על ידי Jacob D. Gerber

Bible Readings for March 25th Exodus 36 | John 15 | Proverbs 12 | Ephesians 5 Exodus 36 is written to describe the work of constructing the tabernacle, but this passage is also rich with insights about church leadership and ministry in the context of the new covenant church of Jesus Christ. First, the text makes it clear that not only do Bezalel an…

Bible Readings for March 24th Exodus 35 | John 14 | Proverbs 11 | Ephesians 4 Throughout Exodus, we have seen Yahweh drawing clear boundaries that separate his holiness from everything that is common: to a high degree from the wider world, but also from different groups of Israelites in varying degrees. Only the priests are set apart for holy minis…

Bible Readings for March 23rd Exodus 34 | John 13 | Proverbs 10 | Ephesians 3 At the very end of Exodus 33, Moses had gone for broke. In the face of Yahweh’s threat to abandon Israel by withdrawing his own personal presence from their midst, Moses pleaded for Yahweh to go up to the Promised Land with them, and Yahweh had granted Moses’s request (Ex…

Bible Readings for March 22nd Exodus 33 | John 12 | Proverbs 9 | Ephesians 2 In Exodus 32 we saw the first part of the wrath of God against Israel’s monstrous idolatry, when they fashioned for themselves a golden calf to worship and then dared to call that golden calf Yahweh. In response, Yahweh sent the Levites through the camp to kill their fello…

Bible Readings for March 21st Exodus 32 | John 11 | Proverbs 8 | Ephesians 1 Exodus 32 includes one of the most famous—and most tragic—stories from the history of Israel, the scene where God’s people make for themselves a golden calf to worship while Moses is receiving the law from Yahweh on top of Mount Sinai. To understand the full significance o…

Bible Readings for March 20th Exodus 31 | John 10 | Proverbs 7 | Galatians 6 In Exodus 31, we find some of the clearest teaching in all the Bible about the purpose and importance of the Sabbath. In recent history, the fourth commandment to keep the Sabbath holy has been largely forgotten among Christians. A lot of this is not willful disobedience b…

Bible Readings for March 19th Exodus 30 | John 9 | Proverbs 6 | Galatians 5 Much of Exodus 30 is focused on an important aspect of tabernacle worship: the altar of incense (Ex. 30:1–10) and the recipe for the incense that would be burned on the altar (Ex. 30:34–38). After teaching the law and offering sacrifices, burning incense was the most import…

Bible Readings for March 18th Exodus 29 | John 8 | Proverbs 5 | Galatians 4 In Exodus 29, we read about three distinct processes to prepare priests to be set apart for ministry, each with a unique and important theological value. The priests were to be washed with water (Ex. 29:4), anointed with oil (Ex. 29:7), and sprinkled with the blood of a sac…

Bible Readings for March 17th Exodus 28 | John 7 | Proverbs 4 | Galatians 3 The garments described in Exodus 28 are holy garments (Ex. 28:2) for a holy priesthood, even down to the plate that they wore on their turbans with the inscription “Holy to the LORD” (Ex. 28:36). The purpose of these garments was “for glory and for beauty” (Ex. 28:2, 40)—th…

Bible Readings for March 16th Exodus 27 | John 6 | Proverbs 3 | Galatians 2 Despite the fact that normal Israelites were not allowed into the holy places, the tabernacle was nevertheless supposed to be the place where Yahweh dwelt in the midst of all his people. So in Exodus 27, Yahweh made a provision for his people to approach his tabernacle in a…

Bible Readings for March 15th Exodus 26 | John 5 | Proverbs 2 | Galatians 1 In Exodus 26, Yahweh describes the two different places in the tabernacle where his holiness would dwell most fully on earth: the Holy Place and the Most Holy Place. Those two places would be separated only by a veil made out of blue, purple, and scarlet fabrics, with figur…

Bible Readings for March 14th Exodus 25 | John 4 | Proverbs 1 | 2 Corinthians 13 For modern readers, the detailed instructions that Yahweh gives for the construction of the tabernacle can become a bit tedious—something like reading a complex instruction manual without any pictures. This is our problem, though, and not the text’s. If we pay careful …

