Living On Purpose In Christ | Bible Study, Biblical Encouragement, Feeling and Feelings, Aroma Freedom (AFT), Essential Oils, Devotions
Feeling stretched thin, stuck in old hurts, or unsure what God is calling you to next? You're in the right place. Living on Purpose In Christ is a Christian Bible study and devotional podcast for women who want to know God's Word, find freedom from what's been holding them back, and live the life God designed for them, one short, encouraging episode at a time.
I'm Paula Behrens. After 21 years leading local churches as an ordained United Methodist pastor, I now spend my days as a Christian life coach and Certified Aroma Freedom Technique (AFT) Practitioner, helping women grow in faith and walk in freedom. I'm grateful that Living on Purpose In Christ is ranked in the top 5% of Christianity podcasts worldwide.
BOOK-BY-BOOK BIBLE STUDY
Together we've studied every book of the New Testament, from Matthew to Revelation, and now we're walking through the Old Testament, starting with Genesis and Exodus. Each study is clear, practical, and short enough for busy women. Printable Bible studies with leader's guides are available for your personal devotions or small group.
FAITH FOR REAL LIFE
We also talk about:
- Hearing God's voice and discovering your purpose and calling
- Emotional healing: letting go of past hurts, anxiety, worry, and emotional chaos
- Positive affirmations and Scripture-based truth statements
- Faith at work: Christian business, entrepreneurship, and your work as ministry
- Parenting, grandparenting, and passing on a spiritual legacy
- Marriage and faith, including when your spouse doesn't share your faith
- Spiritual disciplines: prayer, journaling, fasting, Sabbath rest, and quiet time
ESSENTIAL OILS AND THE BIBLE
Scripture is full of fragrant oils: aloes (sandalwood), cassia, cedarwood, cypress, frankincense, hyssop, myrrh, myrtle, onycha, and Rose of Sharon (cistus). I love exploring these oils of ancient Scripture and how aroma can deepen your prayer life and devotions. I also share Christian aromatherapy practices and simple, natural living swaps grounded in faith.
Grab your coffee (or your favorite oil), open your Bible, and come as you are.
Whether you're brand new to Scripture or have led Bible studies for years, there's a seat for you here. Find printable Bible studies and leader's guides, book a Christian coaching session, or join an upcoming Zoom class at PaulaBehrens.com.
"Now to Him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to Him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen" ~ Ephesians 3:20–21
Before we get started, let me tell you about an upcoming event, Anointing Oils of Scripture, a live Zoom class where we walk through the actual plants and oils mentioned throughout the Bible, including the very ones we're about to talk about today, and how you can incorporate that same ancient practice into your own walk with God. Register here: PaulaBehrens.com/events
Have you ever watched an old pattern take over right after a moment of real closeness with God? You prayed, you meant every word, and then fear or the need for reassurance pulled you right back into what you thought you had left behind.
That’s the painfully familiar moment we meet in this episode. Israel has seen God’s rescue and promised to follow Him. Yet while Moses is on the mountain, they make a golden calf. If your own feelings can change that quickly—or prayer has felt dry since a choice you regret—this part of Exodus holds more hope than you might expect.
We’ll talk about what God’s instructions for the tabernacle reveal about His desire to dwell among His people, and why the holy anointing oil and incense were set apart for worship. We’ll also trace the meaning of anointing toward Jesus and consider what it means for ordinary believers to belong to Him. Along the way, we’ll explore how aroma, prayer, and simple devotional rhythms can help us pause and turn our attention back to God, without treating any of them as a shortcut to His presence.
Exodus ends with the glory of the Lord filling the tabernacle. Their failure was real, but it was not the end of the story. If you need that biblical encouragement today, come listen—and share this episode with a friend who does, too.
Hey friend, welcome back to Living on Purpose in Christ. I'm Paula, and today we are closing out our four-part walk through Exodus with the last one. If you've been with me through this whole series, you've watched Israel get rescued, fed manna and the desert, and take covenant vows at Sinai. Today the story takes a turn. Nobody sees coming though. And honestly, it might be the most relatable chapter in the entire book because it's the one where the people God just rescued turned around and failed him in the most spectacular way imaginable. And God responded by choosing to move even closer to them. Quick note before we dive in: there's a full printable Bible study to go along with this series over at PaulaBehrens.com in the store under Printable Resources. And it goes so much deeper than we have time for today, with leader's guide and all. I'll come back to that at the end. So stay with me all the way through because today's word study alone might be one of my favorites in the whole series. In my personal faith walk, I've wrestled with the challenge of carving out consistent time for God. Some days the line blurred between hearing his voice and my own thoughts echoing back at me. But through life's ups and downs, I've discovered an amazing truth. Spiritual disciplines paired with the God-given gift of natural aromas or what we call essential oils today and create a profound space for clarity and connection. They help us slow down and tune in to God's quiet whispers. Let's talk about what this podcast has to offer. Each week, we delve into meaningful scripture, highlighting memory verses enriched with Greek word studies. If your spirit needs refreshing, you can start with daily devotionals that accompany your morning prayer, and you'll find that many of our episodes are infused with essential oil tips to enhance your focus so you can hear God's voice more clearly as you seek to clarify your unique calling.
