Dave Miller's 2024 Bible Reading Challenge

Today's Reading - Matthew 15:1-39, Mark 7:1-8:9 Background The battle escalates.  Jesus' ministry has moved into phase 2. The early Galilean ministry was one blessing after another - miracles, popularity, crowds, adulation. But as we saw yesterday, Jesus' teachings began to drive people away, slowly but surely. He did not back off, not even a little.  In today's readings, we see the key battle in Jesus' life escalating. The religious leaders were jealous of his popularity and determined to maintain their own power. They challenged Jesus, perhaps seeing the tide of his popularity beginning to turn. Jesus pulled no punches with them, calling them hypocrites and telling them (Matthew 15:8, Mark 7:6) that their hearts were far from God and all they were giving God was lip service.  Matthew tells how the disciples sidled up to him and whispered in his ear that the words had hurt the religionists' feelings. Jesus refused to back off but confronted again the pharisaic

Today's Reading - John 6:22-79 Background This is when it all turned around. There were crowds following Jesus, thousands upon thousands of excited people who were seeing healings, watching demons flee, being fed by supernatural means. Jesus was the coolest thing that had happened in their lives. But then he began to teach them and it got ugly. The Synoptics have told us about Jesus' call to "deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me." But here, in John 6, we see the actual turning point. Look at verse 66.  Many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him.  They left him in droves. The crowds began to slip away and the tens of thousands became thousands. Finally, the thousands became hundreds. When it all came to head there were about 120 faithful disciples left, with perhaps 500 on the periphery. And it was all because of the message Jesus preached. But Jesus never compromised the message to keep the crowds. He knew that his message was hard, th

Today's Reading - Matthew 13:53-14:36, Mark 6, Luke 9:1-17, John 6:1-21 Background Today's readings focus on two stories that are among the most familiar in the life of Christ. First is the story of Jesus feeding the 5000 the food of one young man. It is one of the few stories recorded in all four gospels. It is followed in three of the four gospels by the story of Jesus walking on water. Both stories remind us of the amazing and miraculous power of Jesus Christ. Matthew and Mark follow with stories of Jesus healing in the Gennesaret region. Devotional - Only God Impossible! Jesus, with an enormous crowd surrounding him, called on his disciples to feed the multitude. They threw up their hands in failure - what could they do? There was not enough food among them to feed the Twelve, much less the thousands around them. But Jesus was there that day not primarily to do a miracle that would amaze the crowds, but to reveal himself to his disciples and to build their faith. They brou

Today's Reading - Mark 5, Luke 8:26-56 Background These three stories (or two, the second having two parts), again demonstrate the amazing power of Christ. He casts out the legion of demons, showing his remarkable power there, he heals the woman with the issue of blood, and he raised a young woman from the dead. Demons, disease, and death - Jesus dominates them all. Anyone wonder why there were 2000 pigs in Israel? The answer is simple. The Decapolis, or ten cities, were Roman cities around the Galilee. Gentiles didn't share the Jews' prohibitions against pork. Devotional - Free! Since my recent trips to Senegal, the story of the man with many demons in Mark 5 holds a special meaning place for me. It was one of the five stories that we told in the Ehing villages there. In my first trip, it was the one I was able to learn the best, so I told it the most often. "This is a true story from God's word. There was a many who had many demons inside him." The man live

Today's Reading - Matthew 13:24-52, Mark 4:26-34 Background The parade of parables continues in today's readings. Matthew records six different parables here, and Mark has two of them, variations on those that Matthew told. Here are some principles for reading the parables and understanding them. Jesus, according to his own words, told parables to communicate truth to his disciples while hiding it from the world. Only those whose minds are illumined by the Spirit can hope to understand the truths of God.  The parables explain life in the kingdom of heaven. The focus of this is argued, and beyond the scope of a brief note. But the kingdom of God is anywhere Jesus rules - your heart, the church, and eventually the millennial kingdom.  Life in the kingdom is diametrically opposed to life in the world. Jesus does things differently. Look at the mustard seed principle. We want to make a big splash; Jesus says plant a small seed.  The most important principle for understanding parab

