The Rock of Ages Brings the Water of Life

Wisdom is the ability to respond appropriately to given situation. Folly is to respond to every situation in the same way. Psalm 78 presents a wonderful juxtaposition which exposes God's eternal wisdom.

He split the waters to bring them across on dry rocks. Then, later, he split the dry rock in order to bring them water to drink.

If our God is so wise and so powerful, can he not also use all things together for our good?

Careful It Might Blow Your Mind

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Rest with God - The Crown of Creation

Whether its marriage books, theological discourses on the role of women in the church, or Christian's stating the value and wonder of women in the world, many present women as the glorious culminating jewel of creation. And they are right...to a degree.

The train of thought usually goes something like this: in each step of creation God creates something of higher order or beauty. Woman is the last thing he created. Therefore, women must be the highest or most beautiful creation of all. She is not to be disregarded as inferior, but regarded as the crown of creation.

The deduction is flawless, the premises are not. I agree that the beauty of women is something so captivating that only the glory of the Lord can trump it in the hearts of men. However, she is not the last thing the Lord created. On the seventh day, He rested. He made the seventh day a day of rest. The text says, He made it holy. He set it apart. He had another purpose in mind. Something so glorious that even woman in all her beauty could not compare. He made us for resting with him. It is the rest to which we look forward to and await in the return of Christ.

Not convinced? Unlike all of the previous days, which had a day and night, this day had no night (Gen 2:2). In Revelation 22, we see that in the eternal city there is no more night. The Lord Our God is our light. In addition Revelation 14:11, presents the opposite (eternal torment) as being a lack of rest day and night.

It took God six days to finish his work, and then rest. He has given us (mankind) all of history to complete our work, so that at its end, we may finally sit and rest with Him. So that we might too enjoy the eternal Sabbath rest. The great news is that Christ through his work on the cross, and already purchased us the right to enter into that rest now. We have the right to partake of the Spirit's rest-giving work from our merit-gaining labors. We have a blessed hope indeed.

So, sorry ladies. You really are great, but let's admit rest with God is what we were made for.

Our takeaways:

1. The Sabbath is created for us to remember how God rested

2. The Sabbath is to remind us of what we have to look forward to

3. The Sabbath reminds us of what we were really made for

Keep Your Clothes On!

Do you remember Joseph? No not the carpenter, the patriarch remembered more broadly as the star of a musical (which I've never seen).

What was so special about him anyway? Well his mother was Rachael the finer of two sisters and later wives of Israel (Jacob). She gave birth to Joseph later in life and thus Joseph became the apple of Israel's eye. Well through a course of jealousy-sparking dreams, and lack of p.c. commentary, Joseph ends up sold into slavery. His brothers then take his multi-colored cloak, dip it in blood, and present it as evidence of Joseph's death to their father.

Then, as Joseph rises to a place of privilege in Potiphar's house, his runs into the same issue. Potiphar's wife gets the hots for him and tries to lead him down a path of destruction. Joseph preferred death to sin, and so left his cloak in her hand and fled. Then, she presented his cloak to her husband as proof of Joseph's iniquity. Making Joseph as good as dead one more time.

Lesson number one: keep your clothes on. When it doubt don't let people steal your clothes.

Lesson number two: may we be reminded of the true and better Joseph, who was the favored Son of His Father. He didn't just wear a cloak of colors, he wrapped himself with all the colors of light (Ps 104:2)! And like Joseph, Jesus was sold into the slavery we deserved. Like Joseph He was stripped of all his honor. And like Joseph, because of the sin and pride and jealousy of his brothers (Heb 2:17), he was presented as dead to his Father. But unlike Joseph, Jesus actually died. He was actually turned over to the slavery of sin on our behalf. It wasn't the blood of an animal that stained his cloak, it was his very own. It was his blood presented on our behalf, that we might now share in the honor of the beloved soon.

And like Joseph's second encounter, Jesus was thrown into prison on our behalf. Like Joseph his did not love his life so much as to give into the demands of sin. No, he preferred death to sin, and lived a life that lead him to that death. So remember, keep your clothes on. Not just those fading garments of cotton and polyester, but clothe yourselves with the New Man. Clothe yourselves with the honor and love and majesty given to you by the One who set aside his cloak on your behalf.

