Author: Greg Teats

Psalm 73

Asaph’s writing in Psalm 73 is something probably we all experience at least a little bit as part of our daily lives.  He shares with us how he nearly walked away from God because he was constantly seeing arrogant, corrupt people living their best lives.  These people were healthy, wealthy, no problems, no consequences.  Meanwhile, he was doing everything right and still getting beat up by life.  Sound familiar?  “Why do good things happen to bad people” type behavior.  He felt like following God was pointless.

But right before he was about to go public, or go post on social media in today’s way, he held off.  Instead, he went to the sanctuary, he felt a shift.  He got perspective.  Not new information, but perspective.

He realized the wicked aren’t winning, they are standing on thin ice.  Their prosperity is temporary.  The end of it all is always inevitable.  He even looks back on it and calls himself thoughtless for even envying them in the first place.  Like a big, dumb animal that could never understand the bigger picture.

Here we are in 2026 and Asaph’s testimony rings even truer today than ever.  Back then it was either first-hand experience or word of mouth.  It still is that plus tv, cell phones and social media all at our fingertips.  All the celebrities and billionaires you can fathom.  Even the wealthiest of people sometimes in our communities.

Asaph’s story is black and white.  What seems like perfection vs. what is simply imperfection.  From my experience, I certainly never compare myself to Elon, Bezos or the likes of Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson.  Good for those guys.  I wish them the best and hope and pray they do have a relationship with Jesus and are generous to the world with their fame and fortune.  I will never truly get to know them on a deeper level.  I can only speak of the people I actually do rub shoulders with, those I do business with or even my ‘friends’ on social media.  The ones who talk about or post all the time about ‘having it all’.

In today’s reality it is sometimes that feeling you get scrolling through Instagram  or Facebook watching people make up stories and cut corners to make it look like it is all hunky dory.  Meanwhile you are grinding and barely keeping it altogether.

It is then that I find myself going to the sanctuary.  For me that is church on Sundays or those few minutes talking with God before I call it a night.  It is then I am reminded than a ‘perfect life’ doesn’t exist and what matters most is the person who I fold my hands together for and bow my head to.  It really makes me think how miserable my life would truly be had I never have known Him.  Simply put, I would just be another fool like the rest of them.  But fortunately, like Asaph said, ‘How good it is to be near God!’

My prayer is that we never, ever forget how good God is, and that we never stop realizing that He loves us and only ever wants the best for us.

Revelation 4

In Revelation 4, John describes his vision like something from a Black Mirror episode, almost like a different dimension.  A voice says, “Come up here”, and suddenly instead of being on Earth, he is in the throne room of God.

I have heard this room/experience depicted as the most overwhelming, awe-inspiring place.  Kind of like coming up on the Grand Canyon or a pack super bowl stadium with your favorite team playing – then multiply that by infinity!

God is sitting on his throne and John can’t truly paint the picture to us what he sees.  The closest he gets is gemstones and light.  Jasper(clear/crystal) and carnelian(deep red) surrounded by an emerald green rainbow.  More like radiance – a pure, overwhelming, beautiful presence.

Around God’s throne are 24 elders. They are ready to throw their crowns down for every moment that God is praised as a reminder – “whatever authority we have came from Him, and it belongs back to Him”.  In front of the throne, a sea of glass, clear as crystal.  Some believe it is a barrier representing an uncrossable distance.  Others see it as a mirror, reflecting perfect clarity and peace.

Then some super unnatural imagery!  Four creatures, covered in eyes from front to back.  Never stopping, never blinking and representing the highest and best of all creation:

• Lion – wild/majestic(apex of wild animals)
• Ox – strength/service(apex of domestic animals)
• Man – intelligence/dignity(apex of humanity)
• Eagle – speed/freedom(apex of birds)

Bowing before God and constantly saying, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty – who was, and is, and is to come.”

The throne room of God is the most powerful place in existence — filled with radiance, lightning, and non-stop worship from every corner of creation. Before God reveals anything about the future, He makes one thing unmistakably clear: He is holy, He is sovereign, and He has always been in control. No matter what’s coming, the throne is never empty.

