“Ugh! You are so stupid, Jacob!” Jacob was saying to himself as he pounded his fists against his head. “Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!” Jacob cried out loud with tears streaking down his dusty face. “God had promised me the birthright! He had promised me the inheritance! He had promised me the blessing! Why couldn’t I wait?! Why did I have to take matters into my own hands?!”

Can you imagine how Abraham’s heart ached as he was told to kill his son? He had waited so long for a son. All the promises – many descendants, a great nation, the Savior – were tied to that son. But God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.”

Sounds can leave a lasting impression. Tonight our thoughts of the passion of Jesus are stirred by the haunting sound of clinking coins – the thirty pieces of silver that were paid to Judas to betray our Lord. 

In certain movies, it is fairly easy to figure out who are the bad guys and who are the good guys. Many times the bad guys are dressed in black, sinister looking, and even grotesque. In “The Lord of the Rings” you have Sauron, Saurumon, Orcs, Orikai, and the Bellrog, It is fairly easy to see which team they are playing for. 

Spinning head. Projectile vomiting. Levitation. Talking in reverse. 

I have those images seared into my memory. I don’t like scary movies at all, but for some reason I watched “The Exorcist” when I was a teenager. With its disturbing focus on the demonic possession of a 12-year-old girl, the 1973 movie, “the Exorcist,” has every right to be rated as “the scariest movie of all time.” 

“She’s a bit down with a fever lately, which is why she missed services today,” Peter told Jesus. Jesus comes to the bedside of Peter’s mother-in-law. He takes her by the hand and raises her up. And the fever left her. Then she put on some tea and made cute little triangle cucumber sandwiches and she served them. 

11 people dead. Families torn apart. A city gripped in fear. 

That’s what happened on January 7 in Paris at the French satirical newspaper, “Charlie Hebdo.” 

I listened to the news. I felt sad for the families who lost their loved ones. I was angry that evil was once again getting its way. 

She had prayed for a son. Oh how she had prayed! She poured out her heart to the Lord. Her lips moved, but no sound came out. So absorbed was she in prayer.

The Lord answered and gave Hannah a son. She named him “Samuel” which means “heard by God.” As she had vowed, when her child was around the age of five, she brought him to the Tabernacle at Shiloh. There he would serve the Lord for the rest of his life. Hannah and her husbandbwould see him once a year at the annual sacrifice. Eli, the priest, now served as a sort of religious foster father. 

The jailer had heard of Paul. Pretty much everyone in Philippi had by now. They had heard how Paul and his friend, Silas, had come into town several days earlier. Not finding a synagogue to meet in, they met with some women who were gathered at the river flowing through Philippi. A prominent woman named Lydia was converted to Paul’s strange message about a foreign god – a god named “Jesus.”