The week before last, after writing about rain, I read a news article and took up the charge of writing about its subject. Then I left for a week’s holiday with my wife’s family up North, in Yankee Country. We celebrated Fourth of July together. Returning, I took up the topic at hand. But it wasn’t going anywhere. It seems like I just got off on a tangent, leaving the Spirit of G-d back in the rainy day somewhere.
Earlier this morning the day began with some blue sky and spoke of a sunny day, despite the weather forecast. Now, a couple hours into the day, it is heavily overcast. The NOAA weather forecasts have been close to accurate lately. As foretold yesterday, lightning and thunder closed out the day and lots of rain soaked the garden quite nicely. Even the pond filled to its maximum level.
The pond’s been in about a month now. It isn’t a large pond, really. Oddly shaped with the widest part about ten feet and about twelve feet in the longest. At night a chorus of frogs belts out a tuneless song. Tadpoles swim below the lily pads, some now growing legs. They will soon join the chorus, adding their voices. Eventually we plan to add gold fish to the pond. We’ve added some bog plants, sitting on a shallow ledge that encircles the pond. Bog plants sit in water, with their soil just below the surface. Three lily plants are on another lower ledge toward the middle of the pond. Before the fish, though, we need to drop a large flat rock on a ledge so that it hangs over the deepest part, which is about four feet deep. This will provide a place out of the sun for the fish to stay cool in the summer, and to hide from herons that will feed on them. Also, we are still getting the pond’s natural balance to take hold. At first algae bloomed filled the water with its green haze. I added a bit of natural bacteria to the water, and it is collecting in the filter. A pump forces water through the filter. The algae cleared rapidly as the bacteria decomposed the dying blooms. Algae remains trapped in the filter now, and the bacteria keeps it from getting out of hand. The water is clear, though now we can see the bottom and some leaves and such that have fallen in the pond. We’ll have to clear that stuff too.
Outside the pond, along one side, we planted herbs that will last through the winter, mint and oregano. There are other plants along the other sides. They, too, will last through the winter, to rebloom in the summer. My wife says the garden is done, now, and we can sit on the deck and enjoy. But by this time of year that is nearly impossible; the no-see-ums and the mosquitoes are thick out there. The spring is still the nicest season down here in Georgia. The cool nights prevent the bugs from getting bad, and the warm days carry over to the evening hours making it quite pleasant. Next spring, then, we’ll enjoy the pond as we’ve enjoyed the rest of the garden.
When we were kids, growing up in California, we would sing on the school bus. On rainy days, we’d sing “Rain, Rain, Go Away. Come Again Another Day!” I don’t know why. I’m sure we just didn’t appreciate the rain. Maybe it’s that rain so often has a negative image, like the expression, “Rain on my/your/our/the Parade.” Folks up in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, must be getting pretty sick of rain and its associated flooding. But down here in Georgia, the soft rain this morning is appreciated. Not only does it cool things down somewhat, though making it more humid, it waters the ground that has gone without for a week now.
Sure, a perfect rain would begin in the late evening and continue softly dropping an inch or so until the early morning hours. It wouldn’t interfere with the daily lives of millions of folks all scrambling to make it to work on time. A fresh rain like today will leave the roads slick for a while today. Yet, while I empathize with commuters–been there, done that–I still love to watch the rain gently fall on the garden. I don’t mind walking in the rain, either. Except perhaps those sudden downpours that drench despite rain jacket and hood. No, I do not carry or use an umbrella; that’s just too English. I’m of Good Welsh stock on my Mother’s side, which means I wasn’t born with a silver spoon in my mouth, and don’t have blue blood; I have, indeed, music in my soul and poetry flowing through my veins.
Rain is water. And I love water. While it isn’t the source of life, as many scientist like to say, it is certainly essential. Humans can go many weeks without eating food, and some, like me trying to lose twenty pounds, can go many more weeks. But we need water to exist. Like in three days we’ll perish if we don’t drink of water. We dry up.