Isaiah Chapter 46

What do you think of when you hear the term ‘false gods’?  Short answer…..gods that aren’t real.  The word ‘false’ isn’t even the part that makes me think ‘not real gods’.  It is the fact that ‘gods’ is plural and we all know there is only ONE GOD.

Isaiah really drives it home in chapter 46 and what false gods really look like to God himself.  Babylon’s top gods – Bel and Nebo – are so fat, they are being loaded onto animals to be hauled away.  They can’t even move themselves.  The animals almost can’t even handle the weight.  God flips this image completely.  He is saying, I am paraphrasing, “I have been carrying you since you were born.  I’ll keep carrying you when you are old and gray.  I made you. I will sustain you.  I will rescue you.”  God vs. gods is a no brainer.

Then Isaiah refers to the ‘idol’ comparison.  God challenges anyone to compare Him to an idol.  The idol-making process as described by Isaiah: hire a craftsman, melt gold, shape it, set it on a pedestal.  It stands there.  It can’t move.  You cry out to it and you get nothing in return.  It SAVES you from NOTHING.  We still do this today.  We just happen to build our idols out of different materials.  Influence, financial security, relationships, political saviors.  But the same problem exists, when we cry for help, they don’t answer.

Then God calls out those who have strayed.  “Remember this, you guilty ones.  Remember the things I have done.  Remember who I am.”  He announced the end from the beginning!  He is not reacting to history, he is the author of it.  He doesn’t get surprised, what He says happens.  That sounds like the basis for trust to me.

God calls us to reality and truth.  People turn to many things to fill their inner needs.  But anything other than God will fail like an idol that cannot protect itself or its worshipers from captivity.  In contrast, God is the everlasting, sovereign Lord of history who can, and will, do what he says.  Putting our hope in God’s hands is the only way to find true fulfillment.

Other gods are burdens YOU carry.  The God of Isaiah is the one who carries you…and He’s been doing it your whole life.

1 Peter Chapter 2

You know that moment when you open the fridge and you’re hit with that smell? Something expired, something you kept meaning to toss but just kept pushing to the back? Peter opens chapter 2 with exactly that kind of moment. He names it plainly; deceit, hypocrisy, jealousy, unkind speech. That’s the sour milk. And his point isn’t just ‘throw it out’, it’s ‘go replace it’. Get something fresh. Something worth consuming. Because you can’t grow on stuff that is rotten.

Verse 5 says, “He was rejected by people, but he was chosen by God”.  Jesus is the cornerstone, in other words, the anchor of the foundation that God has set forth.  If you build your life on Him, you are secure.  If you ignore Him, you will trip over Him.  Typically if we have tripped, it means we have not obeyed God’s word.

Growing up, my Dad tested me with the ‘game’ called MERCY that I would go on to ‘play’ with my buddies in high school.  You know the one, you lock fingers, twist, bend, apply as much pressure as you can until the other person can’t take it anymore and finally cries out ‘mercy.’ The whole point of the game was to make someone surrender. But here’s what’s funny, the mercy in 1 Peter 2 works completely backwards from that game. Nobody twisted God’s arm. Nobody applied enough pressure to earn it. He just… gave it. Freely. And that changes everything about how we’re supposed to pass it on.  Peter reminds us who we actually are.  We are chosen, God’s very own possession.  Without Him we are nobody, but with Him we receive His mercy.

5 Ways we can show mercy today:

1. See people the way God saw you

2. Don’t Retaliate – Absorb

3. Live well toward people who dismiss you

4. Use your freedom to serve, not to protect yourself

5. Show up for people in low-status moments

The mercy in this chapter isn’t sentimental; it is costly and active.  It cost Jesus everything.  What Peter is describing is a community of people who received something they didn’t deserve and then turned around and passed it on.  Not because people earned it, but because that’s what mercy is.  The most natural place to start is usually the relationship closest to you where it’s hardest to extend.  That’s almost always where the chapter is pointing to.

