Following Jesus Son of God …

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The scene in this picture is very different than it was just a few minutes earlier.

The colors have faded away; the orange and pink that were so apparent have vanished as if they were never there.

Two thoughts I have here. As we read the holy words and God speaks to us:

1) write down our thoughts and

2) respond to the words to which the Spirit has directed our hearts

In the following text we see that these people had followed God to the promised land but they no longer believed the promise.

The colors faded on the journey. They could not believe God at the threshold of the promised territory because they had not responded to him by faith on the journey.

They still had a “picture” of the promise but the colors had faded because of their unbelief.

Hebrews 3.
7 So, as the Holy Spirit says: “Today, if you hear his voice, 8 do not harden your hearts as you did in the rebellion, during the time of testing in the desert, 9 where your fathers tested and tried me and for forty years saw what I did. 10 That is why I was angry with that generation, and I said, `Their hearts are always going astray, and they have not known my ways.’

Another advantage to a fresh reading of the holy book of God …

Sometimes a familiar text sneaks up on us as we read, especially if we are not reading a Bible that is marked up as sometimes our underlining and highlighting “tell us” what the text says before we even read it.

This happened to me as I read through Lamentations two days ago.

As I made my way through the darkness of the lament, the agony and anguish of a people on the wrong side of God’s judgment, this very familiar text surprised me.

Not because it was unfamiliar but because of the dark background of despair that was painted in my mind as I approached God’s call to hope.

Lamentations 3.21-26

21 Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope:

22 Because of the LORD’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.

23 They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.

24 I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.”

25 The LORD is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him;

26 it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD.

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This is my beast; she’ll be 4 years old in November. Effects courtesy of Toon Paint app.  The geo-tagging is really cool.  Click to find where I was when I took the pic.  Pretty groovy.

The gift of thanks … to God.

It is not enough to just be thankful; we need to realize that “God did it.”

Many millions of people are thankful but don’t realize that God is there, that God did it.

Case in point …
I heard our furnace “kick on” this morning and immediately was aware of the provision of God.

Instantly I knew that God had provided the warm breeze flowing through our house.

The same thing often happens when I push my Delta handle forward and to the left and get hot, fresh water from the tap. Or push it forward and to the right for a cool refreshing drink.

• Deuteronomy 6.10-12
  The Lord your God will bring you into the land he promised to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and he will give it to you. The land has large, growing cities you did not build, houses full of good things you did not buy, wells you did not dig, and vineyards and olive trees you did not plant. You will eat as much as you want. But be careful! Do not forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt where you were slaves.

So I don’t forget and not forgetting I know that God will continue to provide forever.

I am so thankful for my gift.

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A beautiful day in the neighborhood; found this big CAT prowling around.

Not positive but pretty sure I had the Holy Spirit shaking his head.

“Dave, Dave, Dave …” I heard.

From my previous post – If God did country music …

So, yes, I think I could almost hear God laughing. Maybe the members of the Holy Trio were deciding who was going to play banjo, steel guitar, harmonica, etc.

Whatever it was God did speak to me.

Yes! I am coming out of the closet and saying that the Holy Spirit, the third member of the Holy Trio, the Person who lives in me, communicates to me in a very personal way.

And I am just sure I heard him chuckle awhile ago.

From Revelation 2 …
To the Church at Ephesus …

“You don’t love me anymore.”

“I know you’ve worked hard to get where you are.”

“You never gave up; never copped to the lies.”

“But here’s the one thing, darlin’.”

“You don’t love me anymore.”

“You left love for success and you got it.”

“But now you don’t have me.”

“Said you were doing it for me, and maybe it started out true.”

“But, darlin’, your love became business; now I’m takin’ my name off the door.”

• Revelation 2.2-4 NCV
  I know what you do, how you work hard and never give up. I know you do not put up with the false teachings of evil people. You have tested those who say they are apostles but really are not, and you found they are liars.  You have patience and have suffered troubles for my name and have not given up.  But I have this against you: You have left the love you had in the beginning.

God is serious about his love!

Fight for “freedom” in opposition to God and you walk yourself into a prison of your own choices and perspective.

Submission to God is …

Freedom
Peace
Trust
Strength

Submission is like a missing formula for life EXCEPT it isn’t missing but plainly displayed in God’s holy book.

It is only missing in our lives too often.

That is the mystery.

So when we rebel against God by refusing to put on our clothes of humility, maybe we should consider …

1 Peter 5.7
Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time.

Humble ourselves and wait for God to show himself as God.

Like us, they were probably willing to bow before God but not as he directs.

The previous verse calls them to bow before each other, to clothe themselves with humility and to submit to each other.

This is where many – most – miss an opportunity to come into the presence of a sovereign Lord because he or she cannot bow in the everyday per God’s direction.

Much of our evangelical angst concerning the politics of the day involves our refusal to bow before God in the everyday events and relationships of our lives.

We are more concerned about someone else’s morals than devotion to Christ evidenced by loving obedience.

Just got another truck added; gotta’ go.

I have 12 Bibles, a Greek NT, commentaries and more …

Good translations – NASB, NIV. NKJV, KJV, ESV, NLT, NCV, GW …

In my pocket!

For very little expense.