Monthly Archives: May 2015

Herald Of His Coming

Bible Study, , , , ,

HERALD OF HIS COMING

The beginning of the good news about Jesus the Messiah, the Son of God. As it is written in Isaiah the prophet: “I will send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way” – “a voice of one calling in the wilderness, ‘Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for Him.'” And so John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness, preaching a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins. (Mark 1: 1-4).

Israel’s migration through the wilderness from Egypt to the Promised Land was recognised in Scripture as symbolic of their journey through life. In order to navigate the treacherous and unknown path, they had to follow the landmarks which God pointed out to them on the way. He promised to accompany them, to show them the right way and to keep them from wandering off the path, getting lost and dying without food and water. His word would light the way for them.

Their destination was Mount Zion, (tsyiown – meaning landmark) the highest point in the city of Jerusalem. God had told them that it was in Jerusalem that He would establish His name. When they were settled in the land, they were to go to Jerusalem three times a year to celebrate His appointed feasts which were prophetic of the work of the promised Messiah.

There were obstacles and dangers on the way. If they wandered off the path by failing to keep His commandments, they would die but, if they realised they were lost, they were to return to the path by repenting of their disobedience and by following His instructions (Torah – His commandments) which would keep them on the path and take them to their destination.

It was this imagery which lay behind the opening words of Mark’s gospel. His announcement – “the beginning of the good news about Jesus, the Messiah, and the Son of God” would put his readers in the picture. Using Hebraic thought, he related the story of John the Baptist whose role was to call the people to repent (shuv – meaning to return to the path from which they had wandered and got lost).

Isaiah had prophesied, centuries before, that God would send a man ahead of the Messiah to prepare His way and to announce His arrival like the herald who would go before a king to alert the people that he was coming. God’s people had wandered off the path through disobedience and misunderstanding of His word. It was now time to come back so that, when Messiah came, they would learn to follow Him because He was God’s representative to bring them back to God through the forgiveness of sins and to show them the way to the Father by His perfect life.

Mark wanted his readers to understand that John’s appearance and message fitted perfectly into God’s prophetic timetable. He was no upstart preacher, some crank who dressed funny and spoke funny, but His appointed herald to prepare the way for His Messiah. John’s message was a clarion call to return to the way of Yahweh – to come out of the wilderness where for centuries they had wandered around with no one to show them the right way.

They had not heard God’s voice for four hundred years after the ministry of Malachi, the last of the Old Testament prophets. Now, at last, God began to speak again, through John, the last of the prophets of the old era. His role was to prepare the way for the Son of God who came from God not only to speak God’s word but to be God’s final word to His people. If they did not listen to Jesus, God had nothing more to say to them.

Jesus did not come from God with a new message. He came from the Father to show His people how to live the way He had instructed them from the beginning. He came to interpret God’s eternal message. He did not come to do away with torah, but to live it out in the spirit of Torah which was the revelation of God’s mercy to show us how it is done.

On the mountain with God in the wilderness, Moses had begged God to show him His glory. God revealed the meaning of His name – mercy and compassion. In the flesh Jesus became the meaning of God’s name by showing mercy and compassion to His people, culminating in His death to rescue them from the consequences of and slavery to sin.

Just as John the Baptist called his people to shuv – to return to the way of the Lord, so the Holy Spirit still calls His people today. Jesus issued one simple instruction to the twelve men who became His disciples – “Follow me,” and the instruction has not changed. The church of the Lord Jesus has, in the main, become lost in the wilderness of ignorance and sin again because its leaders and those who follow them have ignored His call and made up their own way.

A lady made a profound statement to me in conversation recently, “Without Jesus, all we have left is religion.” How true that is! Many churches have plenty of religion but no Jesus. How tragic that mere humans have usurped His place and taken His people off the path and back into the wilderness where they have become exactly what His people were when He came – harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.

John’s message is as relevant today as it was then: “Repent! Return to God’s way because the good news is that Jesus is here!”

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my new book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (copyright 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

Available on www.amazon.com or www.kalahari.com in paperback, e-book or kindle format, or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

Check out my blogsite at www.learningtobeason.wordpress.com

The Long Look

Bible Study, , , ,

THE LONG LOOK

I heard and my heart pounded, my lips quivered at the sound; decay crept into my bones, and my legs trembled. Yet I will wait patiently for the day of calamity to come on the nation invading us (Hab. 3:16).

What a difference in the prophet’s attitude now! Gone were the accusations that God was seemingly indifferent; gone was the frustration with his own people for their unrestrained wickedness; gone was the confusion about God’s ways. God had taken him step by step through a process from fear to faith. He was now on God’s side, watching the unfolding of history and recognising the purposes of God in the rise and fall of empires because God had given him understanding.

