Month: March 2025

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Jerusalem Focus

Listen to Pastor Nick read the “Firestarter” and the Gospel.

The face of Jesus is bold before his enemies. There is no fear in him as he confronts pride and deceit with absolute truth. Herod Antipas wants to kill Jesus, just as did his wicked father, Herod the Great, when Jesus was an infant.

Jerusalem has become the hub of all the hostility that will mount against Jesus and put him to death. Jesus longs to go there. Follow him to Jerusalem with the kind of victory songs from the Psalms that fill our Wednesdays in Lent.

Meditate with a wide, expansive heart upon the end of the Gospel in verses 34 and 35. Get in touch with where there is sadness in your own life, facing what makes you sad, with the love that Jesus has for Jerusalem. Be one with your Lord. Pray that his profound inner emotions transform yours and make them as his.

Luke 13:31–35

What are “Bible Breaths”? Learn More…
Example: As prophets, suff’ring with You v. 34

Sundays are dedicated to the Gospels from the Revised Common Lectionary.
In year C, we generally read from the Gospel of Luke.

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.

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The Cleft in the Rock

Listen to Pastor Nick read the “Firestarter” and Exodus 33:12-23.

 Forty days and forty nights, Moses fasts upon the mountain, filled with the presence of the Lord. Jesus, who is the presence of God, does the same at the beginning of his ministry. May the time of Lent find you in God’s presence, your awareness of it increased by fasting and faith.

Be with Moses as you listen to his communion with the Lord, the renewal of the covenant and the promises that God makes. Moses longs to see the glory of the Lord. Moses rests in the cleft of the rock, covered by God’s hand as God passes by. The rock now is Christ—the cleft, the open side of Jesus on the cross. The glory of God is Jesus’s compassion and forgiveness from that cross. The people see the presence of God in the face of Moses. The glory of God will radiate from your face if you spend time in the cleft in Jesus’s side.

Exodus 33:12—34:35

This is the third of three parts of the Torah Portion Ki Tissa (Take a Census) 
Conservative and Reform Jewish congregations read only this part this year,
as also in this Bible plan.
Here is the entire portion in all three parts.

Exodus 30:11—34:35

Learn about Bible Breaths Learn More…
Example: I hear You utter my name. 33:12

The Saturday passages follow the reading list that Jewish people use in their synagogue worship
throughout the world. They are taken from
“The Torah,” the first five books of the Bible from Genesis to Deuteronomy
that are read each year beginning with autumn.

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

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The Plot to Glory – with Audio

Listen to Pastor Nick read the “Firestarter” and the Gospel.

Darkness closes in upon the highest religious officials, their vision squeezed into the tiny, dimly lit room of their own self-interest. So is the atmosphere after the raising of Lazarus from the dead as we begin the Friday Gospels of John in Lent this year. The plot to kill Jesus is fashioned. The Scribes and Pharisees are about to succumb to the temptations of power and control, just as did their ancestors in the desert—the same desert temptations that Jesus overcame.

John the Evangelist fills the account with ironic verses, such as verse 50. God is about to use the most hideous of evil plots as a plot to glory. From the greatest evil will rise the greatest good—the Resurrection.

John 11:45–57

Create your own Bible Breaths Learn More…
Example: Dispersed gathered into one v. 52

Fridays are dedicated to the Gospels.
In Lent and Easter we read the Gospel of John.

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.