What a powerful passage of Scripture! I hope that
you will take the time and actually read these verses. The image of the
invisible God – how does that work? How do you get an image of the invisible?
You look at Jesus who is in every sense
the physical manifestation of God. God is Spirit, and Jesus is God in the
flesh. Firstborn over all creation. The Greek word is prototokos and means first begotten. Even before God spoke the
first words of creation, Jesus was there. He holds the same relation to
creation as God the Father does. It is through Him that all things were
created, and as John says, nothing was created that He did not create. Jesus
was not part of creation but He is the beginning of creation – the source, the
agent, the cause of creation. And that creation consists of everything both
physical and spiritual. Planets and powers. Air and angels. Kings and
creatures. Me and you. All of it created through Him and for Him. We are here
for Him, and in fact, consist only in Him. He is the reason that we are here
and the reason that we are able to be here. The word consist means “to cause to
stand.” Jesus causes us to stand. As Hebrews 1:3 states, He “…uphold[s] all things by the word of His
power….” I hope you see this as I do: it is because of Jesus that we live and
love and think and act and serve. He is the preeminent one in all things,
especially the Church. He is the head, the beginning, the source of the church
because He is the firstborn of the dead. How can we do anything but bow down
and worship the One called Jesus?
Saturday, November 8, 2014
Friday, November 7, 2014
What Has God Done For Us?
Colossians 1:13-14 What Has God Done For Us?
Let’s review: given us the hope of heaven, fills us with the
knowledge of His will, strengthens us, qualifies us for our inheritance, and
delivers us from the power of darkness into the Kingdom. Pause for just a
second. He has delivered us from the power of darkness. It is a done deal for His
people. We have been rescued. Sin has no more power over us. The curse of sin
is dead. And in doing this, He has delivered us (done deal) in the Kingdom.
This is not just any Kingdom – this one belongs to the Son of His love, and add
to all of these blessings redemption and forgiveness of sin.
I know you see what this means. This is more than moving our
names from one list to another. We have been taken out of the realm of darkness
and into God’s Light. I was checking out the word that Paul used for “deliver,”
and it means to rush or draw is if through a current. So get this: we are
washed out of the power of darkness by the raging torrent of Jesus’ blood, and
that raging river has carried us right on into the Kingdom of Heaven.
Thank you, Jesus, for shedding your blood. Thank you for
giving me life. Thank you for delivering me from the power of darkness. Now,
Lord, please give me strength to walk in that freedom!
Thursday, November 6, 2014
Praying for You
Colossians 1:9-12 “Praying For You”
What would
it be like to know that someone had prayed this prayer for you?
·
Filled with knowledge of His will with wisdom
and spiritual understanding
·
Walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him
·
Being fruitful in every good work
·
Increasing in the knowledge of God
·
Strengthened with all might according to His
glorious power
·
And even more
As I was reading these verses this morning, a thought
crossed my mind: is this the prayer that Jesus is praying for me right now even
as He is seated at the right hand of God? After all, Paul tells us in Romans
8:34 that He is praying for us there. He might be; or He might be praying
something even more personal – like, “Let Him make it through the day without
totally messing up!” Then I asked myself, “Am I praying that prayer for myself?
Am I praying that prayer for my wife? My children? My church members? Until
today, the answer to these questions is “NO!” But we need this. We need every
one of these things so that we can lead the kind of life that is pleasing to
God. I need these things. I want these things, so I ask you, Lord, today to
strengthen me with your might. You know I need patience and longsuffering and
JOY! Lord, let your joy flow through me today as I minister to hurting people. And
I pray this for every person who reads this because we need Your Church to know
and to walk and to be fruitful and to be strengthened. Thank you, Father. Thank
you for qualifying us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the
light.
One last
thing. Keep this in mind. The focus of this prayer is God, not you. Or me. He
is the one who fills and strengthens and qualifies. That should give you a
reason to thank Him this morning.
Wednesday, November 5, 2014
Have We Lost the Hope of Heaven?
Colossians 1:1-8
Have We Lost the Hope of Heaven?
As we start this journey together, understand that these are just my thoughts as I go through my quiet time and listen for God to speak to my heart. Some of these will be personal. Some may never find their way to this page. Others will speak into your life, I pray, the word that He has for you.
