The Daily Manna

[flightsimmer]

5 A father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows, is God in His holy
habitation. Psalm 28:5

Back in 1953, my father died from a highway accident. He was turning off of
Highway 32 to go into Lapel, Indiana when two Indiana state highway trucks hit
him from behind. He had his turn signals on and was doing everything right.
Dad was an excellent driver with an excellent safety record on the roads. He
had received a medallion from the company he worked for, the Jewel Tea Company,
that said so. In any case, one of the trucks struck his truck in the rear end
and spun it around and the other truck struck his metro van in the front
essentially folding it up like an accordion so I've been told. I never saw the
truck nor him other than at his funeral following the accident. He lay in St.
John's Hospital for two or three days before he died from gangrene poisoning.
My mother was left a widow at about 35 years of age with six children to raise
on her own.
I had become a Christian just about a year and a half before dad died. My next
older brother, Jim and I had been delivering a paper route and upon nearing our
home on 17th street in Anderson, Indiana, a cousin we called "Bunk" Chapin came
out and told us that dad had died just a little while ago.
We were never close to our dad because he would not let us be. He was a strict
disciplinarian. He not only spanked us for the least infraction of the his
rules, he beat us and sometimes he did so until the blood ran down our backs. I
am not sure he understood the wrong in that and, to us five boys, it was just
the way it was. We have a sister. She was the baby. She was too young to see
that side of dad and I am glad for that.
In spite of the fact that dad was so harsh in the discipline he administered to
us and that he was not as faithful to mom as he should have been, we all loved
him and all of us cried because he died. Here is where God comes in as the God
of the fatherless and the judge of the widows. Mom soon rededicated her life to
Christ following dad's death. I have fond memories of all of us getting into
our 1950 Willy's Jeepster and heading out to church every Sunday morning for
Sunday School and AM and PM worship. We also attended "prayer meeting twice a
week, once at the church and once in a private home.
In all of those years, mom turned to God for help in raising us. We were a
handful for her I am sure. Five boys and one baby girl had to be such a
challenge for her. I can remember the many times that I would come into the
house and find mom stretched out across her bed and crying. Her tears were for
us because she was afraid that we were all going to wind in a penitentiary some
where. She was afraid that she was not doing a sufficiently good job raising
us. She did not know how well she was doing, I am sure, until we had all grown,
married, and moved out of her house.
I write this today because mom died a few days ago. She was ninety-seven years
old and she was still "mom" to all of us. God had given her the grace and the
intelligence and the instincts that she needed to raise her little orphans. I
am a pastor. My oldest brother is a retired pastor. All of my brothers and my
sister believe in the God that guided our mother every day of her life. She was
no failure and to our notion, she was a great success. She hardly had two
nickels to rub together, as they say, but we never felt poor or deprived. She
wouldn't let us. We was never allowed to feel like victims either. AS far as
we knew, we were ok.
God is indeed the Father of the fatherless and the God of the widows. Mom kept
God in front of us all of her life. She never tried to force us to love Him,
she just showed us how to do it. I have the best of both worlds. I have
wonderful memories of this life and a marvelous expectation for the next. Mom
is with God now and one day I will go to where she is. I would never ask God to
send her back here-no, not ever. God has her under His protective wings where
the pains and the disappointments of this world will never bother her again. My
only sorrow is based in the fact that I will never have another conversation
with her in this life but I rejoice in the fact that I can talk to God, her God
and mine, and get from Him the same strength that He gave to her. So can we
all.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

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In thee, O Lord, do I put my trust: let me never be put to confusion. 2 Deliver me in thy righteousness, and cause me to escape: incline thine ear unto me, and save me. 3 Be thou my strong habitation, whereunto I may continually resort: thou hast given commandment to save me; for thou art my rock and my fortress. 4 Deliver me, O my God, out of the hand of the wicked, out of the hand of the unrighteous and cruel man. 5 For thou art my hope, O Lord God: thou art my trust from my youth. Psalm 71:1-5 What I wrote yesterday about my father was not written out of bitter memories of him, what I wrote was a statement of the facts as I recall them. I have learned over the years to trust the Lord and to trust that He knew our circumstances, his and mine and those of the rest of the family, and He has done all things right for and by us. In God do I put my trust. I have a great empathy and sympathy for abused children. I also try to understand the abuser. Do they know that they are abusing the children or do they really believe that they are correcting a problem with the child? I will never defend them but I would like to know what drives some adults to assume that they have the right to "discipline" in the manner that they do. It is not discipline, it is intimidation and to a defenseless child with no one else to turn to for protection from such tyranny, what can they do? I am so glad that I found Christ at such an early age. I learned to trust him as an adult figure who loved and disciplined with love. His tenderness and that of God the Father was in direct contrast to what I had experienced otherwise. God gave me a compassionate mother who lived a life of intimidation as well. My heavenly Father has a way of keeping His children in line in such a way that they learn to trust His wisdom and strength and knowledge in all things. He gives His children a secure and a strong habitation. He protects. I don't know how many others needed that but I surely did and I found in Christ a big brother who would come to my rescue when the enemy of my soul threatened to destroy me. God has delivered me our of the grasp of the evil one, Satan. You see, I am not looking to blame anyone other than myself for the evil that existed in me when God found me and saved me. No one other than me was responsible for the evil that was in me. Oh, I know that it is a popular thing to want to bring our upbringing into it and to blame those bringing us up, but every decision to do a wrong thing was my personal decision to make. I owed God a huge apology even at nine years of age. No one made me feel guilty nor could they make me feel guilty except the Holy Spirit of Christ. He convicted me of my sins and I fell on my knees and cried out to God to forgive them in the name of His dear Son, Jesus Christ. He did. I'm forgiven and, if I sin again, all I have to do is come to God in the name of Jesus Christ with godly sorrow for that sin and He will forgive me again. Now, that's discipline. In the process of raising my own children and theirs at times, that is the discipline I applied. I loved them and love them yet. I did not let them get by with the wrong that they did, but I corrected them because I loved them and not to get back at them for making me look bad. God help our parents of today. They need to bring their children into this world to demonstrate the love of God to them by loving those children as God does. The greatest thing ever taught to me in life was the song that says, "Jesus loves me, this I know for the Bible tells me so." I love that little chorus. You need to walk around today singing that little song to yourself because it expresses out heavenly Father's love for us all, even my dad whom in Christ I have learned to love. I, to this day would like to be able to put my arms around him and give him the biggest hug ever and to tell him that that hug was sent from God to him and that I am the one God chose to deliver it through. Some sweet day I will do that in heaven. I believe I will find him there because God loves and forgives and we all can put our trust in Him. I do not regret my life, I cherish it and all the memories God has given me to cherish. I put my trust in Him. God bless and go and have a great day.

