Reading from Tuesday, August 10

I'm losing motivation again. I feel like I'm just slogging through these entries just to get through them. I see that people are coming to the site, but I don't know if you're getting anything out of it. Has there been a noticeable drop in quality? I've certainly had a noticeable drop in motivation...

Although every time I open a post like that, the stuff I read ends up being amazing...let's see what happens...

Reading for August 10
Ezra 10:1-44
Well, this is the last chapter in Ezra - it always feels good to finish a book.

A pretty uneventful conclusion. If you remember in the last reading, Ezra was all upset because he found out that Israelites were intermarrying. Well now he gathers all the people together to tell them he doesn't like it and then they boot out everyone who isn't a Jew.

That's it.

1 Corinthians 6:1-20
Maybe I'm reading this wrong, but this goes against my whole idea of Christianity

⁹Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders ¹⁰nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

Didn't Jesus die for everyone, especially these people? The next line says this:

¹¹And that is what some of you were. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.

I suppose what that means is that Jesus died for these people, and the ones who accepted Jesus as their savior are now heirs to the kingdom. However, that doesn't mean that someone who is "greedy" will never feel the pangs of greed in their life ever again...maybe what it means is those who know these are sins, and yet proudly continue down that road are going to miss out.

Lend me some feedback on this one - what do you think?

Psalm 31:9-18
David really had a way with expressing sadness and anguish

⁹ Be merciful to me, O LORD, for I am in distress;
       my eyes grow weak with sorrow,
       my soul and my body with grief.
 ¹⁰ My life is consumed by anguish
       and my years by groaning;
       my strength fails because of my affliction, ^[a]
       and my bones grow weak.

 ¹² I am forgotten by them as though I were dead;
       I have become like broken pottery. 

The image of being a broken pot to someone is a very palpable one. It's easy to imagine being forgotten or worthless - at least for me it is...but then to remember that we will never have to feel that way with Jesus. He became that broken, unwanted, even hated thing so we would never have to experience that. Sure, we may experience that in some ways on earth, but we can always know that there is one who loves us, distant and mysterious as he may be...

Proverbs 21:3
 ³ To do what is right and just
       is more acceptable to the LORD than sacrifice.

Yes, yes and yes. Of course you have to define "right" here. Is this God's definition of right, or man's? Well, it is in the Bible, so I would assume it's God's. But this leaves the doors wide open as to what you could be doing to please God. You may think that protesting soldiers' funerals with offensive signs is right. You may think that accepting and not condemning homosexuals is right - I do, You may think confessing sins to a priest rather than God is right. I'm not saying any of these things are wrong - each people have their own ways of worshiping God, but doing "right" is infinitely subjective.