MINI-CAST: Niah & Allisha Merrill
#48: Niah and Allisha Merrill on Being in God’s Waiting Room
Helping Kids in Limpopo Live God’s Word
In the Beginning: Part 1
Genesis, the first book of the Bible, is God’s great introduction.
In the beginning, there is nothing.
Then into the nothingness, God speaks, creating a universe that’s beautiful and good because He is beautiful and good. He fills His magnificent world with a myriad of life, and patterns one honored creation—people—after Himself. He crafts human beings, us, like Himself for a very remarkable reason—so that we can know Him & experience His love. connecting with God is seen in the very beginnning.
But God has a vile Enemy—Satan. This Enemy hates God and sets out to sabotage everything. Satan creeps into God’s perfect, innocent creation in the form of a serpent. Then, he introduces evil to the first man and woman—Adam and Eve. Deceived by Satan, Adam and Eve disobey God. Their sin has disastrous consequences. The fatal disease infects God’s masterpiece, and the deadly curse captures it, succumbing to Satan’s kingdom of darkness. But the worst thing is that they—and all of the generations of people who are born after them—lose their close connection to God.
But while Satan smears sin and destruction all over God’s masterpiece, he cannot ruin God’s love.
With great compassion and patience, God zealously begins the long journey to rescue us and draw us back to Himself.
Generations of people are born sick with sin, under the authority of an evil tyrant, enslaved to a curse of death in a world of sickness & pain. The world is in a sad, sad state and people are becoming more and more wicked. It breaks God’s heart. In His sorrow, God destroys everything on the earth with a flood. He then begins to fill the earth with people again through Noah, a man who walks with God. A few generations later, a group of people at Babel attempt to reach God through their own efforts. But the people God has created are helpless to save themselves and disown connecting with God.
Into this mess, God begins His great rescue plan, and He chooses to do it through a family. The God of the universe speaks to a man, Abraham, telling him that He will make his family into a great nation, He will give them a piece of land of their very own, and He will be their God. God informs Abraham that he will bless all of the people of the world through him. Abraham chooses to follow this God whom he barely knows, and after many years, God honors Abraham’s faith in Him & takes a step in fulfilling His promises. He gives the 100-year-old Abraham a son, Isaac, just like He promised.
God makes the same promises to Isaac, and to his son, Jacob. God will raise up a nation from their families, He will give them a home, & He will be their God. Jacob has 12 sons, including his favorite son, Joseph. Joseph’s jealous brothers sell him into slavery, but what his brothers intend for evil, God uses for good. After time as both a slave and a prisoner in Egypt, God elevates Joseph to second-in-command in Egypt and gives him insightful dreams predicting a coming famine. When the famine devastates the entire Middle East, Joseph is in a strategic position to provide not only for Egypt, but also for his estranged family. After a beautiful reunion, all of Joseph’s 11 brothers and their families—including his elderly father, Jacob—move to Egypt. God has protected and provided for His people, and they survive the famine.
Through the lives of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, God begins to show His captive people who He is. Broken and living in a broken world, they’re unaware that they’ve lost their connecting with God—or that they’re even meant to connect with Him at all. And while God’s people are getting to know Him, He’s setting the stage for His masterful and very personal plan to rescue the world.
Genesis shows us who God is, where we came from, and why the world is the way it is. We are deeply broken, yet we are all deeply loved. Through this first book in our story, we find that the foundational plotline of human history is one that’s written in the aches & longings of our hearts. Life doesn’t feel quite right, yes, but that’s because we’re captive. And our God, who loves us deeply, is coming to set us free.
Like what you read? Check out Kingdom Truth #1 & Kingdom Truth #2 also by Walk Thru the Bible!
Read Through the Bible in 2024
Read through the Bible in one year with us! Make 2024 the year you read all the way from Genesis through Revelation; from the Tree of Life in Eden created to the Tree of Life in Eden restored. Read all about how God created the world and everything in it, how humanity sinned and fell, and how He has worked to redeem us back to Himself through His Son, Jesus.
Reading through the Bible will help you grow in your faith, in your relationship with God, in your journey with Jesus. An intentional plan will help you get into the regular rhythm of meeting with God every day, studying His Word, hearing His voice, and drawing closer to Him.
As you meet with God and read your Bible each day, your life will change. You will begin to love as Jesus loves. You will begin to see others through His eyes. You will view this broken world in a new way. You will begin to walk closer with Him, and so much more.
Because the Bible changes everything.
And it’s never too late to start reading.
If your New Year’s resolution is to read through the Bible in 2023, we can help! We have Bible reading plans, the Daily Walk Podcast, the Daily Walk Bible, and others tools and resources to help you stay on track. Maybe you resolved to read through the Bible this year. Maybe you’ve gotten stuck. Maybe you’ve read stories that you don’t understand.
At Walk Thru the Bible, we can help.
The Daily Walk Devotional Podcast will help you listen through the Bible in one year. Each day’s episode features a devotional thought and a guided journey through that day’s reading of Scripture.
The Daily Walk Reading Plan is a free, Bible reading plan that will help you read through the entire Bible in one year.
The New Testament Reading Plan will help you read through the New Testament twice in a year.
The Chronological Reading Plan will take you through the Bible’s grand story, the big story, so that you follow the storyline chronologically. This way you won’t get stuck in certain sections. Instead, it helps you see the big picture and how the Bible fits together.
The Daily Walk Bible offers a simple daily reading plan and tools to help you complete the journey of reading through the Bible in one year. It’s a tool you will find many ways to use—and a tool that God can use in many ways in your life. Each day’s reading has an OVERVIEW that provides a bird’s-eye view of your Bible reading walk for the day; a MY DAILY WALK section that encourages you to think carefully about and apply one scriptural insight from the day’s reading; and an INSIGHTS section that offers interesting facts about the day’s passage to help build your Bible knowledge.