Paul and Timothy are writing together to faithful brothers and sisters in Christ. They are thankful for their faith in Jesus, their love for the saints, and their hope laid up in heaven. Hope? They talk about the hope of the gospel; it’s bringing forth fruit. I was just thinking – do we really have that kind of hope anymore? Maybe if we could really believe in heaven – picture it in our hearts. But our lives have been so good on Earth, we don’t long for heaven like the early Christians. Their lives were filled with constant struggles, fighting to survive and take care of their families. They were facing persecution daily. Enter their lives: the message of heaven -- the promise of rest – healing – joy. Could it be that heaven was more appealing to them than to us? How sad! We have lost sight of the truth. Heaven is so much more than we can imagine.
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Masada, En Gedi, and Qumran
Wednesday morning Jerusalem
Today is our final day, and it will be a busy one. Wakeup call is at 5:30 and we must be on the bus at 7 a.m. We will drive for an hour and a half to Masada, come back to En Gedi, and then to Qumran. Masada was an awesome experience.
It was the Alama for the Jewish people. In 70 AD when Rome destroyed Israel, about 1000 Zealots headed for Masada, Herod's home away from home with 3 huge palaces filled with water, food supplies, and everything necessary to survive for a long time. The fortress could almost have been impenetrable, and in actuality, there was no reason for the Romans to drag all of their war machines out to this desolate wilderness to snuff out these Jewish rebels. The legend says that they came because the Zealots made a horrible mistake. They had gone to the citizens of En Gedi to convince them to join in their battle against the Romans. They refused because they had a financial, peaceful relationship. It seems that these people made a perfume called Persimmon - not from Persimmons though - that supposedly could make people fall in love. A woman would take the "craw" of a chicken, fill it with the perfume, and tie it around her ankle. When se saw the man of her dreams, she simply had to shake her ankle releasing the perfume and it would be like the man was hit in the head with a hammer. The Romans were their biggest customers, buying it and selling it around the world. When the citizens of En Gedi refused to join the fight, the Zealots came and killed 750 of their own people. You see, the Zealots were a horrible group who killed few Romans but many Jews. When the Romans heard what they had done, they laid siege to the fortress and built a ramp. Using slaves, they built the ramp and pushed their war machines to the gate, but the Zealots killed the slaves with arrows. They then brought Jewish slaves to do the work, and the Zealots would have killed them as well, but the wife of Eleazer, leader of the Zealots, said they would kill no more Jews. The Romans were then able to breach the gate, but decided to wait until morning to finish the job.
The Zealots could not imagine living the remainder of their lives as slaves, so Eleazer convinced his people that death was preferable. Since the Jewish tradition precluded suicide, the men drew lots. 10 men were chosen to kill 1000 men, women, and children. Then the ten men would kill each other, after a lot was chosen for the one who would then fall on his sword. When the Romans came into Masada the next morning, only one old woman and a few children had survived and told the story. Archaeologists have actually found the lots, and the story was recorded for posterity.
Qumran, of course, is the area where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered. The Essenes, another Jewish sect with strict rituals and membership requirements spent their time copying scripture and telling their story. John the Baptist was a member of this sect, but left before the 4 years of service and study were through to become a full-fledged member of the community. When they knew the Romans were coming, they hid their scrolls in clay jars and placed them in caves where a young shepherd boy found the original scrolls which contained the oldest existing copies of most of our Old Testament.
The beauty of the discovery was that these manuscripts proved the accuracy of our translation. Even recently, more scrolls have been found in different caves, and more are probably out there. You have to see the area to understand, but perhaps hundreds or thousands of caves have been covered over by landslides and are only discovered when the torrential "streams in the desert" roar through the wilderness as the rains fall in the northern part of the country. The week before we came, a rain such as this occurred and within an hour, 3 to 5 feet of water rushed through the wadis, dry river beds, washing boulders and sand into the Dead Sea. At times, the streams reach as high as 10 feet and destroy the road leading to Qumran and Masada. The truths here open our eyes to the words of Scripture in ways I have never before imagined. What an experience. Thank you, Sonya, and thank you, church, for giving me this opportunity. I will never forget it.
Finally, we came to the Dead Sea.
