Receiving July 19, 2008, worship scriptures

Scriptures for July 19
Genesis 28:10-19a
Psalm 139:1-12, 23-24
Romans 8:12-25
Matthew 13:24-30 36-43

PART I - Receiving the Word as spirit and life for yourself
http://charistis.blogspot.com/2008/03/receiving-word-as-spirit-and-life.html provides suggestions for how to receive the Word as spirit and life. Part II of this post provides notes that are a result of following those suggestions. Receive the Word as spirit and life for yourself and compare notes with others who are doing the same.

PART II - Notes about this week's scriptures

Prayer for receptivity
Receptivity is a way of my heart that You initiate and that You cause to thrive. Please, God, let this receptivity be realized again and more so right now.

Genesis 28:10-19a

What were Rebekah and Jacob believing in and committed to?
What can I learn from them about the strength and the breakdown of faith?
More than trying to figuring out where or why they went wrong, it's occurring to me that I need to confess the ways my faith breaks down. For example, in what ways do I try to help God do what God has promised to do? How often, how readily, do I shift from faith to performance, from trust to achievement? Do I make faith a springboard into works? Do I use faith to get the job done? Or is my trust bearing fruit in confession and surrender followed by light and union with God?
July 19, 2008, note: Oops, today I discovered the mistake I made last week. When open to Genesis 28:10 my Bible is also open to 27:10-19a, which I mistakenly used. Verses 10-19a in Chapter 27 were spirit and life for me in a timely and very valuable way, but they weren't the intended passage in Genesis 28 about Jacob's Vow at Bethel.

Psalm 139:1-12, 23-24
"You know..."
You understand..."
You comprehend my path..."
And are acquainted with all my ways." (vss. 2, 3)

"Search me, O God, and know my heart;
Try me, and know my anxieties;" (vs. 23)

That God knows and understands is hope and comfort. Opening my heart and my anxieties to His knowing is trust and surrender. These are dynamics that need to be renewed and deepened as circumstances intensify.

Romans 8:12-25
"...joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together." (vs. 17)
There's an essential connection between "suffer with" and "glorified together." There are some things that get in the way of suffering with Him: some victims specialize in suffering; pill-taking Americans dodge suffering; joy-joy Christians deny suffering. We need to find our way through distortions in order to suffer with Him as a joint heir.

"...the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed." (vs. 18)
When we have been staggered by suffering; when suffering has hit like a 10.0 earthquake in our soul, this verse can help us reaccess, redefine, realize more fully what we can never fully realize: the incomparable glory.

Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43
"'Let both grow together until the harvest..." (vs 30)
"The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one. The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels." (vss. 38, 39)
When and how good and evil get sorted out is a question that is expressed or implied everywhere these days. Ponder how this parable informs tolerance and integrity.