Bridging The Gap

When we go through a great loss, there can be a tendency within us to turn bitter, and Naomi did at first. But she turned back to God.  Today we’re going to lift our eyes above the difficult circumstances, and see God’s bigger picture.  I think you’ll find this greatly encouraging, for those inevitable hard times we all face.  And just maybe you can relate to Naomi on some level today? 

Today we begin a new series in the beloved book of Ruth. We can all remember times where we have felt at the end of our rope, and discouraged by what’s going on around us.  In Ruth, we find a woman named Naomi who lost all she had in her life. All those that were important to her had perished. Except one, a daughter-in-law who later continued the line of David, Solomon, and Jesus. It’s a story of faith, loyalty and great romance.

Today the plan is to finish up our study of Judges, and we do so with encouragement to be salt and light in a dark world.  Everyone did what was right in their own eyes, and there was no king in Israel.  That statement in a nutshell describes the problem we find in final chapters in Judges.  And clearly it describes what’s going on in our world today too. 

Today pastor Lloyd Pulley gives attention to Judges nineteen. In the days we’re about to read about, there were a great number of people claiming to be a follower of God, but they were doing what was right in their own eyes.  They weren’t following the commands of God.  We see that happening right before our very eyes don’t we?  

 In Judges chapter seventeen it was a time of national disintegration where every man was doing right in his own eyes. Sound familiar? How does one live in a world of moral relevancy? Let’s join pastor Lloyd in Judges seventeen, verse twenty where we will find some answers.

Today we visit the seventeenth chapter of Judges.  It’s here that we see that Israel had forgotten who they were, and were trying to fill the gap in their lives with idolatry. Pastor Lloyd will show us that this mentality is common among people today.  

We’ll be picking up where we left off last time in Judges sixteen, if you’d like to find your place there now we’ll hand things back over to Lloyd as he continues his study of the life of Samson.

We’ve been looking at one of the most notorious me in the bible - Samson. Sure, we’ve all heard about his hair and his incredible strength. But, we’ve also been learning that there’s much more to this man than we may have initially thought. We all know that what goes up must come down - and that was especially true for Samson

One of the more curious and interesting people in the Bible is Samson. I think “notorious” would be a good word as well. But I think we’d all be surprised to see just how much we have in common with this famous Biblical character. He was extremely flawed, yet God chose to use him in a big way. 

We’ll be concentrating on chapter thirteen of Judges today and we invite you to join us there now. We’re going to meet a man today who should be very familiar to us - Samson.

Many people have a “grocery store” mentality when it comes to Christianity. They think they can just pick and choose the parts of the Bible that fit their lives. But God didn’t give us the bible to have it work that way. Pastor Lloyd is leading us through the Book of Judges, chapter by chapter, verse by verse. Judges eleven is in front of us.  If you have a bible handy, turn there and join us! Here’s pastor Lloyd.

If you’ve been tuning in lately, you know that we’re in the midst of a verse by verse study through the Book of Judges and today we will looking at chapters ten through twelve, where we find the children of Israel engaged yet again in apostasy. This section of God’s word shows us yet again that mankind will go to great lengths to serve other gods, but it’s always a mistake.

Sometimes, God’s plan for our life doesn’t seem to make much sense at the time its delivered to us. But, looking back on the journey, we can see how He was working things out all along, right? The Bible is full of examples of this and we’ll be looking at one of them on today’s program.  Pastor Lloyd  is in Judges, chapter nine, with a few words about a man named Jotham.

God’s standards are much different than the world’s and we’ll do ourselves a whole lot of good to keep that in mind on a daily basis. Pastor Lloyd will direct our attention to Judges nine as we continue to examine these Old Testament men and women who were surprisingly a lot more like us than we may think.

Our passage for today can be found in chapter eight. Priorities were certainly important in the era of the Judges, and they are equally important today. It is so easy to get them out of whack, wouldn’t you agree? We invite you to find your place in Judges eight, as pastor Lloyd looks again at the life and times of Gideon.

Johan Sebastian Bach once said, "All music should have no other end and aim than the glory of God and the soul's refreshment”. He was clearly a man who understood that God not only should get the glory in all of life’s victories, He also deserves it. We’re about to meet another man who understood this to be true.

Today on Bridging the Gap. we’ll see Gideon in a real predicament - his army of three hundred against thousands of Midianites. Let's let pastor Lloyd take it from here.

Gideon was given a great task to perform by God, and despite the seemingly long odds, he obeyed God and ultimately found victory. Now, I’d say that’s a life we can learn something positive from!

 On today’s broadcast we continue the story of Gideon. This historic account of this Godly man provides us the opportunity to evaluate our faith. We say we trust the Lord but do we really? As Christians, God has called us to certain things. And our response, like Gideon’s, is often doubt and uncertainty. But as we’ll learn, God in His grace comes down to our level, to bring us higher.

The book of Judges is really timeless because the problems God’s people face are perennial. From Judges chapter six here's, pastor Lloyd Pulley, to begin a mini-series on the life and times of a great man named Gideon.