This did not lessen his fear of the immediate future. His description of his physical reaction is realistic and vivid. He did not underestimate the terrible suffering the Babylonians would inflict on his people.

But, at the same time, his perspective had changed. He was no longer angry and frustrated because his people had forsaken the Lord and were as wicked as their neighbours and God was doing nothing about it. He now knew that God was not indifferent and that He had planned a strategy which would shake them out of their stubborn rebellion and disobedience and bring them back to faith in Him as their covenant God.

Not only did Habakkuk express his fear of what was soon to fall on his people, he also expressed his willingness to look beyond the devastation to the day when just retribution would fall on the evil nation that God would use to whip His people. God’s promise of perfect justice brought him comfort and reassured him that God was still in charge, no matter how bad things appeared to be. No one would get away with wickedness because God rules in justice and truth over all the earth.

This reassurance caused him to break out in a song of praise and an expression of confidence in God that rose above earthly events to the realm of God’s everlasting nature – compassionate, gracious, slow to anger and abounding in love and faithfulness. Yes, He would punish His people by confirming to them the consequences of their waywardness. Yes, He would deal justly with all parties, even those who inflicted punishment on them but, in the end, God was still their God and a shelter for those who trust Him even in the midst of the worst that could happen.

And so Habakkuk concluded his dialogue with God with a song that anyone can sing with confidence even when it seems that the sky has fallen on their heads!

Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there be no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Saviour.

The Sovereign Lord is my strength; He makes my feet like the feet of a deer, He enables me to tread on the heights (Hab. 3: 17-19).

This is the expression of the highest level of trust that anyone can have in God. It’s not about whether everything is going well for me. It’s not about how much He has done for me or what He can do for me.  It’s not about whether He has answered my prayers or not. It’s not about how blessed I am or not. It’s about Him. In the end, everything that happens about me and to me is God painting His bigger picture, writing His bigger story.

Instead of my being the centre of the universe and everything revolving around me, God is the centre of it all and everything is designed to work out His universal plan – the one He started at the beginning and the one He will complete when Jesus returns to bring it all together.

On the strength of that, Habakkuk could sing. No matter how rough the terrain he had to climb, God had equipped him with enough grace to climb the heights. He had given him “the feet of a deer”. Like a mountain goat he had the confidence to navigate the precipices and not fall because he was sustained by the promise that God was working to all out for His glory and the good of His people.

Can you sing, like the prophet, on the highest cliffs and the most dangerous places, when everything in your life has fallen apart and you are, as it were, staring down the barrel of a gun – physically, economically, relationally, whatever – “yet I will rejoice in the Lord, I will be joyful in God my Saviour”? 

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my new book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (copyright 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

Available on www.amazon.com or www.kalahari.com in paperback, e-book or kindle format, or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

Check out my blogsite at www.learningtobeason.wordpress.com

 

Do Not Mess With God

Bible Study, , , ,

DO NOT MESS WITH GOD

Sun and moon stood still in the heavens at the glint of your flying arrows, at the lightning of your flashing spear. In wrath you strode through the earth and in anger you threshed the nations. You came out to deliver your people, to save your anointed one. You crushed the leader of the land of wickedness, you stripped him from head to foot. With his own spear you pierced his head when his warriors stormed out to scatter us, gloating as though about to devour the wretched who were hiding. You trampled the sea with your horses, churning the great waters (Hab. 3: 11-15).

Of whom was the prophet speaking here?

In graphic, vivid, poetic language and with emotional ecstasy he described God’s victory over the Pharaoh and the land of Egypt. God swept through the land with plague after plague, stripping away everything in which the godless Egyptians put their confidence. Using the powers of the natural world, He destroyed their agriculture, their livestock, their infrastructure and finally their firstborn because Pharaoh refused to honour Him and obey His instruction.

God, invisible though He is, is not to be trifled with. He is unstoppable in His wrath against those who defy Him and destroy His people but he is also unstoppable in His mercy towards those who fear Him. This is the amazing thing about our God. When the Bible describes Him as “for” those who fear Him it means that He bends all His energies and provides all His resources to support those who honour Him and uphold His cause.

When puny man takes God on, he gets more than he bargained for. Pharaoh tried it and lost. By the time God was finished with him, his land was in tatters, his people in disarray and his once mighty army lifeless corpses floating in the Red Sea. God defended His people as fiercely as a mother bear her cubs by destroying those who came against them.

Sennacherib, ruler of Assyria, the cruellest and most violent nation on earth, tried to swallow up little Israel in the days of Hezekiah and Isaiah and came off worst. He challenged God and God took him on, leaving his 186,000-strong army lying dead in their encampment outside Jerusalem. He himself perished at the hands of his own sons while he worshipped his idol god.