 

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6 By thee have I been holden up from the womb: thou art he that took me out of
my mother's bowels: my praise shall be continually of thee.
7 I am as a wonder unto many; but thou art my strong refuge.
8 Let my mouth be filled with thy praise and with thy honour all the day.
9 Cast me not off in the time of old age; forsake me not when my strength
faileth. Psalm 71:6-9

A man recently walked into a Planned Parenthood Center in Colorado and shot and
wounded several people. He muttered something to the police afterward about "no
more baby parts". He obviously was referring to the news stories recently of
this organization about the reaping of fetal body parts for selling to other
organizations that do research. This man was most certainly not pro-abortion
and even more not pro-abortion for the profiteering from the remains of these
babies different body parts. He also shot and killed a police officer who was
also a co-pastor of a church. In both instances he was wrong for what he did
and no better than those doing the abortions.
God is our God from womb to tomb and into eternity. The moment a drop of blood
develops in the pro-creation process, there is life For the Bible teaches us
that "life is in the blood". You cannot abort a developing baby without
stopping a beating heart or cutting short a human life. If this creature that
is growing in its mother's womb is not another human being, then what is it? As
you can tell, I am definitely not pro-abortion nor do I believe is God. David
understood the idea of God being his God from the womb to the tomb and he
understood that God was supporting him while he was yet in his mother's womb.
God was with him there and God was with him in his life outside the womb
directing it to a successful conclusion. If David had enough sense to get this
way back when he lived on this earth, why is that concept so hard for us now?
Not a one of us who are Christian advocate the taking of another person's life,
not even that of an abortionist. But we must protest the taking of human lives
whether it be by an abortionist or by anyone else who believes that they have a
right to do so.
Life is sacred to God. He created it and created us so that we could go forward
creating it through the process of child birth. A child is a sacred thing. I
don't mean that in the sense that the child is to be worshiped but, rather, that
the God who gave life to the child should be worshiped and adored. Our mouths
should be filled with awesome wonder and adoration of God and our hearts filled
with the same. Our prayer should be that we not be "cast offs", that is,
rejects. Our prayer should be that every child born be a treasure to the family
it is born into. Not so, today. So many children are the product of its
parents sin and comes into existence unwanted and even despised. The shame for
all of this is not on the child, it is on the parents and on a society that
would not only condone the aborting of the child's life, it encourages it. God
help us all.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

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10 For mine enemies speak against me; and they that lay wait for my soul take
counsel together,
11 Saying, God hath forsaken him: persecute and take him; for there is none to
deliver him.
12 O God, be not far from me: O my God, make haste for my help.
13 Let them be confounded and consumed that are adversaries to my soul; let them
be covered with reproach and dishonour that seek my hurt.
14 But I will hope continually, and will yet praise Thee more and more. Psalm
71:10-14

The only way to defeat evil is by being good. To say the least we have enemies.
This shooting out in California appears to be the work of terrorists. One of
them was home-grown the other was from Saudi Arabia. Both were Muslim by
belief. It has been reported that both of these people had been accepted into
the group of people that they assaulted killing fourteen and wounding seventeen.
This group had recently thrown them a baby shower. Was this about the office
Christmas party? It appears to be about something of that nature. To you and
me it seems so ludicrous to go to this extreme over religion but there are those
who do and will.
It was reported on Fox News this morning that one newspaper located in
California had a headline this morning that read, "Don't Pray, God Isn't Fixing
This". How sad that we have relegated God to being the "fixit man" who is only
recognized when He isn't fixing our failed policies. God will not be relegated
to the fireplace mantle only to be taken down and called upon in times like
these. He is the God of our every day and our every moment or He will not be
our God at all. I am a Christian all of the time and not on a part-time basis.
When will we ever learn? I wonder if we ever will because we have listened to
the pundits instead of God. As David writes here, there are those who say that
God has forsaken us which puts the blame on God when all along the blame is on
us for having forsaken Him. We are the ones who have called right wrong and
wrong right. God makes right and wrong very plain in His Holy Book. He is my
God and as my God He should have my attention at all times. If I ever get
distracted, He has a way of bringing me back to Himself. Sometimes that way is
hard but it is always loving.
Want to defeat ISIS and evil. Seek out God and let Him lead you to the church
of His choice to worship this Sunday. If all over America there was a true
turning back to God, this would be a huge defeat for our enemies. I suppose I
am becoming skeptical of this ever happening. I think that most people believe
that God owes them something more than He has already done for them which is not
true at all. He offers them His hand every day and they slap it away, that is,
of course until something like this tragedy in California happens. Then, they
look to God and shake their fist at Him as shout at Him saying, "How could You
let something like this happen to us?" The question is, why not us? It has
been happening to other people all over the world, so, why not us? Like all of
you, I want to live but if forced to live in godless fear, I rather be dead to
this life and alive to the next.
I suppose now gun sales will go through the roof. That is not the answer. It
might be consoling to carry a gun but that is not the answer. The answer always
has been and yet is, God. As for me and my house, we will be in worship and in
prayer today and, yes, we will pray for California and for those who lost loved
ones in this shooting whether or not the editors of a certain news paper
believes that God can fix this or not. He can if we are willing to cooperate
with Him but only then will He do it.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

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In Judah is God known: his name is great in Israel.
2 In Salem also is his tabernacle, and his dwelling place in Zion.
3 There brake he the arrows of the bow, the shield, and the sword, and the
battle. Selah.
4 Thou art more glorious and excellent than the mountains of prey. Psalm 76:1-4
(A Psalm of Asaph)

What is God doing while all of this is going on? That seems to be the question
on people's minds. Again, could God not have prevented the tragedy that just
occurred in California? I have an even larger question for you. Could God not
prevent every death and every tragedy in the world whether it be far away or
more local? Of course God could prevent all death but in order to do so He
would have to break a cardinal law that He has instituted since creation and
that would be to take away from all of us the right to chose the course for our
own lives. There is such a thing as free-will and just because someone choses
to use that free-will in a destructive way does not mean that God is going to
step in and intervene in their choice. God could have made us all clones of
Himself with no more ability to chose than a tree in a forest but He did not.
He created us all in His likeness and image and in the image and likeness of the
Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit was the way that He created us. That
means that we are expected to be as good as He is good but we can make the
choice not to be and, for that matter, we can chose to be as evil as the "evil
one" we call Satan.
God is good. He is righteous and holy. We can be if we will come to know Him
and to make His name known by the way or manner we chose to live ourselves.
This is the way that God is known in "Judah", in His church. We make God known
by the manner in which we live, that is, a life that is a reflection of His.
Just because a man and a woman choses to follow a religion of violence and of
hate does not give us a reason to follow them on the path for their lives that
they chose. I still serve Jesus Christ who tells us to forgive them and to
continue to do the good and right thing. I know it is a hard thing but if it
were an easy thing there would have been no reason for Jesus to come an
demonstrate the right way with His own life and death which was followed by a
demonstration of a resurrected life. If we want to have the same eternity that
Christ has, we must live our lives in the same manner as He lived His.
I pray that this nation and its people will not lower itself to the level of
bitterness and hate that others have resorted to. We have every right to defend
ourselves but we do not have the right to do this on the level of hate for
anyone but, out of a desire for everyone in the world to enjoy the same freedoms
and the same liberties that we have enjoyed for the past two hundred plus years.
Hate results in chaos and anarchy. That is the agenda of those that hate us.
They want us to hate them as much as they hate us and if they bring us to that
point, they win and we lose. I will follow Jesus. He did not have it in his
heart to hate anyone, not even those who persecuted and prosecuted and put Him
to death. He reached out to them to save them from themselves and, yes, even
wept over their lost condition. We must do the same. The best controls ever
put upon any society are those spiritual controls that come from God through His
Word and His Holy Spirit. Then and only then will the passions of man be
bridled and restrained and society be civil and civilized again.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