Bible Readings for March 13th Exodus 24 | John 3 | Job 42 | 2 Corinthians 12 Exodus 24 is a covenant renewal worship ceremony. Because we also meet weekly on the Lord’s Day to renew the one new covenant that Jesus himself inaugurated through his life, death, resurrection, and ascension—and not to inaugurate new covenants each week—Exodus 24 is uniq…

Bible Readings for March 12th Exodus 23 | John 2 | Job 41 | 2 Corinthians 11 At its core, the law functions on the principle “Do this and live.” So when God gives the law to Israel, he promises them that they will receive either blessings or curses—blessings if they obey all that God instructs them to do in his law and curses if they fail to obey w…

Bible Readings for March 11th Exodus 22 | John 1 | Job 40 | 2 Corinthians 10 Exodus 22:31 might be the most interesting verse in the whole chapter: “You shall be consecrated to me. Therefore you shall not eat any flesh that is torn by beasts in the field; you shall throw it to the dogs.” It is sometimes difficult to imagine why Yahweh places such a…

Bible Readings for March 10th Exodus 21 | Luke 24 | Job 39 | 2 Corinthians 9 Our society may not have a more intellectually lazy cliché than “An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.” The phrase itself is clever, vividly portraying one eye put out after another in an unending, bloodthirsty, universal quest. But is unrestrained vengeance real…

Bible Readings for March 9th Exodus 20 | Luke 23 | Job 38 | 2 Corinthians 8 When a lawyer asked Jesus what was the greatest commandment, Jesus answered by quoting Deuteronomy 6:5 and Leviticus 19:18, explaining that the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and that the second greatest comma…

Bible Readings for March 8th Exodus 19 | Luke 22 | Job 37 | 2 Corinthians 7 Exodus 19 is a pivotal chapter in the Bible. At this point, Yahweh tells his people to stop at Mount Sinai, where he will meet with them and take them to himself as his people through covenant and by giving them his law, beginning with the Ten Commandments in the next chapt…

Bible Readings for March 7th Exodus 18 | Luke 21 | Job 36 | 2 Corinthians 6 We know almost nothing of Jethro’s faith until we come to Exodus 18, when Moses tells Jethro all that Yahweh had done to redeem Israel from Egypt (Ex. 18:8). We read that, in response to the news, Jethro rejoiced at what Yahweh had done for Israel (Ex. 18:9–10), and then he…

Bible Readings for March 6th Exodus 17 | Luke 20 | Job 35 | 2 Corinthians 5 A terrible pattern is emerging as Israel follows Yahweh through the wilderness toward Mount Sinai. It goes like this: Yahweh accomplishes some great act of redemption for his people, but whenever a crisis emerges, Israel acts as though Yahweh has never done anything other t…

Bible Readings for March 5th Exodus 16 | Luke 19 | Job 34 | 2 Corinthians 4 Obviously, providing for the basic needs of Israel in the wilderness would be no small task, yet the entire Exodus would be for nothing if God’s people did not survive long enough to enter into their inheritance. So, God provided water for his people to drink in Exodus 15, …

Bible Readings for March 4th Exodus 15 | Luke 18 | Job 33 | 2 Corinthians 3 The song of Moses in Exodus 15 provides one of the richest overall descriptions of who Yahweh is for his people that we find in the entire Bible—and as such, Exodus 15 is an instructive chapter on what our own worship should sound like. To begin, Moses sings that Yahweh is …

Bible Readings for March 3rd Exodus 14 | Luke 17 | Job 32 | 2 Corinthians 2 Although we might have thought Israel was finished forever with Egypt, neither Yahweh nor the Egyptians are done fighting over the possession of Israel. Yahweh again hardens Pharaoh’s heart (Ex. 14:4) so that Pharaoh and his servants wonder how they could have been so fooli…

Bible Readings for March 2nd Exodus 13 | Luke 16 | Job 31 | 2 Corinthians 1 It is important to recognize that Yahweh liberates Israel not to give them total freedom but so that Israel could be Yahweh’s people and so that Yahweh could be Israel’s God. In other words, Yahweh redeemed Israel. The word redeem means to purchase something back for onesel…

Bible Readings for March 1st Exodus 12 | Luke 15 | Job 30 | 1 Corinthians 16 By the time Pharaoh lets Israel go out of Egypt, his country has come to great ruin. As a result of Yahweh’s terrible plagues, fish from the Nile have died (Ex. 7:21); a legion of frogs has come, died, and stank (Ex. 8:14); the livestock has died (Ex. 9:4); all Egypt has b…