We even have a Facebook group you can join to build community as we walk through Scripture together!
Don’t feel discouraged if you fall behind in your reading plan. Remember, the beauty of reading the Bible is getting to know the Lover of your soul, hearing His voice, and learning His ways.
The Greatest Gift
God gave us the Greatest Gift when He sent His Son, Jesus.
He gave us the Gift we want, the Gift we need, and the Gift we could never, ever get for ourselves.
Merry Christmas, everyone, from Walk Thru the Bible.
The Meaning of Christmas
THE MEANING OF CHRISTMAS: GOD’S PURPOSE
For what the law was powerless to do … God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. Romans 8:3
IN WORD Have you ever really pondered the meaning of Christmas? Was it just God’s attempt to give us a good example to show us the way to live? Was it simply the birth of a great teacher? Did that innocent little bundle of flesh and blood in the feeding trough really hold the answer for us all?
We can never fully understand the depths of all of God’s mysteries, but we can understand a lot. He has revealed His purposes to us, so we know why Jesus was sent to this broken planet. As much as our proud society hates the idea of an atoning sacrifice, Jesus was sent into this world to die. Like the cattle around Him, the baby of Bethlehem was born for slaughter. He bore the brunt of a fallen world so we could escape its tragic direction. He descended deep so we could ascend high. He gave us the way out of the horrible implications of our rebellion.
God demonstrated for centuries that the human condition could not be fixed by humans. It could not even be repaired by an external work of God. No, there had to be a sacrifice to pay the price; there had to be a person to live the life; and it had to be perfect on both counts. Only God could do that. He clothed Himself in flesh to die, He was raised to live, and He put His Spirit within us. He doesn’t just give us life; He is our life.
IN DEED Long ago, we were created in the image of God. We didn’t know exactly what that meant; the image shattered and we weren’t able to see clearly. But in Jesus, we now see the Spirit of God dwelling in the image of God, and we know: We were made for glory. The glory we see in Jesus is offered to us freely—in Him. The earthen vessels that once walked with God in the Garden are now filled with the very God who made them.
Christmas is our assurance: Jesus came in our likeness to die our death, and He came in God’s likeness to live our life. In Him, the image of God and the image of man meet. And now He lets them meet in us.
Read: Romans 8:1-4
“Christmas is the day that holds all time together.” – Fulton John Sheen
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Taken from our FREE, 2023 Christmas Devotional.
Copyright © 2023 by Walk Thru the Bible Ministries, Inc.
Giving Tuesday: Help Kids Everywhere Live God’s Word
Jesus said, “Let the little children come to me, … for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these” (Matthew 19:14). Yet many kids around the world have never heard the Word of God; they don’t know God’s Story; they don’t know Jesus.
The need for children to hear, know, and experience the Word of God is great. Studies show that a majority of believers come to faith in Christ between the ages of 4 and 14 (known as the 4/14 window).
At Walk Thru the Bible, we are helping kids everywhere live God’s Word. As part of a God-given vision, Walk Thru the Bible has launched a global kids’ ministry to teach children the big picture of God’s Word and how they can find their true story in God’s grand story, the Bible. We will reach at least 1.5 million kids around the world this year with the hope and truth of God’s Word.
We are working in Bangladesh, Kenya, Togo, Nigeria, Ukraine, Honduras, the Philippines, Mexico, the UK and the U.S., countries in South Asia, and more, to teach the big picture storyline of Scripture to children in various settings—public schools, Sunday schools, private schools, community outreach programs, urban feeding centers, orphanages, Bible clubs, dusty playgrounds, and more. We have huge opportunities and open doors to teach God’s Word in public schools!
It takes just 50 cents to reach and teach one child with the big picture story of God’s Word. On this Giving Tuesday, will you consider a gift of $50 to reach 100 kids, $100 to reach 200 kids, or an amount of your choosing to bring the hope and truth of God’s Word to children around the world? Many of the children in these regions live in areas of intense persecution or extreme poverty. Their parents may be of different faiths or no faith. They may have never heard the Word of God.
The need for children around the world to hear, know, and experience God’s Word is great.
God has opened many doors of opportunity for us to reach children in many nations—the opportunities and open doors we’ve seen to teach God’s Word in public schools alone will have a huge impact on the now generation. The children are taught by trained Walk Thru the Bible kids’ instructors, and in their own culture, context, and language.
We want to give this generation of children the hope of the Word of God and a purpose for the future He has for them. Will you partner with Walk Thru the Bible to help us give the gift of God’s Word to children around the world?
“The Walk Thru the Bible live event helped the children open their eyes, to reflect on their own lives,” says Pastor Sammy in Huruma, Kenya. “I have a number of them here who have given their lives to Christ. Walk Thru the Bible has helped them to embrace the love of God,” he said.
With the global launch of our Walk Thru the Bible kids’ ministry, we can reach 1.3 million children this year alone. It takes just 50 cents to reach one child with the big picture story of God’s Word. On this Giving Tuesday, will you consider a gift of $50 (reaches 100 kids), $100 (reaches 200 kids), or an amount of your choosing to bring the hope, the truth, the gift of God’s Word to children in places like Ukraine, Togo, Honduras, Nigeria, Manila, Malawi, Davao, the UK and U.S., and more, this year?
Together, we can plant seeds in the lives of children around the world who have never heard the Word of God. Together, we can reach this generation with the hope of Scripture. Together, we can impact God’s Kingdom for eternity.
On this Giving Tuesday, you can help kids everywhere live God’s Word. Will you partner with us?
Helping Pastors and Displaced People in Ukraine Live God’s Word
