This is The Living Word Bible Study for Sunday, October 30, based on the interdenominational scheme of Bible readings widely used in churches and chapels. Here they are with links to bible gateway.com (NIV Bible):
Isaiah 1:1, 10-20 — Prophets appeal about continuing injustice
Luke 19:1-10 — Jesus names Zacchaeus and asks to stay with him
2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12 — Faith and love grows in persecution
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- See also this week’s linked article How Faith Comes: by Hearing and Believing What God Says
- Watch this week’s video (15 min)
- Listen to the podcast on The Living Word — Substack
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Psalm 119:137-144
137-138 You are righteous, Lord, and Your laws are right. The statutes You have laid down are righteous; they are fully trustworthy.
139 My zeal wears me out, for my enemies ignore Your words.
140-141 Your promises have been thoroughly tested, and Your servant loves them. Though I am lowly and despised, I do not forget Your precepts.
142 Your righteousness is everlasting and Your law is true.
143-144 Trouble and distress have come upon me, but Your commands give me delight. Your statutes are always righteous; give me understanding that I may live.
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Isaiah 1:1, 10-20 — Prophets appeal about continuing injustice
• God speaks of how faithfulness to His covenant will bring grace and blessing
1 The vision concerning Judah and Jerusalem that Isaiah son of Amoz saw during the reigns of Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz and Hezekiah, kings of Judah.
“The vision”… presents Isaiah’s prophecies from 740 to 685 BC as a unified whole. Most were directed to the priests and rulers in Jerusalem but some spoke to the northern kingdom of Israel which fell in 722 BC.
10 Hear the word of the LORD, you rulers of Sodom; listen to the instruction of our God, you people of Gomorrah!
“You rulers” – Isaiah likens them to the cities of the plain destroyed because of their persistent sin.
11 “The multitude of your sacrifices – what are they to Me?” says the LORD. “I have more than enough of burnt offerings, of rams and the fat of fattened animals; I have no pleasure in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
“Your sacrifices” – sincere sacrifice honoured the Lord, insincere offerings dishonoured, as Samuel said: “To obey is better than sacrifice,” 1 Sam. 15:22-23, reiterated by later prophets, Hosea 6:6, Amos 4:4, Mic. 6:6-8 and taken up by Jesus, Matt. 23:23. God seeks our hearts, not just our actions, 1 Cor. 4:5.
12 “When you come to appear before Me, who has asked this of you, this trampling of My courts?
“Trampling” – people holding wrong attitudes defiled the temple courtyard.
13-15 “Stop bringing meaningless offerings! Your incense is detestable to Me. New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations – I cannot bear your worthless assemblies. Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals I hate with all Mrefy being. They have become a burden to Me; I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands in prayer, I hide My eyes from you; even when you offer many prayers, I am not listening. Your hands are full of blood!
“I hate… I hide… I am not listening” – prayer and worship that is a hypocritical act is “detestable” (v.13) and something the Lord, like all sin, cannot countenance.
16-17 Wash and make yourselves clean. Take your evil deeds out of My sight; stop doing wrong. Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.
“Stop doing wrong… learn to do right” – the Lord’s people should copy His defining characteristics of mercy and justice, Exodus 34:6-8.
18 “Come now, let us settle the matter,” says the LORD. “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.
“Your sins… shall be… white” – grace and forgiveness, predicated on a change of attitude. Turning to obedience does not earn forgiveness but demonstrates sincerity — and faith.
19-20 If you are willing and obedient, you will eat the good things of the land; but if you resist and rebel, you will be devoured by the sword.” For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.
“If you are willing” – Isaiah’s prophetic word, like Deut. 28, sets out a choice between blessing, or an enduring curse.
Habakkuk 1:1-4; 2:1-4
1 How long, Lord, must I call for help, but You do not listen? Or cry out to You, “Violence!” but You do not save?
“Violence!” — experienced in King Jehoiakin’s cruel and corrupt reign.
3-4 Why do You make me look at injustice? Why do You tolerate wrongdoing? Destruction and violence are before me; there is strife, and conflict abounds. Therefore the law is paralysed, and justice never prevails. The wicked hem in the righteous, so that justice is perverted.
“Tolerate wrongdoing” — it appears to the prophet that God is letting sin go unpunished, so there is no justice.
2:1 I will stand at my watch and station myself on the ramparts; I will look to see what He will say to me, and what answer I am to give to this complaint.
“Station myself” — Habakkuk positions himself as a spiritual watchman, like a look-out on the ramparts.
2 Then the Lord replied: “Write down the revelation and make it plain on tablets so that a herald may run with it.
“Write down” — like a royal messenger, he is to write the vision on a clay tablet to share it accurately, Isaiah 30:8.
3 For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false. Though it may linger, wait for it; it will certainly come and will not delay.
4 “See, the enemy is puffed up; his desires are not upright — but the righteous person will live by his faithfulness.”
“Live by… faithfulness” — or live by his faith, much quoted in this form in the NT; live by holding firmly to what God has promised.
• For further study, Hebrews 10:38-39.
Reflection
SUMMARY An appeal for the ending of injustice and harsh rule begins Isaiah’s sequence of revelatory words from God, and also Habakkuk’s shorter prophecy. Isaiah’s appeal is addressed to harsh rulers and urges them to heed God’s instruction, stop doing wrong and experience His grace in a renewed relationship. Habakkuk shares the same concern but addresses his appeal to God, setting up a listening watch until God gives him a clear, revelatory word.
