Absolutely nothing to do with prayer

I was inspired by this You Tube video.

John 10:10

Ahh … the message of the LIFE giver.

“I came that they may have life, and have it abundantly.”

So we welcome You, Jesus. Bless you for the meaning of Easter, which means that one day we will see You face to face.

Until then we welcome the increase of the LIFE of heaven in our lives and we welcome Baby Zoe Apphia whose name means “LIFE Increasing”.

Check out her debut photo here.

Score Card

Lived in this house 174 days or 25 weeks or roughly 6 months.

Animals Acquired
4 cats
1 rabbit
1 rooster
1 hen

Status of Said Animals
3 obnoxious, trash eating cats, 1 MIA
rabbit is not a female, but desperately missing female companionship
rooster has frostbite on wattle and comb
hen was found dead in barn of some respiratory ailment

I’m not sure this is a good score card so far. It certainly is not boding well for the animals.

Psalm 22 – Good Friday Victory Cry

I know that many of you heard this in services last week, but I was so moved by it that I think it bears meditating on during this holy week.

On the cross, Jesus cried out, “my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”

I have always looked on this phrase with great despair and agony at the enormity of what Jesus bore for me on the cross. While that can never be overlooked, this phrase is so full of threat to the enemy that it is as much a cry of agony as it is a battle cry.

Rabbi’s of Jesus day employed a teaching technique where the teacher would say the beginning of a verse or passage, and expect his students to finish the passage. Psalm 22 (text here) describes the agony of Jesus’ death and the agony of abandonment that belonged to us because of the sin that separates us from the Father.

But Psalm 22 doesn’t end with the crowds mocking Jesus, with all his bones out of joint, with people casting lots for his clothing. Psalm 22 ends with these words.

22I will tell of Your name to my brethren;
In the midst of the assembly I will praise You.
23You who fear the LORD, praise Him;
All you descendants of Jacob, glorify Him,
And stand in awe of Him, all you descendants of Israel.
24For He has not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted;
Nor has He hidden His face from him;
But when he cried to Him for help, He heard.
25From You comes my praise in the great assembly;
I shall pay my vows before those who fear Him.
26The afflicted will eat and be satisfied;
Those who seek Him will praise the LORD
Let your heart live forever!
27All the ends of the earth will remember and turn to the LORD,
And all the families of the nations will worship before You.
28For the kingdom is the LORD’S
And He rules over the nations.
29All the prosperous of the earth will eat and worship,
All those who go down to the dust will bow before Him,
Even he who cannot keep his soul alive.
30Posterity will serve Him;
It will be told of the Lord to the coming generation.
31They will come and will declare His righteousness
To a people who will be born, that He has performed it.

Jesus was telling the world – seen and unseen – that he was not going to be abandoned to the grave, that he would be king over all the nations of the earth, he would be worshipped and adored for all eternity and that the ends of the earth would remember what he was accomplishing on the cross.

SO enemies of God know this – I am part of the posterity that will serve him and declare his righteousness forever and forever! Bless you Jesus for what you have done for me. I am forever in your debt and I will pour out my life for you as long as I have breath. Bless you Jesus forever and forever. Amen

Glorious Cause – Part 2

Oh how I wish I was eloquent and able to express things in a articulate way. David was the master of poetic expressions to the LORD. In Psalm 45:1, David writes:

 My heart is stirred by a noble theme
as I recite my verses for the king;
my tongue is the pen of a skillful writer.

So in my opinion, the glorious cause of Christ is to reunite us with God. To bring us back into a relationship with the God whose heart is inclined with love towards us.

Somebody else…articulate this for me – please.

Rooster – Again and Again

Great – now Teresa (see her comment on last rooster entry) is hearing roosters even on vacation in Hawaii and using them as prayer prompters for me.

LORD – you have some interesting ways to prompt us pray, but really do you have to associate me with roosters in peoples’ minds? Seems like you are getting a pretty good chuckle out of this.

Rooster – again

Three rooster things in 24 hours…what is the LORD trying to tell me?