Hebrews Chapter 4

Just 2 weeks ago I was reflecting on Moses coming down the mountain after a harsh discussion with God about the people asking for new gods.  Because of their behavior and unwillingness to share the faith of those that actually did listen to God, they were denied the ‘rest’ that was promised them.

For those of us today, God’s promise of rest is still very much on the table.  What we need to do, though, is figure out if we are really taking it seriously.  We can all HEAR the message but are we LISTENING??  Do we BELIEVE the words that we are listening to??  Our faith has to connect with the message for it to do anything.

Let’s think about this….God finished His work at creation and rested on the 7^th day.  This rest wasn’t just for Him, it was always meant for us as well.  If Joshua had fully delivered on that rest when he led Israel into the Promised Land, God wouldn’t still be talking about “a day called Today.”  But He is.  Which means the rest is still out there where we stop striving to earn everything and simply rest in what He’s already done.  BUT, don’t just simply coast along on this.  We still must make every effort to actually enter that rest.  We cannot follow the same pattern of stubborn unbelief that tripped up those before us.

Let us also never fall numb to the Word of God just being text on a page.  It’s alive, active, sharper than any blade ever made.  It cuts through all the noise, past our emotions, our rationalizations, right to the core of who we actually are.  Sometimes we may really despise this truth but we know deep down it exposes our real thoughts and motives.  Nothing is ever hidden.

Now,  that all might sound like a little bit of bad news, and it is, but here is the good news….there is someone in all of our lives who sits at the top, the Son of God!  He knows exactly what it feels like to be us.  He was tempted in every way we are, the full human life experience, and He never broke.

So don’t let yourself fade in the shadows.  We must continue to walk straight into God’s presence with confidence, the kind of confidence of someone who knows they are welcomed.  What you will find is NOT a judge waiting to lower the hammer, but instead the grace and mercy when you need it most!

I believe this chapter is essentially saying, stop white-knuckling life by trying to earn your way.  The rest God offers isn’t laziness, it is trust.  We all have a Savior that has been in those trenches, and we have all been given the roadmap to our spot on the bench right next to Him.

Exodus 32

I would be lying if I said I couldn’t relate.  All the Israelites that had been saved from bondage in Egypt, endured months of hard travel, boring food and uncertainty about where they were going, had on this night decided to rave like party animals.  They asked Aaron what was taking Moses so long on top of the mountain and they were getting a bit anxious.

So Aaron thought it was best to play into all their foolishness.  They asked him to make new gods for them to follow.  He knew that was wrong and tricked them into bringing all their gold to him instead.  So they did.  Then he just threw it all in a fire.  And a golden calf ‘came out of it’.  Then the crowd grew out of control.  Guess who saw this….yea, God.  He was pretty stinking upset.  He basically tells Moses how these people no longer need to exist.

Moses pleads to God to let them be and that he will handle this.  So, he heads back down the mountain to alert them of their insane behavior.  Mind you, he is also carrying two stone tablets with commandments written on them from God himself.  Ten to be exact.  Moses gets to the bottom and now HE is pretty stinking upset.  He throws the tablets smashing to the ground. After getting the ‘facts’ from Aaron, Moses gathers those who believe in God and sends to rest to kill their friends and families.  He certainly thinned the herd but the next day God told Moses how he will take care of the rest who had sinned against him via a plague.

Like I said at the beginning, I can relate, to some of their actions.  It was a long road.  We have all been there.  Then we start to look for a good steak instead of all the bologna and hotdogs we had been eating.  We are looking for a place to call home instead of all the traveling and renting we had been doing.  Then we get a little anxious and loose and decide to party a little hard one night and make all these silly demands.  I mean, what is one night going to hurt, right?  Wrong!

When we are at our weakest, pushed to our limits, we let our guard down and become fools.  Sometimes we may forget why we are all here.  Sometimes we forget the purpose of our existence.  Often this is when we are given a test.  Sometimes it is as simple as a pass or fail.  Thank God that today when we FAIL those tests we don’t get the plague put on us the next day.  Maybe, though, that is how we need to live our lives and remind ourselves of our purpose.

