Welcome to Buoy, a Life in Deeper Water podcast.

Episode 67. The Power of God in His Story (hey human, it starts in Genesis)

Hello human.

I just finished reading the Old Testament. 872 pages. With one question:  What happened, God?

For those who are jumpin’ on BUOY for the first time, I made this commitment to immerse myself in God’s journey with His people. Not as a student, not as part of a Bible study with a group, not as a daily devotional over the course of a year. Not as a follow-along podcast experience.

I did it because I was feeling like my timeline was getting all mixed up, and that I was forgetting all the people, and I had carried some major questions around long enough… finally time for answers. Like when you clean out your closest, or your garage, or attic—drag everything out completely—just to see what’s there.

An All-In Proposition to Read God’s Story

It’s an all-in proposition. To read the Bible as God’s story.

To kneel in His presence, and ask:  What happened, God?

And let His narrative rule. Engage in it like a book you can’t put down.

I knew this would require yielding to the process, but how?

My original plan was to schedule reading the Old Testament and New Testament straight through, starting on December 15 and finishing on December 29. I would read approximately 114 pages per day, over 10 days, with a break during the Christmas weekend.

As my schedule turned out, I had to take time to prepare for it mentally and emotionally, because I did not want to start down the Genesis road and find myself in a mental roadside heap rafter a few chapters. That I hadn’t prepared myself for this commitment and was spiritually dehydrated. I prayed for God to prepare my heart and well, gird my focus. If that’s even a thing.

I started the afternoon of December 19, and finished on Sunday, January 7. It came to about the same number of days, but how I did it and the length of each reading varied. But I always read for long enough to get lost in it.

I wanted to be fully immersed. My Bible doesn’t have maps or timelines, so I ordered a timeline that showed Biblical history, world history, and Middle East history running concurrently ($4 bucks). And a pamphlet with maps for all the major segments of Biblical, world and Middle Eastern histories with land designations reflecting each period of time (another $4 bucks).

So, my Bible, my timeline, my pamphlet of maps, a highlighter and pencil. I didn’t stop to look anything up, but following completion of each book I attempted a summary until I got to judges, kings, and prophets, then I just read and read and read.

One more thing: I listened to Middle Eastern music that reflected the Biblical times I was reading about. This was an amazing way to stay in God’s story.

A Story About What is Divinely Important in God’s World

What did I draw from this experience? God’s story is a mystery. It is historical, but not fiction. It is about families. It is about generations. Battles, major land grabs and plundering.

It is about what is divinely important in God’s world, and how humans disobey His Word.

It is about covenants, leading to the covenant of grace.

But most important to me, it is about the power of God in His story.

I have so much to share about this journey, but I need time to review, reflect, and write about how I personally claim and love His story and why. You will be first to hear it all.

For now, if you are thinking one of three things (or some variation):

1. I want to do this, but I just don’t have time… to that I want to encourage you to focus on immersion, which means to read long enough for God to gird your focus and get your mind settled on traveling with His chosen people. There’s room for you on the journey. I found that 20 pages is immersion-worthy. I read more in a day, but I have a pretty flexible schedule. Also, segmenting it by family story (Adam, Noah, Abraham, etc.) could work. And reading consistently will keep the story alive in your mind and heart. This approach really just means reading enough at one time to get lost in the power of God.

Or maybe you are thinking…

2. I can’t think of anything more boring to do… to that I want to say, then you do not know what’s in it. Our God is not a boring God. You don’t have to memorize the genealogies, but your heart will naturally mark the path to Jesus through God’s chosen people. And God is the divine master of repetition.

Or possibly…

3. I do not know why I need to do this to follow Christ…. to that I say, you do not need to do this… but above any devotional you will ever read, or scholarly interpretation of scripture from the greats, or any Christian influencer you follow who provides bite-sized spiritual boosts on-the-go (I do this), more than whatever way you get your daily spiritual dose, this is God’s story that has always come before you. I say do it because you will get to know your God in a way that the world cannot offer. And, you will get to know your place in His story. Conviction is the river that runs through it.

If you want to continue this conversation, connect with me at deeperwater@kathrynbise.com

When God Says

You may have missed something I said in episode 66, that Moses gave his last sermon in the context of a very challenging personal circumstance. It’s such a good example of the power of God in His story. It illuminates His love for Moses and His sovereign power over what He created the story of Moses’ to be.

Do you know what that circumstance was?

Here’s where it started.

Numbers 20: 7-12

 

7 The Lord said to Moses, 8 “Take the staff, and you and your brother Aaron gather the assembly together. Speak to that rock before their eyes and it will pour out its water. You will bring water out of the rock for the community so they and their livestock can drink.”

 

9 So Moses took the staff from the Lord’s presence, just as he commanded him. 10 He and Aaron gathered the assembly together in front of the rock and Moses said to them, “Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?” 11 Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank.

 

12 But the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them.”

This is a man who had an unbelievable relationship with God.

Exodus 33:11

 

11 The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend.

His life was saturated with God’s presence. Illuminated with God’s work. And he had done so much. It was such a powerful covenant between God and Moses.

But he struck the rock, as if in his own power.

Moses did not trust enough to honor God when he was asked. It was God’s will that Moses’ earthly story was over before he crossed the Jordan River. Moses asked God to reconsider. God did not. Moses would only see the Promised Land from Mount Nebo, the mountain he would die on.

In Exodus 32: 52 “God says, Therefore, you will see the land only from a distance; you will not enter the land I am giving to the people of Israel.”

God told Moses the ending to his life. It didn’t diminish his faithfulness, the power of his work to lead the Israelites. It’s just this. God said, “Your earthly life in my story is over, Moses.”

Human, I am inviting you to get lost in the power of each Biblical character who “falls face down” and yields to the power of a sovereign God. The power of God in His story.

Because God’s story starts with His sovereign nature.