Today's Reading - Matthew 13:1-23, Mark 4:1-25, Luke 8:4-18 Background "Jesus told stories so that people would understand him better." So many preachers have used Jesus' love for parables as a reason to be a storyteller in their messages. They reference Jesus' parables as their reason for such a tactic. He told stories to make his sermons understandable to the masses. The only problem with that is that Jesus said just the opposite. It is one of the more difficult to understand themes of the gospel story, but Jesus often discouraged people from speaking out about him, and here he tells his disciples that the purpose of the parables was to PREVENT people from understanding. Look at Matthew 13:11-12 To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, so that   “they may indeed see but not perceive,  and may indeed hear but not understand,  lest they should turn and be forgiven.” Jesus told parables to communicate

Today's Reading - Matthew 11:20-12:50 Background Matthew's treatment of the early Galilean ministry of Jesus wraps up in today's readings. He has called, challenged, and empowered his disciples. He has done miracles that would amaze even the jaded people of the 21st Century. And, as we see in chapter 12, his battle with the religionists continues to escalate. Chapter 12 begins with two stories that provoked the Pharisees. First, Jesus' disciples picked grain on the Sabbath - a handful or two for food. Jesus did the unthinkable, he claimed to be Lord of the Sabbath. He then healed a man on the Sabbath, offending the Pharisees again. Jesus then appealed to Isaiah for scriptural authority of his ministry. That's when the teaching on the unpardonable sin comes in. Jesus then made two statements about the Pharisees. First, he said a tree is known by its fruit, then he discussed the "sign of Jonah" - both teachings were rebukes to the Pharisees and other religi

Today's Reading - Matthew 11:1-19, Luke 7:18-35 Background Today's reading is brief - the Matthew and Luke readings are virtually identical. They speak of the ebb and flow of the ministries of John and Jesus. John steps back in humility to prepare the way of the Lord, fading into the background so Jesus can take his place as the focus of the nation. His humility and kingdom focus are a great example.  Devotional - Giving Up the Glory John the Baptist was unique - Jesus called him the greatest of men. He boldly proclaimed truth calling people to repentance, without regard to people's worldly status. He denied himself to serve the purposes of God. Eventually, he gave his life for his bold proclamation. But in Matthew 11:1-15, we see an interesting transition taking place. John the Baptist was the biggest news in Israel for a long time. People were coming from all over to hear him preach and to be baptized for the repentance of sins. Some loved him while others hated him. But

Today's Reading - Matthew 10 Background Jesus reveals much of his leadership philosophy in Matthew 10. In the opening verses, he names his inner circle, the "Twelve" who would form the leadership core of his work (well, 11 of them would!). Volumes could be written about Jesus as a leader, but a few highlights must suffice here. Jesus did not pick the best and the brightest - a serious error according to most leadership gurus. But Jesus chose those who would obey him, and he worked his power through them. His kingdom is ordinary people indwelled by an extraordinary God walking in the power of his Spirit. It's about God's ability, not theirs. Jesus picked Galilean fishermen, tax collectors, and one or two political zealots.  He sent them out to do his work, walking in dependence on him. The disciples were significant because of their obedience and dependence, not their talent, charisma or any other human factor.  He never promised them a rose garden! He let them kn

Today's Reading - Matthew 8:18-9:38 Background There are Bible teachers who think that chronological Bible reading is less than helpful; some even oppose it. We embark today on a section that demonstrates why those critics have a point. It is still helpful to read the Bible in any way, and the way we are doing it is valid, and I believe helpful, but it has its downsides. Each of the Gospel writers had a purpose. They were not simply chronicling the life of Christ, but they were making a point. Matthew was showing the authority of Jesus as King, the rightful king in the line of David, Israel's true ruler. He chose certain stories in a certain order based on his purpose and the points he was trying to make. For the next several days we will be reading Matthew 8:18-12:50, which help to set this theme, begun in the genealogy in chapter 1 and carried through every page of the book. Many of these stories were already told in Mark and Luke, and come from Jesus' early Galilean min