We dry up physically without enough water. We dehydrate. If you pinch your flesh between two fingers, softly gathering the skin together, then release, it quickly moves back into shape. When you are dehydrated, your skin just stays puckered for a while. Dehydration dries us up, and makes us weak. There’s a spiritual correlation to dehydration. It’s worst than physically drying up. Like a the skin test, spiritual dehydration makes us pucker up, too. Our demeanor is sour, agitated. We wither, like a plant in the sun, drooping over spiritually. There’s a saying, “One Week without Prayer makes One Weak.” Prayer, the Word of G-d, praise and worship, thanksgiving, it’s all fellowship with G-d. Without that, we dry up.
That’s pretty much what kept happening in Israel, during the Temple Days. The people would forget about G-d and things would begin to go terrible wrong. They’d listen, at last, to a new Judge or a new king, and return to the LORD.
We don’t live in a theocracy, though. Once upon a time in America, we were a Christian nation and while we’ve had many and varied denominations, we worshiped the same G-d, the G-d of Israel. Those days are gone now. Some say that’s a good thing. But even then there was no one leader that we all looked toward that would lead us back to G-d if we strayed too far away. The secular government, while made up of Christians, mostly, had separated the political from the religious. We have a history of this separation of Church and State. And it’s really worked out pretty well. We don’t yet have a political ruler that also tells us how and whom to worship. That’s good thing. But it also leaves us with out a shepherd to call our attention, our focus back upon our Lord.
How do we get back into right communion with G-d after staying away? What will prompt us, remind us? For jsut like dehydration can come upon us easily on a hot day, we can move away from our Lord easily to, without even really noticing it until we’ve drifted a ways.
Water.
Photo credit: gregglesworth
When we pour a glass of water, crisp, clear water, we should think of G-d. We ought think perhaps of the well outside Shecham where our Lord Y’shuaJesus asked a woman for cup of water to drink. When it’s raining, it can remind us of the Living Water that the Lord said he’d give to all who ask of Him. A pond or pool or lake can remind us of John who baptized in the Jordan River, or of the pool by which a crippled man awaited healing. The sea reminds us that the Earth is covered mostly in water. We must be moved by the ocean’s power, majesty, and vastness. Our minds must turn to our Creator, reminded that He, too, is all powerful, majestic, and everywhere and close at the same time.
Winter is long gone; so too spring. It is now summer. Yet there are heavy clouds that obscure the sun. It doesn’t have to be winter to just feel like it. The sky looms darkly over Georgia like an anvil ready to drop on our heads at any moment. Yesterday, showers with lightning and thunder, then out of the darkness followed bright sun and blue skies. The seasons are confused. Looking outside, the temperatures may be in the 20 C range but it appears like more like 20 F. Are we depressed? Are we sad? Do we just feel like crying? Do we even know why? Perhaps prompted by the weather, what we see though the window, we stare at the state of our nations, our people, and we mourn like Jeremiah mourned.
His people were far from G-d. And to this he wrote:
“For these things I weep; my eyes flow with tears; for a comforter is far from me, one to revive my spirit; my children are desolate, for the enemy has prevailed.”
Lamentations 1:16
A Glooming Perspective by Wil Robinson
Jeremiah had cause to weep. Things hadn’t gone well for his people. G-d felt very far away. And his people had distanced themselves from Him. And He allowed disaster to strike. And perhaps as we look through our own eyes, we see a world not much different than his. We as a people are distant from our G-d, too. Here in America, there are many that cry out to the nation to repent and turn to G-d before it is too late. It’s another Welsh revival that we seek. Or a revival like the Azuza Street Revival. We want the Spirit of G-d to fall upon us and lead us as a nation back into being a Christian nation. We want the 1950s back, were life seemed some how simple. So we mourn, too, like Jeremiah.
And we see what might be signs of revival, like what started down in Lakeland, Florida. It was suppose to be a move of G-d that had begun in Toronto, Canada. People flocked to the church services looking for a “blessing,” looking for the Spirit of G-d to fall afresh up them–like the praise song goes. People yearn for something from G-d. We want to somehow “feel” His presence.
There are movements afoot that capitalize upon this yearning, too. They seek to build a peaceful kingdom here on Earth. If we just do this or that or have love and tolerance then. . . Then what? If we are honest with ourselves we can look at these movements and see the fallacies within them. On the surface they appear to promote a Christian revival. At the least, they promote a “modern” Gospel with a “modern” Messiah. Hummmmm. A New Age Gospel for a New Age. If we could all just get over the exclusivity of the old notion of one savior, one Christ, they tell us. We need to broaden our minds, our thinking. This is a darkness that engulfs the world today. Perhaps this is the mourning we feel. Naivety passes. We face a world of chaos as spoken of in the Book of Revelation. We are not building a new and peaceful world. We are seeing the first stages of chaos and the coming of G-d’s wrath that will cleanse the world in order for Y’shuaJesus to come and rule as Lord and King over a Kingdom that He will build.
