’d like to have Stuff Steve Said emailed to you basically daily, put your email address here.
Bible/Life 