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Give ear, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
2 I will open my mouth in a parable: I will utter dark sayings of old:
3 Which we have heard and known, and our fathers have told us.
4 We will not hide them from their children, showing to the generation to come
the praises of the Lord, and His strength, and His wonderful works that He hath
done.
5 For He established a testimony in Jacob, and appointed a law in Israel, which
He commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children:
6 That the generation to come might know them, even the children which should be
born; who should arise and declare them to their children:
7 That they might set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God, but
keep His commandments: Psalm 78:1-7

We keep trying. We keep reminding when and where we can. God is Lord. God is
sovereign Lord. All of the human race needs to know this and to live
accordingly. Historically God has proven Himself over and over again. The
Psalmist notes God at work in the life of Jacob and in the life of the people of
Israel. He mentions this as a way to remind the people of Israel that they did
not get to where they were as a people on their own but by the will and power of
a great God in heaven.
I want to make a note here or, rather to put this nation on notice. The only
reason it has survived for over 200 years as a democracy is because of the grace
and the mercy and the power of God. Let me explain that this way. The people
who have made this
country great have been people of faith in God. The fact that God's church has
found in this country freedom to be the church without government intrusion has
brought upon this nation the great blessings of the Lord. As one person has put
it, it is not that this is a Christian nation nor has it ever been and nor will
it ever be. It is because this nation has welcomed the Christian
and have given them a safe and secure place to teach the doctrines of Christ.
The church has produced more literature and sent it into all the world safely
here in America. The church has sent missionaries all around the world from
here in America. The church has been good for America and America has been good
for the church. For that matter, the nation adapted much of the teaching of the
church into its very fabric by enacting laws that reflected the Christian moral
code set forth by God. This present generation of Americans are enjoying the
freedom, the liberty it does because of that moral code.
Today, there is a trend toward turning against the church. I know that the
church (using that term in the general sense) has not been perfect and that some
have even taken advantage of it and used it or personal gain. I know that there
are those today doing the very same thing. That fact alone does not and should
not give government any cause to move against the church. The church has been
pretty good at policing itself down through the years and God has been perfect
at it. Today in our society, Christians are being relegated to a less than
protected group. They are being accused of being the problem and not the
solution. I remind you that this is what the Roman empire did in the early
years of the church. They blamed the Christians for the burning of Rome when
all the while their leaders was the one who set the fire and fiddled as it
burned.
Don't be too quick to try to send the church into oblivion. What you will find
is that you cannot do that because God will not allow it. The church is
indestructible because God had created her that way. That is not to say that
you cannot cause her pain and even persecute and kill some of its membership.
Many nations have tried this only to find when you kill one Christian ten others
take their place. It has been that way and it will remain that way. God is
God. You who want the church to be destroyed and made over again in your image
will find very soon that you are no match for Him.
This I believe and this is my stand. You stand where you want but here is where
I stand. God can and will fix the nation if the nation will recognize Him as
sovereign God.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

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10 They kept not the covenant of God, and refused to walk in his law;
11 And forgat his works, and his wonders that he had shewed them.
12 Marvellous things did he in the sight of their fathers, in the land of Egypt,
in the field of Zoan.
13 He divided the sea, and caused them to pass through; and he made the waters
to stand as an heap.
14 In the daytime also he led them with a cloud, and all the night with a light
of fire.
15 He clave the rocks in the wilderness, and gave them drink as out of the great
depths.
16 He brought streams also out of the rock, and caused waters to run down like
rivers.
Psalm 78:10-16

Remembering the past helps us to avoid the pitfalls of the future. It also
helps us to know the benefits that are ours if we will only remember Who was our
benefactor. In this passage today, Asaph reminds Israel of the benefits of
being God's people and the dangers attached to turning away from the Lord. One
question we all must ask ourselves is this, why is it that we have been so
immune to what other nations have suffered down through the years? Think about
it. Nearly every nation in western and eastern Europe has been invaded at one
time or another by conquering armies. Most of them have been occupied by those
armies. During World War I and II, it was this nation and those that allied
with it that restored those occupied nations. We did not do it alone and, yes,
we had help but out greatest help came from the almighty God of heaven.
In the past week it has been said by the leadership of this nation that we do
not want to put those who want to come to this country
to a religious test. I understand how impossible that would be but I also
understand that the one or ones saying this are saying that Christianity is no
longer the dominant religion of this country. I have news for them, it has not
been for a long time. We, as a nation of people, have decided to go it on our
own without God. To many, if not most Americans, God is a by-word. He is a
person of history and not the present. That is very sad because God is the
ever-present I AM. He is the I AM to all who know Him in truth. It just might
be to America that God is the I Was God but not to those of us who serve Him
every day of our lives. He is still the I AM and ever will be.
When Asaph lists all of the things that God had done for Israel as a people and
before they really were a people, I have to think of this nation in its infancy
and what it has grown up to be. In our infancy as a nation God gave us great
leaders and great and brave men and women who believed that freedom was worth
the sacrifices they made. They had an idealism that is lacking today. That
idealism grew our of a faith the there is a God in heaven who rules over the
affairs of men on the earth and that the nation that they was building was His
divine plan and that it had a divine destiny. Up until recent decades we
believed that and lived as though it was true. Now we are wandering in the land
of no particular purpose but to merely survive. Our fore-parents wanted to
leave us with a legacy that if one worked hard and gave their all great benefits
could be gained. Today, it is more about knowing which government agency to
contact when things go wrong and to seek a hand out instead of a hand up.
It is not so much that we are in danger of losing faith in God, it is that God
is losing faith in us. And, He has every right to be disappointed in us. We
are more like spoiled children than a grateful people. I don't want to be a
pessimist but I am a realist and I don't see much change for the better on the
horizon. For that matter, most Christians I know from a variety of different
churches are just waiting for Christ to return for the church and take it home
and get it out of this moral mess. Me, I am still praying for a time of
spiritual awakening and renewal and revival. Will you pray with me?
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

65 Then the Lord awaked as one out of sleep, and like a mighty man that shouts
by reason of wine.
66 And he smote His enemies in the hinder parts: He put them to a perpetual
reproach.
67 Moreover He refused the tabernacle of Joseph, and chose not the tribe of
Ephraim:
68 But chose the tribe of Judah, the mount Zion which He loved.
69 And He built his sanctuary like high palaces, like the earth which He has
established for ever.
70 He chose David also His servant, and took him from the sheepfolds:
71 From following the ewes great with young He brought him to feed Jacob His
people, and Israel His inheritance.
72 So he fed them according to the integrity of his heart; and guided them by
the skillfulness of his hands.
Psalm 78:65-72

