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Backseat Bible Nuggets

Laura Young

Devotionals for kids. Full of God's Word. For families on the go.

  1. 06/23/2025

    Haggai & Zechariah (Extra Nuggets Preview)

    Well now that we come to the book of Haggai and Zechariah, we find them writing in a time period when the 70 years of exile was ending and the people were returning to Jerusalem. What a time to have been alive, right?! Seeing God’s people be able to return to their homeland, the land God promised them surely had to be exciting. And it was! But Haggai and Zechariah wanted to warn them too. They tell the people that God has great things planned, His promises are still true, if the people commit to the Lord and His ways as they return to the land.   Haggai focuses on the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem and how it’s important that they do it the right way so that it’s holy and honoring to God. Remember that the temple was where God’s presence would dwell, so it’s important to get it right! That’s what Haggai was communicating. And God cheers the people on through Haggai’s words by saying things like ‘be strong’ and ‘don’t fear, my spirit remains among you.’   And then there’s Zechariah….like any good prophet, Zechariah has all sorts of crazy dreams with crazy images. Things like horsemen and horns and a guy who has a measuring tape and a gold lampstand and olive trees and my favorite, the flying scroll…. but these dreams were like symbols and confirmations to Zechariah and the people of God’s plans for them. And while these dreams spoke of things that would happen Zechariah’s lifetime, they also pointed forward to when Jesus would come both as Messiah and Conquering King. Almost like setting the stage for God’s grand plan that He’s writing throughout history.

    7 min
  2. 06/17/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    Habakkuk

    This book is interesting because in other episodes we’ve talked about how God would speak to the prophet and then the prophet would go tell the people what God said….but here, this book is almost like a conversation or journal between Habakkuk and God. ...... But Habakkuk is sad and upset with the ways he sees everything going around him. In chapter 1 Habakkuk says things like “Lord, how long do I have to call out for help? Why don’t you listen? How long must I keep tell you that things are terrible?” He goes on to explain to the Lord the bad things he sees like people hurting others and not treating others fairly. And the Lord answers…he tells Habakkuk the Lord is going to do something in his day that he wouldn’t even believe if he was told. That sounds like a pretty cool deal, right? Weeellll, God goes on to say that He’s going to send the Babylon army to attack them even though He knows how bad Babylon is. ..... And while the Lord agrees that Babylon is bad and does terrible things, God reminds Habakkuk how GOD is the one in control and one day Babylon will pay for the bad things they’ve done. God says in chapter 2 how terrible it will be for the Babylonians. You see, God is going to let the evil Babylon take over Judah, but they were just God’s instrument for His wrath towards sin. One day, the sin of Babylon will face God’s wrath. You see, it’s not like God is letting them get away with something here by conquering Judah. God sees all sin and we know that the wages of sin in death from Romans 6:23. That just means that all sin must be paid for. ..... This is a perfect example of taking all of our thoughts and feelings to the Lord and trusting Him to answer. You see, it’s not that Habakkuk LIKED or AGREED with God’s answer, but it’s just that the more they talked it out together, Habakkuk realized that God knew what He was doing and that He could be trusted. Habakkuk was reminded of God’s character, the things He had done in the past, and so Habakkuk trusted God to be the same unchanging God in the future even though this bad thing was going to happen when Judah was taken away by Babylon.

    7 min
  3. 06/17/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    Haggai & Zechariah

    Well now that we come to the book of Haggai and Zechariah, we find them writing in a time period when the 70 years of exile was ending and the people were returning to Jerusalem. What a time to have been alive, right?! Seeing God’s people be able to return to their homeland, the land God promised them surely had to be exciting. And it was! But Haggai and Zechariah wanted to warn them too. They tell the people that God has great things planned, His promises are still true, if the people commit to the Lord and His ways as they return to the land. Haggai focuses on the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem and how it’s important that they do it the right way so that it’s holy and honoring to God. Remember that the temple was where God’s presence would dwell, so it’s important to get it right! That’s what Haggai was communicating. And God cheers the people on through Haggai’s words by saying things like ‘be strong’ and ‘don’t fear, my spirit remains among you.’ And then there’s Zechariah….like any good prophet, Zechariah has all sorts of crazy dreams with crazy images. Things like horsemen and horns and a guy who has a measuring tape and a gold lampstand and olive trees and my favorite, the flying scroll…. but these dreams were like symbols and confirmations to Zechariah and the people of God’s plans for them. And while these dreams spoke of things that would happen Zechariah’s lifetime, they also pointed forward to when Jesus would come both as Messiah and Conquering King. Almost like setting the stage for God’s grand plan that He’s writing throughout history.

