Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - Is God Working in Your Life? | Torah | Genesis 31

Episode Date: March 21, 2022

Do you see signs of growth in your faith? Is God growing you? Are you the same person you once were? In today's episode, Keith looks at Jacob's life in Genesis 31 to emphasize that how you finish in your faith is more important than how you start. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it with others, so others can find it too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Genesis 31 Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now.

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. In the time it takes to get to work. I'm Keith Simon. Right now, we're going through the first book of the Bible, Genesis. It's not how you start, but how you finish. I think it's unwise, unfair even, to define a person's life only in terms of how that life ended. Should a marriage that ends in divorce cast the whole marriage in a bad light? Well, maybe not. But the reality is, fair or unfair, that is how it works. How something ends affects how you think about everything that

came before it. Consider an example from sports. Alex Rodriguez. He came up into the major leagues in 1994. He played shortstop for the Seattle Mariners. And a lot of people thought he might become the best baseball player in the history of the game. Alex Rodriguez, he was known as A-Rod. He played over 20 years in the major leagues. He played. He was, He was a fabulous hitter and fielder. He really was one of the best baseball players ever. But his career ended in an embarrassing way. His career ended when it became known that he was using performance-enhancing drugs.

But a lot worse is that he lied extensively about how he used those drugs. He was finally busted, exposed. And how he finished his career tainted his whole career. His nickname went from being a rod to a fraud. Or what about an example from entertainment? Let's take Bill Cosby. Bill Cosby spent decades as a well-known, a well-loved stand-up comedian. He became America's father, Cliff Huxable, on the Cosby show.

But then several women started to say that Bill Cosby had taken advantage of them, even sexually assaulted him. He denied it, but eventually went to court, and he was found. guilty of sexual assault. Now, that conviction was later overturned, and I think it's still in the appeal process. But now Bill Cosby is seen completely differently than he had been for the majority of his life. This sexual assault, the allegations, the conviction, even though it's been overturned, well, that's how he's known, because how you start isn't necessarily as important is how you finish. I want to show you this in the Bible. It's a guy named Demus, D-E-M-A-S. I'm sure you've probably never heard of him. He only comes up a couple times in the New Testament. We know that

Paul calls him a fellow worker. So think about this. He's out there with Paul, a part of the ministry team, doing the work of the gospel. That took a lot of commitment. That was a huge sacrifice. That's not like going on a mission trip today, which is part mission and part vacation. No, this was really difficult. But listen to what Paul says about Demus in the last letter that he wrote before he was killed by the Roman authorities. So this is 2 Timothy chapter 4. Paul writes, do your best to come to me quickly for Demus, because he loved this world, has deserted me and gone on to Thessalonica. See, Demus started. the Christian faith, but he didn't finish it. He loved this present world and that love for this

world, it pulled him away from Jesus and away from Paul. It's not how you start, but it's how you finish. Now, so far, all the examples have been negative, but it can also be really positive. You can finish strong. John Stephen Aquari represented his country, Tanzania, in the marathon in the 1968 Mexico City Olympics. The way the course was set up, is the way the course was set up, that runners left the stadium, ran the vast majority of the course, then came back into the Olympic Stadium and ran a couple of laps to finish up the 26.2 miles. About an hour after the winner had entered into the stadium, run the laps and crossed the finish line, the crowd in the Olympic Stadium was beginning to leave. It was kind of thinning out. That's when John Stephen Aquari

entered. And when he entered into that stadium and began to run the final couple laps of that Olympic marathon, people took notice and they began to stand and cheer for him. John Stephen Aquari finished that race, but he finished last. There were 57 runners who finished and he was 57th. He was a full hour behind the leader. It turns out that early in the race, he fell. It was a pretty serious fall. He got bandaged up and he kind of had to run slash limp the rest of the race. Reporters asked him, why didn't you just stop running? I mean, why not just sit out? You fell.

You had a very good reason to not finish the race. There were a lot of other runners who didn't finish the race and they didn't have near as good a reason as you did. And John Stephen Aquari looked at the reporter and he said this, my country did not send me 7,000 miles to start this race. my country sent me here to finish it. So it is with God. God sent us not just to start the race of the Christian life, but to finish it.

It's not where you start in your faith. It's where you finish. So Jacob is going to finish his life in a different place than he started. And to be frank, it's a better place. Because as we've gone through the book of Genesis, we've noticed how God is at work in people's lives, broken people's lives. And in the last few days, we've been. watching as God has been at work specifically in Jacob's life. When we first met him, he was a liar, deceiver, manipulator, who trusted in himself. He manipulated circumstances to try to get his own way.