Just when we tend to think that the situation is out of hand and irretrievable,
God goes into action and settles everything down. In this time in which we
live, there is so much chaos. I have written before that this would be the
result of our pushing God aside
and us relying on our own wisdom and intellect. What we have today is humanism
full blown. It is the "me and now" syndrome that grows our of deifying man and
humanizing God. We have made God one of us instead of us becoming more like
Him. It is the consequence of our thinking of ourselves as our god and not
taking that daily walk with God that we should have been taking.
What I am praying for more than wealth or health is for God to rise up and roar!
I want Him to express Himself as never before. I don't need for Him to do that
for my sake but we all need Him to do it for the world's sake. God has done
this from time to time when the situation called for it and I believe our
situation certainly calls for it today.
I want more than just a revival in the church though we certainly could use one.
I am talking about a spiritual move on God's part
that leaves the world awakened to His existence, His glory, His being. I want
to see every one: man, woman, and, child on their face acknowledging that Christ
is Lord and that God is sovereign in all things and that we are all His
sheepfold.
I want to point something out that Asaph speaks here. God chose Judah and He
chose mount Zion. Think seriously here about what is revealed about God in this
saying. God chose them. He did so because they met His criteria for subjects
of His kingdom at that time. If God were to choose a people today to be His own
special people, who is it that He would choose. Be careful how you answer that
question because those He has chosen may not be the ones that you would choose.
We would all choose those we most closely relate to doctrinally and spiritually.
We would turn others away. God searches the heart of the person and He knows
who is a person of faith and who is not and He understands the basis of that
person's faith. It has nothing at all to do with public appeal or personal
charisma that draws the masses around them, It has everything to do with that
person's faith in God and His trust of God.
So many want a God that will be there for them but really have no desire to be
there for God. God chooses those who will be there for Him. It is not a
denominational thing, it is a matter of the heart and soul of each person
individually. God chose Judah and God chose Zion and to this day both of these
are types of the church of God, not as some man-ruled denomination but as a
people who love God and are called according to His purpose and ready to do His
will no matter if it raises some eyebrows and upsets others in their
fellowships. We are not here to be rebels but we all are here to serve the Lord
even if that looks like rebellion to others.
Where would the church be today if it had not been for the Huss's and the
Luther's and those that followed them in the reformation?
The reformation happened because men of God come under conviction about how the
established church of man was going against the Christ created church of God.
They put their lives on the line literally to call others attention to the
atrocities going on in the name of God. Their lives did not matter, God's truth
did and that is what we need to resurrect in the church today and that will take
a movement of God to achieve. Pray for that movement. Pray for God to send
revival to the church and spiritual awakening to the world. Pray with me for
this.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

8 O remember not against us former iniquities: let thy tender mercies speedily prevent us: for we are brought very low. 9 Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of thy name: and deliver us, and purge away our sins, for thy name's sake. 10 Wherefore should the heathen say, Where is their God? let him be known among the heathen in our sight by the revenging of the blood of thy servants which is shed. Psalm 79:8-10 There was a time when sin was recognized for what it is but such cannot be said of the present. We have so blended sin into our lives that no one feels uncomfortable around it any more. To a large degree television is responsible for this because through this medium we invite it right into our homes and nowadays every room of our homes. I am not blaming television for our sins. What am saying is television has allowed us to grow comfortable with sin. It makes sin look normal and holiness of life fanatical. No one can deny that our very culture has changed because of television or it could be that television just made it easier for us to move into those areas it touted because the desire was there all along but because of fear of rejection by our peers we didn't go there. Again, I am not blaming television, I am blaming us for letting it happen. When the Bible speaks of iniquity, it is not speaking of only murder and mayhem, it speaks of all of those ways of life that God never intended for us to live. God created man and placed him in a garden called Eden. Eden was a place pure and holy and free from all the sins that are now so prevalent in the world around us today. Who can deny that all of us would like to go back to Eden and live there in preference to the ugliness of the world around us today. Oh yes, there are some decent things going on in the world around us but those things have ceased to be the norm, they are now the exception. God expelled man from Eden because man was no longer worthy to live there. Why? Because he had sinned against the very God that had created him by attempting to become His equal. All of humanity added together from Adam until now and until the end of time will never equal God. It is about time we come to that realization and get back to worshiping the One who Is above all others. Not to be a Christian leaves one only one other option and that is to be a heathen. The heathen believes he or she has achieved their goal of becoming God's equal. They live as though there is no God to answer to and if there is no God to answer to they are free to make up their own rules as they go along in life. This is called by those of us who still have the sanity to see it they way it really is, anarchy. Anarchy is the natural outcome of a godless life. Anarchy is what we have today especially in the realm of religion. One can not be an anarchist and be a Christian. Christians believe that God is and that He is the "rule-maker" and that His rules are to be faithfully adhered to. That is why you will not find Christians rioting in the streets seeking some mystical right to be Christian. Our protection comes from God and that is why you will find writers such as David talking to God instead of a man-made law-making body. Has it ever occurred to you that David, the king of Israel, was always seeking refuge in the Lord? If a king knows where his help comes from and the protection of himself and his kingdom, then why is it that we think we don't need God for the same reasons? God is and He does and He will see to His people and their right to exist in this world and in the one to come. No legislative body or religious assembly can make such a guarantee, only God. My faith is in Him and not any government of mankind and that is where it will always be. God is always the same and He tells me what to expect from Him when I live either as a Christian or a heathen. Either way, He is always true to His words and that being the case, heathen watch out for He will not ever be mocked or made to look impotent. God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

1 Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, thou that leadest Joseph like a flock; thou
that dwellest between the cherubims, shine forth.
2 Before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh stir up thy strength, and come and
save us.
3 Turn us again, O God, and cause thy face to shine; and we shall be saved.
4 O Lord God of hosts, how long wilt thou be angry against the prayer of thy
people?
5 Thou feedest them with the bread of tears; and givest them tears to drink in
great measure. Psalm 80:1-5

This Psalm is a continuation of the previous one found in Psalm 79. God is the
Shepherd of Israel. Joseph is the savior whom God leads. God sat on His mercy
seat in the holiest of places between the cherubim. Now, He is needed to shine
forth in His mercy for His people, Israel and Judah and the tribes beyond the
river Jordan. This is what Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh signify-Ephraim
for Judah, Benjamin for Israel, and Manasseh for those yet remaining beyond
Jordan. All are Israel, all are the total of the people that God has chosen for
His very own to shepherd.
Now, what is needed according to the writer of this Psalm is that God send
revival into all of the lands of Israel, His people. God has rejected them only
because they refused to walk in obedience to Him. They rejected His laws in
practice. They did not attempt to annul the laws of God, they simply did not
live by them thereby making the laws ineffective and impotent in the lands in
which they lived. In the words of the Old Testament they prostituted themselves
by worshiping other Gods which they had set up in the high places and wooded
plains. Oh yes, the temple still was visited but only as a way to placate God.
Their intent was not to worship Him but only appease Him thereby putting off His
judgments against their sins. They had brought sin into the camp and expected
God to tolerate it and, even give His approval to it. They continued to
sacrifice their unacceptable sacrifices which made God even angrier with them.
They were playing their religious games trying to keep all of the gods happy
along with the one true God of Israel. We see the same thing happening today.
People have just enough of God to fear Him somewhat but they have more fear of
public opinion than the opinion of God. The reason God was angry with the
prayers that they made was because those prayers were not made from an honest
and sincere heart. Thus, God fed them "the bread of tears" and gave them "tears
to drink in great measure". The joy of the Lord was replaced with the sorrow of
sin.
If we could only see ourselves as God does I think we would tremble. I get very
discouraged with the church and more so with the church than the world. The
world makes no pretense about being God's people but the church boasts that they
are and yet, when God calls them out to assemble themselves together they find
other things to do rather than to be where God's people are which is where God
is. I will never understand the rationale of some who believe that a one
service a week is ample evidence of love for God. So many congregations only
have one worship service a week these days because they cannot get enough people
back to do more than that.
And, yet, we call ourselves the church of God. Really? Even Nebuchadnezzar
demanded more than that from his people and got it. Does not God deserve
devoted service more than some worldly king? Some people will tell me that they
don't get anything much from those "other services" thus they don't attend. I
have a question to ask Just what are you getting out of staying away from them?
What deeply spiritual thing are you doing that justifies staying home or going
elsewhere? Just asking. I had rather be where God is than anywhere else even
if it doesn't send chills down my spine by being there. At least I am available
to God and for God to bless. Is there any wonder there is no revival for us?
We want God to send it but not to bother us with it. We want our loved ones to
be saved but don't ask us to go to any great lengths or run any risks or give
any extra time to see that they do come to Christ. I don't get it at all. If
God is indeed God, then why is it that we are so reluctant to serve Him as such?
As for me, I will serve the Lord. I will be the church which by the way means
those called out to assemble in worship and service. You do what you want-I
will do what HE wants.
God bless and go and have a good day.

