Oct 24, 2017- 1st Service Suggested Reading Psalm 62

One thing God has spoken, two things I have heard: “Power belongs to you, God, and with you, Lord, is unfailing love”; and,“You reward everyone according to what they have done.”

Psalm 62:11,12 (NIV)

It is relaxing to know from scripture that it is OK even GOOD to talk to yourself! David talks to himself- he tells his soul to find rest in God, he tells himself that God is his fortress, his rock, his salvation. He reminds himself that his salvation and HONOUR depend on God. What a wonderful truth to remind ourselves of- that I can’t save myself, nor can I protect my reputation- but that salvation and honour are completely dependent on God. David ends this psalm by reminding Himself of what he heard God say- that God is power and that with this power is unfailing love. Our world has a saying “absolute power corrupts absolutely” – which seems to be true about humans but is absolutely false when it comes to God. God has absolute power and also has unfailing love, he is the opposite from corrupt- he is Holy Holy Holy. May I trust this God today with everything, my salvation and my honour- for He is POWER and He is LOVE!

October 22, 2017 - 2nd Service Suggested Reading Exodus 28

Also put the Urim and the Thummim in the breastpiece, so they may be over Aaron’s heart whenever he enters the presence of the LORD. Thus Aaron will always bear the means of making decisions for the Israelites over his heart before the LORD.

Exodus 28:30 (NIV)

Here we have the fascinating instructions concerning the clothes the man who represents God’s people must wear when He enters the Most Holy Presence of the Holy Holy Holy God. I cannot help but think of our Lord entering the true Holy of Holies- what does He wear as He intercedes continually in the Presence of our Heavenly Father? Aaron wore a breastplate of decision. We could take time and wonder at the meaning of the various stones that represented the 12 tribes, or time trying to understand what the Urim and Thummin are and how they work, and that time would be profitable time. But let us consider the placement of the breastplate on the man. The breastplate is worn over his heart! Note this place and remember that although we know the heart is the seat of our emotions, it is also the seat of our will. We know that our decisions are made in our mind - do we know that our mind only thinks on the things our heart directs it to? Oh heavenly Father move in our hearts as we approach you by ourselves in worship today- may our hearts be set on your kingdom, may our minds dwell on heavenly thoughts.

October 22, 2017 - 1st Service Suggested Reading Numbers 11

But Moses replied, “Are you jealous for my sake? I wish that all the Lord’s people were prophets and that the Lord would put his Spirit on them!” 

Numbers 11:29 (NIV) 

Moses was discouraged by the people’s attitude towards God. They were grumbling - God was killing them - and Moses had enough! He says to God “Please kill me now! My task of leading your people is impossible!” The amazing response from the LORD (and the central point of this chapter) is to have Moses select 70 elders, gather them around the tent of meeting, and when God came down in the cloud to talk with Moses, the power of the Spirit transferred onto these men for a time. More questions then answers come from this chapter- but it seems pretty clear that Moses received the encouragement he needed to carry on as the leader of God’s people. The Lord was similarly encouraged when He heard reports of the Spirit’s power working thru the seventy He sent out. Here we are today in 2017 and Moses’ wish has come true! God has put His Spirit on all of us, every single Christian in our church has the Holy Spirit and the power of the Spirit- His Word is true, His people are all prophets, and what an encouragement it is to be a leader among the Spirit filled and led people of Parkdale.

Job 3:20-26

"Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death." 

Revelation 20:14 (NIV) 

Job 3:20-26

This headline caught my eye on the editorial page this morning: “This is the year we choose death over indignity.” I didn’t bother reading the article, because I was sure that I would read an article congratulating Canadians on being ‘progressive’ or ‘sophisticated’ enough to believe that every person should have the ‘right’ to end their own life. The headline was enough for me! My father died this June and his last days on earth were filled with pain and the desire to die that Job expressed. His last 48 hours in particular stripped any dignity from him that he had left.

I feel that I have a glimpse of understanding of the ability of pain and disease to strip away our dignity - a glimpse only - but for sure I have been very close to it, not only with my father, but with other family members and church family. I don’t want to argue using the strong case contained in the Word for submitting to God’s timetable for a person’s death - as a matter of fact - I don’t want to argue about it at all, I just want to point out to myself and whoever reads this post, that there is no dignity in death - in any death - in any type of death. Job voices that he thinks being stillborn is better than going through misery before death, yet talk to a mother about the death of her stillborn. We read of Moses death at 120 years, still strong and vital, wouldn’t that be a death with dignity? Moses didn’t think so, for he was being humbled before his people for his pride.

There is no dignity in death. It is a terrible terrible state of affairs that we live under, this sentence of death and we are powerless to stop it, or to somehow make it more dignified (really!) by cutting short the pain that our bodies suffer as we fight to live. This is one of the most amazing truth about God’s Only Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. The Bible teaches that He willing surrendered to indignity for you and me! Not just the indignity of death, but also of suffering a humiliating shameful, painful death! He did this willingly for you and me, that we might have true Life in His Name, and that one Day - one glorious Day - we will stand at His side and watch Him destroy death forever!

