Earworms by Cindy Hess Kasper (Our Daily Bread)

3:52 PM |

If there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things. —Philippians 4:8 (Our Daily Bread)

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Philippians 4:4-9

New International Version (NIV)

Final Exhortations

⁴Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! ⁵Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. ⁶Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
⁸Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. ⁹Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.

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Earworms

July 20, 2013 — by Cindy Hess Kasper

from: http://odb.org/

They burrow. They bore in. They attach themselves inside your head. Earworms, a term once used exclusively for insects, is now the name for those unrelenting tunes that you can’t get out of your head. Songs like, “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” the “Barney” song, or my personal nightmare: “It’s a Small World After All.”
They say the only way to rid yourself of the insidious infestation is to replace it with another tune—your “cleaner” song. New words and a fresh tune can crowd out the old.

Maybe we could use a cleaner song for our thought-life as well. When lustful or vengeful thoughts creep into our minds, reading and meditating on God’s Word can help to clean up our thinking.

Scripture tells us to love the Lord “with all [our] heart, with all [our] soul, and with all [our] mind” (Matt. 22:37) and not to “be conformed to this world” but to “be transformed by the renewing of [our] mind” (Rom. 12:2). It instructs us to think about things that are true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent, and praiseworthy (Phil. 4:8).

When our minds wander to evil, the best “cleaner” is to allow the wisdom of the Bible to permeate our thoughts and hearts (2 Tim. 3:16).

Dear Lord, our desire is to spend time in Your Word.
We know that meditating on Your Word fills our minds
with thoughts of You and helps to keep our thinking
from wandering to evil. Help us to do so.

Character is the sum total of all our

thoughts, words, and deeds.

Bible Reading

Psalm 26-28

New International Version (NIV)

Psalm 26

Of David.

¹Vindicate me, Lord,
    for I have led a blameless life;
I have trusted in the Lord
    and have not faltered.
²Test me, Lord, and try me,
    examine my heart and my mind;
³for I have always been mindful of your unfailing love
    and have lived in reliance on your faithfulness.

⁴I do not sit with the deceitful,
    nor do I associate with hypocrites.
⁵I abhor the assembly of evildoers
    and refuse to sit with the wicked.
⁶I wash my hands in innocence,
    and go about your altar, Lord,
⁷proclaiming aloud your praise
    and telling of all your wonderful deeds.

⁸Lord, I love the house where you live,
    the place where your glory dwells.
⁹Do not take away my soul along with sinners,
    my life with those who are bloodthirsty,
¹⁰in whose hands are wicked schemes,
    whose right hands are full of bribes.
¹¹I lead a blameless life;
    deliver me and be merciful to me.

¹²My feet stand on level ground;
in the great congregation I will praise the Lord.

Psalm 27

Of David.

¹The Lord is my light and my salvation—
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life—
of whom shall I be afraid?

²When the wicked advance against me
    to devour^[a] me,
it is my enemies and my foes
    who will stumble and fall.
³Though an army besiege me,
    my heart will not fear;
though war break out against me,
    even then I will be confident.

⁴One thing I ask from the Lord,
    this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
    all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
    and to seek him in his temple.
⁵For in the day of trouble
    he will keep me safe in his dwelling;
he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent
    and set me high upon a rock.

⁶Then my head will be exalted
above the enemies who surround me;
at his sacred tent I will sacrifice with shouts of joy;
I will sing and make music to the Lord.

⁷Hear my voice when I call, Lord;
    be merciful to me and answer me.
⁸My heart says of you, “Seek his face!”
    Your face, Lord, I will seek.
⁹Do not hide your face from me,
    do not turn your servant away in anger;
    you have been my helper.
Do not reject me or forsake me,
    God my Savior.
¹⁰Though my father and mother forsake me,
    the Lord will receive me.
¹¹Teach me your way, Lord;
    lead me in a straight path
    because of my oppressors.
¹²Do not turn me over to the desire of my foes,
    for false witnesses rise up against me,
    spouting malicious accusations.

¹³I remain confident of this:
    I will see the goodness of the Lord
    in the land of the living.
¹⁴Wait for the Lord;
    be strong and take heart
    and wait for the Lord.

Psalm 28

Of David.

¹To you, Lord, I call;
    you are my Rock,
    do not turn a deaf ear to me.
For if you remain silent,
    I will be like those who go down to the pit.
²Hear my cry for mercy
    as I call to you for help,
as I lift up my hands
    toward your Most Holy Place.