Prefer Death to Sin

Most of humanity (I think) would take a wage instead of the work. To get paid and not have to do the work required for the payment has become the American Dream.

The Bible says that the wages of sin is death. Does our America Dream reach to the spiritual application? Do I desire the wage without the work? Do I desire death instead of sin?

Wayne Grudem, in discussing death and the intermediate state, notes that the martyrs of old preferred to die rather than sin. The sin presented them was typically denial of Christ, but the general application struck me. Would I rather die than sin? If someone stuck a gun to my head and told me to steal a piece of bread, would I do it? Or out of such shear hatred of sin and godlessness would I refuse to commit even the smallest atrocity and ask for death rather than sin?

O God that you would give me the resolve to choose death over sin. That I would resist sin to the point of shedding my own blood. That if an arm or eye causes me to sin I would pluck it out, preferring to lose that part than let sin take hold of me. Let me not love my life so much as to hold it back from honoring you in resisting and conquering sin.

Redeemed by Guilt

Four years later, I finally read it. In an attempt to avoid TV and online time wasters, I went to the library to lay hold of a story that laid hold of me. Khaled Hosseini's Kite Runner is a self-ascribed sad story. It has its bitter swoops and a life full of melancholy dips remedied only by the dull waves of time. I leave this book with two profound thoughts:

1. A father's love is unfathomable to the childless. Throughout the tale, Amir, the legitimate but weak Jacobian son of one of the richest men in Kabul, wrestles to gain his father's approval and affection. He would do anything. ANYTHING. As long as it would lead to the smile of approval, the embrace of acceptance, the glance of attention. In fact, he did. He, in his weakness, left his illegitimate brother (whom he thought to be a servant) to be abused and wounded so that he would gain the approval of the father. Amir was always jealous of Hassan, and the equal treatment he received. Always aware of how this Isaac of a father loved the Esau in Hassan, and desperate for even a bit of exclusive attention from his baba.

In America, they find their roles changed. the father becomes weak, unable to speak English. Nevertheless, he pushes himself to provide. He endures lowliness, humility, embarrassment. All for the good of his son. His weak-stomached, novel-reading, story-writing son.

And then, Amir meets a girl, and has baba call her parents. Things go well, and Amir is married. His baba looks at him that day and says "This is the best day of my life". Oh, how I long to know the heart of a Father who loves his weak children so much, that the proudest moment of his life, the culmination of years of laboring, providing, disciplining, comes in a single event. O How Deep the Father's Love.

2. We so desperately want to buy our own redemption, that we hope our guilt will lead to it. Despite the sadness of the story, there is redemption. There is a way to make amends, and be healed of our self-inflicted wounds.

"I think everything he did, feeding the poor on the streets, building the orphanage, giving money to friends in need, it was all his way of redeeming himself. And that, I believe, is what true redemption is, Amir jan, wen guilt leads to good...I know that in the end, God will forgive..."

This is our natural reaction. We seek to cover our guilt, to bury our wrongs with a thousand offerings. If only I can outdo my sin by doing good. If only I can balance the scales. But our hearts know better. Our consciences never let us rest. We are forever indebted to the haunting reality that our good deeds do not fit us. Our guilt will only be satisfied when it kills us. It will drive us to the grave, and Amir KNEW it. He didn't feel redeemed even in the beating he got for going back for his nephew. We will only be given back value (redeemed) in the transfer of our guilt to one who was guiltless.

It is only by the blood of Jesus that we find redemption. I try to do plenty of good to cover up my iniquities, but it doesn't last. I am too weak. I am the novel reader. I am the motion sick one. I am the one incapable of standing up for those in need. I need One who stood up for me. I need one who made a way for the Father to smile at me.

Thank you Jesus for the embrace you earned, not through your guilt, but because of ours.

Abortion the new Racism

See the Table below and the abortion rates in the Black and Hispanic communities as compared to White.

Or read the whole report or maybe even just glance at some of the facts.