Come Lord Jesus Come!

"Come Thou Long Expected Jesus", Chris Tomlin, via YouTube

Proverbs 31:10-31

"To the woman he said,...“Your desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you.”
Genesis 3:16 (NIV)
Proverbs 31:10-31

A husband and wife living together in unity can be summarized with this exhortation: “Grab each other's hand and go through it together!”

Adam and Eve were one flesh; they were united in thought and deed. Some friends of mine give Adam a hard time. They think Adam should have told his wife not to eat the fruit, and yet I see the account in Genesis 3 as proof of their unity. Adam didn’t rule over Eve, but he was beside her. She decided to eat, so he ate. He decided to hide so they both hid. The curse God spoke to the man and his wife, is carried out in every marriage that has ever been! The curse is a curse of DISUNITY, the wife wants to rule the relationship, but the man rules with an iron fist.

I don’t enjoy reading this curse but I love to read the account of the Wife of Noble Character in Proverbs 31. What strikes me when I read this passage is the confidence and trust that the husband has in his wife and that the wife has in her husband. Nowhere in this passage do you get a hint that the husband is ruling the wife, nor do you get a hint that the wife is trying to rule the husband. You get a sense that they are in unity together, blessing each other’s efforts and filling their own God given roles. And it is beautiful. Marriage as it can be through the power of the LORD!

Proverbs tells us twice that it is, “better to live on a corner of the roof than share a house with a quarrelsome wife.” (21:9 & 25:24), yet in the chapter 31 passage, her husband has full confidence in her and praises her. I heard a preacher say that this passage is impossible! He pointed out that the passage starts with: A wife of noble character who can find? and told us that women need to recognize that this is an ideal description not reality. I think his motives were good; he doesn’t want ladies reading this passage and operating under guilt - but I find that approach discouraging. What I would ask is this: Men, have you found the wife of noble character? That is, have you recognized the wife that the LORD brought to you is the woman of Proverbs 31? Do you see her with the eyes of God? Will you give her your confidence and stop ruling over her? Will you praise her and say out loud in her hearing: “Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all"?

Let us be those who grab our spouse’s hand and go through whatever it is that is facing us - TOGETHER - with full confidence in each other!

Proverbs 31:10-31

"The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down." 

   Proverbs 14:1 (NIV) 

Proverbs 31:10-31

Feminists scoff at the idea of holding the position of being a wife in high regard, for they deliberately ignore that when God created humans, He created them male and female and He made them man and wife. Marriage, defined as a man and a woman in a life-long covenantal relationship, is the highest and holiest relationship known to humans. It is the primary relationship and all other relationships - even civil society - are built upon marriage.

The importance of marriage can be compared to the cells that make up all matter. These cells are made up of various members and yet they operate as a unit and together with other cells, they form complex organisms and structures. God brought the woman to the man and they became one flesh; perfectly united - two individual parts, but together they are one. All of humanity is based and built upon the relationship of marriage.

This verse in Proverbs teaches that in marriage the wife holds the power to the unity of the relationship: “she can build her house, or she can tear it down”. When a woman decides before God to be the woman that He wants, calls and empowers her to be, she builds her house. I don’t know if you have seen the sign, “Welcome to the nut house” but whenever I see it above a door of a house, I chuckle. The truth is that there is no such thing as a perfect house; every family has dysfunction. BUT there is such a thing as a WISE wife, a WISE mother and she has power that the husband and father doesn’t have. She has the power to either build or tear down her own house, with her own hands.

If you are a wife or a mother, may God bless you as you seek to build up your family in wisdom. If you are a husband or a child may you rise and call your wife or mother “blessed”. Not only do these ladies hold the power over their own families, how they build their families determines the strength of our society!

Isaiah 65:17-25

 "The wolf and the lamb will feed together, 

and the lion will eat straw like the ox, 

and dust will be the serpent's food. 

They will neither harm nor destroy

on my holy mountain, says the LORD." 

Isaiah 65:25 (NIV) 

Isaiah 65:17-25

Last week the newspapers shouted: “The pope teaches that dogs will be in heaven!” No matter if he is right or wrong or if the newspapers are making stuff up again to sell copies, it got me thinking about this passage in Isaiah which describes the new heaven and new earth, and feeling very SORRY for the lowly snake.

The similarities between Genesis 1 & 2 and Revelation 21 & 22 are marvelous and teach us the truth that God’s original design will be restored in the new earth, albeit with some changes. According to Isaiah 65 one of those changes will be the status of the lowly snake. POOR SNAKE! We are not told in the creation account what the snake looked like, nor how it moved, but part of God’s curse on this animal for being used by Satan was that it would crawl on its belly and eat dust! Things are better for the wolf, the lamb and the lion (dogs aren’t mentioned in this passage) on the new earth, but the POOR SNAKE is still eating dust! What a marvelous place the new earth will be – where death is no longer, where we who are His are holy in every way, and where God’s creatures who because of the curse became predators, are fulfilling once again the peaceful purposes for which He created them!

Come long expected Jesus, Come!

"Come Thou Long Expected Jesus", Chris Tomlin, via YouTube