 

[flightsimmer]

Sing aloud unto God our strength: make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob.
2 Take a psalm, and bring hither the timbrel, the pleasant harp with the
psaltery.
3 Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our solemn
feast day.
4 For this was a statute for Israel, and a law of the God of Jacob.
5 This he ordained in Joseph for a testimony, when he went out through the land
of Egypt: where I heard a language that I understood not. Psalm 81:1-5

All I have done for the past several weeks is to re-introduce you and
re-acquaint myself with the precious book of Psalms. It has been a good journey
and will continue until we have come all the way through it. One of the
precious things about this book of songs is that it focuses our attention on the
One that should have it. In this Psalm we are told to "sing aloud" unto the God
of our strength which is not to say, strength is God. Strength comes from God
but merely having physical strength does not make one godly. Even spiritual
strength alone is not enough to claim that we live a life of godliness for there
are many spirits at work in this world and not all of them are of or from God.
We are also told to make a "joyful noise" unto the Lord. We have supposed that
this means to sing beautifully well so that God can take pleasure from the sound
of our songs. I must say that many of us are not the best of singers but I must
also say that making a joyful noise unto the Lord has little to do with that
ability. This means that we should praise Him from our hearts and from the very
depth of our souls and spirits. Unless what we are saying to the Lord is from a
heart filled with His joy unspeakable the is full of recognition of His glory,
it is not joyful to Him no matter how beautifully well to the human ear it is
sang or said.
In my lifetime I have heard a great number of singers who have sung beautifully
well and, so well you would have thought that they were so very close to the
Lord. But, upon getting to know some of these singers more closely, you
discover many of them are just performers and not the saints they pretend to be.
I have a few songs that I can sing fairly well but singing is not my area of
giftedness. I can sing but others can do so much better than I and I prefer
they did the singing. I told a congregation that I pastored several years ago
that I would leave the special music department to those who did it best and I
would concentrate on the preaching and pastoring work. That worked out well.
Then, in this Psalm, we come to the area of musical instruments and worship. Do
we need them? Should we use them? Some say no and others see no harm in it and
even find that it enables them to get into a better frame of mind to worship.
There was a young man who was from a certain denomination that did not use
musical instruments in their services who also attended the church that I was
pastoring on Sunday evenings. He came in one evening and said, "Pasto, you
should not be using those instruments in your church!" He was pretty emphatic
about it. My response to him was that I would not come down too hard on him if
he didn't use them where he worshiped if he did not come down too hard on me
because we do. It is a little like the "necktie controversy" in the church of
God. Several people left this movement many years ago over the matter of men
wearing ties. I met a member of this "no-tie" group once and told him that if
he felt so convicted about not wearing a tie but all means he shouldn't but I
was under no such conviction of the Holy Spirit.
This brings us to the manner of our worship of God. For it to be worship it
must conform to the standard that He has set for us and not to the whims of
man's opinions. Everyone has an opinion but only the standards of God truly
matter. We worship from the heart and soul of our being the One who created us
and keeps us and lets us live in His holy house. I don't have much time or the
energy to go around tilting at spiritual windmills and I am afraid that is what
we do a great deal of the time when we get into the area of the right way to
worship and the music we use to do it. The only question that needs be asked
and answered is this, is what you are doing truly worship of God or is it merely
entertainment? Only you can answer that question for yourself as only I can
answer it for myself.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

6 I removed his shoulder from the burden: his hands were delivered from the
pots.
7 Thou calledst in trouble, and I delivered thee; I answered thee in the secret
place of thunder: I proved thee at the waters of Meribah. Selah.
8 Hear, O my people, and I will testify unto thee: O Israel, if thou wilt
hearken unto me;
9 There shall no strange god be in thee; neither shalt thou worship any strange
god.
10 I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy
mouth wide, and I will fill it.
11 But my people would not hearken to my voice; and Israel would none of me.
12 So I gave them up unto their own hearts' lust: and they walked in their own
counsels.
13 Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways!
14 I should soon have subdued their enemies, and turned my hand against their
adversaries. Psalm 81:6-14

Today, like every other day, belongs to the Lord. The problem is that many
don't belong to Him and that is a matter of personal choice. I belong to Him by
personal choice but I full well know that simply deciding to belong to Him was
not enough, He had to want me to belong to Him and to make away so that I could
and, He did just that. As the writer of this Psalm wrote better than two
thousand years ago, God called out to us because He did want us to belong to
Him.
It seems that all of us want to believe that we are able and fully capable of
rescuing ourselves but what we find out is that we are no where near capable of
doing that. Trouble comes that we nor any earthly power can resolve and we do
one of two things with that. We either deny that there is no earthly solution
or we take it to the Lord because we know that is the only place the help we
need exists. In this, we must listen to the Lord God of Israel. He is our
present help in times of trouble and the emphasis here is upon the words present
help. He is ever present and He is ever help.
Why is it then that we are so prone to think when our trouble is past that we or
some other human agent was responsible for the resolution of it? There is no
knowledge that man can acquire that God did not know and for that matter did not
create to be known, discovered. We study what God created to learn about the
possibilities of His creation and how that those created things were created to
benefit us. That is what science is. True science in any field or area of
study is a study of what God made and how that it can make things better for us.
Gold for wealth and the atomic and chemical makeup of the earth for health, who
put them there for us to find? God did. If He had not made them in the first
place they would not have been there for us to find in our time.
When it comes to wisdom and knowledge, what is it that you can know that God
does not already know? Not a thing. That is why He invites us to ask Him for
wisdom and knowledge in every area of life and living. When it comes to
science, He already knows to the most infinite measure the expanse of the oceans
and the lands that make up the earth. He also knows the composition of every
planet and celestial body of the universe. Things that we are just now
discovering are already known to Him. We will come to know these things when
the need arises for us to know them but God has known them all along.
Today, as you move through this day, know this: God is the sole source of
wisdom and knowledge. He knows all of the knowables and that being true, does
it not make sense to seek for truth, wisdom, and, knowledge by study and prayer?
He invites us and even begs us to come to Him for these things. The best thing
about this is that when we go to God for them they will all of them prove to be
true whether it be in the area of faith or in the area of science or the area of
the economy. This being true, then why not join me now in prayer to the one and
true God who knows all things and is willing to share what He knows with us as
we need to know it.
God bless and go a have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

