I learned some great things today, which started with the topic of “Joy” and ended with the thought “Holy crap, don’t get YHWH mad at you! (Thank you, Jesus!)”

3 John was where it all began: “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.” (v. 4) A-hah! This man obviously took joy in the fruit of his labor/obedience to God. My parents must be pretty joyful, with four of us all grown up and still serving God–which means they obviously did something right. Praise the Lord for my parents, who taught me the Truth, and how to treasure the really important things in life, which are:

“To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” (Micah 6:8) At this point, I got sucked into reading Jude, which is nice and short, and very under-read. When I hit verse 11, where Jude says something about Korah’s rebellion, that’s where all of this took that weird turn. (Who was Korah?) My cross-references brought me to Numbers, where I read about some Levites who got too big for their britches and were subsequently smote.

I can take joy in the following

1. Jesus’s sacrifice means that I don’t have to earn my salvation (whew)
2. God doesn’t demand miracles from us, but He does ask for our all
3. Thanks to Christ, God doesn’t smite me when I get too big for my britches. (which happens from time to time, regrettably)

Sorry, this isn’t as smooth and coherent as it was this morning, but I didn’t have my journal with me, so this is all from memory. (and a bit of help from Gospelcom) It’ll be better tomorrow, I promise.