Reading & Praying Intro
Life in the Spirit

Jon Weatherly • Associate Pastor
October 2, 2026

2 Minute Read

Welcome to the Reading & Praying the Bible Plan!

We are so excited you have joined us on this journey to build and maintain a habit of reading the Bible daily, as well as using Scripture for prayer.

Our focus for the year is ‘Life in the Spirit.’ Two prevailing concerns that led to this focus on are, 1) modern culture demands we see the world, including the Bible, through its lens, yet the Scripture instructs us to see all things, including our culture, through its lens; and 2) our specific temptation as believers in a college town is such that we tend to rely on ourselves (as sinners wanting to be self-sufficient) rather than relying on God. Life in the Spirit is the antidote to both these conditions. Life in the Spirit grants us transformation in Christ rather than cultural conformation. Life in the Spirit opposes fleshly self-reliance. Life in the Spirit is God’s gracious renewal from the effects of sin and the Fall. Sin and the Fall produced the social dynamic of ‘the world’and the internal dynamics ‘the flesh’ under the spiritual dynamic of the kingdom of darkness.

To support our efforts to live in the Spirit, we will be providing a daily reading that connects to each Sermon series, with a monthly prayer focus. This time, there is only one plan, but as with anything, go at your own pace, do what you can, because doing anything is better than nothing, and God will use whatever you give him for your good and his glory.

Here’s Pastor Jon to give you more details.

Download the plan for the Creator Series here:

Reading & Praying the Bible Plan
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From this Tag: Reading & Praying
October 20, 2026 • 3 Minute Read
Reading & Praying Week 3
Weekly Devotional – Starting Mon. Oct 19, 2026 This Week’s Readings Monday - Genesis 37-38 Tuesday - Genesis 39-40 Wednesday - Genesis 41-42 Thursday - Genesis 43 Friday - Genesis 44 Saturday - Genesis 45 Sunday - 1 John 3 Monthly Prayer Focus - Psalm 51 Welcome to week 3 of Reading and Praying the Bible. First, how’s your praying going? Don’t worry if it’s not as regular and fulsome as you’d like. It’s happening. God hears. He grows us from where we are to where he is taking us. But if you are sincerely expressing your sense of inadequacy and failure to God but then relying on and rejoicing in his mercy all the more, God is definitely taking you to a good place. This week’s sermon text is the first part of the story of Cain and Abel. This narrative begins a theme that runs through Genesis: conflict between brothers. What we see between Cain and Abel we see again in Ishmael and Isaac, Esau and Jacob, and finally in Joseph and his brothers. To that last epic story we will turn for much of the week. Notice how the story of Joseph develops. Young Joseph is a bit insufferable about being Dad’s favorite. We understand his brothers’ resentment (and we blame Jacob, who is not unlike his father and grandfather in the way he has a favorite), but of course that resentment shouldn’t lead to what it does. Like Cain, some of the brothers want to kill Joseph. But others talk them down: they will abandon him or finally sell him into slavery. Thus begins Joseph’s journey of pain. He seems abandoned by God, but in fact God protects him at every point. And we see his insufferable personality yield to something much more noble. Meanwhile, God is working on the other brothers, especially Judah. His continued duplicity leads him to an outcome of guilt and shame, which he remarkably owns up to. Finally a crisis leads the brothers to seek help in Egypt, where they meet Joseph, who conceals himself from the brothers. We sense Joseph is conflicted: he wants vengeance, but he also longs for reconciliation. When he presses the point by demanding Benjamin, now his father’s favorite, as a hostage, Judah, transformed by repentance, offers himself as a substitute. That is enough for Joseph to reveal himself. “You intended it for evil, but God used it for good,” is Joseph’s interpretation of these events. In Genesis and especially in the story of Cain, conflict between brothers is a microcosm of conflict among humans in general. Cain’s violence spreads from Genesis 4 to Genesis 6, in which people care about nothing but violence. It continues after the flood with Ham’s shameful treatment of his father, and in the story of Babel, as people band together to build a tower, a structure used to project power over other people. Remarkably, God promises to reverse all this with his blessing on all nations that comes through Abraham’s seed (Genesis 12:1–3), and it’s that very seed who continue the legacy of brotherly conflict. We await the one seed of Abraham, who surrenders himself willingly as the victim of sinful violence so that sinners can be free of sin’s penalty, power, and ultimately its presence. That’s what 1 John 3 will remind us: we are tempted to be like Cain, but we are called to be like Jesus, loving others to the point of laying down our lives for others. It’s a rich and challenging story! Be blessed as you read and pray.More Reading & Praying the Bible Info

