My wife and IFiled under: Culture, God, Politics | Tags: Hate, immorality, Jesus, Prayer
As a young man I joined the Army at 17 years of age, in 1963 I went through Basic training and then advanced training. I was sent to a place called Dreux in the Normandy area of France. I was there when JFK was assassinated, we thought it was WW 3, we spent a week guarding the perimeter of the base, scared to death that the Soviet army would be coming. Of course that did not happen, but we were really scared. I can imagine that the Jews who had come with Ezra to rebuild the temple felt like that too. They had begun to rebuild the walls as well, and the people in the area around them began to make trouble for them.
Their fear made them stop working on the walls, they also began to assimilate into the people groupings around them, inter-marriage became something that they thought would lessen the animosity against them. They forgot that God had expressly forbidden that type of exercise, they were not to marry outside of their own people. They were not to worship anything other than Yahweh, God, and yet idol worship was beginning to infiltrate their society. The Levites who were the priests left the city and began to work their own farms because the people were not paying their tithes to the temple.
Nehemiah was called by God to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, and in the 2nd chapter we see how forceful he is in getting the people to do just that. In the reading today we see that the people were gathering together and they are ready to hear the word of God read. Ezra read from the book of the Law, but he read in Hebrew, the people no longer spoke Hebrew they had taken up Aramaic in its place. This was the language of the people around them and it was the common language of the day, they could not understand what Ezra was reading. So there were a number of Levites who were explaining in Aramaic what it was that was read, and what it was that Ezra was telling them.
Just an aside here, the reading was from morning until noon and the people stood to hear the words of God. They also worshiped with uplifted hands, then with their heads bowed and looking down at the ground.
As the people heard the word of God, they began to weep, realizing that they were doing wrong in the sight of God. Then they were told that this was to be a feast day to the Lord, that they were to celebrate, but note that their celebration was not only for themselves. They were to make sure that any who had need were to receive a portion from those who had plenty. Our reading ends with the words, “Do not sorrow, for the joy of the Lord is your strength.”
In Psalm 19 we read about God, that the heavens declare His glory, the heavens is that great expanse that we can see at night. Thousands of stars, thousands of galaxies which we can’t see with just our eyes, but with a telescope we can begin to see it all. Some one once said that if it cost a penny to travel 1000 miles, it would cost $2.38 to travel to the moon, $930 to the sun, and $260 million to travel to the nearest star. The light we see from the Andromeda galaxy shows us where that galaxy was 2 million years ago, that is how long it takes the light from that galaxy to reach us. God created all of that expanse, so yes it does declare His glory.
David ends the psalm with words of praise to God and instruction for God’s people. “Psa 19:7-11 NKJV The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul; The testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple; (8) The statutes of the LORD are right, rejoicing the heart; The commandment of the LORD is pure, enlightening the eyes; (9) The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring forever; The judgments of the LORD are true and righteous altogether. (10) More to be desired are they than gold, Yea, than much fine gold; Sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. (11) Moreover by them Your servant is warned, And in keeping them there is great reward.”
Now we come to Luke 4:14-21. All that has gone before in that which we call The Old Testament, leads up to what we find in the Newer Testament. Jesus has been preaching and teaching in Galilee, and he finally arrives in Nazareth, where he grew to manhood and he goes to the Synagogue on the Sabbath Day, that is Saturday, and he stood up to read. Reading from the scroll of Isaiah “Isa 61:1-2 NKJV “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon Me, Because the LORD has anointed Me To preach good tidings to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives, And the opening of the prison to those who are bound; (2) To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, And the day of vengeance of our God; To comfort all who mourn,”
Let us understand what Jesus is saying here, it is important for us to see that this which he has read is known as the Ministry of the Messiah and when Jesus says “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” He was in the clearest possible manner proclaiming that He was the Messiah of Israel. So what exactly was this mission, this ministry? He came to deal with the great problems of mankind throughout all of history.
Poverty: To preach the gospel to the poor.
Sorrow: To heal the brokenhearted.
Bondage: To proclaim liberty to the captives.
Suffering: Recovery of sight to the Blind.
Oppression: To set at liberty those who are oppressed.
He came to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.
The dawning of a new era for this world and its hurting multitudes, he presents himself as the answer to all the ills of the world. No matter what you may think of the ills of the world, Jesus is the answer to them all. It is also significant that he stopped reading with the words “to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.” the rest of that verse is: “and the day of the vengeance of our God.” The purpose of the first coming of Christ was to proclaim the good news the acceptable year of the Lord. We are living in the present age of grace, we are still able to come before the throne of grace and receive salvation because Jesus came the first time. He came to die and to rise from death into newness of life, so that you and I could see that there was and is a newness of life for us.