This was strictly about fun and relaxing. Apparently people pay good money to cover themselves in the mud. I think that is just wrong. It was nasty. As soon as you step in, you sink almost to your knees. You can hardly walk out any ways -- you have to basically crab walk backwards. But it is insane how you float. We have pictures, and I will post them later. After a quick cleanup at the beach, we headed for Abraham's tent where we enjoyed camel rides (3 times this trip) and a marvelous meal. Chicken baked in date honey. We had to hurry back to the hotel for good showers, packing, and a quick trip to the airport. Customs, as usual, was fun. I won't tell you who packed something they shouldn't have in their carryon, but his initials are P.A. We all made it through fine, but we did have a couple of our ladies that had to get their VAT money back. One of them arrived at our gate when we were just about finished boarding. Close call.
The trip was long, crowded, warm, and noisy. Not as bad as the trip to Israel, but sleeping was difficult. On the trip over, we traveled in daylight almost the whole way, but the way back was in total darkness until we got to New York, and the first rays of sunshine appeared almost as if to say, Welcome home.
As much fun as it was to go, there is nothing like landing on American soil. Even though I am still hundreds of miles away from my family, I feel like I a home.
Thanks for going on this journey with me. I will probably do some editing on this, add some pictures, and make it a little bit more readable. I need to add some of my thoughts that will take some processing, but let me conclude by saying that my life has been changed. I have grown to love Israel even more. I have discovered that the Jordanians are a people that welcome us with open arms. And I am praying even for the Palestinians that need to see Jesus even more than the others.
Today is our final day, and it will be a busy one. Wakeup call is at 5:30 and we must be on the bus at 7 a.m. We will drive for an hour and a half to Masada, come back to En Gedi, and then to Qumran. Masada was an awesome experience.
It was the Alama for the Jewish people. In 70 AD when Rome destroyed Israel, about 1000 Zealots headed for Masada, Herod's home away from home with 3 huge palaces filled with water, food supplies, and everything necessary to survive for a long time. The fortress could almost have been impenetrable, and in actuality, there was no reason for the Romans to drag all of their war machines out to this desolate wilderness to snuff out these Jewish rebels. The legend says that they came because the Zealots made a horrible mistake. They had gone to the citizens of En Gedi to convince them to join in their battle against the Romans. They refused because they had a financial, peaceful relationship. It seems that these people made a perfume called Persimmon - not from Persimmons though - that supposedly could make people fall in love. A woman would take the "craw" of a chicken, fill it with the perfume, and tie it around her ankle. When se saw the man of her dreams, she simply had to shake her ankle releasing the perfume and it would be like the man was hit in the head with a hammer. The Romans were their biggest customers, buying it and selling it around the world. When the citizens of En Gedi refused to join the fight, the Zealots came and killed 750 of their own people. You see, the Zealots were a horrible group who killed few Romans but many Jews. When the Romans heard what they had done, they laid siege to the fortress and built a ramp. Using slaves, they built the ramp and pushed their war machines to the gate, but the Zealots killed the slaves with arrows. They then brought Jewish slaves to do the work, and the Zealots would have killed them as well, but the wife of Eleazer, leader of the Zealots, said they would kill no more Jews. The Romans were then able to breach the gate, but decided to wait until morning to finish the job.The Zealots could not imagine living the remainder of their lives as slaves, so Eleazer convinced his people that death was preferable. Since the Jewish tradition precluded suicide, the men drew lots. 10 men were chosen to kill 1000 men, women, and children. Then the ten men would kill each other, after a lot was chosen for the one who would then fall on his sword. When the Romans came into Masada the next morning, only one old woman and a few children had survived and told the story. Archaeologists have actually found the lots, and the story was recorded for posterity.
Qumran, of course, is the area where the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered. The Essenes, another Jewish sect with strict rituals and membership requirements spent their time copying scripture and telling their story. John the Baptist was a member of this sect, but left before the 4 years of service and study were through to become a full-fledged member of the community. When they knew the Romans were coming, they hid their scrolls in clay jars and placed them in caves where a young shepherd boy found the original scrolls which contained the oldest existing copies of most of our Old Testament.
The beauty of the discovery was that these manuscripts proved the accuracy of our translation. Even recently, more scrolls have been found in different caves, and more are probably out there. You have to see the area to understand, but perhaps hundreds or thousands of caves have been covered over by landslides and are only discovered when the torrential "streams in the desert" roar through the wilderness as the rains fall in the northern part of the country. The week before we came, a rain such as this occurred and within an hour, 3 to 5 feet of water rushed through the wadis, dry river beds, washing boulders and sand into the Dead Sea. At times, the streams reach as high as 10 feet and destroy the road leading to Qumran and Masada. The truths here open our eyes to the words of Scripture in ways I have never before imagined. What an experience. Thank you, Sonya, and thank you, church, for giving me this opportunity. I will never forget it.Finally, we came to the Dead Sea.
