“Respect your elders.”So we are told.
“But they’re not right;
Wisdom comes not from ‘old’.”
“Well, didn’t God make them
Fore He made you,
And isn’t His Wisdom
Greater than ‘new’?”
Tag Archives: obedience
Be Patient
The war. The battle. The temptation. The weakness.
The repair. The change of mind. Determination:
It takes a while. Reside in prayerful attitude.
It takes a while to journey,
For we reside so far from
HE.
In God We Trust
“In God we trust.” I know what that means. You know what that means. Our minds understand the definition. But our lives will prove something greatly less.
In the history of Man, only Jesus could say it fully; “In God I trust”. Everyone else holds something in reserve to themselves.
It is because of our living definition (the proof of our choices) that we find so much tragedy in this world. Every single place we reserve the right for judgment, wisdom, righteousness, and doings, we add to the chaos of this world. Everyplace we deny him the right to be our God, we frustrate his desire.
You want a New Year’s resolution? Improve your intent to trust God. Strive to let Jesus be your master more and more this year.
It was said that when Jesus knew his time was near he set his face like flint toward Jerusalem. As we employ that same attitude we can refine our definition of trust in the living God.
May God grant us eyes to see and ears to hear that he may have what rightfully belongs to him.
Amen.
Heavenly Ultimatum, The Eaternal Litmus Test
What does this mean do you? How do you interpret it.
I’m just asking the question. I don’t want to know what the answer is.
32 “Whoever acknowledges me before others, I will also acknowledge before my Father in heaven. 33 But whoever disowns me before others, I will disown before my Father in heaven.
34 “Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. 35 For I have come to turn
“ ‘a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
a daughter-in-law against her
mother-in-law—
36 a man’s enemies will be the members of his own household.’
37 “Anyone who loves their father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves their son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. 38 Whoever does not take up their cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39 Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.
40 “Anyone who welcomes you welcomes me, and anyone who welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. 41 Whoever welcomes a prophet as a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and whoever welcomes a righteous person as a righteous person will receive a righteous person’s reward. 42 And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones who is my disciple, truly I tell you, that person will certainly not lose their reward.”
Marriage
Did you know that the current divorce rate in America is 50%?
I was thinking this morning about how I want my life to matter. In the end, I came to the conclusion that I want to bring gifts to the Lord’s wedding. It didn’t take a heartbeat for my mind to compare gifts at a wedding today with gifts at the wedding of the Lord.
People marry for their lifetime, at best. The Lord’s wedding to his people will be a “once in eternity” event. Never has it happened before, and never will it happen again. It would be good to let that sink in.
With divorce at 50%, what is the value of any gift we might bring to a wedding? There’s a 50-50 chance they will only be useful in the division of things. Our token of love might well become a token of division.
But then it dawned on me, the importance of the Lord’s wedding to his people. When the Lord marries us, it will be forever without the slightest chance of disillusionment. What then is the value of the things I bring him on that Holy day?
How do I bring him gifts? What can my hands invent that I can bring him in my soul? The Flesh, and all I can do, will be nothing on that day . Nothing. What then are these gifts I’m talking about? Simply put, the gifts we bring the Lord are born of obedience to him today. We bring honor to his wedding because we have let him do the work in us that brings his Father Glory.
We know what he wants. We know who he is. And we know who he wants us to be. I’m really not sure I need to say anymore.
The Reason for Faith’s Necessity
2 questions:
_____________
1. Why do we need faith?
2. What does the voice of God sound like?
Beginning with the second question:
The voice of God is life. When the Israelites were released from bondage in Egypt, God displayed his voice in a thunderous noise from the mountain. But this was for the sake of the people, that they may worship Him and obey. As he spoke with Moses, however, he used no such voice. Rather, God treated Moses as a friend. (What does that say about those to whom he spoke as a thunderous noise?)
The voice of God requires faith to hear. God is thoroughly life. Everything he is, everything he says, everything he does, is life. Ask yourself then what does life say, what does life sound like, what does life look like, what does life feel like? Look carefully at the situations and things that come to you.
Please don’t consider that God is like a man. The life I am speaking of is Purity, Holiness, Righteousness, Justice, Mercy, and in the end Grace to us through sustaining toward the same things.
He would prefer that we gain his wisdom to perceive with our eyes and ears, mind, heart and strength. Isn’t this why the first and greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your mind and with all your strength and with all your soul? Then you will begin to hear his voice. How do I know this?
Romans 1:20 tells us how we know this. “For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities–his eternal power and divine nature–have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.”
(And we have the testimony of those who do hear his voice through faith. The one who writes this testifies. And some who read this testify. The voice of God, one may say, also comes from those who know him. Perhaps better said, those God knows in Jesus His Holy and Righteous Son. The people would find advantedge listening to the words of such people, instead of pre-judging them as worthless.)
He speaks to us from what we can say “IS”. Because life “IS”.
And we must inject another slice of information here. God does not demand too much, for he gives us everything we need to accomplish his Holy will in our lives. To say he does not, is to join with satan in the primary accusation that has caused creation of this place of testing in the first place. We find the second slice of information in the following scripture.
5 If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to you. 6 But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. 7 That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. 8 Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do. (James 1)
Rejecting this promise is a sincerely precarious place to choose to live! For if we do not receive his wisdom, that God is so willing to give freely, we will surely lack precious gifts. (Even, perhaps, finding death in the end. For not a single one of those who of those who heard the Thunders from the mountain receive the promise of God.)
Having read this, it is now your responsibility to act. Though having said that, (it sounds like a threat) the Wonders that God is willing to give to any man is far worth the struggle to suppress our rebelion (That which is crouching at our very door, desiring to have us. But we must master it. [Taken from Genesis 4:7])
Think about this deeply: we need faith because it will never cease to be necessary.
Go and see if what I have said is true.
P. S. The voice of God is called Jesus. Think about that for the rest of your life.
Words From There 