In my thirtieth year, in the fourth month on the fifth day, while I was among the exiles by the Kebar River, the heavens were opened and I saw visions of God. - Ezekiel 1:1

Today's Scripture Reading (July 25, 2026): Ezekiel 1

In 525, a Christian monk named Dionysius Exiguus proposed dating events by referring to a common point in time. For Dionysius, because of his commitment to the Christian faith, that moment in time was the birth of Jesus Christ. Dionysius made a few mistakes in how he counted the five centuries that had passed between the birth of Jesus and his own life, and because of those mistakes, his dating is off by somewhere between four and seven years, yet the idea itself has stuck. Today we still date back to the same point in time. We call it the Common Era (or the Current Era or even the Christian Era), but it was originally called Anno Domini, or in the Year of our Lord, usually shortened to AD. The system allows us to date historical events so we can compare events across cultures, something that was once much more difficult. The last Western European nation to switch to the common calendar was Portugal, which made the change in 1422. 

The idea of dating events back to a common point is an old one. In ancient times, it was often dated to a significant event or death. The problem was that each culture chose different starting dates, and those dates changed with every generation. So, Ezekiel starts his account with a dating system, a common point in time that his readers would have understood. The NIV translates the dating very personally. Ezekiel dates his prophecy to "my thirtieth year," but it is unlikely that Ezekiel was counting the years of his own life.

For one thing, the idea of celebrating birthdays is more of a current practice. The dates of birth in ancient times were not celebrated. A better translation of the verse might be "in the thirtieth year," dating back to some common event. The problem is that while his first readers understood the connection to a common event, that event has been lost over time.

However, we can make some guesses. Ezekiel might have been dating back to the last year of Jubilee that had been celebrated in Judah. The problem with that idea is that the Jubilee celebrations in Israel were sporadic, if they were ever really celebrated at all.  Another possibility is that Ezekiel dates back to the discovery of the law during the days of Josiah. Dating the events of his life to the discovery of the law during the Temple renovations is the solution suggested by the Jewish Targum. Hilkiah found the book of the law in 621 BCE, which means that Ezekiel's vision dates to around 591 BCE, or five years before the fall of Jerusalem.

All of this indicates that Ezekiel was among those taken before the fall of Jerusalem and the destruction of the Temple in 586 BCE, and that it is in Babylon that his prophetic career begins. What is significant about this is that God finds Ezekiel far from home and the Temple dedicated to God by the Jews. Here, by a river in Babylon, Ezekiel hears the instructions of God and is compelled to follow them. The law found in the Temple thirty years earlier was still the instruction by which Ezekiel would structure his life, and the God who ruled in Jerusalem was still the God who ruled over Ezekiel and the exiles, even though they now found themselves living in a foreign land.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Ezekiel 2

Concerning the Ammonites: This is what the LORD says: "Has Israel no sons? Has Israel no heir? Why then has Molek taken possession of Gad? Why do his people live in its towns? – Jeremiah 49:1

Today's Scripture Reading (July 24, 2026): Jeremiah 49

Israel was always designed to operate as a theocracy, a nation where God was supposed to rule as the physical king. What we sometimes forget is that, while that is an unusual form of government, Israel would not have been the only theocracy in ancient times. Many nations were built on the idea of the "rule of the gods."  And another possible candidate for a theocracy is the Kingdom of Ammon and the Ammonites. In this case, the god in question would be Molech or Molek. But for the Ammonites, Molek was not just the name of their God; it was the name of their king. In fact, Molek seems to mean "the god who is king." Another interesting parallel between Ammon and Israel is that both nations were known as "The Children of." The people of Israel were known as "The Children of Israel," and the people of Ammon were known as "The Children of Ammon."

Gad was a Transjordanian tribe of Israel (a tribe that had settled, along with Manasseh and Reuben, on the east side of the Jordan River, while the rest of the tribes settled on the west side of the river). But the territory, which had been part of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, not Judah, was no longer a possession of the descendants of Jacob. By the time of Jeremiah, the Kingdom of Israel had long been defeated by the Assyrian Empire, and Israel had been carried into exile, now just a province of a foreign empire. Yet God still seemed to expect Judah, who represented the surviving children of Israel, to be in control of the cities of the Northern Kingdom, specifically the cities of Gad, which had long been lost to the Kingdom of Ammon. God's question is: why did Judah allow this situation to arise?