Takeaways –

Impatience leads to substitutes – The people didn’t stop believing in God, they just wanted a version of God they could see and control.

Aaron is a cautionary tale – He had authority, he had access to God, and he folded under social pressure in about five minutes.  The “it just came out of the fire” excuse may almost be funny, but the consequences were deadly.

Moses is a picture of intercession – He stepped between God’s wrath and guilty people, willing to sacrifice himself.

God holds individuals accountable – His answer to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against me, I will blot out” established a clear principle.  Personal responsibility, not collective punishment by proxy.

1 Corinthians Chapter 2

Paul starts off by saying that he didn’t come to everyone to try and WOW them with intelligence and eloquence.  He was relying on slick messaging, persuasive sales tactics, or trying to sound like the smartest guy in the room.  He was simply keeping the focus on Jesus, and what He did on the cross.  Faith should not be built on how convincing someone is rather, how God’s power actually works in one’s life.  In other words, if someone chooses me as a realtor only because of my flashy marketing and not trust or substance, then that relational foundation is already off to a shaky start.

Then Paul shifts a little.  Reading this chapter I was introduced to the term ‘Mature Christian’.  Also, ‘mature saints are easily edified’.  Essentially, just because something isn’t spoken or presented in an intelligent or eloquent manner, us ‘Mature Christians’ use our spiritual maturity to find nourishment in the simplest truths of the scripture rather than requiring exceptional preaching or production.

There are deep truths and insight in Christianity but not the kind you arrive at through status, education, or worldly success.  It is something God reveals, not something you figure out on your own.  “No eye has seen, no ear has heard….what God has prepared….”.  None of us can fully grasp God’s plans using just human perception.

Toward the end of the chapter Paul gets right down to it.  I think what he is trying to drive home is that pure human perspective like logic, experience, and culture can’t be relied on to get Christians across the finishing line. Instead, we need to be spiritually tuned in to be able to distinguish the deeper meaning.  We must have the mind of Christ.  Believers begin to think, see, and evaluate life the way Jesus does.

The Takeaways:

• Don’t rely on hype, intellect, or image
• God’s wisdom is real, but is not discovered the same way as worldly knowledge
• The Holy Spirit is what makes spiritual truth make sense
• WITHOUT it, it sounds foolish. WITH it, your entire perspective shifts.

How to Apply it:

• Authenticy > Performance
• Clarity > Complexity
• Truth that lands > Words that impress

Remember, you don’t have to ‘over-sell’ truth, whether that’s your faith or your value as a person.

Psalm 136

If you read Psalm 136 you will quickly notice that all 26 verses in the chapter end with the same words every time.  “His faithful love endures forever.”(NLT Version)  I see purpose throughout this chapter right away.  The psalmist is repeating one truth and driving it deep into our souls.  This chapter is equivalent to a training manual in a sense.  I feel like the author is telling the reader, “Whenever you think you have failed beyond recall or you feel that there is no path to becoming one with God, remember, His love endures forever!”

• No matter who’s in charge politically, culturally, or economically – God is still sovereign. His love doesn’t expire.
• The God who made the stars is the same God who watches over your daily life. He is not overwhelmed by your everyday stresses and worries.
• You can’t physically see it, but He sees the wrong. He intervenes.  He breaks the chains.
• When you have no clue what direction to go, there appears to be no progress, and you don’t understand what God is doing……remember He has not abandoned you.
• He knows when you are at your lowest. He supports you every day.  He sees you battling on the inside.

Just like in Psalm 136, after you read each of those bullet points you should be reminded, “His faithful love endures forever”.  Repeat it often.  Engrave it into your soul.  I am not even upset if you tattoo on your arm!?   Look at everything He has created for you and in you and remember most of all, His faithful love will never run out.

I leave you with an excerpt from the most recent Bible I was recently gifted, “Every Man’s Bible”(NLT version)……

“At times, moving through life can be like a lonely walk through the wilderness.  But God is able to lead us out of the wilderness if we are willing to surrender our lives to Him.  He will never abandon us, because “His faithful love endures forever”.

