No Darkness At All

Philippines
Pray for the missionaries sent from this country- they are many and some go to "closed" countries where it is difficult to share their faith.  Pray for Manila, which is a gigantic city.  There are many who live in extreme poverty here.  Pray for the many people who leave the country to find work.

Proverbs 28:23-24
A rebuke is better than flattery.  Anyone who robs his parents is a destroyer.

Psalm 119:153-176
The first section asks for deliverance because of how much the writer knows and loves God's laws.  The second section, again, speaks about loving the Word and God's law.  This section has a little more of a pleading feel to it, but the writer still uses the law as his reason for receiving help.

1 John 1
John is the writer and begins by saying that the things he will write are things he has seen with his own eyes and heard with his own ears and is therefore going to testify about.  The message he has to tell is "that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all."  He says that even if we just have a small amount of darkness in us we do not walk in the truth.  When we walk in the light we are cleansed from sin and walk in fellowship with other believers.  And here is what I think is the most important verse in this first chapter: "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."  This is super important to understand and very freeing once you experience it!!

Daniel 7
Today Daniel had a vision that would give Ezekiel a run for his money!  Daniel's vision came at night and featured four beasts.  One had features of a lion, one an eagle, one a leopard, and the last one was terrifying.  It had iron teeth, claws of bronze, and 10 horns, three of which were then replaced with another horn that had eyes and a mouth.  The cool part, though, was that he got to see the Ancient of Days take his place on the throne.  He also saw "one like a son of man" who came to the Ancient of Days and was given dominion over everything.  This is a pretty amazing story of Jesus from someone who had never known him!  It turned out that the beasts represented four nations that would all be destroyed.  Daniel was pretty shaken up by the whole thing!