So, God's message to Judah asks the question, "Does Israel (or Jacob) have no sons? Because the cities that I gave to the children of Israel are now in the possession of the children of Molek" (either the god, the king, or both). This lack would form part of the charge against Judah; they had not had the faith to keep all that God had given to them.

It is a question that I admit that I wrestle with. Do I have the strength and the faith to keep what God has given to me? And I am not sure that I always know the answer. But I do believe that the church has become a safe church, not that it is a safe place to be, but rather, a safe place that is unwilling to risk for God. And because of that, we have lost the holy places and the people God intended for us to impact. And I wonder if at some point in the future, the question that Jeremiah asked of Judah will be asked of us. Why have you lost the ones whom I entrusted to your care?

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Ezekiel 1

Every head is shaved and every beard cut off; every hand is slashed and every waist is covered with sackcloth. – Jeremiah 48:37

Today's Scripture Reading (July 23, 2026): Jeremiah 48

In March 1861, Queen Victoria's mother died. Even though her relationship with her mother had been rocky, Victoria was deeply moved by the event. Victoria was at her mother's bedside when her mother died, and her feeling of loss was only intensified when she went through her mother's papers and discovered that her mother had loved her deeply. Victoria's grief was so intense that she began to disengage from even her own duties. In the months that followed in 1861, it was her husband, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, who took over her duties, despite being ill with a chronic stomach condition. And then the unthinkable happened. At the beginning of December 1861, Prince Albert was diagnosed with typhoid fever. Prince Albert died on December 14, 1861.

With the death of Albert so soon after her mother's demise, Victoria went into a permanent state of mourning. The Queen wore black for the rest of her life. The color indicated the darkness that had invaded her soul. Victoria would reign for another 40 years, but during that time, she would rarely appear in public. She rarely stepped foot in London. She shied away from all public appearances, to the point that her reputation and the Monarchy's public image began to decline. Her advisors begged her to make public appearances to remind the people that she was still the Queen of the United Kingdom, but she only agreed reluctantly. The defining feature of her life was no longer her status as the Queen of the United Kingdom and the Empress of India. Her grief now defined her life. All of this earned Victoria the nickname of "The Widow of Windsor."

Jeremiah speaks in this passage, not of humiliation as some might think, but rather of grief. In the pagan cultures surrounding Israel, each of these behaviors is associated with grief. In ancient times, in deep grief, men would pluck out their hair until they were literally bald; they would shave their beards, which were considered the "glory of their faces." They would cut themselves, especially their arms and hands, either with their fingernails or with a knife, in an attempt to relieve the pain of their souls. And they would cover themselves with sackcloth, a rough, uncomfortable fabric, to indicate to the world that they were in mourning. All of this was an outside view of an inner pain. And all of this is Jeremiah's message. Moab's pain will not just be physical; it will be emotional, and it might be that the emotional pain is more debilitating than the physical.

Sometimes we seem to be tempted to downplay our emotional pain as if it were not real. But that pain is real, and it needs to be dealt with. The truth is that our emotional pain changes more than just the way we dress; it changes the way that we react to the world. Left unacknowledged, it can remove us from life and stop us from making the difference in this world that we are intended to make. And that is simply too high a price to pay for our unaddressed pain.       

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Jeremiah 49

During Jehoiakim's reign, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon invaded the land, and Jehoiakim became his vassal for three years. But then he turned against Nebuchadnezzar and rebelled. – 2 Kings 24:1

Today's Scripture Reading (July 22, 2026): 2 Kings 24

Necho II reigned in Egypt during a particularly tumultuous time. The Babylonian Empire began its rise to prominence, and with the help of the Cimmerians, Scythians, and the Kingdom of Judah, it shattered the Assyrians' previous hold on the region. Necho wanted to maintain the status quo and avoid the chaos of an Empire-wide military struggle in the area, so he sent part of his army to help the Assyrians. Unfortunately, the army he had sent proved to be too small, but he learned his lesson quickly and attacked one more time, and this time he succeeded. It was this battle that would claim the life of Josiah, King of Judah.