Today's Reading -  Luke 7:36-8:3, 19-21 Background In Luke 7:36-8:3 we see two stories that show Jesus' concern and compassion for a group of people that the religious world often forgot, discounted, or disrespected - women. Jesus treated them as people, as co-bearers of the image of God and as people of worth and value. At the end of Luke 7, we have a shocking story of Jesus showing compassion for a woman of low character, someone the religious leaders would uniformly shun. He gave grace and forgiveness to the woman and a bad case of heartburn to the Pharisees. Then, in Luke 8:1-3 we read acknowledgment of the women who traveled with him and were his friends, his disciples (though not part of the Twelve), and his support. These are part of a theme in Luke, showing how Jesus moves beyond human boundaries to love and reach those the world rejects. Devotional - A Christian Irony What is a Christian? We are good people, right? People who do what is right, who live the way we are s

Today's Reading - Matthew 8:1-17, Luke 7:1-17 Background After a side-trip into the early chapters of John and an excursion in Matthew and Luke in the wonderful teachings of the Sermon on the Mount (and its cousin, the Sermon on the Plain), we return to the early Galilean ministry of Jesus in today's readings. After years of obscurity, Jesus appeared before John and was baptized, went into the wilderness to be tempted, then under the fullness of the Spirit headed into Galilee to begin his ministry. He proclaimed the good news of the coming kingdom of God and healed many. When he was rejected in his hometown of Nazareth he moved to the northern shore of Galilee, to a small fishing village called Capernaum. He healed and preached and cast out demons, causing no small stir in the sleepy region and throughout the nation of Israel. Three stories come to the fore here - the story of the leper's healing (likely the same one we've seen in other gospels previously), the story o

Today's Reading - Luke 6:17-49 Background Did Jesus preach the same sermon twice, with a few tweaks, or did Luke and Matthew just disagree about the details of the same sermon? That's the question that faces us as we look at today's passage in Luke 6. It is clearly a retelling of the Sermon on the Mount, but there is quite a bit that is different. The setting is different - Jesus is on a level place, not a mountain. The message is different. Jesus talks about the poor, not the poor in spirit. He balances his blessings with woes. He intersperses a parable into the sermon.  Read the Sermon on the Mount out loud. It likely does not take more than 10 or 15 minutes. But it seems that Jesus spoke for much longer than that. We only have a synopsis of his words in Matthew. It is also likely that he repeated these words in subsequent messages. So, what we have here in Luke is a repetition, with variations, of the message of the Sermon on the Mount. It is not a contradictory account

Today's Reading - Matthew 6:19-7:29 Background In one of my favorite movies, Inigo Montoya tells Vizzini that the word he keeps using, "inconceivable," doesn't mean what he thinks it means. Today's reading has some of the most misunderstood and misapplied scriptures in the Bible. Some of its teachings do not mean what people seem to think that they mean.  After dealing with the law and with religion, Jesus in the remainder of the Sermon turns his attention to a series of ten teachings on life in the kingdom of God. The first four deal with financial issues - Storing up treasures in heaven, (6:19-21), a healthy eye (6:22-23), serving two masters (6:24), and living without anxiety (6:25-34). In chapter 7, Jesus gives eight teachings about relating to others and God - Judging (7:1-5), pearls before swine (7:6), asking and receiving (7:7-11), the Golden Rule (7:12), the narrow gate (7:13-14), judging a tree by its fruit (7:15-20), false confidence (7:21-23), and the h

Today's Reading - Matthew 5:1-6:18 Background Sometimes the teachings of Jesus are so shocking that we tend to ignore them, redefine them, or put them in some special classification to justify the fact that we do not live them out. The teachings of the Sermon on the Mount fall in that category. Several of the words Jesus spoke act like ice cold water on a hot day to our souls. Beside the Sea of Galilee there is a natural amphitheater in the side of a hill that some believe is the location of this greatest of all sermons, the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus went up on a mountain, sat down and began to teach his disciples. It appears at the end of the sermon that the crowds had followed and gathered around. The sermon begins with the Beatitudes, which describe the way Jesus has called us to live our lives. Then, in tomorrow’s readings, from verse 17 to the end of chapter 5, we will read of Jesus’ interactions with the Law. In chapter 6 we will see what Jesus says about true religion, the