Bible Readings for February 28th Exodus 11 | Luke 14 | Job 29 | 1 Corinthians 15 Exodus 11–12:21 narrates the final showdown between Yahweh and Pharaoh. Again and again, Pharaoh has hardened his heart against Yahweh, exalting himself against the God of the Hebrews, and in today’s reading, Yahweh finally brings this story to a close. Despite Moses’s…

Bible Readings for February 27th Exodus 10 | Luke 13 | Job 28 | 1 Corinthians 14 Although we are not quite to the end of the war between Yahweh and Pharaoh, there are several indicators in Exodus 10 that the battles are moving increasingly in one direction. Yahweh’s glory continues to shine brighter in the face of the false gods of Egypt, and Phara…

Bible Readings for February 26th Exodus 9 | Luke 12 | Job 27 | 1 Corinthians 13 As the plagues keep coming in Exodus 9, Moses continues to preach the word of Yahweh to Pharaoh. Every time they meet, Moses gives a bit more of Yahweh’s word, and in Exodus 9 we come upon one of the more interesting speeches that Yahweh makes through Moses when he expl…

Bible Readings for February 25 Exodus 8 | Luke 11 | Job 25–26 | 1 Corinthians 12 In yesterday’s reading from Exodus 7, we encountered the first plague, when God turned the water of the Nile into blood. For today’s meditation, we will explore what God is doing through these plagues, which are at the heart of the theology of Exodus. To start, we shou…

Bible Readings for February 24th Exodus 7 | Luke 10 | Job 24 | 1 Corinthians 11 As Yahweh helps Moses regroup before confronting Pharaoh again, Yahweh repeats a strange promise from Exodus 4:21, saying, “But I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, and though I multiply my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, Pharaoh will not listen to you” (Ex. 7:3–4). Y…

Bible Readings for February 23rd Exodus 6 | Luke 9 | Job 23 | 1 Corinthians 10 In Exodus 5, we saw that the pressure of leadership was beginning to get to Moses. In frustration, Moses asks why Yahweh has done evil to Israel by sending him, since Pharaoh had only increased his cruelty since Moses had come. While Yahweh’s response in Exodus 6 doesn’t…

Bible Readings for February 22nd Exodus 5 | Luke 8 | Job 22 | 1 Corinthians 9 When Moses proclaims to Israel all that Yahweh has called him to do to lead Israel out of Egypt, we read that “the people believed; and when they heard that the LORD had visited the people of Israel and that he had seen their affliction, they bowed their heads and worship…

Bible Readings for February 21st Exodus 4 | Luke 7 | Job 21 | 1 Corinthians 8 We should not judge Moses too harshly for his fear of confronting Pharaoh to declare God’s word. Moses makes up a variety of excuses in Exodus 4:10 about being less than eloquent and slow of speech, but even when Yahweh reminds Moses that he himself is the one who created…

Bible Readings for February 20th Exodus 3 | Luke 6 | Job 20 | 1 Corinthians 7 Exodus 3 is a critical passage for understanding how God’s holiness and his love fit together. In this encounter, God both approaches Moses and tells Moses to keep his distance. So, when Moses turns aside to see how a bush could burn but yet not be consumed, God calls out…

Bible Readings for February 19th Exodus 2 | Luke 5 | Job 19 | 1 Corinthians 6 The early life of Moses includes both high drama during his first forty years and then quiet obscurity for the next forty. He escapes being executed as a male Hebrew infant through a basket (literally, an “ark,” the same word that is used for the ark that had rescued Noah…

Bible Readings for February 18th Exodus 1 | Luke 4 | Job 18 | 1 Corinthians 5 Exodus 1 explains the transition between the story of Joseph and the story of Moses. When Joseph died at the end of Genesis 50, he was the second most powerful man on the planet, a man seated at the right hand of the pharaoh of Egypt himself. As such, Joseph’s brothers an…

Bible Readings for February 17th Genesis 50 | Luke 3 | Job 16–17 | 1 Corinthians 4 As we talked about in the meditation for Genesis 45, Joseph evaluates the suffering he endured in his lifetime in a surprising way. Rather than seeing himself as a victim of thoroughly unfair treatment (which he certainly was), Joseph understood that God had sovereig…

