Tag Archives: David

Enemies of God

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Psalm 34,18

Psalm 34,18 (Photo credit: NEWS OF PEACE)

You who think the Lord is an angry beast of a God:

You do so because you are His enemy.  How does it make logical sense to consider your enemy in a good light?  He desires you to become His friend.   But your pride is holding you back.

Look how you curse His Holy name.  Isn’t that to be expected?   Won’t an enemy curse his foe?  But that is not what God desires.  He sits ready to forgive your unholy, godless, and utterly profane life.

Your enemy is beautiful, lovely, righteous, eternal, endlessly powerful, forgiving, and full of grace.  This is what you hate.  Don’t you think it a bit odd that you should hate what you adore in yourself and others?

Yet, we warn.  Yet we speak on His behalf among men.  Yet we invite as He has taught us to do.  Yet we pour out our words and very lives to convince His enemies to enter His camp as friends.  But who hears?  Who understands?  Who bends their wicked will so that they can peer out at what is Good?

8Taste and see that the Lord is good;

blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.

9Fear the Lord, you his holy people,

for those who fear him lack nothing.

10The lions may grow weak and hungry,

but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.

11Come, my children, listen to me;

I will teach you the fear of the Lord.

12Whoever of you loves life

and desires to see many good days,

13keep your tongue from evil

and your lips from telling lies.

14Turn from evil and do good;

seek peace and pursue it.  (Psalm 34)

The Great Gift!

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Christ Healing the Blind Man c 1640

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Two blind men heard that Jesus was passing by.  They shouted, “Son of David!  Have mercy on us.”  The people told them to be quiet.  Evidently the people wanted a ceremony of pomp and revere.  Perhaps they were thinking, “Silence, a great teacher is passing by.”  But the men with no sight knew their only hope for working eyes lay in the man who had done such greater things than anyone before him.  So they shouted all the more.  For if there was any hope, this was the moment!  How could a blind man hope to chase after the man of such power?  This slice of time was all they were going to get.  Hope was NOW!

Have you any hope from the moment of time when you shouted to the Lord for sight?  Do you now know that Jesus is the Christ of God?  Do you believe that Jesus is Glorified and Lord of all things?  Is your life laced with a particular hope that non-believers cannot own?  Regardless how much faith you have, it is as if you have received working eyes.

The two blind men received their sight.  Now they saw shapes, colors, shadows, and light.  What did they do in response to this great gift from the Lord?  They followed Him.  They considered that they had nothing before He touched them.  Now they had all they had ever wanted.  They didn’t consider that they could now go out and earn a living, create a household, and perhaps marry and have children and a social purpose.  They left behind all the things the people around them craved.  They forsook this world and all it offers and bent their will and lives around the Son of God.

Far too often, people who receive an understanding of the Kingdom of Heaven receive this gift as if it is owed to them.  Many are indifferent to the gift given them in the Gospel.  They receive this gift as if it is some kind of social rite of passage, not realizing that this gift is precious and glorious.  The gift of salvation is the beginning of the central reason for life here.  But it is not often perceived as such.

What have we forsaken after receiving our sight?  I recognize that not everyone is called to forsake their households, land, income, social status, and position in life.  But surely, before we received our sight we held dear the things the people in that crowd desired.  It should not be that the Gospel makes no permanent and radical change in our lives.  It is not a rite of social passage.  It is a soul shattering change from death to life.  It is not religious ceremony and a particular belonging to a social club called the church.  It requests and requires a vibrant following after the Glory of God in Jesus the Christ.

Remembering Who We Are.

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Srikanta Datta Narasimharaja Wodeyar, Scion of...

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Two things come to mind this morning that bear posting:

The first is that it is God who raises up leaders of nations to accomplish His will among the world’s people.  And what that man or woman does is a direct reflection of God’s will among us.  This is a hard thing to understand as we see what we have known being undermined or destroyed.  But consider this:

There was a people who lived in America before the “white” man came ashore.  Their culture, religion, and economy were destroyed.  This has been so throughout history.  Those who took over lands and peoples always felt God was “for” them.  The people subjected to a different rule always felt like God had abandoned them.  It appears to be our turn to experience a certain defeat.  But God is still God!  And it is His Holy Wisdom that will rule into eternity.  This is why we are instructed to pray for them, to do good to all men (including our perceived enemies), and to allow ourselves to become subjects of the rulling peoples.  It is pleasing to God that we should live as He does.  What does that mean in this instance?  Remember how He sends rain on the just and the unjust?  Remember how Jesus submitted to the rule of His own people, as well as the oppression of the Roman machine.

And the second thought is to do with Martin Luther King.  I notice how he is being set up as a glorious man.  The people of this world rally together under his name.  How is this?  Shouldn’t the name of Jesus be first on our tongues?  Wasn’t it Jesus who Martin worshiped?  Yet they make all kinds of beautiful noises at the mention of a man.  Figures!

The Lord Jesus will receive His rightful due in time.  But for now, we do not see Him being presented as the Rightful Ruler of all men.  Take heart, this will not last forever.  And those who glorify men will be ashamed when they see Him as He truly is.  Speak!  Go ahead and speak of man as if he is something.  It is God who will divide our words, intentions, and actions.  And it is God who will divide His people’s words, intentions, and actions.  Let us be sober then.  To live as God’s people in a world of chaos and rebellion.  Chaos, because they who do not have God do not have direction or understanding of eternity.  Rebellion, because they deny the name of the One who has made this place of testing.

By His Grace.

The Faith of David

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Jewish scroll icon

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David, the second King of Israel, was a man of amazing understanding regarding the character of God.  David tumbled into sin as do we all.  He saw a woman, when he should have been with his men in the battlefield.  He called for her, and allowed his lust to carry through with temptation.  Upon her announcement of pregnancy, David had the woman’s husband killed.  I don’t state these things as an accusation toward David.  I state them to build an understanding of the severity of David’s sin.

The point is not what David did.  The point is what David did before God.  God told David the child would die and that bloodshed would not leave his family.  What did David do in response?  He appealed to God that God should change His mind regarding the punishment.  But when David saw that no change of mind would come, he rose, washed his face and went to have dinner.

We are told that there is no fear of punishment at the hands of God in those who love Him.  And I see no fear in David’s response.  David trusted the wisdom of the Most High God.  So it is in my own experience with God.  Yes, I have sinned before the face of the Lord.  But should that be the end of me?  Perhaps it should be the end of me.  But that’s not what God promises.  He says that we are sin, even our righteous acts are as filthy rags.  Groveling like a worm under the heat of the sun is not what God desires from His people.  God desires that we admit our state of affairs before Him, believe His promises, and rise up to serve.  What else can we do?  What else shall we think?  Can we conjure up some kind of sacrifice that will undo our sins?  No.

So swallow your pride, drop to your knees and confess to Him.  Accept His promise, and rise up forgiven.  Billions would call that hypocrisy.  God calls that The Faith.

 

by His Grace.