The village vicar couldn&rsquo;t sleep. As World War II raged, he&rsquo;d told a small group of American soldiers they couldn&rsquo;t bury their fallen comrade inside the fenced cemetery next to his church. Only burials for church members were allowed. So the men buried their beloved friend just outside the fence.
The next morning, however, the soldiers couldn&rsquo;t find the grave. &ldquo;What happened? The grave is gone,&rdquo; one soldier told the reverend. &ldquo;Oh, it&rsquo;s still there,&rdquo; he told him. The soldier was confused, but the churchman explained. &ldquo;I regretted telling you no. So, last night, I got up&mdash;and I moved the fence.&rdquo;
God may give fresh perspective for our life challenges too&mdash;if we look for it. That was the prophet Isaiah&rsquo;s message to the downtrodden people of Israel. Instead of looking back with longing at their Red Sea rescue, they needed to shift their sight, seeing God doing new miracles, blazing new paths. &ldquo;Do not dwell on the past,&rdquo; He urged them. &ldquo;See, I am doing a new thing!&rdquo; (Isaiah 43:18&ndash;19). He is our source of hope during doubts and battles. &ldquo;I provide water in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland&rdquo;&mdash;providing &ldquo;drink to my people, my chosen . . . people&rdquo; (vv. 20&ndash;21).&nbsp;
Refreshed with new vision, we too can see God&rsquo;s fresh direction in our lives. May we look with new ways to see His new paths. Then, with courage, may we step onto new ground, bravely following Him.

Our Daily Bread Podcast | Our Daily Bread

Move Your Fence

Darryl was a baseball legend who nearly destroyed his life with drugs. But Jesus set him free, and he&rsquo;s been clean for years. Today he helps others struggling with addiction and points them to faith. Looking back, he affirms that God turned his mess into a message.
Nothing is too hard for God. When Jesus came ashore near a cemetery after a stormy night on the Sea of Galilee with His disciples, a man possessed by darkness immediately approached Him. Jesus spoke to the demons inside him, drove them away, and set him free.
When Jesus left, the man begged to go along. But Jesus didn&rsquo;t allow it, because He had work for him to do: &ldquo;Go home to your own people and tell them how much the Lord has done for you&rdquo; (Mark 5:19).
We never see the man again, but Scripture shows us something intriguing. The people of that region had fearfully pleaded with Jesus &ldquo;to leave&rdquo; (v. 17), but the next time He returned there, a large crowd gathered (8:1). Could the crowd have resulted from Jesus sending the man? Could it be that he, once dominated by darkness, became one of the first missionaries, effectively communicating Jesus&rsquo;s power to save?
We&rsquo;ll never know this side of heaven, but this much is clear. When God sets us free to serve Him, He can turn even a messy past into a message of hope and love.

From Mess to Message

Considered one of the greatest video games ever made, Nintendo&rsquo;s The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time published by Nintendo has sold more than seven million copies worldwide. It&rsquo;s also popularized the ocarina, a tiny, ancient, potato-shaped musical instrument made of clay.
The ocarina doesn&rsquo;t look like much of a musical instrument. However, when it&rsquo;s played&mdash;by blowing into its mouthpiece and covering various holes around its misshapen body&mdash;it produces a strikingly serene and hauntingly hopeful sound.&nbsp;
The ocarina&rsquo;s maker took a lump of clay, applied pressure and heat to it, and transformed it into an amazing musical instrument. I see a picture of God and us here. Isaiah 64:6, 8&ndash;9 tells us: &ldquo;All of us have become like one who is unclean. . . . Yet you, <smallcaps>Lord</smallcaps>, are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter. . . . Do not be angry beyond measure.&rdquo; The prophet was saying: God, you&rsquo;re in charge. We&rsquo;re all sinful. Shape us into beautiful instruments for You.
That&rsquo;s exactly what God does! In His mercy, He sent His Son Jesus to die for our sin, and now, He&rsquo;s shaping and transforming us as we walk in step with His Spirit every day. Just as the ocarina maker&rsquo;s breath flows through the instrument to produce beautiful music, God works through us&mdash;His molded instruments&mdash;to accomplish His beautiful will: to be more and more like Jesus (Romans 8:29).

God’s Molded Instruments

Friday was market day in the rural town in Ghana where I grew up. After all these years, I still recall one particular vendor. Her fingers and toes eroded by Hansen&rsquo;s disease (leprosy), she would crouch on her mat and scoop her produce with a hollowed-out gourd. Some avoided her. My mother made it a point to buy from her regularly. I saw her only on market days. Then she would disappear outside the town.
In the time of the ancient Israelites, diseases like leprosy meant living &ldquo;outside the camp.&rdquo; It was a forlorn existence. Israelite law said of such people, &ldquo;They must live alone&rdquo; (Leviticus 13:45&ndash;46). Outside the camp was also where the carcasses of the sacrificial bulls were burned (Leviticus 4:12). Outside the camp was not where you wanted to be.
This harsh reality breathes life into the statement about Jesus in Hebrews 13: &ldquo;Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore&rdquo; (v. 13). Jesus was crucified outside the gates of Jerusalem, a significant point when we study the Hebrew sacrificial system.
We want to be popular, to be honored, to live comfortable lives. But God calls us to go &ldquo;outside the camp&rdquo;&mdash;where the disgrace is. That&rsquo;s where we&rsquo;ll find the vendor with Hansen&rsquo;s disease. That&rsquo;s where we&rsquo;ll find people the world has rejected. That&rsquo;s where we&rsquo;ll find Jesus.

Outside the Camp

In memorializing his grandfather&rsquo;s work, Peter Croft wrote, &ldquo;It is my deepest desire for the person who picks up their Bible, whatever version they use, to not only understand but experience the scriptures as living documents, just as relevant, dangerous, and exciting now as they were those thousands of years ago.&rdquo; Peter&rsquo;s grandfather was J.B. Philips, a youth minister who undertook a new paraphrase of the Bible in English during World War II in order to make it come alive to students at his church.
Like Phillips&rsquo; students, we face barriers to reading and experiencing Scripture, and not necessarily because of our Bible translation. We may lack time, discipline, or the right tools for understanding. But Psalm 1 tells us that &ldquo;Blessed is the one . . . whose delight is in the law of the Lord&rdquo; (vv. 1&ndash;2). Meditating on Scripture daily allows us to &ldquo;prosper&rdquo; in all seasons, no matter what hardship we are facing.
How do you view your Bible? It is still relevant with insight for living today; still dangerous in its call to believe and follow Jesus; still exciting in the intimate knowledge of God and humanity that it imparts. It&rsquo;s like a stream of water (v. 3) that provides the sustenance we need daily. Today, let&rsquo;s lean in&mdash;make time, get the right tools, and ask God to help us experience Scripture as a living document.

A Living Document

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