LET’S ACCEPT THE CHALLENGE

We accept the culture as is.  We are reluctant to challenge it.

Here is a thought I will throw out to you.  Unafraid of what you might discover, read the Bible every day.  In fact, a further thought:  read through the Bible over and over and over for the rest of your life.  We have only one Holy Bible, only one life.

You are living with the breath you are privileged to take in day by day, the heartbeat you hardly think about (unless it begins to cause trouble).  All of this brings life and thought and emotion and inspiration through the brain and the “spirit, soul and body”.  How does this work?  When scientists begin to try to understand and explain “inspiration” or “giftedness” or the “spirit” and “soul” as it is in combination with the body, they are at a loss.

Why?  We are created in the image of God, the Triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Christians are aware of the relationship of our inner being with Almighty God, Creator of the heavens and the earth.  He is also Creator of the person you are, the complete person.  “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God and the Word was God.  The same was in the beginning with God.  All things were made by Him and without Him was not anything made that was made.” John 1:1-3.

The simple challenge is this:  read and meditate on the Word.  The Word of God that lives and abides forever.  See what happens within your spirit and soul and body.  I promise you this: if you read through the Bible, you will begin to be intimate with your Creator, Jesus.  You will never be the same.

A caution: get a translation of the Bible (rather than an interpretation, which may or may not be God’s Word).  Just for a while, stop reading anything else, anybody else.  When you are listening to a teacher or preacher in the Church, ask yourself, “Does this person challenge me to draw near to the LORD?  Is it what I know the Holy Spirit says directly from Scripture?”

And then, stay in this mode until you experience the Teacher, the Comforter, the Helper: your Creator.

Jesus quoted from the Old Testament, “It is written that man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God." (Deuteronomy 8:3; Luke 4:4)

ON MY MIND FOR A LONG TIME...

For a long time, Isaiah 58 has given me concern.  Are we (am I) guilty of just pretending to seek God and obey Him? Or am I passionate to love and give Him my honest obedience? We want the most successful life here and now, given our gifts and opportunities.

Here is Isaiah 58 from The Modern King James Version.

Cry aloud, do not spare, lift up your voice like a ram's horn, and show My people their rebellion, and the house of Jacob their sins. 

Yet they seek Me daily, and delight to know My ways, as a nation that did righteousness, and one who did not forget the ordinance of their God. They ask of Me the ordinances of justice; they take delight in drawing near to God. 

They say, Why have we fasted, and You do not see? Why have we afflicted our soul, and You take no knowledge? Behold, in the day of your fast you find pleasure, and crush all your laborers. 

Behold, you fast for strife and debate, and to strike with the fist of wickedness; you shall not fast as you do today, to make your voice to be heard on high. 

Is it such a fast that I have chosen? A day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head like a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Will you call this a fast and a day pleasing to Jehovah? 

Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed ones go free, and that you break every yoke? 

Is it not to break your bread to the hungry, and that you should bring home the wandering poor? When will you see the naked and cover him; and you will not hide yourself from your own flesh? 

Then shall your light break out as the dawn, and your health shall spring out quickly; and your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of Jehovah shall gather you. 

Then you shall call, and Jehovah shall answer; you shall cry, and He shall say, Here I am. If you take the yoke away from among you, the pointing of the finger, and speaking vanity; and if you draw out your soul to the hungry, and satisfy the afflicted soul; then shall your light rise in darkness, and your darkness shall be as the noonday. 

And Jehovah shall always guide you and satisfy your soul in dry places, and make your bones fat; and you shall be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water whose waters fail not. 

And those who come of you shall build the old ruins; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; and you shall be called, The repairer of the breach, The restorer of paths to dwell in. 

If you turn your foot because of the Sabbath, from doing what you please on My holy days, and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of Jehovah, honorable; and shall honor Him, not doing your own ways, nor finding your own pleasure, nor speaking your own words, then you shall delight yourself in Jehovah; and I will cause you to ride on the high places of the earth, and feed yourself with the inheritance of .Jacob your father. For the mouth of Jehovah has spoken. Isaiah 58:1 thru 14. 

The New Testament affirms this Old Testament chapter. “For whatever things were written before were written for our learning, so that we through patience and comfort of the Scriptures might have hope.” Romans 15:4.

The promise to you and me when we seek Him sincerely: “Then shall your light break out as the dawn, and your health shall spring out quickly; and your righteousness shall go before you; the glory of Jehovah shall gather you…you shall call, and Jehovah shall answer; you shall cry, and He shall say, Here I am.” Verses 8 and 9.