Leaving a sizable army in the field to protect his assets, Necho returned home, and while passing through Judah, he noticed that the people had placed Jehoahaz, the son of Josiah, on the throne of Judah. But Necho wanted someone more amenable to Egypt's interests in the area. So he removed Jehoahaz from the throne and took him captive to Egypt. Jehoahaz would live out the rest of his days as a guest of Necho in Egypt. In his place, Necho placed Jehoahaz's brother Jehoiakim on the throne in Judah. Jehoiakim paid Egypt an annual tribute as the price of Judah's freedom, but, in effect, the nation paid for its alliance with Babylon by becoming a vassal state of Egypt.

But in 605 BCE, Nebuchadnezzar succeeded his ailing father as king of Babylon. And one of his first acts was to invade Judah, the vassal state of Egypt. Nebuchadnezzar defeated Judah and carried off the first installment of captives to Babylon, an exile which likely included Ezekiel, Daniel, and Daniel's friends: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. For the next three years, Judah would be a vassal state under Babylonian rule.

But in 601 BCE, two significant things happened. The first was that Nebuchadnezzar returned home, leaving a sizable army in Judah, but not his personal presence. The second event was Necho II of Egypt's final attempt at world conquest, beginning with Judah. Whether Jehoiakim recognized Necho's return as an opportunity to shake off the bonds of Babylon, or whether he was moved because his brother Jehoahaz was still a captive of Necho in Egypt, Jehoiakim rebelled against Babylon. But what Judah did not recognize was that Nebuchadnezzar's rise at this time in history was an act of God to get the people's attention. It was not really Nebuchadnezzar that Necho and Jehoiakim were struggling against; it was God. Judah's continued rebellion would only solidify Nebuchadnezzar's hold over the nation.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Jeremiah 48

But if you tell me the dream and explain it, you will receive from me gifts and rewards and great honor. So tell me the dream and interpret it for me. – Daniel 2:6

Today's Scripture Reading (July 21, 2026): Daniel 2

Nostradamus was born in December 1503 in France. He is probably the best-known of the secular prophets. His prophecies, broken down into a series of quatrains, were published in three installments between 1555 and 1558. As was common for the day, no two editions of the prophecies were identical. Some have tried to describe the differences as a prophetic emphasis, but there is no indication that this is true. Nostradamus is thought by believers to have accurately predicted many of the events that have happened since the time of the writing of the prophecies until the present day. Supporters maintain that Nostradamus correctly predicted the Great Fire of London, the rise of Adolph Hitler, and the September 11 attack on the World Trade Center.   

But the thing about any prophecy is that the prophecies always make more sense in reverse. After the events have already happened, we can recognize patterns in the unexpected waves of time. But this is not really what readers of prophecies want. What the reader of the prophecy desires is to predict the future, but even biblical prophecies seldom do that. A case in point would be the birth, life, and death of Jesus. While Jesus, the Messiah or Christ, is predicted throughout the Old Testament, the fulfillment of those prophecies was not well understood, and no one really believed that the prophecies about the Christ would turn out as they did. We see the Messianic prophecies much more clearly in retrospect than the people would have before the events happened. And sometimes, while a prediction may seem to be accurate, critics will always question whether or not the correct prediction is any more than mere coincidence.

It would seem that Nebuchadnezzar was a critic when it came to the subject of prophecy. As a result, when Nebuchadnezzar has a dream that he needs interpreted, he fears that once his wise men learn the dream, they will just make up an interpretation of the prophecy. He actively questions how he could trust a prophecy given in that manner. And so, he comes up with a plan. If the wise men could tell him the dream, as well as tell him what the dream meant, maybe then he could trust the prophecy.

This requirement that the prophet reveal the dream and its interpretation was a new idea. It would seem that this was not the usual request of a king concerning the interpretations of their dream. But the reality was that the request was impossible, something Nebuchadnezzar's wise men understood. But the presentation of an impossible situation left an opening for God. And God was ready to move through that opening.

