Day Two

Well, I don't have anything profound to say today, and I'm still stinging from an ugly loss this morning by my Huskers.  On the other hand, I'm thrilled to have 35 page views for this blog, and 4 subscribers in the first day.  That means we are building a support group, which is our goal. 

In two days we have covered roughly 2000 years of the history of the world, and it got ugly just about as quickly as the football game this morning did.  It only took one generation past the Fall for the first murder to occur.  In ten generations mankind's sinfulness progressed to the point where God had to, as Pastor Barry Mahler says, hit the reset button. God says that His Spirit will not strive with mankind forever, and we must recognize that this applies to us today as well.  His Spirit DOES strive with us and with our loved ones for a time, giving us every opportunity to repent, but at some point He will let us have our way if we continue to harden our hearts.

Since this blog is about support and accountability, I thought I'd ask a couple of questions: 

• What methods have helped motivate you in reading God's Word in the past?
• What resources do you use? 
• How can we help support each other in our common goal of reading through the Bible this year?

I find that journaling helps me a lot.  I always have a pen and spiral notebook available.  It's an act of faith.  If I am prepared to hear God speaking, He will speak, and I will be ready to write down what He says.

It is also a way of involving all of my senses in the learning process.  Sometimes I am just writing down facts or a paraphrase of the passage.  Sometimes I am writing down my questions, and sometimes I am writing down God's answers to my questions or an application to my current life situation.  I don't feel that I am getting the full benefit of reading if I don't write something down.  Today I created the chart below to help me visualize the generations.  Notice that Adam survived through the birth of the ninth generation.  That means that Adam was still alive when Noah's father Lamech was born.  This is one of the ways that the account of creation was preserved:  Noah heard it from his father, who very likely heard it directly from Adam. 

When I have learned something new, when God has revealed some "great and unsearchable thing" to me, that is what keeps me coming back.  What new thing did you learn today?