The second part of that verse is not yet here, and so we have time to become children of God, it is still the acceptable year of the Lord, but the day is coming when that will end, and then comes the day of the vengeance of our God. None of us knows when that Day of Vengeance will come, but, if we truly believe that Jesus is who he said he is, then it will come! What does this mean for you and I in the time of acceptance? It means we have a job to do, it means that we are to stand in the gap against the forces of darkness, and proclaim that Jesus is the way, the truth and the life, that sin leads to death, and Christ leads to life.
How can we stand, how can we come against the forces of darkness? We stand in the power of God, we have been promised the Holy Spirit and the gifts of ability to do the work that God has called each of us into. In 1 Corinthians 12 the apostle Paul speaks of the gifts of the Spirit. 1Co 12:27-30 NKJV Now you are the body of Christ, and members individually. (28) And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations, varieties of tongues. (29) Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles? (30) Do all have gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?
In the time of Nehemiah and Ezra, individuals would receive the Holy Spirit to help them do the tasks they needed to do, so we see these men and many prophets such as Isaiah and Jeremiah, working to bring the the people of God to understand that they were moving in wrong directions and needed to work for God not against God. We see the miraculous building of the walls under Nehemiah, and the preaching of the prophets as they struggled with the sins of the people. In today’s reading in the book of Nehemiah, we see that the people are grief stricken by the reading and teaching of the scriptures by Ezra and the Levites.
In the time of Jesus the Spirit still only came upon men as needed and left after the job was done. Today, and since the first Pentecost after the resurrection, the Spirit inhabits each of us as we become believers, children of God. The Spirit helps us and guides us into all righteousness, and away from that which is sinful. Helping to mold and shape us into all that God has for us to be, and giving us the power to work against the forces of evil in the world.
Many people think that we need to kill the people who are the army of ISIS, and I suppose that some of them will have to die in battle, but Jesus himself teaches that we are to pray for our enemies. Pray that they may come to see their wrong and change their ways, and come to Jesus as Savior and Lord. We are also to pray for those who lead our nation, whatever they may be doing and no matter whether we agree or disagree with them, we are to pray for them and ask the Lord to guide and help them to see the right.
I hear a lot of folks talking about how we have to elect the right people to congress and to the state government, yet we have been doing that for many years. Has anything gotten better? The truth is, if we are not involved in the Father’s business, by being in prayer, by standing against immorality of all kinds, by using the resources that God has provided to help the poor, to bring healing to the brokenhearted, proclaim liberty to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind and to set at liberty those who are oppressed. If we are not working to bring people into the kingdom, then we are against God, that is not a good place to be.
We live in a nation that is rushing headlong into hell, can we stand and work to stop that train? If we will not then our nation is doomed to continue on a path that leads to destruction, Jesus said we are to make disciples, have you talked to anyone lately about Jesus? Our purpose is to be the light of the world because we serve the risen Savior of mankind and our lives are to be a reflection of that light. Just as Luke, Paul, Nehemiah, Ezra, Isaiah, Jeremiah and a host of others through all of time have shown the light of God in their own lives and have had an affect on those around them, we too are to shine.
We too are to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, until the time comes when there is no more acceptance, only the day of vengeance of the Lord comes upon this world. We who have come to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, who have the Holy Spirit of God indwelling us, need to be standing for right, shining the light of Christ into the darkness of this world.
If there is anything in our own lives that goes against the word of God, we need to rid ourselves of that sin, asking God to cleanse us of all unrighteousness, and help us to be warriors for the kingdom. We who profess Jesus as Lord and Savior, should want to share the joy of our salvation with others, so that they too might become as we are, sinners saved by the grace of God. As we look at the stealing, rape, murder and just plain hatred toward one another, we need to first pray, and then act in accordance with the will of God, as it is plainly written in the scriptures.
Filed under: Church Stuff, God | Tags: immorality, Islam, murder, Persecution
John 15:18-23 NKJV “If the world hates you, you know that it hated Me before it hated you. (19) If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. (20) Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they kept My word, they will keep yours also. (21) But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know Him who sent Me. (22) If I had not come and spoken to them, they would have no sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. (23) He who hates Me hates My Father also.
This series would not be complete without a truth that Jesus taught his disciples. That truth is that just because you have become a Christian person does not mean that all things will come to you and you will live a good life, with all that you need to be fulfilled in your person. I know that the scriptures say that all things work to good for those who love the Lord and that is true, but, this teaching in the gospel of John is also truth. You only have to look to the middle east to see that Christians are being persecuted for their faith by the radical Muslim group ISIS. However they are not the only ones who persecute Christians.
