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Lord's Prayer

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, forever and ever.

Prayer for the Day Ahead (from an old Prayer Book)

Almighty God, my heavenly Father, who declares your glory and shows forth your creation in the heavens and in the earth; Deliver me, I pray, in whatever work my hand may find today, from the service of mammon; and assist me, that I may do the work which you have given me to do, in truth, in beauty, and in righteousness, with singleness of heart as your servant, and to the benefit of my fellow men; for the sake of him who came among us, humbling himself to serve all who came to him and received him, your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.

RMB 11/30/13

Ancient Prayer of Praise

Holy is God, the Father of all;
Holy is God, whose will is accomplished by his own powers;
Holy is God, who wills to be known and is known by his own.

Holy art thou, who by Logos has constituted all existing things;
Holy art thou, of whom all nature was born as the image;
Holy art thou, whom nature has not formed;
Holy art thou, who art more mighty than all power;
Holy art thou, who art greater than all eminence;
Holy art thou, who art superior to all praises.

from the “Hermetic Corpus”, @ 150 A.D.

Benediction

Oh Lord Jesus Christ, who said to your apostles, “Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you”; I pray that I and your whole church, the body of all faithful people, will know your peace, and live in harmony and unity, one with another, in accordance with your wishes. This I pray to you, who lives and reigns forever.

Think of the day ahead in terms of God with you, and visualize health, strength, guidance, purity, calm confidence, and victory as the gifts of His presence.

Psalm 89:25-26 (NKJV)

Genesis 22:15-24 (ESV)

The Story of Abraham [38] - Isaac

And the angel of the Lord called to Abraham a second time from heaven and said, “By myself I have sworn, declares the Lord, because you have done this and have not withheld your son, your only son, I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore. And your offspring shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in your offspring shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, because you have obeyed my voice.”

So Abraham returned to his young men, and they arose and went together to Beersheba. And Abraham lived at Beersheba.

Now after these things it was told to Abraham, “Behold, Milcah also has borne children to your brother Nahor: Uz his firstborn, Buz his brother, Kemuel the father of Aram, Chesed, Hazo, Pildash, Jidlaph, and Bethuel.” (Bethuel fathered Rebekah.) These eight Milcah bore to Nahor, Abraham's brother. Moreover, his concubine, whose name was Reumah, bore Tebah, Gaham, Tahash, and Maacah.

Notes on the Scripture

esterday we discussed how the Bible uses Abraham as an analogy to God Himself. We can never truly know the mind of God, but we can understand the pain of Abraham in offering His only son as a sacrifice for us, because Abraham is a man, like us. It is also prophetic of Christ, for Abraham tells Isaac that God will provide a lamb to be sacrificed, as payment for sin.

In today's passage, an even more marked prophecy is made, as God's angel promises that “all the nations of earth shall be blessed” by Abraham’s faith. God has repeatedly promised Abraham that he will father a great nation, the Hebrews; but the prophecy extends here all the way to Christianity, for by Abraham’s faith and the offering of Isaac as a sacrifice, God promises to bless all the world. Moreover, this blessing will come from Abraham’s offspring. And, indeed, Jesus will be able to trace his ancestry all the way back to Abraham.

As if to demonstrate, the end of the passage give us an accounting of the children of Abraham’s second brother, Nahor, and all his children. They will not be important (except perhaps to provide odd names for our ancestors), with one exception: we will be seeing Rebekah again.

Abraham sacrificing Isaac, by Wilhelm von Reutern, ca. 1849.

Daily Inspiration

“ A Nickel Back Scratch ”

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