Nebuchadnezzar, ruler of Babylon, thought he was God and demanded worship or else  . . . Three young Hebrew men refused to bow down to his image and paid for their disobedience by being thrown into a seven-times-heated oven. Instead of burning, though, their ropes burned and they walked freely in the fire in the company of their God. Nebuchadnezzar had to admit defeat and call them out because they were indestructible in the presence of God.

Goliath, giant warrior champion of the Philistines, tried it too and lost his head in the effort. Stripling teenager David, not even a seasoned soldier but a keeper of sheep, accepted his challenge and, unarmed except for a sling and a stone, sank a pebble into the forehead of the challenger, leaving him face down in the dirt and as dead as a doornail.

Make no mistake, when God is for His people, He is for us. No matter how badly things go for us when the world takes us on, we shall come up trumps in the end. We have the many stories in the God’s history book and the many promises of God that evil will never overcome God or His people.

What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? (Rom 8: 31).

God is just. He will pay back trouble to those who trouble you and give relief to you who are troubled, and to us as well. This will happen when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven in blazing fie with His powerful angels. He will punish those who do not know God and do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ  (2 Thess. 1: 6-8).

Reminiscing led Habakkuk to go on to an expression of confidence that has echoed down the ages. More of that tomorrow . . .

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Have you read my new book, Learning to be a Son – The Way to the Father’s Heart (copyright 2015, Partridge Publishing)? You’ll love it!

Available on www.amazon.com or www.kalahari.com in paperback, e-book or kindle format, or order directly from the publisher at www.partridgepublishing.com.

Check out my blogsite at www.learningtobeason.wordpress.com

The Glory of God

Christian life

As we peruse the Word of God, we see that time and again, God’s glory is revealed to mankind through His wonder working power. The children were enslaved by the Egyptians, and they began crying out to God for deliverance. God raised up a man called Moses to be instrumental to liberate the children of Israel from slavery. To be able to seek God’s guidance Moses was in continual communion with Him. This led him to be bold enough to say to God “PLEASE SHOW ME YOUR GLORY”. God during His dialogue with Moses says to him, “YOU CAN-NOT SEE MY FACE”. However, God placed Moses in a cleft of a rock and covered Moses with His hand while His Glory passed by.

As we sum up the situation throughout the world, and especially in our own country at this point of time, we see that the only solution for this country is for the people of this nation to turn back to God.

We need to pray that God will raise up Godly leaders who, through the leading and guidance of the Holy Spirit, will be instrumental in a “HOLY GHOST REVIVAL” in this rainbow nation. 2 Chronicles 7:14 is the cure for our nation, “IF MY PEOPLE WHO ARE CALLED BY MY NAME WILL HUMBLE THEM-SELVES, AND PRAY AND SEEK MY FACE, AND TURN FROM THEIR WICKED WAYS, THEN I WILL HEAR FROM HEAVEN, AND WILL FOR-GIVE THEIR SIN AND HEAL THEIR LAND.”

When a nation seeks God’s face and obeys His word, we will see the Glory of God being manifested in and through its people. Homes will become a place where God is revered, Churches will be filled with people glorifying God, jails will be unoccupied by criminals, true justice will be the order of the day, and God will prosper our land so much so that we will have an influx of all those people who immigrated to other countries, wanting to be part of the movement of God. Cause us, Lord, to seek your face.

Colin

Show me your glory

Pastor's Desk

Dear Family

There is much written on the subject of the “glory of God” for us to study and learn from. Most of it leaves us feeling better about who God is and what He is able to do for us. All the “weight” or “heaviness” of His goodness is wonderful to dwell upon. We natu-rally love to know that our God is completely surrounded by mercy and goodness. I love the way the Psalmist states the obvious for us in Psalm 19:1–4 “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.”

But as I thought about His glory, I felt the LORD saying to me, “Now show me YOUR glory”. And this is what I think He meant:

Jesus taught in Matthew 5:14–16 “You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15 Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”

The Apostle Paul says to us in Philippians 2:14–15 “Do everything with-out complaining or arguing, 15 so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe”.

As believers we do not have an option but to be reflectors of God’s glory. I have no doubt that God is often pained by my lack of reflection of who He actually is. My flesh is rotten to the core. But we have lost our license to behave as we want. Besides, we are dead! Our lives are now in Him and He in us and so our role is to reveal Him to everyone – His glory through us. What an in-credible privilege! These cracked jars of clay are the vessels God has chosen to reveal Himself to the earth. Will you be a reflector of His glory in response to His desire, “Now show me your glory”?

Paul