APPLICATION This introduces a fundamental and commonly-asked question about God and faith — why do bad things happen around godly people, and why do they persist, despite righteous prayer appeals? The lesson is that only faith can see God’s higher purpose and believe Him in His longer time-frame. In hearing and responding to God, faith is a prerequisite.
QUESTION What might God be saying about declining church attendance and how are we asking Him?
Luke 19:1-10 — Jesus names Zacchaeus and asks to stay with him
• The despised tax collector finds faith to repent as he encounters the Lord
1-2 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy.
“Jericho” — rebuilt by Herod the Great near the site of the old city, and the toll collection point in a prosperous area.
“A chief tax collector” — although rich, notorious and socially shunned. This is a climax in Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem which highlights His love for the least and the lost
3-4 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see Him, since Jesus was coming that way.
“Climbed a sycamore-fig” — into a short and sturdy tree, accessible, but still a very undignified action for a rich man.
5-6 When Jesus reached the spot, He looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.” So he came down at once and welcomed Him gladly.
“He looked up and said” — Jesus knew his name, situation, need of Him and likely response. Later in the NT this kind of divine insight would be called a ‘word of knowledge’, 1 Cor. 12:8.
7 All the people saw this and began to mutter, “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.”
“The guest of a sinner” — people made critical remarks, as when Jesus went to the house of Matthew Levi, Luke 5:27-29.
8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”
“Here and now I give” — the open-hearted generosity of someone whose heart has been changed by the gospel. Zacchaeus was pledging to repay as if the gains were theft.
9-10 Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”
“Jesus said to him” —addressed to Zacchaeus but for the hearing of “all the people”, v.7.
“Son of Abraham” — considered an outcast, Jesus accepts Zacchaeus not just as a fellow Jew but as a true son of Abraham because in his response he walks in Abraham’s kind of faith, Romans 4:12. Galatians 3:7.
Reflection
SUMMARY Jesus is nearing the end of a circuitous final journey to Jerusalem in the course of which He both taught and demonstrated remarkable ministry to ‘outsiders’ such as a crippled woman, a leprous Samaritan, and a blind beggar. This highlighted the breadth of God’s love and grace for all — a challenge to those who sought to preserve the privileges of strict Judaism. Now, through prophetic insight, he identifies the despised chief tax collector Zacchaeus, as someone, however undeserving, seeking freedom from a life of dishonesty.
APPLICATION As Zacchaeus tries to draw close to Jesus and Jesus comes close to Zacchaeus, faith for repentance and a new start rises in him as the crowd hears him pledge restitution to the One he calls “Lord”. Wherever we are in life, whether relatively free or bound up in sinful confusion, in moving towards Jesus, we sense His response, faith rises and we experience change.
QUESTION What in Christian life would help us be more aware of Jesus speaking now and helping us change our lives?
2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12 — Faith and love grows in persecution
This church of believers knew their calling and persevered in trusting God
1-2 Paul, Silas and Timothy, to the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ: Grace and peace to you from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
“In God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ” — a blessing which expresses both being coequal as the source and imparts grace and peace to them to them in their trials.
3 We ought always to thank God for you, brothers and sisters, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more, and the love all of you have for one another is increasing. 4 Therefore, among God’s churches we boast about your perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials you are enduring.
“Faith in all the persecutions” — since the earlier letter, increasing persecution is being met by growing faith, 1 Thess. 1:6; 2:14; 3:3-4. God will relieve their suffering, 2 Thess. 1:5-10 and judge their persecutors.
11 With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may make you worthy of His calling, and that by His power He may bring to fruition your every desire for goodness and your every deed prompted by faith.
Paul was praying for church members to be increasingly aware of God’s call so that faith would be behind their every action.
• For further study see 1 Thess. 2:12; compare also Eph. 4:1; Phil. 1:27; Col. 1:10.
12 We pray this so that the name of our Lord Jesus may be glorified in you, and you in Him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
“Jesus… may be glorified” — for the Lord’s reality to be magnified through these faithful believers.
• For further study: 1 Thess. 2:14; Romans 8:17-18; Colossians 3:4, and also Isaiah 66:5.
Reflection
SUMMARY The church in Thessalonica was planted by Paul, Silas and Timothy but persecution forced them to flee to Berea, and then to Athens. Timothy was back in Thessalonica encouraging the believers who were still suffering persecution a year later, as the second letter reveals. This was a church that was growing in “perseverance and faith in all the persecutions and trials”, v.4, where Christian witness was costly ands “every deed prompted by faith”, v.11
APPLICATION Continuing difficulty and especially unfair and unloving treatment by others draws out how much we trust God and take Him at His word. Difficulty endured with faith grows resilience and Christian maturity. Faith tested is faith tempered — the kind that wins through.
QUESTION If, as some say, Christians in the First World are beginning to suffer for the beliefs and values they hold, what will be the effect on the church?
PRAYER Lord, help us to get better at hearing You and more resolute in believing You.
We know that faith comes by hearing, and we have not given enough attention to listening.
Compared with believers in places of persecution, we know our faith lacks depth and our prayer lacks priority.
Help us in our desire to grow in You. Amen.
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- See also this week’s linked article How Faith Comes: by Hearing and Believing What God Says
- Watch this week’s video (15 min)
- Listen to the podcast on The Living Word — Substack
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TLW is also available in a print edition which comes as a Bible-sized folder to print on A4 paper. Download the PDF here:
