MOVING FORWARD

1 Samuel 16:1–23; James 4:1–17; Psalm 119:137–152 Moving on after a person, a hope, or a dream has died can be one of the most difficult challenges of life. It certainly was for Samuel. The prophet Samuel believed that God had chosen Saul as king, but Saul failed God and His people (1 Sam 15:10–35). Now God was ready to select a new king, but Samuel was dragging his feet. Moving forward meant readjusting his expectations about the future and about God’s work in general. God called him out on his hesitancy: “How long will you mourn about Saul? I have rejected him from king over Israel! Fill up your horn with oil and go” (1 Sam 16:1). Samuel had to learn that things rarely play out the way we think they will. We inevitably end up on a different path than we planned—whether because of our own actions or because God’s route turns in a direction we never anticipated. The key is recognizing the changes when they occur and preparing ourselves for a new reality. Clinging to misguided expectations can drive us into the ground, effectively driving God’s work out of us. Unlike Samuel, Saul’s problem was not that God sent him in a new direction. Saul created his own situation when he chose a different route—he disobeyed, and God responded by taking away from Saul what was his to steward but not to own: a kingdom. Saul’s story illustrates James’ statement, “From where are conflicts and from where are quarrels among you? Is it not from this, from your pleasures that wage war among your members?” (Jas 4:1). But Saul’s ultimate responsibility did not lessen Samuel’s pain. All of us must be willing to realign our expectations. More important, we must seek to be aligned with God all along. We must move on from destructive behaviors and disobedience. Along the way, we must be mindful of the things God wants to create, and we must be ready to respond when God calls us to “Fill your horn with oil and go.” What do you think God is asking you to move on from today? What is He asking you to move toward? JOHN D. BARRY John D. Barry and Rebecca Kruyswijk, Connect the Testaments: A One-Year Daily Devotional with Bible Reading Plan (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012).

RECASTING FAITH

1 Samuel 14:1–52; James 3:1–12; Psalm 119:97–120 Faith is often cast as a type of intellectual pursuit: It’s something our minds rise up to, conform to, or simply agree with. But in the Bible, faith is often portrayed as rather mystical: Jonathan somehow knew that God would act on his behalf if his enemies behaved in a certain way (1 Sam 14:1–15). We don’t know how Jonathan had this foreknowledge—prayer seems to be the only explanation for it—but we recognize that Jonathan had tremendous faith. Who else would take on a garrison of 20 men, armed with only one armor bearer and a hunch? Clearly God was at work. We see God’s work progress as the Philistines inadvertently turned on one another, and previous enemies of Israel joined in the charge against the Philistines (1 Sam 14:16–23). Jonathan’s simple act of faith served as the catalyst for victory. If he had analyzed his inclination and pursued faith without mystery, the Israelites likely would have failed in their campaign against the Philistines. Yet the real testimony of faith in this account belongs to the armor bearer. After hearing Jonathan’s plan, the armor bearer said, “Do all that is in your heart. Do as you wish. Behold, I am with you heart and soul” (1 Sam 14:7). While the armor bearer was obligated to follow the king’s son on pain of death, when faced with what appeared to be inevitable death, he could have played his odds by saying no. This scene tells us more about Jonathan: He was known for his faith in God—so much so that his armor bearer took him at his word. I often wonder what makes a man heroic and others forever loyal to him. In Jonathan, we find the answer: a history of God working through your life and a dedication to follow the mystery of God’s work among us, no matter what stands against us. Is your faith primarily intellectual, or is it grounded in the mystery of God? How can you bring more of God’s mystical work into your life? JOHN D. BARRY John D. Barry and Rebecca Kruyswijk, Connect the Testaments: A One-Year Daily Devotional with Bible Reading Plan (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012).

FAITH

1 Samuel 12:1–13:23; James 2:19–26; Psalm 119:81–96 Sometimes it’s difficult to view our lives as a whole. We fulfill different roles as we interact with different people at school, home, work, and even church. In the natural donning and discarding of these roles, we might be tempted to compartmentalize our lives, yet we do so to the detriment of our faith. Even as we read our Bibles with intellectual vigor at home and participate in a small group at church, we might miss the mark of application. We forget to connect the dots, neglecting to treat our coworkers with kindness and our peers with love. We can know our faith intellectually but still miss out on the call to action and the response of obedience in our lives. But James shows us that belief and action are inextricably linked. When we think about them as separate entities, we develop a deep-rooted problem: “But do you want to know … that faith apart from works is useless? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith was working together with his works, and by the works the faith was perfected” (Jas 2:20–22). James wasn’t arguing that Abraham earned his righteousness before God; rather, Abraham was acting out of obedience as a response of faith. As people who have been redeemed by Christ, we can joyfully express our faith—we are enabled to do good works because of His work. Although we won’t attain perfect obedience in this life, we will desire obedience and love. We will desire to use our lives to apply what we know in our heads and feel in our hearts. Because of our faith, we will do good works. Real faith doesn’t sit still, but it doesn’t move on its own, either. We need to pray for God’s Spirit to ignite this desire in us, prompting us to act with love and obedience. In what area of your life are you missing the mark of application? How can you pray for wisdom in that situation? How can you act faithfully? REBECCA VAN NOORD John D. Barry and Rebecca Kruyswijk, Connect the Testaments: A One-Year Daily Devotional with Bible Reading Plan (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012).

DISCERNMENT, KNOWLEDGE, AND ACTION

1 Samuel 10:1–11:15; James 2:14–18; Psalm 119:65–80 We often wonder whether God hears our prayers. Even when we acknowledge that God deals with each petition we send His way, we experience doubt because we don’t understand how He has handled our plea. Yet instead of asking “Is God hearing me?” we should be asking God to help us grow closer to Him and gain a better understanding of His ways. We should echo the words of the psalmist, “You have dealt well with your servant, O Yahweh, according to your word. Teach me good discernment and knowledge, for I believe your commands” (Psa 119:65–66). We often misunderstand the concepts of discernment and knowledge. Discernment allows us to know God’s will and perceive the decisions He would have us make. Knowledge helps us to understand God Himself, primarily His character. Both of these concepts are grounded in our relationship with God and others, both empower us to work for Him—and we are called to cultivate both qualities in our lives. Unless we know God, we’re incapable of successfully doing His work. We must be willing to talk to God honestly about our relationships, as the psalmist does in Psalm 119:69–72. The psalmist acknowledges that he needs God’s help in all matters of his relationship with God and all matters of his relationship with others. He understands that he cannot even begin to know God without the power of God helping him. We must be empowered for action, both in the intimacy of prayer and in the reality of relationships. And we must support what we believe with our works, as the letter of James call us to do: “For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead” (Jas 2:14–26). Reflecting regularly on how God has worked with us and is working in us allows us to recognize that everything in our lives has a purpose. God often works in others through us, and that great calling requires us to have knowledge of Him and discernment about His workings in our world. How are you discerning the great work of God in your life? How are you enhancing your knowledge of God? JOHN D. BARRY John D. Barry and Rebecca Kruyswijk, Connect the Testaments: A One-Year Daily Devotional with Bible Reading Plan (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012).

MAKING DISTINCTIONS

1 Samuel 8:1–9:27; James 2:1–13; Psalm 119:49–64 We’re often entranced by those who have what we don’t—riches, popularity, position, and power. We want to befriend cool moms, hipsters with ironic mustaches, and supervisors who can get us to the next step on the corporate ladder. We relate to them differently, even though we know we shouldn’t. Our problem is one of perception. In his letter, James reprimands members of the early church community who were displaying partiality by honoring the rich and overlooking the poor. James shows them that they need to reset their standards because making distinctions in this way doesn’t reflect God’s nature, and it doesn’t reflect the grace He extends to us: “Did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him?” (Jas 2:5). We shouldn’t act with partiality because God didn’t deal with us in that way. We don’t deserve God’s love, yet He, in His perfect holiness, chose to give it to the unpopular, the uncool, the dirty, and the undeserving—which is all of us. James shows us that the proper response to this grace is to love our neighbor: “If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself,’ you are doing well” (Jas 2:8). Brought into a new community of faith based on grace, Christ-followers aren’t meant to live by the judgment-based standards of their old way of being. The members of James’ community had to reset their standards, and that’s a message we still need to hear today. Do you make distinctions? How can you view others through the grace that God has shown to you? REBECCA VAN NOORD John D. Barry and Rebecca Kruyswijk, Connect the Testaments: A One-Year Daily Devotional with Bible Reading Plan (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012).