God standeth in the congregation of the mighty; he judgeth among the gods.
2 How long will ye judge unjustly, and accept the persons of the wicked? Selah.
3 Defend the poor and fatherless: do justice to the afflicted and needy.
4 Deliver the poor and needy: rid them out of the hand of the wicked.
5 They know not, neither will they understand; they walk on in darkness: all the
foundations of the earth are out of course.
6 I have said, Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High.
7 But ye shall die like men, and fall like one of the princes.
8 Arise, O God, judge the earth: for thou shalt inherit all nations. Psalm 82

34 Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?
35 If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the scripture
cannot be broken;
36 Say ye of him, whom the Father hath sanctified, and sent into the world, Thou
blasphemest; because I said, I am the Son of God?
37 If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not.
38 But if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works: that ye may know,
and believe, that the Father is in me, and I in him.
John 10:34-38

To the leaders of the Jewish people the whole of what we call the Old Testament
was legally binding. If it said something, they were bound to what it said to
believe it and to put it into practice. I Psalm 82 God is reminding His
community of people that they are to judge righteously, even as He would judge,
in every situation and circumstance. What had happened is what is happening in
our world yet today, judges are bought and paid for by the political systems
they are appointed to serve. Our own Supreme Court is a prime example of this.
It makes decisions based on either public opinion or the politics of the day and
no longer on the intent of the Constitution or those who framed it. I do not
write this in a rage but as a matter of fact and who can deny that it is true?
For a long time now the courts of our land have been migrating away from
constitutional law and into the area of what I deemed to politically correct at
the moment. A true judge, a godly judge, would never judge any situation this
way. A true judge and a righteous judge would judge based on what is right
morally and ethically according to the God of heaven and never on what is deemed
correct based on public opinion. This is what Jesus meant when He said "If I do
the works of My Father believe in them even if you cannot find it in yourself to
believe in Me." So the emphasis is on the works rather than the man. If they
are the works of God then, believe in them.
I am not a person pleaser and quite often find myself the object of other
people's judgments. T had rather please the Lord any day than man because man
is so fickle. His opinions are easily swayed by the social and political
climate of the moment. There is little or no stability in mankind as a whole.
That is not a pessimistic view of man, it is realistic. All we have to do is to
go back to what we call Palm Sunday and the so-called triumphal entry of Jesus
into Jerusalem on that day. Five days later the mob is in the courtyard of
Pilate's judgment hall calling for Jesus' crucifixion on the cross. Explain
that to me if you can. I know that some say that these were two different
groups and not the same people at all. One was the general population of
Jerusalem and the other the lowest dregs of its social structure. I don't know
about that, but what I do know is that Jesus wept over all of Jerusalem and
pronounced that it was going to become a by-word, a house left desolate and
empty. And, it did.
Jesus is God. I never speak of Him as a was or a has been. He was a direct
descendant of David the King through Mary His mother.
He was a direct Son of God and in this way He brought God and man into one
Person, Himself. He was both, fully God in all things spiritual and fully man
in all matters of the flesh. Cut Him and He bled, torture His flesh and it
would die. But, He never, not once, wavered in the area of His Godly perfection
in every deed and every word. He is God and not merely a god. God has said of
us that we are gods and that is what His intent was from the very beginning. We
are not and never will be God but we are to be godly in all of our deeds and our
words and all of our judgments. Like the Jews of the past we quite often fall
far short of the glory that God intended for us. In order to have that glory we
must first give up the world and all of its trappings just as Jesus did. May
God enable us to be able to do that.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

8 O Lord God of hosts, hear my prayer: give ear, O God of Jacob. Selah. 9 Behold, O God our shield, and look upon the face of thine anointed. 10 For a day in thy courts is better than a thousand. I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God, than to dwell in the tents of wickedness. Psalm 84:8-10 We had a wonderful day with the church yesterday. What a marvelous God it is that we serve. It is not that the attendance was up or that we had a huge number in Sunday School, it was simply that the Holy Spirit was with us and blessed us as we presented the short musical that we had prepared for over the past three months. The people enjoyed it and we enjoyed doing it. That is what is so wonderful about serving the Lord and being in His courts, you do not need any outside stimulus to enjoy being there, the Holy Spirit is quite enough. There is much there to create for us a sense of belonging and a sense of peace and security. In a world where it seems everyone is bent on terrorizing others this is an environment in which one can feel the presence of God and fell His love. It is a place where we can offer up our prayers and our gifts to God and know that He has received them warmly and in the spirit in which they are offered. We do this because we love Him and because we know that our love for Him will be reciprocated. Indeed, a day in His courts is better than a thousand spent pursuing the things of this world. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord than to live worldly in a world of worldly pursuits. I saw on FOX news this morning a report about a "new style" of worship that is going on in New York City I believe. The young man being interviewed was very attractive and well-dressed. He had a certain charisma about himself and he described the manner in which he and others worship as being laid-back. Their services included eating and drinking wine and, according to the one doing the interview, this was the way it should have been all along. Really? When we come together to worship the Lord should we not be reverent and respectful of Him? I don't mean we have to be rigid and cold but we do need to take into account that we are there to serve God in a manner that gives Him the glory and that is sacrificial on our part. If we come together to worship only to be at another party, then where's the worship of God in that? Being in the presence of those who come with the sole purpose in mind of worshiping God and be servants of one another as Christ taught should be enough but, for some folks, I guess it isn't. I had rather be in the courts of the Lord than in the wide broadway of that leads down to hell. God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of
Abraham.
2 Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and Jacob begat Judas and his
brethren;
15 And Eliud begat Eleazar; and Eleazar begat Matthan; and Matthan begat Jacob;
16 And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is
called Christ.
17 So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and
from David until the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations; and
from the carrying away into Babylon unto Christ are fourteen generations.
Matthew 1:1-2 & 15-17

