Chapter 12
As I looked, a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman came into view clothed in the radiance of the sun, standing with the moon under her feet, and she was crowned with a wreath of twelve stars on her head. She was painfully pregnant and was crying out in the agony of labor. Then a second sign appeared in heaven, ominous, foreboding: a great red dragon, with seven crowned heads and ten horns. The dragon's tail brushed one-third of the stars from the sky and hurled them down to the earth. The dragon crouched in front of the laboring woman, waiting to devour her child the moment it was born.
She gave birth to a male child, who is destined to rule the nations with an iron scepter. Before the dragon could bite and devour her son, the child was whisked away and brought to God and His throne. The woman fled into the wilderness, where God had prepared a place of refuge and safety where she could find sustenance for 1,260 days.
a f f i r m
Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain. In vain you rise early and stay up late, toiling for food to eat— for he grants sleep to those he loves. Psalm 127:1-2
r e a d + r u m i n a t e
Mark 10:1-12 (NRSV)
He left that place and went to the region of Judea and beyond the Jordan. And crowds again gathered around him; and, as was his custom, he again taught them. Some Pharisees came, and to test him they asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of dismissal and to divorce her.” But Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote this commandment for you.
But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.”
Then in the house the disciples asked him again about this matter. He said to them, “Whoever divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery against her; and if she divorces her husband and marries another, she commits adultery.”
d e c l a r e
Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil, or fade—kept in heaven for you, who through faith are shielded by God‘s power until the coming of the salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. 1 Peter 1:3-5
d o j u s t i c e : l o v e m e r c y : w a l k h u m b l y
Think of seven married couples in your circle of friends and acquaintances. Now write the name of one couple on each of the following seven days. Give yourself to praying for these couples daily throughout the next week. As you are praying, try to visualize Jesus laying one of his hands on the wife and the other on the husband. Imagine how he might speak blessing over them and how he might pray for them. Imaginatively enter into this way of praying for them yourself. Pray that these marriages will be
strengthened in their bond in every way.
the God Movement course is like a quarter-master
who comes up with both new and old
things from his warehouse.”
Matthew 13:52, Cotton Patch Translation
#40 Buy only used clothes for a year.
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