CONFLICT AND CERTAINTY

1 Samuel 2:22–4:22; James 1:9–18; Psalm 119:17–32 Conflict drives fiction and riveting movies, but if we had it our way, we’d live stable, stress-free lives. We might crave the excitement or change of a vacation, but we rarely welcome an unexpected complication. So when James says to “count it all joy … when you meet trials of various kinds” (Jas 1:2), we are tempted to dismiss his perspective as something that works on paper but should not disrupt our real lives. James shows us how to internalize a faithful response to unwelcome conflict. He starts by describing a negative reaction: When difficult times come, we might be like the person who prays and then doubts that God will provide him with wisdom for the situation. This person complicates the conflict by internalizing it with uncertainty and doubt. He is “like the surf of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed about” (Jas 1:6). The irony is that, although we only create more conflict when we doubt, we like to think we can trust ourselves. As long as we remain in control (we tell ourselves), we can avoid the storms of life. It’s tempting to manufacture an attitude of stubborn self-sufficiency—of inner strength. That’s the opposite of how we should respond. God wants us to meet the chaos by trusting in Him. We might feel tossed about by life’s events, but God provides us with wisdom for the chaos we encounter. When we ask Him and trust that He’ll provide us with wisdom, He gives generously and without reproach (Jas 1:5). Stability isn’t an inner strength, but certainty in God’s provision is. We can meet the uncertain with the certain when we trust God to help us work through the chaos. We can also remember that, at the end of the novel, the protagonist who endures conflict is changed by the experience. In the same way, God is working through the conflict in our lives to make us more wholly devoted to Him, since “testing produces steadfastness” (Jas 1:3). And there will be an end: We’ll “receive the crown of life that he has promised to those who love him” (Jas 1:12). How are you turning to Christ in the midst of difficult circumstances? REBECCA VAN NOORD John D. Barry and Rebecca Kruyswijk, Connect the Testaments: A One-Year Daily Devotional with Bible Reading Plan (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012).

GOD MAKES GOOD OUT OF TROUBLE

1 Samuel 1:1–2:21; James 1:1–8; Psalm 119:1–16 God often shows His goodness to us through trials, making good out of human error. We see this principle in the lives of Elkanah and Hannah. Elkanah was prone to make mistakes. His first mistake was to marry two wives (1 Sam 1:1–4); his second blunder was to ignore his wives’ disputes (1 Sam 1:6). On top of that, he repeatedly imposed his own form of justice by giving Hannah double what he offered Peninnah, his other wife (1 Sam 1:5). In this story, however, the goodness of God redeems the mistakes made by fallible people. Despite Elkanah’s generosity to her, Hannah was deeply disturbed: Nothing Elkanah offered could compensate for her barrenness (1 Sam 1:8–10). In this period, women who had not borne children were often considered accursed and second rate, as demonstrated by Peninnah’s persecution of Hannah. In her distress, Hannah prayed to God at the temple, seeking redemption. Eli the priest recognized the sincerity of her plea and blessed her (1 Sam 1:15–18). God also recognized Hannah’s sincerity, and He answered her call by giving her a son, Samuel, who would grow up to be a great prophet (1 Sam 1:19–28). Hannah’s son offered her hope; in response, she delivered a beautiful piece of poetry to honor Yahweh’s goodness (1 Sam 2:1–11). This poem was so significant that Mary would later echo it in her own song of praise (see Luke 1:46–56). Through Hannah’s story, we see that God’s work among His people is so interconnected that He often chooses to answer not only our prayers, but also the prayers of others in the process. In scenes like this—where God not only makes good out of a bad situation, but also sets up a providential event in the history of His people—we see much of the framework for the Christian life. New Testament writers including James drew on stories such as Hannah’s when discussing the trials of God’s people. In the first century AD, James remarks in a letter: “Consider it all joy, my brothers [and sisters], whenever you encounter various trials, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking in nothing” (Jas 1:2–4). Hannah’s story shows us that when we pray to God, He shows up. And in the midst of our dire circumstances, He answers the call of not one, but many people. Here, in the pain, we learn what it means to know our Lord and savior. What trials are you currently experiencing? What do you think God is doing through them? JOHN D. BARRY John D. Barry and Rebecca Kruyswijk, Connect the Testaments: A One-Year Daily Devotional with Bible Reading Plan (Bellingham, WA: Lexham Press, 2012).