Genealogy was very important to the people of Israel and Judah. Being able to
prove your relationship to those of the past gave you legitimacy in the present.
Several in my family have done genealogical researches on our family, both the
Girts and the Kirbys.
They did not find what they were looking for necessarily and they did find a few
surprises. There is a man who was supposed to have been an ancestor of the Girt
family and the reason that the family condensed its name down from Girty to
Girt. His name was Simon and he had two brothers one of which began a small
town in Ohio called Girtytown. It was a trading post originally. Simon and his
brothers were mighty unpopular with the early settlers and especially with
Daniel Boone at the end of their days. Early on Daniel Boone and Simon Girty
and Simon Kenton were close friends but when Simon Girty aligned himself with
the British in the war of 1812, they parted ways. I did some research on this
while attending Oklahoma State University years ago. I used that subject matter
for a term paper for a course in American History and America's Westward
Expansion. It was very interesting but I never could find the connection
between he and his brothers and our family on my mother's side.
Enough of that. Let's get back to today's Scripture. Jesus knew His genealogy.
He knew His relationship with Abraham and even further back than that. He said
of Himself, "Before Abraham was, I am." This upset the religious rulers of His
day because they believed He was claiming to be God, and, He was and at the very
least a personal relationship to God that none other could claim.
Let the fact be known that as we come to what we have come to call Christmas
day, we are not celebrating the day He actually was born on, we are celebrating
the fact of His birth and those miracles that surround it. Both Joseph and Mary
were direct descendants of David who was the king of Israel. This is important
for messianic reasons. But, we must remember that Joseph was not the biological
father of Jesus Christ, he was his appointed by God guardian. He was told to
take Mary, the biological mother of Jesus Christ, to be his wife but not to have
any relationship with her until after the birth of Jesus. Jesus was, indeed,
born of a virgin. Mary was chaste and pure and a holy vessel to carry the Son
of God until it was time for Him to be born. But, even that is not enough
reason for us to go to all the trouble we go to in order to celebrate His birth.
It was not the manner of His birth that caught our attention, it was the manner
of His death and His resurrection. It is, even now the reason for the
celebration for if that latter is not true the birth and all the miracles
surrounding it are not worthy of our attention.
There is a huge push toward universalism today that the church of God must
resist with all its might. There is no religion nor the teachings of any
religion that can and will save a person's soul. Jesus Christ is the ONLY name
given on earth and that is acknowledged in heaven where by a person can be
saved. There are not "many roads" that lead to heaven, there is only the strait
gate and the narrow way taught by Jesus Christ. You can take any road you want
and if it is not the road that Christ taught, that road will lead to hell. For
those of us who are Christian and for all the world and its people, that is the
truth and it is the truth that we must abide and exist by. To do less will cost
us our relationship with God through His Son of whom He said, "This is My
beloved Son, hear ye Him." I know of no other person that God ever spoke those
words about, do you? So, hear Him and come with me and let's celebrated His
birth into our world two thousand years ago. Something mighty important in
human history is about to happen and very soon and I want to be on Christ's side
in that something, don't you?
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise: When as his mother Mary was
espoused to Joseph, before they came together, she was found with child of the
Holy Ghost.
19 Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a
publick example, was minded to put her away privily.
Matthew 1:18-19

Of all of those involved in the story of the birth of Jesus Christ, Joseph
intrigues me the most. Is he young or is he in his late twenties or is he in
his thirties? I have read and heard various statements concerning his age.
Mary was a young girl in her teens most likely but even that is left to
speculation. There are so many details left out concerning Mary and Joseph both
and there is a reason for that. They are not the main characters in this story,
the main character is Jesus Christ. They are important
to the story, of course, but they are not the focus, Jesus is.
Having said that, I still wonder about Joseph. From what few details we get
from the Scriptures about him we can speculate a lot. There is nothing said at
all about his stature in the community of Nazareth among his peers. Was he a
quiet fellow or an outgoing one? What attracted him to Mary and Mary to him?
Why was he going to be the father-figure in the life of the Son of God? From
what we read here in Matthew, he was a "just" man which means that he was not
too judgmental of others and looked for the right side of every issue. To be
"just" means that you thought long and hard before leaping to judgment. He was
most certainly that way with Mary who was as good as married to him. She was
his betrothed which means she had promised herself to him and when he found out
about her carrying a child that he knew was not his, he, even then, wanted to
protect Mary and the child. If this were to become a public issue both the
mother and the child would likely be put to death and at the very least they
would have been exiled from the community in shame. Joseph, even though he felt
betrayed, did not want that for Mary which tells me that he loved her very
deeply.
By trade he was a carpenter. This may not have meant then what it means now.
He worked with wood and I suspect that he was good at it but there is no way to
be sure of this. Later, when Jesus enters into the ministry God sent Him here
to perform, He was called a carpenter. He knew what it meant to make a set of
yokes for oxen that would make their work less exerting and a whole lot easier.
He said, "My yoke is easy and, My burden is light". That is a phrase He likely
learned from Joseph as He trained to take over his business once he was no
longer able to do it. When it was that Joseph stepped out of the picture
altogether, we cannot say. Somewhere along the way, he dies and Jesus takes
over the family business. Even by training Jesus to do this business, Joseph
was looking out for Mary and their children even in his absence through death.
By reading what the Bible has to say about Joseph we know that he was a
compliant man and especially willing to listen to God and go where he was sent
and to wait patiently for the next thing. He went to Bethlehem and from there
down into Egypt and then back to Nazareth. Did he know at all that by doing all
of these things as God commanded him to do, he was fulfilling prophecy
concerning
the coming of Israel's Messiah? I doubt very much that he did know but it
appears to be important to him to be in obedience to the Lord God of heaven and
the nation of Israel.
As I say, I have to assume these things but good evidence is there to
substantiate them. As I look into the life of Joseph, I see a role-model as a
husband, a father figure and a good citizen and, a good man all around. My goal
is not to be another Joseph, it is to be a faithful servant of the Father and
the Son of the Father. I want to be ready, as Joseph was, to go when God says
go and to stay when God says stay and to be what He wants me to be so that my
life can have served God's good purpose. That should be the goal of everyone.
Thank God for a man like Joseph.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king,
behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem,
2 Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star
in the east, and are come to worship him.
Matthew 2:1-2

So, the question is even yet today, where is He that is born King of the Jews?
In a world of chaos and anarchy, where is Christ Jesus? As we move to Christmas
Day, we have to ask that question. The angels promised peace on earth and
goodwill toward men. So, where is it? It seems that nearly everywhere there is
someone doing an injustice to someone else. The question that comes to my mind
is, who's to blame?
Christ is the Prince of Peace. He is the Mighty Counselor. He is Mighty God.
He is all of this and so much more but in order for us to experience all that He
is we have to first make way to where He is and worship Him as the Son of God
who has come to save us from our sins. The reason that our nation is in so much
trouble is that we have literally told Him that God has sent to us to save us
that we don't need His form of salvation. We are like the child that rejects
the offered help of a parent and tells them that we can do it ourselves. Of
course we cannot. The salvation that we all need can only come with Christ and
from Him. He is the mighty Savior of the world. God sent to us His only
begotten Son to have Him to believe in Him so that we can have eternal life. So
many have rejected that Gift from God and what a shame it is that they have done
so. God's offer was Peace but we will only have that peace when we access it in
the manner that God intended.
Today, as we gather with our family for a Christmas Eve gathering, we will do
our best to remind them all of the conditions that God set before us in the
Person of HIs only begotten Son. We must believe in HIM if we are going to have
eternal life and have peace with God. So, where can I find Him, the Christ of
God who takes away the sin of the world? He is only an act of worship away.
When the Magi found Him, He was living in a house with Mary His mother and her
husband Joseph. These men found Him there and as soon as they entered the house
they knew they had found justification for making such an arduous journey.
There He was, a little boy and they immediately fell down and worshiped Him and
offered Him gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. What He wants us to offer
Him is our hearts and our undying and unfailing love. So, this Christmas
season, why don't you and I do this? What one discovers upon making that
decision is that the peace that passes understanding suddenly settles upon the
heart and mind. It can be yours and it is there, waiting for you to find.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

3 When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem
with him. Matthew 2:3

The first thing upon bringing up my computer this morning to do this "Manna" was
to read that some Muslim cleric wrote that to say "Merry Christmas" is worse
than murder. For him that may be true but for those of us who own Christ as our
Lord, Savior, and King, not so. This cleric will find a place in eternity
alongside of Herod and they can commiserate together that they missed their
opportunity to know Him the way that we do.
Herod was a miserable man who was afraid to go to sleep at night. He had no
one, and I mean, no one to trust. His time of being king of Israel was a time
of intense suspicion of anyone and everyone whom he thought wanted his kingship.
When Christ was born, he "was troubled" and this means that he was further
perplexed. He wanted to find this new born king and kill him. Of course, we
know he didn't because God was looking after His Son which was another thing
that Herod had no concept of because he was a totally "godless" man.
Today, as we Christians around the world, celebrate the birth of our Savior and
Lord, may we remember His mission was to seek and to save that which was and is
lost. The price that Christ paid for our sins and His message of salvation for
all is why we celebrate. We do not celebrate for any other reason than that
explained to us in John 3:16 and 17. In Christ can be seen the pure love of God
and deep desire of God to save us from sin and from the world that wallows in
it.
God bless you and yours this Christmas Day. And, may those blessings follow you
into the new year.
God bless and go and have a blessed day.

