David R. Veerman - Life Application Study Bible Devotional: Daily Wisdom from the Life of Jesus

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Life Application Study Bible Devotional: Daily Wisdom from the Life of Jesus

Copyright 2011 by Livingstone Corporation. All rights reserved.

Produced by the Livingstone Corporation: David Veerman and Neil Wilson, writers; Bruce Barton and Linda Taylor, editors.

Cover photograph of bread copyright Isabelle Lafrance Photography/Gerry Images. All rights reserved.

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Designed by Jessie McGrath

Scripture quotations marked NLT are from the Holy Bible , New Living Translation, copyright 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked NIV are from the Holy Bible, New International Version , NIV . Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. TM Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

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Scripture quotations marked NKJV are from the New King James Version. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. NKJV is a trademark of Thomas Nelson, Inc.

Scripture quotations marked KJV are from the Holy Bible , King James Version.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Life application study Bible devotional : daily wisdom from the life of Jesus.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 978-1-4143-4813-1 (sc)

1. Bible. N.T. GospelsChronology. 2. Bible. N.T. GospelsMeditations. 3. Jesus ChristBiographySources, Biblical. 4. Jesus ChristBiographySources, BiblicalMeditations. I. Bible. N.T. Gospels. English. Selections. 2011.

BS2559.L54 2011

232.9007dc22 2011016100

To one of the many behind the scenes, now with the Lord, a relentless practitioner and enthusiastic spokesman for Bible application

James Winfield Wilson

19282009

PK, husband, father, grandfather, great-grandfather, Bible translator, friend

Introduction

They delight in the law of the L ORD , meditating on it day and night. They are like trees planted along the riverbank, bearing fruit each season. Their leaves never wither, and they prosper in all they do.

Psalm 1:2-3, NLT

The picturesque language of the first Psalm describes the potential impact of Gods Word in peoples lives. Meditating and delighting in Gods Word produces trees of desirable and unusual character. These trees take their stand by a river that gives them life. You might call it a river of life, and you might also call what flows in that river living water. These trees are described as bearing fruit each season, which can mean, among other things, that whatever the season of life, the trees produce fruit appropriate for that season. These trees are also evergreen, since their leaves never witherthe seasons may come and go, and the fruit ripens and is harvested, but these trees persevere. They change and grow, yet remain the same. And these trees prosper.

The trees of Psalm 1 know what to do with Gods Word. They live beside it, and it lives in them. They delight in what they discover from Gods Word because they allow it to change the way they live. The results of their continual meditation are practical applications that lead to direction, change, truth, correction, and an increasing sense of Gods involvement in their lives. We become those trees when we let Scripture speak into our lives that waywhen we commit to becoming people who know what it means to both hear and do Gods Word (James 1:19-25)when we anticipate delight in Gods Word.

The Birth of the LASB

The Life Application Study Bible (LASB) began during a coffee break. Someone asked a question, If you could give students a Bible with built-in tools that would help them overcome unfamiliarity with Scripture and give them confidence to respond in obedience, what would you include in that Bible?

Those of us sitting around the table that day were committed to communicating Gods Word in ways that would give young people the best chance to experience its life-changing power. The coffee got cold as we brainstormed the kind of notes and other features that we were convinced might help people to come across the threshold of Gods Word and into the life they could find in those pages. We were excited about the possibilities, but we had no idea what God would bring about as a result of that discussion. We also did not know what producing that Bible over the next several years would take. Our delighted naivet was a tribute to the glory of God. We were about to join that throng of people through the ages who have been drawn into Gods plans and purposes only to realize they had become part of something infinitely larger than themselves.

The point of the Life Application Study Bible wasnt to add to the Bible. Rather it was to provide people with tools that would help them experience the Bible. We didnt think the Bible needed help in being Gods Word; we did think that people could use help in dealing with practical obstacles between themselves and Gods Word. Judging from the responses to the LASB weve received over the years, God has used it in that way in countless lives.

The Life Application Study Bible Devotional was developed as one answer to the question: How can we encourage the readers of Gods Word to delight in his Word? Application sounds like workand often is. But its the work we were designed to do. Rather than the frantic and hopeless work of trying to save ourselves, Bible application is the joyful work of gratitude for the priceless gift of salvation we have freely received through Christ (Ephesians 2:8-10)!

A metaphor similar to the psalm writers picture of fruitful trees was used by Jesus to describe us. He spoke of vines and branches (John 15). Other places in the Bible point to the life God wants us to experience and uses the idea of roots (Ephesians 3:17-19; Colossians 2:6-7). The trees in Psalm 1 arent running around the countryside getting good stuff done for God; rather they are healthy trees producing succulent fruit in season. What trees ultimately do is what God does in and through them. Good fruit is evidence of a tree or branch yielded to the purpose for which it was created. Attentive time spent in Gods Word will bring about good fruit. The Life Application Study Bible Devotional is a tool to help you spend that time.

The Devotional Plan

This Life Application Study Bible Devotional allows you to spend time meditating day and night on the life of Jesus in order to thoroughly delight in that central part of Gods Word. The pace is designed to take you through a year of concentrated reflection on the lessons found in Jesus words and actions.

One of the features in the Life Application Study Bible is a Harmony of the Gospels, located between the Gospel of John and the book of Acts. That extended chart offers a chronological list of 250 key events in the life of Jesus and where those events are found in each of the Gospels. (The Harmony is also built into the text of the Gospels; every paragraph mentions its possible Gospel parallels.)

Those 250 key events were organized into 52 larger sections to form the structure of this Life Application Study Bible Devotional . You will not only spend a year with Jesus; you will also spend each week in deliberate meditation on a specific event in his life.