We need to see clearly, despite the darkness that engulfs our tiny world, which is the limitations of our perspective. Y’shuaJesus, the Light of the World, shines brightly upon our hearts as He chooses.
There is for the people of G-d, to the people whom G-d has chosen and written their names in the Book of Life, continual renewal, a refreshing in and by the Holy Spirit of G-d. We don’t go to church to find it. This revival isn’t something for which we can pray. It is something that G-d, our Heavenly Father, drops upon us at His pleasure. This is the Springtime in our relationship with our Lord, when we feel anew His refreshing breath, His Spirit falling upon us. . .
Springtime for the Heart by Wil Robinson
We are renewed in Praise. We acknowledge acts of kindness, wisdom, and truth previously unseen. We acknowledge that even during those troubling times our Lord has been right beside us, urging us onward. Have we not heard the angels singing “Onward Christian Soldiers. . .” Praise is the acknowledgement of what G-d has done, is doing, and is going to do.
We are renewed in Worship. We find a deep and utter sense of who our Heavenly Father is, and Y’shuaJesus, and The Holy Spirit. We find ourselves and our place in our Lord. We worship for Who He is.
We are renewed in our Gratitude and Thankfulness. We begin to understand, to see through the vale that has distorted our vision. The troubled pieces of our lives seem less disjointed, less terrible, more just stepping stones to get us into a place in which we are engulfed by HIS PRESENCE.
We are renewed in our Purpose and our Mission. We begin to sort out where in Messiah we are at the moment. We begin to recognize where we are going, where He is taking us.
We are renewed in Holy Fear, the Awe of G-d Almighty. Our Father invites us into His house, through His library, and on to His back porch. He shows us His backyard. The Lord Y’shuaJesus comes to sit next to us while we are in our own home. We are speechless. There is nothing we can say. We just experience Him. We are lifted up by the Holy Spirit and carried upward, beyond the Earth and its woes, toward Heaven, toward the Throne of the Living G-d. We begin, so slowly, to understand. We gain some perspective. Revival is the springtime of our Lord that invades our heart and makes us a little more whole.
They were all eyes and ears. They monitored the doings of the people about them. They cast angry looks toward anyone who might dare to commit an infraction, or what they perceived to be wrong. They are self-appointed critics. The speak out at any opportunity, pointing out the sins of those they encounter, those they choose to hate. They are Accusers.
They are the liberals in America pointing fingers at people for doing what is, to the liberal, wrong, which is just about everything a liberal doesn’t like. They are conservatives pointing equally judgmental fingers at anyone whom they don’t approve. Some are worse than others. All have some basis they think gives them the right, the mandate, to be an accuser.
After this there was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades. In these lay a multitude of invalids–blind, lame, and paralyzed [waiting for the moving of the water;] [for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool, and stirred the water: whoever stepped in first after the stirring of the water was healed of whatever disease he had.] One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. Now that day was the Sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.“
John 5:1-10 (emphasis added)
Now here’s the thing: “It is not lawful. . .” What they are saying is, “It’s not me telling you that you that you are not allowed to do that, it is (insert some reference here)!”
Standing upon some ruling, some law, they point there fingers saying, “I don’t judge, but the law says what you are doing is unlawful.” How many times have I heard some Christian say that he doesn’t judge people but the Word of G-d does? Too many. And yet who am I to say that he wasn’t appointed, like Jonah or Elijah, or whomever else, to point out the wrongs he is shown by Almighty G-d Himself?
How do we respond to accusations of wrong doing? To the credit of the newly healed man in the Gospel of John, he didn’t say “@$#%&$ Off!” Rather, he, according to Matthew Henry, wanted to give credit and glory to the One Who healed him, though didn’t know the man’s Name. He said, “He made me whole.” Eventually, the healed man learned the Name of the One who’d healed him, and told the Jews. Matthew Henry points out that while done with a mind to give glory to Y’shuaJesus, was like “throwing pearls before swine.”