Bible Readings for February 16th Genesis 49 | Luke 2 | Job 15 | 1 Corinthians 3 Genesis 49 records the final words of Jacob before the patriarch is gathered to his people in death, buried in the same cave as Jacob’s grandparents Abraham and Sarah, Jacob’s parents, Isaac and Rebekah, and Jacob’s wife Leah (Gen. 49:29–33). The bulk of Genesis 49, how…

Bible Readings for February 15th Genesis 48 | Luke 1:39–80 | Job 14 | 1 Corinthians 2 In Genesis 48:5–7, Jacob formally adopts Joseph’s sons, Ephraim and Manasseh. There is a solid, practical reason for Jacob to do so: by adopting Ephraim and Manasseh, Jacob gives those sons direct portions of his own inheritance. So, rather than giving Joseph’s fa…

Bible Readings for February 14th Genesis 47 | Luke 1:1–38 | Job 13 | 1 Corinthians 1 As we discussed yesterday, the last few chapters of Genesis are setting up the story we will read in Exodus—a story of God’s redemption of his people that lives at the heart of the rest of the Scriptures. Genesis 47 charts three key events that establish the founda…

Bible Readings for February 13th Genesis 46 | Mark 16 | Job 12 | Romans 16 What an incredible scene it must have been to see Jacob reunited with his son whom he had believed to be dead for so many years: “[Joseph] presented himself to [Jacob] and fell on his neck and wept on his neck a good while” (Gen. 46:29). This is very similar language to the …

Bible Readings for February 12th Genesis 45 | Mark 15 | Job 11 | Romans 15 I love to imagine what must have been going through the minds of Joseph’s brothers when he revealed himself to them. All we are told directly is that “his brothers could not answer him, for they were dismayed at his presence” (Gen. 45:3). What could they possibly have been t…

Bible Readings for February 11th Genesis 44 | Mark 14 | Job 10 | Romans 14 By Genesis 44, Joseph has spent considerable time with his brothers. He has interrogated them, imprisoned them, and feasted with them. It does not seem as though anything Joseph has done—even at the points when he treated them roughly—has happened out of malice but rather ou…

Bible Readings for February 10th Genesis 43 | Mark 13 | Job 9 | Romans 13 When the first measure of grain runs out for Jacob and his sons, Jacob instructs his sons to return again to Egypt to buy more grain. Judah not only reminds Jacob that Joseph had told them not to appear before him without Jacob’s youngest son, Benjamin, but Judah also pledges…

Bible Readings for February 9th Genesis 42 | Mark 12 | Job 8 | Romans 12 In Genesis 42, we read the first installment of how Joseph reconciles with his brothers after many years since they had sold him into slavery. Although the brothers do not recognize Joseph—how could they possibly imagine that their brother had ascended to the right hand of Pha…

Bible Readings for February 8th Genesis 41 | Mark 11 | Job 7 | Romans 11 Despite the fact that the cupbearer had promised Joseph he would remember him and work to free Joseph from prison, two entire years pass without anything happening to rescue Joseph. And once again, even though the cupbearer abandons Joseph (one more person in a long line of pe…

Bible Readings for February 7th Genesis 40 | Mark 10 | Job 6 | Romans 10 In yesterday’s reading, Joseph ended up in prison through no fault of his own. After being ambushed by his brothers and sold into foreign slavery, Joseph had gained the respect and admiration of his Egyptian master. But when Potiphar’s wife falsely accused Joseph of trying to …

Bible Readings for February 6th Genesis 39 | Mark 9 | Job 5 | Romans 9 After the brief interlude in yesterday’s reading when we read about Judah and Tamar, Genesis 39 returns us to the story of Joseph. In this chapter, the narrator picks up where he left us at the end of Genesis 37, where we learned that Joseph had been sold to an Egyptian named Po…

Bible Readings for February 5th Genesis 38 | Mark 8 | Job 4 | Romans 8 Because Jacob was renamed Israel after wrestling with God in Genesis 32:28, the sons of Israel then served as the heads of the tribes of Israel. And of all the tribes in Israel, the tribe of Judah (named after the man whom we read about in Genesis 38) will end up playing an unus…