WEBVTT

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It's Thursday and I'm Dan.

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Welcome to your daily walk.

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This is the last day of Vacation Bible School at our church, and tonight is Family Night, starting at 6 p.m.

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I hope many of you can come out and celebrate what a wonderful week of VBS we've enjoyed.

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Now on to my encouragement for today, which is to flourish where you're planted.

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It says in Nehemiah 7.4 that the city was wide and large, but the people within it were few and no houses had been rebuilt.

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Wouldn't it shock you to know that scholars believe that roughly 50,000 Jews returned from the Persian Empire to Jerusalem in the initial phases of resettlement, leaving well over 90% of Jews who did not return?

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Why in the world wouldn't more of them want to return to Jerusalem?

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After all, we're talking about the city of David, and Psalm 48.1 goes so far as to declare it to be the city of our God.

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Why wouldn't everyone want to live there?

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But when you take just a minute to think about it, you and I know that God isn't confined to this or that city.

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The Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians 3 asks, Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?

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Now there were many reasons why the vast majority of Jews decided to stay put.

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Many were living lives of comfort and prosperity in Persia, Babylon, and surrounding areas for generations.

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Their homes were established, along with their businesses and communities, and Jerusalem had largely been in ruins and lacked economic infrastructure.

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Some might even say that the non-returning Jews were blooming where they were planted.

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They would continue to worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob where they were.

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And let that be a lesson for all of us.

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The Spirit of God lives in us if we've been born again by trusting in Jesus alone as our Savior.

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And we can worship the Lord no matter where we live.

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Isn't that wonderful?

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Have a great day, everyone.