Hey friend, I want to tell you about something happening this November that pairs beautifully with what we're covering today. It's called Anointing Oils of Scripture, a live Zoom class where we walk through the actual plants and oils mentioned throughout the Bible, including the very ones we're about to talk about today, and how you can incorporate that same ancient practice into your own walk with God. It's the third Tuesday of the month at 6 p.m. Central, and you can find all the details at PaulaBehrens.com /events. That's Paula Behrens B-E-H R E N S .com /events (no spaces). Before we dive in, I have a quick favor to ask. If this podcast has been a blessing to you or helped you grow in your walk with Christ, would you take a moment to leave a review? Thank you so much. I truly appreciate your support.
Okay, let's talk about a God who wanted to move in. So God brings Moses back up the mountain, and what follows is chapter after chapter of extraordinarily detailed instructions, exact measurements, specific materials, gold and acacia wood and fine linen, down to the smallest clasp and curtain loop. It's tempting to skim right past all of this, but I want you to catch the sentence that explains why any of it matters at all. God says, Let them make me a sanctuary that I may dwell among them. Listen to that again. Not a sanctuary so people could visit God occasionally, but a sanctuary so God could dwell among them permanently in the middle of their camp, in the middle of their ordinary everyday mess. Think about the sheer relational significance of that. God had already rescued Israel from Egypt, He had already fed them in the wilderness, He had already given them His law at Sinai, and now, after all of that, He wants an actual address in the middle of their camp. Not a temple set apart on a distant hill somewhere, a tent right in the center of everything, with the tribes literally camped around it on every side. God didn't just want to rescue Israel and then step back. He wanted to live close enough to be woken up by the noise of their daily lives.
In the middle of all these tabernacle instructions, God gives Moses two very specific recipes. And I think this is the part of Exodus that gets skipped over more than almost anything else, which is a shame because it's genuinely beautiful. The first is a holy anointing oil, a specific blend of myrrh, sweet cinnamon, fragrant cane, and cassia, mixed into olive oil. And this oil was used to consecrate the tabernacle itself, its furnishings, and the priest who would serve there. The second is the holy incense, a blend of fragrant spices burned continually before the Lord. Both of these were explicitly set apart. God tells Moses plainly that this exact formula was never to be duplicated for ordinary everyday use. It belonged only to him. Now it's worth pausing on why God chose myrrh specifically. Long before anyone understood microbiology, one of the oldest medical records in existence, the Ebers Papyrus out of ancient Egypt, already listed myrrh among its remedies. We now know it carries real antibacterial, antiviral, and anti-inflammatory properties, so God wasn't only giving Israel a fragrance for worship, he was also protecting the very people who spent their days near the blood and smoke of the daily altar offerings. Symbolism and practical care woven together in one recipe straight from the mind of God. I love this detail because it tells us God cares about more than just visual symbolism. He cares about the safety of the ones serving in the tabernacle, and he cares about the aroma, about the actual sensory experience filling that space.
There's something happening here that goes beyond ritual instruction. God is teaching an entire nation to connect a fragrance to his presence, that stepping into this holy space should engage more than just the eyes and the mind. And this threat doesn't stop in the Old Testament. Later, wise men travel a great distance to lay frankincense and myrrh at the feet of the Christ child, echoing the same concept around anointing oils and resins. Scripture actually places that visit not at the manger, but later in a house. We see that in Matthew 2, verse 11, which is part of why many scholars think the Christ child may have been closer to two years old by the time the Magi arrived, rather than a newborn. And later still, the Apostle Peter writes that this exact priestly anointed identity, the very thing that once belonged only to priests, now belongs spiritually to every single believer in Christ. We'll get to that passage in just a moment. I want to slow way down here because this word carries something genuinely beautiful. The Hebrew word for anointing is māšḥâ (מִשְׁחָה), and it describes the art of being set apart for a sacred purpose through the application of oil. In the Old Testament, this anointing was reserved for a very small, specific group of people, priests, kings, and prophets, individuals set apart for a unique holy calling that ordinary people didn't share in. When the Septuagint translators rendered the Old Testament into Greek, they translated this concept using the word chrisma (χρῖσμα). And if that word sounds familiar, it should because it's the exact root behind the word Christ, or in the Greek Christos (Χριστός), literally meaning the anointed one. Jesus isn't simply a name, it's a title built directly on this ancient Hebrew concept of being set apart through anointing. And here's where it gets even more remarkable.