But God has been at work in his life. Did you know God wants to work in your life too? God's salvation is by grace. He loves you where you are, but he doesn't leave you where you are. He wants to grow you in godliness. He wants to grow you to be. more like Jesus. He wants your character to reflect God himself. One of the ways that God worked in Jacob's life is through his encounter with his uncle Laban. The liar met the liar. In Laban, Jacob had met someone just like himself. The hardship that he experienced with his wives and his business dealings with Laban, well, all that seemed to be used by God to change him. Hebrews 12 tells us to endure hardship as discipline from God.

All the hardship that comes into our life, God uses to mature us and make us more like Jesus. Or at least he wants to. A lot of it depends on how we respond to it. Listen to what it says in Hebrews chapter 12. It's talking about our earthly parents and it says, they disciplined us for a little while as they thought best, but God disciplines us for our good

in order that we may share in His Holiness. No discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it. We've been watching God take Jacob through a long season of hardship, and that hardship is discipline. It's meant to correct Jacob, develop his character, and deepen his faith in God. Do you see hardship is something that God uses in your life?

for your good? It takes a lot of faith to see that, right? Because I have to trust God, because what we read is true. Discipline is unpleasant, painful at the time. So it feels in the moment like God is against me. But can I see that hardship through eyes of faith? Can I see this painful moment in my life as something that God is doing for my good? So while the Bible never tells us to be thankful for health problems or job problems or any other problems in this life. We are told to be thankful for what they produce, how God uses them in our life. Jacob didn't like being lied to and manipulated by his Uncle Laban, but it's changing him. Let's see how it all plays out in Genesis chapter 31. This is the chapter that Jacob leaves Laban with his wives, Rachel and Leah, and all of his children,

and returns back home. The Lord said to Jacob, go back to the land of your fathers and to your relatives, and I will be with you. And Jacob listens to God. He listens to God and immediately starts to obey God. He calls his wives Rachel and Leah together to meet him out in the field so that they can't be overheard. And he says to them, this is verse 5, I see your father's attitude toward me is not what it was before.

But the God of my father has been with me. In other words, Laban had turned his back on Jacob. He used to like his son-in-law, but now he's begun to resent him because Jacob's business has thrived while Laban's has gone backwards. Verse 9. So God has taken away your father's livestock and has given them to me. Jacob had come to Laban with nothing, but now comparatively he's a rich man. He has herds and livestock of his own. That is the fact. But notice how Jacob interprets the fact. Instead of saying that his increase in livestock and the increase of his herds was due to his smarts or his hard work,

he quickly says it's all due to God's blessing. One mark of the humble person is that they are quick to credit God with everything good in their life. James 117 says, Do not be deceived. Every good gift comes from your father in heaven. Isn't it interesting that James warns us to not be deceived right before he tells us that every good gift comes from God? I think what he's saying there is that we can easily be deceived into thinking that those good gifts are the product of our hard work, our good choices, our smarts, and not from God. Jacob is beginning to see that he doesn't need to lie or deceive or manipulate to get the life he wants,

but that he can trust God because God is the one who gives good gifts. God is good. He is trustworthy. I can trust him with a plan for my life. When I understand it, I can trust him. And when I don't, I can trust him. When the road is clear and I can see far and it all looks good, great, I can trust God. But when it's cloudy and rainy and stormy and I can't see.

see very far and I'm confused and it doesn't look very good to me, I still can trust God. That's a huge thing for us to learn. I can trust God to provide for me. I can trust God's will for my life. I can trust God enough to obey him. I can trust God to give me satisfaction. I can trust God to give me whatever I need in this life. Whatever is best for me to have, God will give it to me. If I don't have it, that's because it's not best for me. Because if it were best for me, then God would give it to me. So I don't need to complain. I don't need to try to take my life into my own hands and try to make a relationship work or to try to make a job work or to try to make anything work.

I can go through life confident that God is faithful to his promises. We've seen God use hardship to help Jacob grow. And he really is growing. Do you see signs of growth in your life? Are you beginning to see more and more that everything good in your life comes from God? Are you quick to give thanks to God? Are you quick to obey God? Are you quick to listen and seek God's perspective and want God's help in your life? Those are signs that God is at work.

Those are signs that you're God's child and that he's working in your life. And there's a lot to be thankful for. Just take a moment now and say, thanks, God, for how you are making me more like your son, Jesus. Amen. Hey, thanks for listening. If you want to go deeper, sign up for the 10-minute Bible Talk newsletter. You'll get a short email once a week. It'll challenge you to grow in your faith, give you interesting background on today's passage, and a lot, lot more.

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