To prevent the frustration of falling behind, which most of us tend to do when following a Bible reading plan, each month of this plan gives you only twenty-five readings. Today we start a few “free days” . We encourage you to catch up on any readings you may have missed this month.
If you have finished the month’s readings, you can use these final days of the month to study the passages that challenged or intrigued you.
Daily Devotion
Oversized Baggage
Over the years my wife and I, including our kids, have done a great deal of air travel. We have traveled in small 4 seat airplanes on up to the large jets.
The excitement, or stress of the start, is still there for us yet the traveling most often ends with us standing around in a crowd of people waiting for our baggage in the arrivals area of the airport. While we are not ‘light’ packers (nor do we pretend to be) over the years we have obtained quality suitcases that we rely upon to keep our clothes and accessories safe and clean.
When at the end of the journey, waiting to truly wake up and our brains reengage after a long flight, we become ‘observers’ of people and their bags.
The seasoned traveler is easily found. The parents with young children are obvious. Those that insist on traveling with their pets are noticed as well. Then there is the ‘hmmmm what could be in that case, box, plastic wrapped odd shaped package?’ And there the imagination runs away from us.
In Genesis 50:25-26 we find Joseph on his death bed (verse 25) and he makes the family promise they will not leave him in Egypt. In verse 26, they embalm Joseph and place him in a coffin!
Jump ahead to Exodus 13:19 and we find Moses taking the bones (embalmed body of Joseph in a coffin) with him when the children of Israel leave Egypt.
Can you imagine the looks everywhere they were seen as the children of Israel wandered in the wilderness with bones in a coffin?
How do you explain that one at the Border to Customs? Could you imagine TSA trying to figure out what to do there?
The whole purpose of Joseph insisting his body was carried out of Egypt was because he KNEW… Egypt was NOT their home. They (the children of Israel) would only be in Egypt for a set time, then they would go to the land God promised them. Even in death, Joseph did not want to be left behind or mistaken for an Egyptian for his identity was WITH God’s chosen people. Even in death, Joseph was going forward to the promised land.
Philippians 3:13-14 “Brethren, I count not myself to have apprehended: but this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.”
~Pastor Seagraves