Archive for category: GAMEtime Sharing

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Jonah 4:1-11.  As usual, I encourage you to read the passage yourself first and see what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help, then read the GAME sharing below.  Let’s go!

Jonah 4:1-3 (NIV) 
1  But Jonah was greatly displeased and became angry. 
2  He prayed to the LORD, “O LORD, is this not what I said when I was still at home? That is why I was so quick to flee to Tarshish. I knew that you are a gracious and compassionate God, slow to anger and abounding in love, a God who relents from sending calamity. 
3  Now, O LORD, take away my life, for it is better for me to die than to live.”
 
On verses 1-3:  God has just shown great mercy to the Ninevites by not bringing the destruction He had warned about (see Jonah 3:10).  What is Jonah’s response to God’s act of mercy?  Displeasure and anger.  Why?  It’s for the same reason that Jonah did not want to go to Nineveh to preach in the first place: Jonah despised the Ninevites.  Jonah had probably learned from the prophets Hosea and Amos that one day Assyria (of which Nineveh was or would be the capital city) would one day attack Jonah’s country of Israel.  So Jonah did not want God to spare the Ninevites. 

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Jonah 2:1-10.  As usual, I encourage you to read the passage yourself first and see what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help, then read the GAME sharing below.  Let’s go!

Jonah 2:1 (NIV) 
1  From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the LORD his God.
2  He said: “In my distress I called to the LORD, and he answered me. From the depths of the grave I called for help, and you listened to my cry.
3  You hurled me into the deep, into the very heart of the seas, and the currents swirled about me; all your waves and breakers swept over me.
4  I said, ‘I have been banished from your sight; yet I will look again toward your holy temple.’
5  The engulfing waters threatened me, the deep surrounded me; seaweed was wrapped around my head.
6  To the roots of the mountains I sank down; the earth beneath barred me in forever. But you brought my life up from the pit, O LORD my God.
7  “When my life was ebbing away, I remembered you, LORD, and my prayer rose to you, to your holy temple.

On verses 1-7:  Here Jonah recounts how he cried out to God for help when he was drowning in the sea and how God rescued him.  Similarly, when we were drowning in the sea of our sin, Jesus came and rescued us from sure death.  No matter what kind of trouble you may be in, like Jonah, cry out to God and believe that God’s grace is greater and He can deliver you.

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Malachi 3:16-4:6.  As usual, I encourage you to read the passage yourself first and see what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help, then read the GAME sharing below.  Let’s go!

Malachi 3:16 (NIV)
16 Then those who feared the LORD talked with each other, and the LORD listened and heard. A scroll of remembrance was written in his presence concerning those who feared the LORD and honored his name.

On verse 16:  Here Malachi describes how those who feared God – that is, worshiped, revered, and honoured God – talked to each other, and God not only heard them but also took notes about them.  What can we learn from this?  God not only listens to how we talk to Him.  He also listens to how we talk to each other.  When we talk to each other in ways that honour His name – when we encourage one another in the Lord – God takes notice.   Just as it pleases a parent to see his or her children getting along and encouraging one another, so it pleases and honours God when we speak in ways that encourage one another and lift up His name.

Hi GAMErs,

Today’s passage is Malachi 2:10-17.  As usual, I encourage you to read the passage yourself first and see what you can glean with the Holy Spirit’s help, then read the GAME sharing below.  Let’s go!

Malachi 2:10 (NIV) 
10 Have we not all one Father? Did not one God create us? Why do we profane the covenant of our fathers by breaking faith with one another? 

On verse 10: In this passage God identifies three ways that the Jews “broke faith” with one another. By carrying on these three sinful practices, the Jews were hurting one another, discouraging each other’s faith in God, threatening their unity as God followers, profaning the covenant their ancestors had made with God, and setting a bad example for the generations that followed them. Let’s take a look at each of these three practices, which are even more common today than they were in Malachi’s time.

Hi GAMErs,

Today we begin our look at the book of Malachi.  Here is some background on the book of Malachi that you may find helpful:

1.  The book of Malachi was most likely written in the 5th century B.C.  (around the same time as, or maybe slightly before or slightly after, the events described in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah).  It is the last of the Old Testament prophetic books to be written.

2. During the time that Malachi was written, the Jews were under Persian rule.  Jewish governor Zerubabbel and prophets Haggai and Zechariah had already successfully led the Jews in rebuilding the temple by 515 B.C.  Still the Jewish people had become cold spiritually and were struggling financially.  Doubt about God’s promises and spiritual apathy had set in, resulting in many Jews marrying non-believers and refusing to tithe or to be accountable to their spiritual community. It is in this context that God sends several hard-hitting messages to the people through the book of Malachi.  Let’s go!