(For those of you new to this blog, we have rooster issues. See my entry from Jan. 18 and Steve’s posts from Jan 18 and 20. His Gatepost blog link is on the right. And yes that is the rooster in his office, and yes, it did spend the night in our garage when it was 20 below zero.)

Rooster Event #1 – Outside in the balmy weather last night, I heard the rooster. He must not have done anything with his clock for day light savings time. Maybe he’s just mad because he got frost bite on his comb and wattle this winter.

Rooster Event #2 – Watching some stupid “World’s most amazing videos” – type show last night, and here’s a segment on a rooster. Apparently in Istanbul, Turkey, some kid got accused of stealing a rooster which led to a knock down fight at the court house between his family and the owners of the alledged rooster.

Rooster Event #3 – This wonderful You Tube video came to my attention this morning after a small snippet caught my attention on a news web site on wild animals in city limits.

All of you with the gift of interpretation…I need a little help with this, because all I see is crock pots and frying pans.

The Glorious Cause

With all my heart, I believe the old adage that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. American history is full of of moments of divine intervention, of godly men and women who made courageous decisions, and moral characters that can teach us much about how to respond to the battles of our day and age.

So here’s the book I am reading right now. Shaara is one of my favorite authors of all time. As a historian, he has a commitmment to write about these familiar characters through the lenses of their own times and their own words. So often today, there is a need to make these figures “human” through our 21st century mindsets. Titillating situations and ways to blacken characters of the past whose moral standards were a product of their day and time are invented or enlarged to denegrate those who have been heros for centuries. Our need to make them more like us reflects so dramatically on the moral decay that is our normal lens on life and the world around us. I’m not saying that these men were flawless, because they did make colossal mistakes in many areas particularly in the area of natives and slaves. BUT for the most part their integrity and character shine a spotlight on the putrid decay of our society today.

Scripture emphasizes our need for purity in thought, word and deed by showing how far the world will fall in the last days.

II Timothy 4:3-4 talks about the way that truth will be supressed in doctrine, but I think this will apply to anything that would inspire us to take up a cause that is counter to the mindset of the last days.

For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.

For example, the world wants to hear that abortion is a remarkable alternative to life, so they find authoritative people who can’t decide when life begins. Is it when the cord is clamped? Or even when, as Barak Obama says, “when it is welcomed into the human family”/”loved”.

Who are your teachers, and what are they teaching you about the glorious cause of Christ?

Middle of the Night: Homesick

I love the way the LORD wakes me in the middle of the night. When He is the one who wakes me up He either gives me a prayer burden, a song that expresses His heart, or gives me a song that tells me what my spirit is singing to him. Psalm 16:7 says:
I will bless the LORD who has counseled me;
Indeed, my mind instructs me in the night.

At night the quiet allows the LORD to show me what my spirit is saying to the LORD.

Last night I woke up several times singing the chorus to a song over and over.

All I want is to be near You,
With You where You are.

The homesickness for the LORD has overwhelmed me again. The yearning to be with Him draws me to meet wiht him in prayer even when I sleep and am not conscious of my longing.

Come LORD Jesus!

God

This morning we sang the amazing song by Glenn Pakiam – Everlasting God.

One thing I know that I have found
Through all the troubles that surround
You are the Rock that never fails,
You never fail

One thing I know that I believe
through every blessing I receive
You are the only One that stays, You always stay

Chorus

You never change, You’re still the same
You are the Everlasting God
You will remain after the day is gone and the things of earth have passed
everlasting God

Verse 3:
One thing I know that I have found
Through all the troubles that surround
You are the Rock that never fails, You never fail

Chorus
You never change, You’re still the same
You are the Everlasting God
You will remain after the day is gone and the things of earth have passed
everlasting God

And I was overwhelmed just thinking about who God is. All those qualities that I so flippantly say … creator, King of the universe, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent …

That God That God cares about me.

Just think about God … everything that He is … is available to each of us now

His hand is on us. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me.

This is where I learn to pray. When I begin to grasp who He is.