Looking at the United States, we find that there is much trouble for Christians here at home, we are told that we must support homosexual marriage, that we must agree with abortion on demand, and allow for other sexual sins as being just another type of life style. This includes man with boys as well as adultery, and the change in morality that says that a person in power can have sex with an employee and it is acceptable. Teachers with students or a President with an intern.
Of course none of this can hold a candle to the darkness that is engulfing the rest of the world. In Europe, we see Christians and Jews being told that they cannot say anything wrong about Muslims, we see the Muslim attacks in Paris, and London, Brussels and Germany on New Years Eve, as hundreds of women were assaulted by Muslim men. Some were raped, some were groped, and the governments in the towns where these things happened hid the truth from the public.
Then there is the middle east where the city of Mosul, which had a Christian presence from the very beginning, around 100 CE, and there are now no more Christians in that city. They either escaped, or were murdered by the adherents of Islam under ISIS. They were told to convert to Islam, leave or die, there is no other choice.
On December 14, 2015 Kathryn Jean Lopez wrote an article in National Review titled “See and Name the Genocide” In the article she quotes from Carl Anderson of the Knights of Columbus who testified before congress in regard to Iraqi and Syrian Christian refugees from ISIS. He said: “Fear of being slaughtered or enslaved for their faith prevents them from returning home.” “Like the Jews in Nazi Germany, these Christians are escaping genocide. They are being specifically targeted because they put their faith in Jesus Christ.”
Returning to our own nation, I have to make note of the fact that the Obama administration has accepted Muslim refugees, but has sent Christian refugees back to their home countries, to face the terror of extermination. In that context you can say that Christians are no longer welcome in the United States either.
In the past year we have witnessed horrific killings in Islamic held territories. Christian men have been burned to death, had their heads cut off, been drowned and of course shot to death. In Egypt, during the time when the Muslim Brotherhood was in charge, we witnessed actual crucifixions of Christians in the middle of Cairo. All of this violence has been practiced against a people of who try to live by loving each other as brothers and sisters in Christ.
We are told that the suicide bombers of Islamic radical groups, are martyrs of their faith, true martyrdom however comes when you are confronted with the threat of death unless you convert to Islam. If you refuse to give up your faith in Christ, your throat is cut. Yet thousands have refused to give up Jesus Christ for Allah or Muhammad.
So, Jesus said that persecution would come to those who followed his way and it is for sure coming to pass in this day and time. Here in America, we are told we may not pray in the name of Jesus if we are going to be chaplains. The prayers in the Chaplains book for the American Legion do not use the name of Jesus, on military bases there are now sacred groves for the use of pagans and witches. There is even a movement afoot now to have atheist chaplains, a bit of an oxymoron in my book, but there it is. There have been children expelled from school, not for using curse words, for acting badly, but for wearing a Christian tee shirt, or refusing to remove a cross.
Prayer of course is strictly banned in many schools across the country, and there are schools where they make the children wear Muslim garb and recite the pillars of Islam, and pray to Allah. If they were forced to pray to Jesus it would bring cries of outrage, but to Allah not so much. We will have to go a bit further to see true persecution, that will come though it is only a matter of time.
Jesus also taught the disciples this:
Mat 5:10-12 NKJV Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness’ sake, For theirs is the kingdom of heaven. (11) “Blessed are you when they revile and persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely for My sake. (12) Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
Persecution is coming to our nation, whether we realize it or not, we who follow Jesus Christ, are out of step with our society. We believe that there is a moral code to be followed, that sin leads to hell for all eternity, and that following Jesus leads to eternal life in heaven. There are real penalties associated with sinful living, hell being the end result. Will we Christians live abundant lives? Depends on what you know about abundance, for me, it is a resounding YES! Not because I will be rich or famous, but I will come face to face with my savior and Lord one day. I know that my Lord walks with me through all the stuff that life throws at me. I have a wife who loves me, brothers and sisters (in the Lord) who I love and who love me as well, because Jesus loved us all enough to die for us, to pay our price for our sins. He also sealed the deal when he rose from the dead to show us that we too would one day rise with him into eternity.
I have an abundance of love in my life and that gives me all the riches I could possibly want in this life. I know that my redeemer lives, and that my future is secure in Jesus Christ, fully Man and fully God.
Filed under: Politics
Mat 24:3 Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives, the disciples came to Him privately, saying, “Tell us, when will these things be? And what will be the sign of Your coming, and of the end of the age?”
Men have been wondering when these things will come to pass now for about 2,000 years, and many have begun to think that God has left and won’t be back, others think it was just stories and that God does not exist. Others think that God is really Allah or Budda or Krishna, but not the God of the Bible. Jesus taught the disciples that there would be a time of great apostasy, a time of hatred of Jews and followers of Christ. That many would be persecuted and killed for their faith.