John 3

This chapter is one of the most renowned chapters in the bible.  There are millions of people that have never even opened the Good Book, but they have heard or seen one of the most repeated verses ever to come from it in the book of John.

Before we get to that, let’s visit what else this chapter lays out for us.

Nicodemus is a highly educated, church-going leader.  He pulls Jesus aside to affirm that He is who He is because no one else could fake such things He has done.  Jesus says how, unless you are born again, then you can’t see the Kingdom of God.  Nicodemus at first is assuming this in the literal sense and is confused.  Jesus proceeds to explain it further, just having knowledge of God is not the same thing as knowing God.

Aren’t there routes that some of us take and can get lost on?  It’s not, nor has ever been about just reading the bible, attending Sunday sermons or choosing a lesser of two evils in our decision making.  It has always been about truly knowing Him and walking the path alongside Him.  John 3:16, “For God so loved the world He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.”  It is about the belief in God, the trust in Him, understanding that He didn’t send advice, rules, or a moral upgrade, He sent Himself.  Jesus goes on to clarify why people reject Him.  It’s the uncomfortable truth that none of us want to speak out loud.  People often avoid Jesus not because of lack of evidence, but instead because the light exposes the things that we don’t want to change.  It is not always disbelief, sometimes it is simply our resistance.

Further reading you hear that John’s followers worry that Jesus is getting more attention.  They haven’t quite grasped it.  This is the way it is meant to be.  John explains to them that none of this was ever about him(John), his job was solely to point the people to Jesus.  Jesus wasn’t sent down to condemn the already broken person; He came to save us.

At the end of the day, YOU don’t need to become better – you need to become new, and only God can do that through faith in Jesus.

What John 3 still does to us in 2026:

• It contests self-made spirituality
• It strips down religion as a performance
• It proposes hope without pretending we are fine
• It says it starts with God, not us

Today’s reading – Ruth 3

Which human weakness highlights God’s faithfulness?

Let’s cut to the chase and answer this question first, then we can discuss further.  What human weakness best highlights God’s faithfulness?? It is the inability to keep promises!  At first, I wasn’t sure what the appropriate answer was.  In 2 Timothy, chapter 2:13, “If we are faithless, he remains faithful”.  So what exactly makes us faithless to Him??  We could go on all day listing out things that can make us faithless to God.  But I get it and agree, it’s the empty promises we tell ourselves and share with God.

Let’s get back to the reading, Ruth 3.  Naomi knows it is time for Ruth to secure her future, and Naomi has a plan.  She sends her off to Boaz to present herself appropriately and let him see her as a potential wife, not just a worker.

Ruth waits until he is asleep and lies down next to him.  He wakes up and she explains her being there.  None of this was inappropriate but more so the legal and covenant-based way to do things back then.

Boaz praises Ruth for her character and is honored she chose him instead of some younger and richer man. But there is a problem, another man has the legal right to redeem Ruth.  In turn, Boaz shows integrity, patience and respect for the law to see that the correct steps are taken and no shortcuts are made.

Boaz sends Ruth back to Naomi but not empty handed.  When Ruth returns, Naomi knows that Boaz is a man of action and of his word and will do what is necessary and right.

Let me break down everyone in this story.  Ruth is bold, respectful, and intentional.  Boaz is honorable and decisive.  Naomi is strategic and wise.

How will we respond in trust and obedience?

God is working quietly throughout our lives and with normal decisions and integrity.  Ruth chapter 3 is about trusting His timing, doing things the right way, and courageously stepping into our futures without manipulation.  How will I respond in trust and obedience in the day to day??  Well…I have an idea how I have been doing it.  Half the time I don’t think about it, I just DO.  The other half I talk with God and trust that I am making the right decisions, and He will help guide me the rest of the way.  The fault in that statement is the word HALF.  HALF the time is not how often He wants me to trust and obey Him.  He wants ALL of me and you, not just a part, not just 50%, ALL.

The more we could all be like Ruth, Naomi, and Boaz the better.  The faith and trust they have in God is what we should desire.  The promises that we give Him and the promises that He gives us all we need to help us make sure our footsteps align with His until we see him in Heaven.