Some points come to mind while reading the Word this morning, and reflecting upon it. One I led with, that too many people are self-appointed judges, regardless whether or not they are liberals or conservatives, or Chistians. Worse, I’m right there along with them. I have a very bad habit of pointing out the driving faults of most every one on the road, especially when my kids are in the truck with me. My excuse is that I want them to notice the wrongs so that they’ll know to do right. And I certainly get there attention when my hand goes to the horn, and it blasts away at some unwary offender. Yet, I’m just acting in the self-appointed role of accuser. Just like too many other people in this angry, volatile, ready-to-explode country, world.
But there is a more important point, easily overlooked when I get off on to a tangent. This newly healed man said, “He that made me whole. . .” told me what to do.
Thank You, Y’shuaJesus, for making us all whole in You. May we be bold and stand firm in You when accused of wrongs. For this newly healed man obeyed the One who made him whole. He stood, picked up his bed, and carried it away. In essence, his reply to those who accused him was, “I do not do it in contempt of the law and the sabbath, but I am obeying a greater law than the one you cite, for the One who healed me is greater than those laws.” (paraphrased from Matthew Henry’s Commentary) This man obeyed G-d.
Y’shua was accused of breaking the law, too. Many times. On several occasions he referred to scripture to support his action. He pointed out David’s eating of the showbread, of the priests’ slaying the sacrifices, and of the people’s watering their cattle on the sabbath day. Eventually, when accused of healing this man on the sabbath, Y’shuaJesus goes higher and alleges the example of His Father and His divine authority.
Another point: Y’shuaJesus was a radical. Why not just come back another day. That man had been there 38 years, so another day wouldn’t hurt. Then Y’shuaJesus wouldn’t have caused this man to “break the law” and carry his mat. Y’shuaJesus wouldn’t have broken the law, either. Well, why did Y’shuaJesus heal the man on the sabbath?
The other day I heard someone on the radio speak of the gentleness and kindness of Jesus. This authority on Jesus said Jesus wasn’t a zealot. I sorta figured he meant that Jesus just walked around Israel doing nice things for people, patting the heads of children, talking to outcasts, eating with sinners. Okay, so sure, Y’shuaJesus did those things. But that just isn’t ALL of the things Y’shuaJesus did. And to imply that it was, is to undermine the Word of G-d. It borders on deception. It also marks a man as not truly knowing Y’shuaJesus.
Maybe the Lord was just plain tired of the self-righteousness of a stubborn people who prized the “Law” over the people for whom the Law was given. Perhaps Y’shuaJesus wanted to stir up some trouble to make a point. I’m sure it got the attention of more than one person when He went into the Temple, in an act of fury, and drove out sellers and money changers. This gentle Jesus was also the One Who called Pharisees white-washed, empty tombs, vipers. Hum. Not so very gentle. Y’shuaJesus was a very dangerous man, one that the religious establishment knew would cause them distress, one that would undermine the all they’d done to get along with the Roman rulers. Y’shuaJesus was a rebel.
Y’shuaJesus didn’t come down from His throne to bring a temporary, carnal peace. He came to die violently for a true Peace that is eternal, offered to all. Well, to all as long as they believe that Y’shuaJesus is Lord and Savior. He said “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. . .” Hummmmmmm. That’s “hate” speech, isn’t it? I mean, He excluded a lot of people who follow the universalist religious views. And humanist who believe humanity is god, as well as New Agers. Well, let’s not go there, shall we.
Jesus (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The One Who healed me made me whole. Thank G-d. Blessed is the Name of the Lord Y’shuaJesus.
Lord Bless, Keep, Shine upon you and yours today and tomorrow, as we long for His coming. . .
. . . and that means we’re off to a state university to watch a couple state championship semi-final high school basketball games. My daughter’s team will play, as will the school’s boy’s team. Last year the girl’s team got into the top eight, this year into the semi’s. Not too shabby for. . . I was going to say, a small school. But the there is a somewhat level playing field, so to speak, in that the schools compete within divisions based upon school size. The kids’ high school is in the lowest division, having a student population of around two hundred.
