Listen to Nick read the Firestarter and the reading.

 Mark tells how people “went out” to be baptized by John in the Jordan. This is the same word in Greek for the Exodus. Jesus is the one who is going to lead you up and out of waters drowning you. Spend time with John and Jesus by the banks of these waters of freedom.

The Gospel of Mark will be our companion for the Fridays of most of this year. I suggest you spend time with a Bible Dictionary and a commentary on this Gospel so that you will appreciate the power of Jesus portrayed by Mark. The more you learn, the more the Holy Spirit will find a mind and heart receptive to the presence of God.

Just as in the Exodus, this presence will go before you as a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night, splitting open the chaotic waters of your life!

Mark 1:1–8

Create your own Bible Breaths Learn More…
Example: Baptized with th’Holy Spirit v. 8

Fridays are dedicated to the Gospels.
In the Winter Season of Advent to Epiphany this year we read Luke 1-2; Mark 1-3

For all the Firestarters I recommend the ebook.  You will have the entire program of well over a thousand of these introductions with you on your phone or tablet. Check the menu options at the site for more information.

Listen to Nick read the Firestarter and the reading.

Pray this passage, open to its simple, clear truth. As with darkness and light, here contrasts of death and life, love and hate are starkly set against each other so that John’s teaching will affect his listeners.

John does the same as Moses in Deuteronomy 30 when he placed life or death before the people. As Moses invited them to choose life so that they could live, John does the same. Choose light, love, and life instead of darkness, hatred, and death.

Which way will you go today—toward life, or toward death? Pause at various moments of transition in the day to monitor your choices. As an astronaut, perhaps you need “mid-course” correction!

1 John 3:10–24

Find out all about Bible Breaths Learn More…
Example: From death to life through loving v. 14

Thursdays are dedicated to the letters of Paul, other letters,
the Book of Acts, and the Book of Revelation.
In the Winter Season of Advent to Epiphany this year we read the Letters of John and Jude.

For all the Firestarters I recommend the ebook.  You will have the entire program of well over a thousand of these Firestarters with you on your phone or tablet. Check the menu options at the site for more information.

Listen to Nick read the Firestarter and the Psalm.

For a video meditation on today’s Psalm created three years ago, Tap here.

Read this psalm with Herod in mind, along with the scheming retinue that surrounds and chokes him of life. They are fools that do not know God. The root in Hebrew for “fool,” nabal, means to “fall away,” or “to wither.” Just as in Jesus’s “Parable of the Sower,” when seed falls on rocky ground, the plant withers and falls away, because the roots do not go deep.

Feel again the contrast between corrupt, worldly power typified by Herod, and the salvation expressed in the final verse that has come in Jesus. Do not play the fool by failing to engraft your spiritual roots onto the vine, which is Christ.

You followed Jesus to Bethlehem and adored him there; now go with him to safety in Egypt and feel an inward serenity until all that is “Herod” in your life withers away and dies.

Psalm 53

What are Bible Breaths? Learn More
Example: Lord may I grow in goodness. v. 3

We continue to follow the Psalms in numerical order.

For all the Firestarters I recommend the ebook.  You will have the entire program of well over a thousand of these introductions with you on your phone or tablet. Check the menu options at the site for more information