Jon Weatherly

Associate Pastor

October 9, 2026 • 3 Minute Read
Reading & Praying Week 2
Weekly Devotional – Starting Mon. Oct 12, 2026 This Week’s Readings Monday - Genesis 3 Tuesday - Psalm 76 Wednesday - Ecclesiastes 12 Thursday - Isaiah 24 Friday - Matt. 7:1-27 Saturday - John 5:1-46 Sunday - Genesis 4 Monthly Prayer Focus - Psalm 51 Hi, friends! How was your first week of Reading and Praying the Bible? I hope you gained insight into the way we all participate in the fallen world but how God’s mercy is even more abundant than our stubborn rebellion. In response to the sermon text for October 11, which narrates God’s judgment and promise for Adam and Eve, we will reread Genesis 3, considering both the act of willful rebellion and God’s response. Then as the week continues, we will read more widely to reflect on God’s judgment and our response. Some of our texts will be descriptions of God’s judgment. Psalm 76 is such as text, reminding us that God stands alone as judge. He alone is to be feared, not human authorities with all the power they wield, for even kings must bow to him. Isaiah 24 will take that thought further. This chapter describes in vivid imagery God’s judgment against those who rebel against him. The prophet Isaiah had in the preceding chapters detailed the sins of Israel and her neighbors. Here he warns of the judgment their rebellion warrants. They had relied on their economic and military power, and so the judgment against them is pictured as a deprivation and defeat. In the Creator’s moral world, the punishment fits the crime. But Genesis 3 is about more than judgment. It is also about victory: the woman’s seed will crush the snake’s head. Matthew 7 and John 5 remind us of this. Here we see Jesus presenting himself as divine judge and as the one who gives divine mercy. In Jesus, God fulfilled the promise to bring life where sin has brought death. By turning to him in faith, we not only escape sin’s deadly punishment but receive God’s blessing of power to overcome sin and live in true righteousness. So what do we do with all this? Ecclesiastes 12 tells us to remember the Lord while we’re young, and to realize that all of life points us to the only way of life, to fear God and keep his commandments. Every other alternative means judgment. Finally, it preparation for the coming week, we will read Genesis 4. The story shifts from parents to children, but sadly the issues remain the same: refusal to submit to God, with all the terrible consequences such rebellion produces. Yes, Lord, have mercy on us, for we are sinners, as we pray in Psalm 51. But as you remind us in that text, your mercy is far greater than our sin. Amen!More Reading & Praying the Bible Info

Jon Weatherly

Associate Pastor

October 2, 2026 • 3 Minute Read
R&P Week 1
Weekly Devotional – Starting Mon. Oct 5, 2026 This Week’s Readings Monday - Genesis 1 Tuesday - Genesis 2 Wednesday - Genesis 3 Thursday - Exodus 32 Friday - 2 Samuel 11 Saturday - 2 Samuel 12:1-26 Sunday - Ephesians 2:1-10 Monthly Prayer Focus - Psalm 51 Welcome to Week 1 of Reading and Praying the Bible! Each week you will receive an email like this one introducing the texts we will be reading. This week we are reading the first three chapters of Genesis, reminding ourselves of the lessons of the creation story from chapters 1–2 and setting the context of chapter 3. These texts are so full of important insights. Note especially God’s care for his creation, how humans are at the center, and how God provides for humans in all he does. That in turn helps us understand the tragedy of humans turning away from God, seeking their own autonomy over dependence on their loving Creator. This isn’t just Adam and Eve’s story; it is ours, each of us and all of us. Other stories of the Bible are classic examples of people turning from God to find security in themselves or something they control. Exodus 32 will show us Israel during the exodus from Egypt, impatient as Moses hears from God atop Mt. Sinai, demanding that the priest Aaron make a god for them. This god of their own making is an act of rebellion against the God who liberated them. Adam and Eve’s story is also Israel’s story, and ours. Another classic story of abandoning God is the account of David’s sin with Bathsheba in 2 Samuel 11. But here we also have a story of profound repentance, as God reveals David’s sin in 2 Samuel 12. This also is the narrative context of the text we are praying in October, Psalm 51. As God promised our first parents forgiveness through the seed of the woman, so David receives forgiveness as he confesses and repents. The week wraps up with Ephesians 2:1-10. This text summarizes what the previous stories have told us. Whether we are Israelite or non-Israelite, we have rebelled against God, and as rebels, we’re under the rebel’s sentence given our first parents: death. But despite our unworthiness and offenses against him, God’s rich mercy reaches us through Christ, who gives life to our dead selves and restores us to life and fellowship with him, even restoring our role in creation as his co-regents as we are “seated with Christ in the heavenly places.” All this is God’ doing in Christ, not the result of being observant of the Mosaic law or any other moral code. But through it God re-creates us to begin a journey of restoration to joyful obedience, exercising our role in God’s rule though the good work he gives us to do as his people. This week’s readings are about sin. But where there is sin, God’s grace abounds. Let the grace of God abound in your heart and mind as you read and ponder his word.More Reading & Praying the Bible Info

Jon Weatherly

Associate Pastor

Currently Reading
October 2, 2026 • 2 Minute Read
Reading & Praying Intro
Welcome to the Reading & Praying the Bible Plan! We are so excited you have joined us on this journey to build and maintain a habit of reading the Bible daily, as well as using Scripture for prayer. Our focus for the year is ‘Life in the Spirit.’ Two prevailing concerns that led to this focus on are, 1) modern culture demands we see the world, including the Bible, through its lens, yet the Scripture instructs us to see all things, including our culture, through its lens; and 2) our specific temptation as believers in a college town is such that we tend to rely on ourselves (as sinners wanting to be self-sufficient) rather than relying on God. Life in the Spirit is the antidote to both these conditions. Life in the Spirit grants us transformation in Christ rather than cultural conformation. Life in the Spirit opposes fleshly self-reliance. Life in the Spirit is God’s gracious renewal from the effects of sin and the Fall. Sin and the Fall produced the social dynamic of ‘the world’and the internal dynamics ‘the flesh’ under the spiritual dynamic of the kingdom of darkness. To support our efforts to live in the Spirit, we will be providing a daily reading that connects to each Sermon series, with a monthly prayer focus. This time, there is only one plan, but as with anything, go at your own pace, do what you can, because doing anything is better than nothing, and God will use whatever you give him for your good and his glory. Here’s Pastor Jon to give you more details. Download the plan for the Creator Series here:Reading & Praying the Bible Plan

Jon Weatherly

Associate Pastor