The Orientation of “Valuable”


365 days in a year. 365 years. I haven’t even quite made it to 65 yet. But Enoch, the seventh from Adam, lived 365 years before he walked with God and was seen no more for God took him.  

Can you close your eyes and imagine living 365 years in this place?  


Without God, I know for a fact I would despise my life in short order. But with the Lord to comfort me, guide me, teach me, and make me useful, it doesn’t matter how long I live where.  


Let us rethink “valuable”.

Being a Christian


This morning I see this:Darkness on the earth is witness to a hushed murmur of violence. The night is a cloak for the thieves.  


They steal what they will; property, life and peace.  


But this I perceived:

The world spins around causing the Sun to rise. And the noise of wickedness is no longer a murmur.  


Now it is a deafening roar of greedy desire and wicked intent.  


Their eyes open shooting fiery knives of blame. Dreams and nightmares give way to the reality of judgmental hearts.  


The peace of the wee hours of the morning.  


The time of prayer, time of reflection. The time to receive life from He who is Life. Clarity comes from Him. And in the clarity I can perceive as if indeed from some vast distance. The place where the splatter of blood cannot reach.  


The night will come again. The thieves will sleep, the thieves will tiptoe about. But He who lives forever is Peace.  


By the command of the Living God, His name is Jesus! Quiet your soul and trust Him. Listen intently for what cannot be heard. Search for what IS. His desire is for you. Doesn’t the blood beneath the cross prove His intent?


He is not a thief, unlike we who pray. He comes to grant life, wisdom, forgiveness, peace, joy, faithfulness, and doesn’t the list become endless? Those who learn to receive become like He. The spinning of the earth becomes far less fearsome.  


This, is to be a Christian.  

The Currency of Man’s Traditions


Will you enter into heaven by virtue of your own religion?  Will you set your own standard of righteousness and accomplish it, saying to the Holy guard of heaven, “I am a righteous man let me enter”?

Have you been to heaven?  Have you seen the surpassing glory of the creatures there?   Have you understood the nature of their holiness?  Have you understood the Holy commands they have received?

Will you now, you who are so feeble of mind, hold to the traditions of your own?  Or will you seek the unmovable, Holy and pure traditions of eternity?

You cannot spend the currency of Man’s traditions in the store house of God.  In that place, by your own strength, you can be no more than a beggar.  

“Doings”


People can do an apparently endless volume of things. Yet, by the command of the Lord God Almighty, the things they do amount to “nothing”.

“Without ME you can do nothing.”


What then is the value of human achievement?

Astounding Warfare


Man goes to war with tools of death, that he may bring a “ceasing” to his enemy.  

God goes to war against the “deceased”, that he may bring them to life.  


Man’s enemy says to him, “We will not die today. It will be you who’s eyes will close!”


God says to his enemy (the dead), “Ask of me and I will open your eyes”.  


Curiously, how many say “NO!”, choosing instead to remain in death.  


What in odd battlefield the Holy One inhabits.  

The Other Side


The façade is quite complete. The wall erected between heaven and earth is unmovable by man.  

People stare at the wall. They imagine all kinds of things on the other side. And how quick they are to believe in their own imagination. “My mind can see it.   It must be true!”


Even scientific medicine promotes more imagination. “We can stave off death. We can bring many back from the brink of death.” They proudly say, “We are saving lives”. Still, the wall arrives, and their proclamation falls empty on the ground.  Having spent a fortune, the people still bury their dead. 


Consumed with the trivial and temporary things, people waste the moments of their life without the slightest care. They entertain themselves with an insatiable lust for more. Still, the wall looms like a shadow over Man.  


All the while, the Bible lay closed. An earnest searching for the will of God is pushed aside. The populace prefers their own imagination. Religions of man abound. Science-fiction appears to be more believable than the words of the Living God. The unmovable wall takes no notice.  


Here is today. It is filled with the things that ARE. Imagination is like a boy filled with fear; eyes wide, screaming at the top of his lungs, and arms flailing about. He will not listen to the calm voice of his parents. Lacking wisdom, woven tightly in his fear, his ears are firmly shut.  


Is there a better day to read the words of God and believe what you read? Is there a better day to pray for clarity? Will there be a better day to ask God for sanity?