 

[flightsimmer]

11 Teach me thy way, O Lord; I will walk in thy truth: unite my heart to fear
thy name.
12 I will praise thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart: and I will glorify thy
name for evermore.
13 For great is thy mercy toward me: and thou hast delivered my soul from the
lowest hell.
14 O God, the proud are risen against me, and the assemblies of violent men have
sought after my soul; and have not set thee before them.
15 But thou, O Lord, art a God full of compassion, and gracious, longsuffering,
and plenteous in mercy and truth.
Psalm 86:11-15

I heard a rumor about a brother in Christ the other day. He is a brother that I
have known for a good part of my life and the biggest part of his. I am praying
for him and his family and that he and they will survive and even be drawn
closer to the Lord than ever before as a result of this experience. One thing I
do know is that Satan is strong and getting stronger by the day. This is not
because God is weakening. It is because many are letting their guard down and
walking according to the will of the flesh and no longer in the spirit of the
Lord. Satan is good at giving us all a false sense of security and getting us
to believe that we are stronger than the next person. We are all of us
vulnerable to being drawn away by a thing that we would otherwise be able to
resist. Oh, how we must pray for the ministry of the church of God in these
days. The ministry of the church is under great pressure to perform and produce
and little comfort or support is offered to those who don't. Any failure on the
part of any minister is partly the fault of those he or she is ministering to
because the support and the accountability was not there for them that should
have been. Satan loves to separate the leaders from the rest of the flock. The
Psalmist wrote, "Teach me Thy way, O Lord". Every leader of any congregation of
the church of God must pray that way earnestly every day and all through the day
because Satan is going to keep looking for an opening and will find it if we
don't keep filling those gaps in our faith with prayer and faith and the Word of
God and the Holy Spirit of Jesus Christ.
One thing I do know is that God is just and kind and merciful toward us. He
does not judge us the way we have a tendency to judge one another. When a
brother or sister in Christ has a moment of weakness and succumbs to sin, we are
quick to turn on them and to want to dispose of them so that we don't have to
face their embarrassment with them. In times like these we need to ask the
question, what would Christ do? I think I know. He would boldly condemn the
sin and reach out to the sinner to rescue them and to restore them to the fold.
The problem is, we want to sweep these things under the rug, so to speak, and be
done with them as soon as we can so as not to be embarrassed by them ourselves.
If we do this, we will miss a wonderful opportunity to learn from the situation
the lessons that we need to learn. We put pastors and missionaries and
evangelists and youth leaders and other workers out there and offer them little
more than a little compensation for their efforts and then leave them to all of
the crafty assaults of the devil. If they fail they are on their own. They
should have known better and certainly should have done better.
If what I hear about this brother in Christ is true, wouldn't this be a great
time for those he has served so well over the years to rally to his side and to
take him by the hand and reassure him that he is not alone? Even if he did sin,
doesn't the Bible say in I John 2 that we have an advocate in Christ? This does
not mean that Jesus Christ will ever condone sin but He most certainly will
forgive it and He will restore the sinner. Isn't this the message we have been
preaching to the lost world for as long as there has been a ministry of the
gospel of Jesus Christ?
I am not as smart or nearly as wise as others who will have to face this
situation head-on, but I am sensitive to it and care deeply for those who will
have to do just that. May the blessed will and wisdom and grace of God be with
all parties involved.
God bless and go and have a great day.

 

[flightsimmer]

His foundation is in the holy mountains. 2 The Lord loveth the gates of Zion more than all the dwellings of Jacob. 3 Glorious things are spoken of thee, O city of God. Selah. 4 I will make mention of Rahab and Babylon to them that know me: behold Philistia, and Tyre, with Ethiopia; this man was born there. 5 And of Zion it shall be said, This and that man was born in her: and the highest himself shall establish her. 6 The Lord shall count, when he writeth up the people, that this man was born there. Selah. 7 As well the singers as the players on instruments shall be there: all my springs are in thee. Psalm 87:1-7 Here is a blessed truth. No other "foundation" can be laid than that which God has laid. Think this through with me because it is of the utmost importance. When the Psalmist wrote these words, what was it that he saw as a deep spiritual truth that most people never give a consideration to? He saw the church as the mountain of God and His foundation is in the church of God and the foundation of the church of God is the Son of God. Paul got it when he wrote that no man but the Son of God could ever be looked to as the foundation of the church of God. The disciples were foundation stones built upon the true foundation, Jesus Christ. They were built into the foundation of the church but were not themselves its foundation. When one begins to build a house, he digs around the perimeter of the planned building. He then pours a footer and then he lays blocks on the footer and from there the rest of the building goes up. If the foundation is bad it matters not how well he builds the rest of the house, it will not stand the test of time. This is a tied and proven truth that every building contractor is aware of and cannot deviate from if they intend to stay in business. The "holy mountain" in the Psalm is the church of God and Christ is in it. Verse 2 goes on to say that God loves the "gates" of Zion. Zion is another term for the mountain of God or the holy mountain which is the church. Why does God love the "gates"? He loves the gates because they are strait and the only way to pass through them is by the way given to us by Scripture. Christ is the "door" to the sheepfold which means that He has the key to the gates of the kingdom of God and it matters not which direction you come from to get there, everyone has to enter through the gates in the same manner. God loves the gates because they typify the manner of our salvation through His Son, Jesus Christ. Jesus tells us that He is the Way and the Truth and the Life and that no one can come to the Father but by Him. That makes it as plain as it can get and I cannot do anything or say anything that will make it any plainer. There is no other way into the church except through the gate that God has set in place and the name of the gate is Jesus. By Him we access the grace of God by faith in Him and by that faith we inherit eternal life. Zion is the eternal city of God and it is not temporal city built by man in any age, it is the city that God has built and continues to build on the sure foundation of Him who is truth and life. O, I can speak glorious things of this "holy mountain" which is called Zion. It has ever been my spiritual home for as far back as I can remember. I came to that mountain over 60 years ago and, though tempted to come down from it from time to time, I have stayed there with Jesus and it has been a glorious place to be. One of these days the Lord is coming and He is going to look in His book and there He will find my name and note that I have been there and He will take me to go and be with Him in His heaven. What a promise to rest on as we begin this day. God bless and go and have a great day.