God still moves in the impossible if we will trust him and give him that chance to move.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: 2 Kings 24

Please test your servants for ten days: Give us nothing but vegetables to eat and water to drink. – Daniel 1:12

Today's Scripture Reading (July 20, 2026): Daniel 1

Many well-known Christians, including Pastor Rick Warren, have advocated the health benefits of a vegetarian-style diet, citing the Book of Daniel as the model for the nutrition plan. These plans usually use Daniel's name in their branding and often promote Daniel's Diet as a biblically based diet guaranteed to promote health and weight loss. And there is no doubt that these plans do both of those things, but what isn't so clear is that the diet plans are biblically based.

The concept that these diets are biblical plans stems from this passage. The problem with saying that this vegetarian diet is biblically based is that we would have to take the passage out of context to make the argument. There is no place in this passage where Daniel announces that the vegetarian lifestyle (or even that a vegetarian purge or detox) is part of God's plan. The problem Daniel faced was that no suitable kosher meat was available. Most of the meat that would have come to the king's table would have been offered as a sacrifice to the gods of Babylon. That reason alone made the meat unsuitable for consumption by a good follower of Israel's God. Besides being sacrificed to the gods, it also would not have been prepared in a way that would remove all the meat's blood, a process that usually involved salting the meat to draw out moisture. This process is what makes the meat kosher. It was this lack of suitable meat that led Daniel to adopt a vegetarian diet; however, it was not because he believed in the health benefits of vegetarianism.

In fact, Daniel's story promotes an opposite lifestyle. The story holds that a meat diet was required for health, something that we now know is not true. This belief in the power of meat is the basis for the reaction of the handler of the Hebrew men. He was responsible for their health, and, as was understood at the time, that health demanded a high-meat diet.

The miracle of the story is that not only did the vegetarian diet work, but it also worked in a relatively short period of time. But the moral of the story is not about diet; it is about the four men's willingness to place their trust in God and do the unusual. The men's health was never attributed to the diet, but rather to the God they had served. Because Daniel and his friends trusted in God and kept God's laws, they passed the test. A strong belief in the God of Israel was the only reason that Daniel and his friends passed the test.

Trust in God is one of the major themes of Daniel. If we are willing to trust, then good things will happen. Life has never been about the physical realities that surround us. Life is about trusting in the God who created our physical realities. And no one else will do.

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Daniel 2

 

… at the sound of the hooves of galloping steeds, at the noise of enemy chariots and the rumble of their wheels. Parents will not turn to help their children; their hands will hang limp. – Jeremiah 47:3

Today's Scripture Reading (July 19, 2026): Jeremiah 47

Rapid Dominance (also known as Shock and Awe) is a military doctrine developed by Harlan Ullman and James Wade in 1996. The doctrine advocates spectacular displays of force to paralyze the enemy and destroy their will to fight. Rapid Dominance was the military strategy used by the United States during the Iraq War, which might be appropriate because, although the doctrine was written in 1996, the Americans were not the first to use it in Iraq.

Long before the doctrine had a name, the same strategy was used in Iraq. When it was first used, Iraq was called Babylon, and instead of being used against them, the strategy of “Rapid Dominance” was used by them. It was used in the last years of the 7th century BCE, an era that Jeremiah knew very well. Jeremiah's warning is directed at the Philistine cities and concerns the “Shock and Awe” of Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian war machine. Jeremiah says that the Philistines will not actually need to see the Babylonian army coming. All that will be needed to strike fear into the hearts of the Philistine people is the sound of the beat of the horses' hooves and the rattle of the wheels of the chariots that are carrying the military officers.

On that day, the fear would be debilitating. In fact, it would be so bad that people's natural behaviors would be disrupted. Rabbinical writings on this passage stress that the passage indicates that "the fathers shall not look back to have mercy on their children." In their fright, they will forget what is natural, and their fear will be so great that they will not be able to have pity and compassion on them. The only thing that will matter is their own safety and deliverance.

The Babylonian Empire did not last very long, but at its height, it struck fear into the known world. And the sound of their war machine was all it took to paralyze the ones that they rode against.   

Tomorrow's Scripture Reading: Daniel 1