    7 min
  4. 05/30/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    Jonah

    God wanted Jonah to go to the people of Nienvah and tell them about God’s love for them and how they should stop sinning against God. Well, there was just one problem. Jonah didn’t like the people of Ninevah. He didn’t think they deserved to hear from God. So……he just didn’t do it. He disobeyed God and that’s where everything went wrong. He tries running away to this other place and I mean, you can’t sneak around God, He sees everything. And he controls everything….so much so that he sends a storm to Jonah’s boat and next thing ya know Jonah is swallowed sitting in a stinky fish for days. ....... God’s love and mercy chase Jonah down until God gets Jonah’s attention. Can you imagine? Well, we should try to because the same God that continues loving Jonah even when he makes dumb choices and disobeys is the same God who continues loving me and you when we make dumb choices and disobeys even today. And the same God that wanted someone to go warn the people of Ninevah about how they should live is the same God who instructs me and you today how WE should live. He does that mostly through His word, the Bible, and also through wise godly council like our parents or pastors. ...... Well, that’s how Jonah’s story ends. It ends with him being mad at God for giving mercy to the people of Ninevah because Jonah didn’t think they deserved it! Wow. You should read that chapter because I appreciate Jonah’s honesty and it’s very much relatable. But God puts Jonah in his place. These decisions are up to God and not up to humans like Jonah or me or you. And it’s such a picture of God’s mercy and grace that He extends towards ALL people. Even people that you and I might think don’t deserve it!

    6 min
  5. 05/28/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    Joel, Amos, Obadiah

    Joel talks about giant bugs, called locusts, that attack the land and destroy it like a big army. Yuck! Can you imagine an army of giant bugs?! Well, this was to warn the people of Judah what would happen if they didn’t turn to God and start living by His ways. Joel 2:1 God says “return to me with all your heart. There is still time.” And the next verse says God is gracious, tender and kind, slow to get angry, full of love. And we see that in this small book. God is so patient with His people in sending them warning after warning about what would happen to them if they didn’t live by God’s ways. But we also see that doesn’t tolerate sin forever. His love doesn’t mean that people can take advantage of Him and just do whatever they want. No, God is serious about how His people live because it’s an overflow from their heart. While God is a judge and He will judge sin fully, there’s also hope here. There is great promise for those that DO turn to the Lord. ........ Amos focuses on doing what is right, treating people fairly, especially poor people and not being mean to others. Again, God is calling out the sinful ways that people were acting. And it’s not like they didn’t know any better. God is clearly telling them over and over that they are doing wrong and how they should correct their behavior. Do your parents ever do that? ........ The teeny tiny book of Obadiah. We see God telling the people that despite the bad consequences for their behavior, those who stick with God’s ways will be protected in the end. They are promised to get their land back even though it was taken away from them for a time. And the people who took things from them? The enemies of God’s people? They will be punished for what they’ve done. You see, God doesn’t miss anything here. Every detail of how we live, how we act, the things we do, the way we treat others, the ways others treat us. God sees it all and He doesn’t let anything slip through the cracks.

    7 min
  6. 05/26/2025 • SUBSCRIBERS ONLY

    Hosea

    Has anyone ever hurt your feelings? Okay, the answer for all of us is yes. Having our feelings hurt in some form or fashion is something we’ve all experienced. And it’s not something any of us enjoy. It HURTS us when someone does something that hurts our feelings, right? Have you ever thought about how we might hurt God’s feelings? Just like we can do things or not do things that can end up hurting someone’s feelings, when we sin, we basically hurt God’s feelings. Because, remember, He hates sin. He is holy and always without sin and when we sin it makes Him really sad. ........ God told Hosea to go and marry a lady named Gomer. But this wasn’t a happy story, sadly. God and Hosea knew that Gomer was a lady who made bad decisions that would hurt their chance of having a happy marriage. And that’s just what happened….Gomer hurt Hosea’s feelings over and over and over again yet Hosea kept loving her and pursuing her, wanting to stay married to her despite all the things she had done. .......... The story of Hosea is heartbreaking to think about but there’s lots to learn here. We learn about God’s faithful love for us. He keeps loving us no matter how many times we mess up and sin. His love is unchanging even when we make bad decisions. In fact, God loves us so much, even in our sin, that He sent Jesus to die for our sins so that we could be forgiven and live with Him forever. But, we also learn from the book of Hosea that we are like Gomer, we often do things that hurt God’s feelings. We aren’t always faithful to God and His ways despite His perfect love for us.

    5 min
4.9
out of 5
66 Ratings

About

Devotionals for kids. Full of God's Word. For families on the go.