Dear sisters,
What a blessing this Bible Reading Challenge has already been! We are so very grateful to the Lord for the way in which it has pleased Him to draw so many of us at the same time to His Word. We are grateful for each one of you. Thank you for your enthusiasm and your faithfulness. We pray for you every day that the Lord will make you understand the way of His precepts, that you will meditate in His wondrous works as you read about them in the Bible, and see them every day around you (Psalm 119:27).
This week we will be reading Genesis 37-50 and Matthew 20-28. Then, on Friday, we have a catch-up day before we start reading the book of Exodus (1-4) and Galatians (1-2). If you are current in your readings, I would love to be able to persuade you to read Galatians in one siting either on Friday (our catch-up day) or on Sunday. Reading the epistles in one sitting is truly wonderful, I am sure you will agree with me after you try it once!
We will read this week the story of Joseph, and we will be surprised to read that even though all signs point to him, he is not the one through whom the Seed of the Woman will come. He endures, by God’s grace, horrible circumstances to preserve the line through which the Promised One will come. For now I will give you the name of a character that you need to pay attention to in our readings this week: Judah. We will talk more about them in this week’s webinar. I can’t wait to share more of that with you! I hope you can watch it live (or recorded!) here.
We will be reading in the Bible and talking in our webinar about God’s Providence. We have been reading and understanding how God is Sovereign, which means that He does all that He pleases to do and that He chooses whoever he wants to choose to fulfill His purposes to bring glory to His name and good to His people. Now, God’s Providence is the way in which God actually directs all circumstances so that His plans may be fulfilled. Both are fascinating doctrines because they bring so much hope, comfort, and rest to the soul of the believers. And in Ch. 50 of Genesis you will see exactly this. Joseph will wholly embrace the life God has chosen for him to live because he knows that God is good, that God is sovereign, and that God rules through the acts of His Providence all circumstances including the decisions of men.
In Matthew we will be reading how the Devil, the Serpent, continues to plot a way to kill the Seed of the Woman. We will see God exercising His sovereignty and how through His Providence will direct the hearts of men to betray Jesus, to mock him, to kill him; a series of events will fall into place and the Seed of the Woman, the Promised One, will be hanged on the cross because God -not the Devil- had planned and decided it that way. Jesus’ crucifixion was God’s “plan A” since the very beginning.
But the story doesn’t end there. God’s plan to redeem the nations through the Seed of the Woman will be fulfilled. Christ will not remain in a tomb. So once again we will take the Book and read. We will read what the Devil, the Serpent, never saw coming: the Son of God, the Promised One crushing his own head. The question he has asked to tempt many comes to him as a powerful statement: God did say, Satan, that your head would be crushed! Our Lord Jesus Christ reigns! He is risen and risen indeed! Alleluia!
May our prayer this week be, Lord these circumstances are pressing me hard on my right, these others hard on my left, at times I feel crushed under the heaviness of them all, “But I trust in you, O Lord, I say, ‘You are my God.” My times in your hand, Sovereign God! May I keep, God, my eyes fixed on the risen Christ. Amen! (Psalm 119:14)
Happy reading, Friends!
Under His Sun and by His grace,
Becky Pliego and the Team of Christ Church Ladies Fellowship