It’s been a good year for sports. I mentioned that my son made it to the regional wrestling championship. That was a great accomplishment: he wrestled only half season last year and only half season this year. When he switched schools after first semester last year, he was, by Georgia’s Athletic Association rules, unable to compete for one complete calendar year.
Unlike so many American families that really get into sports, neither my wife nor I are particularly interested, at least not until the kids’ interest developed beyond the years of playing soccer (which is really football throughout the rest of the world). This year we even hosted a Super Bowl party in which my son had two male friends and three female friends over to the house.
Now I competed in various sports as a kid. I was on the swim team, competing back stroke and freestyle. I played football as a line man. I was also on the rifle team. But I didn’t get into watching sports or attending games. . . as I said, until now.
One thing I’ve noticed at both the wrestling matches and basketball games is the audience/spectator involvement. There’s an energy that seems to build until even I begin to shout “Yeah!” when one of the girls on my daughter’s team makes a long hoop shot for three points. And when their team leads by sixty points, we all cheer when a girl on the opposing team scores on a tough shot, and sometimes on any shot. At a game last weekend, a girl was hurt, twisting her knee badly. Immediately the gym began to quiet down, and when both team trainers and the athletic director headed to join the coaches attending the girl, you could hear a pin drop.
My take on all the energy flow, and reaction to injuries, is that spectators become engaged in the activity such that it becomes personal. Each player becomes a daughter or a son or a sister or brother. There’s a corporate flow of brain waves that seem to draw even the most reluctant person into the moment, engaging some primordial place within each of us. Some how we all become one family–at least for a few moments.
That’s a totally secular spirituality, in a sense. It’s what it was like when the Believers gathered together. They were all in one accord. [ ASIDE. That reminds me of a joke: The Bible says the Apostles drove a Honda; it says the Apostles were in one accord. The Bible also says Joshua rode a motorcycle; his triumph was heard throughout the land. ]
And they, continuing daily with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart. . .
Acts 2:46
Flag of St David with Welsh Red Dragon (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Today is also St. David’s Day. Don’t know what that is, it’s a day for the Welsh patron saint, something like the Irish St. Patrick’s Day. I can only guess why all America seems to celebrate the Irish day and not the Welsh. Perhaps it has something to do with the invisibility of the Welsh in America. Here, yes, and throughout the last two hundred years, but reserved and just invisible. Anyway, Happy Saint David’s Day.
If the Earth were a giant caldron, our Lord Y’shuaJesus came to make sure it was well stirred. Take a look at the following selection from The Book of John.
One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be healed?” The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.” Jesus said to him, “Get up, take up your bed, and walk.” And at once the man was healed, and he took up his bed and walked. Now that day was the Sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who had been healed, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to take up your bed.”
John 5:5-10
Invalid at the wall Jerusalem Old City, Israel Photo by Wil Robinson
This invalid spent thirty-eight years waiting to be helped to the healing waters. Lord Y’shuaJesus comes along and says, in essence, “If you want to be healed, break the rules of the Sabbath that say you can’t carry any load.” What would you do? Would you refuse, because you follow the rules? Would you question the Lord, try to find out why you were to break the rules of the Sabbath?
G-d made the Sabbath rules in the first place (Jer_17:21; Neh_13:15; Exo_20:8-10). Why did Y’shuaJesus command the invalid to break them then? “It may be answered, wrote Albert Barnes (1798-1870):
“1. That the Son of man was Lord of the Sabbath, and had a right to declare what MIGHT be done, and even to dispense with a POSITIVE law of the Jews, Mat_12:8; Joh_5:17.
“2. This was a poor man, and Jesus directed him to secure his property.
“3. The Jews extended the obligation of the Sabbath beyond what was intended by the appointment. They observed it superstitiously, and Jesus took every opportunity to convince them of their error, and to restore the day to its proper observance, Mat_12:6-11; Luk_6:9; Luk_13:14; Luk_14:5. This method he took to show them what the law of God really “permitted” on that day, and that works of necessity and mercy were lawful.”
The religious community got it wrong. Lord Y’shuaJesus made the rules, and set about trying to show people there is some depth to them, some principles behind them.
Is is just me, or do you feel as though we, as Christians, are placed into a particularly small box, confined to a narrow set of behaviors considered “Christian”? Take the following scripture and Matthew Henry’s own comments on it as an example of how it all starts.
Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrels. And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.