³Do not drag me away with the wicked,
    with those who do evil,
who speak cordially with their neighbors
    but harbor malice in their hearts.
⁴Repay them for their deeds
    and for their evil work;
repay them for what their hands have done
    and bring back on them what they deserve.

⁵Because they have no regard for the deeds of the Lord
and what his hands have done,
he will tear them down
and never build them up again.

⁶Praise be to the Lord,
    for he has heard my cry for mercy.
⁷The Lord is my strength and my shield;
    my heart trusts in him, and he helps me.
My heart leaps for joy,
    and with my song I praise him.

⁸The Lord is the strength of his people,
a fortress of salvation for his anointed one.
⁹Save your people and bless your inheritance;
be their shepherd and carry them forever.

Acts 22

New International Version (NIV)

22 ¹“Brothers and fathers, listen now to my defense.”
²When they heard him speak to them in Aramaic, they became very quiet.
Then Paul said: ³“I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city. I studied under Gamaliel and was thoroughly trained in the law of our ancestors. I was just as zealous for God as any of you are today. ⁴I persecuted the followers of this Way to their death, arresting both men and women and throwing them into prison, ⁵as the high priest and all the Council can themselves testify. I even obtained letters from them to their associates in Damascus, and went there to bring these people as prisoners to Jerusalem to be punished.
⁶“About noon as I came near Damascus, suddenly a bright light from heaven flashed around me. ⁷I fell to the ground and heard a voice say to me, ‘Saul! Saul! Why do you persecute me?’
⁸“‘Who are you, Lord?’ I asked.
“ ‘I am Jesus of Nazareth, whom you are persecuting,’ he replied. ⁹My companions saw the light, but they did not understand the voice of him who was speaking to me.
¹⁰“‘What shall I do, Lord?’ I asked.
“ ‘Get up,’ the Lord said, ‘and go into Damascus. There you will be told all that you have been assigned to do.’ ¹¹My companions led me by the hand into Damascus, because the brilliance of the light had blinded me.
¹²“A man named Ananias came to see me. He was a devout observer of the law and highly respected by all the Jews living there. ¹³He stood beside me and said, ‘Brother Saul, receive your sight!’ And at that very moment I was able to see him.
¹⁴“Then he said: ‘The God of our ancestors has chosen you to know his will and to see the Righteous One and to hear words from his mouth. ¹⁵You will be his witness to all people of what you have seen and heard. ¹⁶And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name.’
¹⁷“When I returned to Jerusalem and was praying at the temple, I fell into a trance ¹⁸and saw the Lord speaking to me. ‘Quick!’ he said. ‘Leave Jerusalem immediately, because the people here will not accept your testimony about me.’
¹⁹“‘Lord,’ I replied, ‘these people know that I went from one synagogue to another to imprison and beat those who believe in you. ²⁰And when the blood of your martyr^[a] Stephen was shed, I stood there giving my approval and guarding the clothes of those who were killing him.’
²¹“Then the Lord said to me, ‘Go; I will send you far away to the Gentiles.’ ”

Paul the Roman Citizen

²²The crowd listened to Paul until he said this. Then they raised their voices and shouted, “Rid the earth of him! He’s not fit to live!”
²³As they were shouting and throwing off their cloaks and flinging dust into the air, ²⁴the commander ordered that Paul be taken into the barracks. He directed that he be flogged and interrogated in order to find out why the people were shouting at him like this. ²⁵As they stretched him out to flog him, Paul said to the centurion standing there, “Is it legal for you to flog a Roman citizen who hasn’t even been found guilty?”
²⁶When the centurion heard this, he went to the commander and reported it. “What are you going to do?” he asked. “This man is a Roman citizen.”
²⁷The commander went to Paul and asked, “Tell me, are you a Roman citizen?”
“Yes, I am,” he answered.
²⁸Then the commander said, “I had to pay a lot of money for my citizenship.”
“But I was born a citizen,” Paul replied.
²⁹Those who were about to interrogate him withdrew immediately. The commander himself was alarmed when he realized that he had put Paul, a Roman citizen, in chains.

Paul Before the Sanhedrin

³⁰The commander wanted to find out exactly why Paul was being accused by the Jews. So the next day he released him and ordered the chief priests and all the members of the Sanhedrin to assemble. Then he brought Paul and had him stand before them.