The apostle Peter takes this same priestly set apart identity and applies it directly to ordinary believers, writing in 1 Peter chapter 2, You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God's own people. Do you see what's happening here? The very language once reserved for the small anointed group set apart to serve in the tabernacle now describes every single person who follows Christ. You are not an afterthought in God's plan. You share in that priestly set apart identity. You are set apart on purpose, for a purpose, the exact same language once reserved for Israel's holiest leaders. Here's what I love most about tracing this word all the way through scripture. It doesn't stay locked in the Old Testament, and it doesn't even stop with the label Christian, though that one's worth pausing on for a second. Did you know that believers in the city of Antioch were nicknamed Christian as an insult, essentially meaning little anointed ones? And the name was meant to mock them? We see that in Acts 11:26. But instead it became the truest thing anyone could have called them, and it's the name that stuck for good.
That anointing also didn't stay symbolic. In Mark chapter 6, Jesus sends his disciples out, and they anoint sick people with oil, and people are healed. Later, James writes to the early church and tells everyone who's sick to call on the elders, be anointed with oil in the name of the Lord, and pray in faith. The Greek word behind heal in that Mark passage is therapeuo (θεραπεύω), which describes a healing that happens over time with care, not necessarily all at once. The word behind made well in James is sozo (σῴζω), the same root behind our word for salvation, describing a wholeness that touches mind, body, and spirit. This was never meant to be locked away as some ancient priestly ritual reserved for a select few. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, actually called anointing with oil a general means of grace, simply a channel God uses alongside prayer to bring healing and wholeness to anyone ready to receive it. So if you belong to Christ, you're also invited into that same practice of prayer. And if it fits your own tradition, anointing with oil, offered in faith for yourself and for someone you love who's hurting.
And then, almost unbelievably, right after all of this, while Moses is still up on the mountain receiving these instructions, the people down below grow impatient and convince Aaron to build them a golden calf to worship instead. It's a jarring whiplash moment in the text. God is in the middle of describing exactly how he wants to dwell among his people, and the people are simultaneously breaking the very first commandment they've just received. Moses comes down the mountain, sees the chaos, and in righteous anger shatters the stone tablets on the ground. But here's what I want you to notice, because it's the whole heartbeat of this final section of Exodus. Moses doesn't walk away. He goes back up the mountain and intercedes for the people, pleading with God not to destroy them. And then he asks God something remarkable. Please show me your glory. And God, instead of turning away from a people who had just betrayed him in the most spectacular way, agrees to pass by Moses and reveal his character, describing himself as merciful, gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love. The covenant gets renewed, new tablets are cut, and the whole book ends with the tabernacle finally completed and the glory of the Lord filling it so powerfully that Moses himself can't even enter.
So here's what I want you to walk away with today. The story of Exodus doesn't end with the perfect people finally earning God's presence through good behavior. It ends with a God who chooses to dwell among a people who had already failed him spectacularly, right in the middle of receiving his plans to move in close. If you belong to Christ, your set apart identity was never based on your track record. It was based on God's character, merciful, gracious, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love, the same God who wanted an address in the middle of Israel's mess and wants one in the middle of yours, too.
If today's episode stirred something in you, come and go deeper with me. Head on over to PaulaBehrens.com/store, and under the "Printable Resources," you'll find the full companion Bible study for this episode, part four of our four-part Exodus series. Inside, you'll find the key passages laid out, the theological truths tucked into this section, what this passage reveals about God's own character, practical application for your everyday life, this same word study explored in even more depth, reflection questions, journaling prompts to help you process what God might be saying to you right now, and a complete step-by-step leader's guide if you want to walk your small group, your Bible study, or even just a friend through this series. So head on over to Paula Behrens B E H R E N S .com /store and look for the "Printable Resources" where you'll find the Exodus (Part 4), Bible Study and Leader's Guide.
Thank you for tuning in today. And remember, just like setting biblical boundaries, it's okay to say no to things that don't serve you well, like that third piece of cake at the church potluck. If you were blessed by this episode, be sure to share it with a friend and leave a review so that we can reach even more listeners like you. Check the show notes for all the links. Join us next week as we continue to discover how to live on purpose in Christ. Until then, keep leaning into Him and walking in His Wisdom. See you next time.