Let us look at what Jesus teaches in this chapter of Matthew. Mat 24:4 And Jesus answered and said to them: “Take heed that no one deceives you.
Mat 24:5 For many will come in My name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and will deceive many. I remember when the “Rev.” Moon came on the scene and told people that God had called him and said he was to be the new messiah, that Jesus would teach him and he would then become the Christ.
Many believed this and many have followed his teachings since but he has died and gone on to his just deserts. David Koresh was another of these who took the place of Christ and was believed, and what happened to him and his followers was a tragic happening in Waco TX. There are others out there who claim to have miraculous powers, who claim to speak for God, but really speak only for their own avarice and take the followers on a merry road, that leads to death and destruction.
Mat 24:6-7 NKJV And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. (7) For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places.
Lots of wars and rumors of more wars are all around us today, but this is just the beginning of tribulation. We also have seen the hatred of one group for another group, in Islam it is Sunni vs Shia, but it is also ISIS against everybody who is not like themselves, even their fellow Sunni Muslims are not immune to their hatred, for if you are not following their path, you are the enemy. The Russians are now flexing their muscles, and getting involved in the mess in the middle east. Bombing the enemies of Assad, namely the same people America is helping, and some ISIS sites as well.
India and Pakistan are both looking at the possibility of war between themselves. Then the Chinese are building Islands in the South China Sea and claiming that it is a part of their nation, not international waters, and in our own country we have become balkanized and we have somewhat of a civil war in this country. Of course there is also the wish to wipe out history, which is self defeating at best and leads to repeated violations of civil society.
Mat 24:8-9 NKJV All these are the beginning of sorrows. (9) “Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and kill you, and you will be hated by all nations for My name’s sake. Jesus says that if you are his follower you will be hated and persecuted, even to death because you are a Christian. It is already happening in many parts of the world, we have seen the beheadings of Christians in many places captured by Muslims. In India it is the killing of Christians by Hindu believers. In Saudi Arabia, you better not be seen with a Bible, you are subject to death on the spot. We keep hearing about how Islam is a peaceful religion, but I don’t see it, I see instead a complete hatred of all who are not as they are, including women and children. There have been some very nasty arguments between Muslims and others in trying to practice their own religion. Tensions run high in some of these areas. We also are beginning to see Christianity in this country being marginalized, in favor of Islam, or the State as savior. Reference Obamacare (The Affordable Care Act). Some states are even legalizing Euthanasia as well as supporting Planned Parenthood and abortion on demand.
Mat 24:10-12 NKJV And then many will be offended, will betray one another, and will hate one another. (11) Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many. (12) And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.
There is much hatred in this world of ours today, within the church there is even hatred, those who believe that sexual immorality is now OK and condoned and those who disagree. Let us just look at the homosexual lobby and its activities in trying to make the church adhere to their sin as if it was normality. Then there are those who say that it is OK to kill babies, just because the child is not wanted. Or the ones who say that there are multiple ways to heaven, even though Jesus himself taught that he was and is the only way to heaven. There are many false leaders in the church, saying that the scriptures are not all true, that parts of it were just added to make people do things. Of course there are also those who claim that the early church fathers, like Paul, did not really know what homosexual love was all about, today science has taught us it is just another life style.
The newest one I have heard is that God has become a transsexual and has had a sex change operation. I would like to meet the Doctor that took on that challenge. God doesn’t have a sex, God is God, and the one who is putting that out is in for a VERY rude awakening.
Mat 24:13-14 NKJV But he who endures to the end shall be saved. (14) And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the end will come.
Those who hold to their faith shall be saved, those who lie about it, and those who abandon it, will have a tough time when it comes to entering heaven. If you are truly saved, heaven is a guarantee, but if you are not, and just said you were, you will find yourself on a very hot seat, in a very dark place.
The gospel, the good news will be preached and taught throughout the world, as a witness to all that God is and always will be God. That all who claim to be gods will be found out to be liars because God will be supreme in all the universe and will help each and every one who would not accept HIS reality into the place reserved for him or herself. The gospel is quite plain, it says that if you
“confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Please take this to heart, for the time is growing short, you are not guaranteed even one hour more, much less tomorrow, don’t wait, find Jesus for yourself and begin to follow him. The immorality of this world is going to come to a screeching halt, and those who have refused to accept the invitation of Jesus Christ, will find themselves on the express to hell for all eternity. God does not want any to perish but the decision is yours, God will honor your decision to follow Satan into the fires of hell. He made us in His image, giving us free will to decide for ourselves whether to follow heaven or hell. Death or Life, choose life.
texasjq2 