2 Timothy 2:23-26
Matthew Henry commented: “The servant of the Lord must not strive, 2Ti_2:24. Nothing worse becomes the servant of the Lord Jesus, who himself did not strive nor cry (Mat_12:19), but was a pattern of meekness, and mildness, and gentleness to all, than strife and contention. The servant of the Lord must be gentle to all men, and thereby show that he is himself subject to the commanding power of that holy religion which he is employed in preaching and propagating. – Apt to teach. Those are unapt to teach who are apt to strive, and are fierce and froward. Ministers must be patient, bearing with evil, and in meekness instructing (2Ti_2:25) not only those who subject themselves, but those who oppose themselves.”
My dispute with Mr. Henry isn’t that we, as followers of Y’shuaJesus, are not encouraged to not stir up strife. And, certainly, it behooves us to be considerate in all our dealings with all people. No, my dispute is that this places us into a small, confining box. By this commentary upon the Words of G-d, we are confined to fulfilling only one roll, utilizing one tool, in our daily living.
Let’s take a look at our example of what a true believer is to be. Let’s look at Y’shuaJesus as he appears to his disciples.
And the Jews’ passover was at hand, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem, And found in the temple those that sold oxen and sheep and doves, and the changers of money sitting: And when he had made a scourge of small cords, he drove them all out of the temple, and the sheep, and the oxen; and poured out the changers’ money, and overthrew the tables; And said unto them that sold doves, Take these things hence; make not my Father’s house an house of merchandise. And his disciples remembered that it was written, The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up.
John 2:13-17
In the English Standard Bible Version, verse 17 concludes with “Zeal for your house will consume me.” This public display certainly shocked the disciples who had been with Y’shuaJesus for some time. Those disciples saw his first miracle, at the wedding where He turned water into wine. These disciples had seen His gentle ways, His meekness. Now these disciples witnessed the first public display of our Lord Y’shuaJesus. What part of gentle, meek, and mild is that display? What do we learn from it? We learn that “Zeal for your house will consume me.”
Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?
And [Y’shuaJesus] said to him, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.
In other news conservative commentator Glenn Beck says it’s time for conservatives in America to leave liberal states. He sites Israels Babylonian exile as an example of how a people who are exiled can build, prosper, and bless others.
A round bale of hay with a flag of the United State of America on display for the 2008 presidential election on New Hope Church Road (Highway 1723) . Note the solar panel and spot light set up to illuminate the display at night. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Today is America’s Election Day. For months now candidates have made great efforts to gather support, thereby enough votes. As this day approached, a lot of people speculated who would be the next president of the United States. Yet, American voters, according to a variety of polls, are evenly split between the incumbent president and his primary rival as we go to the voting polls.I read an article that outlined what to look for today as the voting progressed. We can predict the outcome early. We seem to want to know, now, and not wait. Oh, well, that’s not really unusual; we want to know what’s going to happen. Then thing we need to remember is that we just don’t want to take it too far, like King Saul did.
“When Saul saw the army of the Philistines, he was afraid, and his heart trembled greatly. And when Saul inquired of the LORD, the LORD did not answer him, either by dreamsor by Urim or by the prophets. Then Saul said to his servants, “Find me a woman who is a medium, that I may go to her and inquire of her.”
1Samuel 28:5-9, 11-19, NKJV
King Saul inquired of the Lord. Then, not hearing an answer, inquired of a witch. Not a good thing to do. While I’ve never inquired of a witch, that I know of, I know that I’ve prayed about something and before hearing an answer, gone off and mentioned something to someone, who wainting to be helpful, gave me some answers that I acted upon. Later I wondered if I’d done the right thing.
Learning to wait. Wait upon the Lord. Let Him bring answers to us as He desires.
This pray comes to mind today again. “. . .Lord direct your hearts into the love of G-d, and into the patient waiting of Messiah.” [2Thess 3:5] Also, Lord Y’shuaJesus Bless you, Keep you, and Shine upon you always.
. . . a song came on XMRadio’s The Message that used the Lord’s Name, Jesus.
Jesus, Your Presence is Heaven to Me, by Israel & New Breed surprised me with it’s frequent use of the Name of Jesus. Check it out here. Here’s a link to some other of Israel & New Breed videos on Yahoo!
Jonah’s Song 