This was strictly about fun and relaxing. Apparently people pay good money to cover themselves in the mud. I think that is just wrong. It was nasty. As soon as you step in, you sink almost to your knees. You can hardly walk out any ways -- you have to basically crab walk backwards. But it is insane how you float. We have pictures, and I will post them later. After a quick cleanup at the beach, we headed for Abraham's tent where we enjoyed camel rides (3 times this trip) and a marvelous meal. Chicken baked in date honey. We had to hurry back to the hotel for good showers, packing, and a quick trip to the airport. Customs, as usual, was fun. I won't tell you who packed something they shouldn't have in their carryon, but his initials are P.A. We all made it through fine, but we did have a couple of our ladies that had to get their VAT money back. One of them arrived at our gate when we were just about finished boarding. Close call. The trip was long, crowded, warm, and noisy. Not as bad as the trip to Israel, but sleeping was difficult. On the trip over, we traveled in daylight almost the whole way, but the way back was in total darkness until we got to New York, and the first rays of sunshine appeared almost as if to say, Welcome home.
As much fun as it was to go, there is nothing like landing on American soil. Even though I am still hundreds of miles away from my family, I feel like I a home.Thanks for going on this journey with me. I will probably do some editing on this, add some pictures, and make it a little bit more readable. I need to add some of my thoughts that will take some processing, but let me conclude by saying that my life has been changed. I have grown to love Israel even more. I have discovered that the Jordanians are a people that welcome us with open arms. And I am praying even for the Palestinians that need to see Jesus even more than the others.
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
So much to see
Tuesday afternoon Jerusalem
Man, what a day. We started early at the Garden Tomb where I am convinced Jesus was buried. Just up the way from the tomb is a hill with the image of the skull.
All of the evidences point to this place, at least in my opinion. What a moving experience just to be in that place. Then to have the privilege of leading a devotion and Lord Supper service. I am so blessed that I cannot even begin to express it in words. 
Entered the Old City through the Lion's Gate. Exciting to see the Old City for the first time.
Went to the Pool of Bethesda where Jesus healed the lame man on the Sabbath. How mind-boggling that the Pharisees would get so angry when a man's life is changed.
Walked the Via Dolorosa. It is an uphill walk difficult under the best of circumstances.
Armenian Pizza for lunch. We were told it was the best pizza in the world. Good, but not the best.
Ethiopian Chapels - these are the poorest of Christians, and their chapels stand in stark contrast to the gawdy extravagance of the Catholic churches.
St. Anne's Church - a church dedicated to the Mother of Mary. The acoustics were great. We sang Alleluia and How Great Thou Art. Beautiful experience.
David's Tomb - where King David is buried inside the city. The only person to have that privilege. The amazement was in the Orthodox Jews that stay there reading Scripture and praying constantly.
Church of the Holy Sepulchre - another huge Catholic church where Helena, mother of Constantine, believed Jesus was buried.
I still believe it was the Garden Tomb.
Crossed the Muslim and Jewish Quarters
Saw the wall of Eliakim - more later.
Mt. Zion
The Upper Room - not very dramatic.
St. Peter Galicantu/Caiaphas house - 99.9% sure that this is the place due to the rooms found there and the location. The room where Jesus was held had one entrance and exit -- at the top. The prisoners would be lowered and raised by rope to stand before the Sanhedrin.
Western Wall - a beautiful experience to stand as close as a Christian can stand to where the Holy of Holies once stood. I didn't place any requests into the wall because I think that is merely superstition. I did, however, stand at the wall touching it and praying.
Praying for my family, for the peace of Jerusalem, for my church, and for so many other things.
It was a busy day, but wow, what emotion. Seeing and hearing and doing all of that leaves a lasting imprint on you. Realizing how grueling the walk is under normal circumstances demonstrates how difficult it must have been for Christ. Perhaps I will spend some time later filling in the gaps. Suffice it to say that the emotions were overwhelming.
Man, what a day. We started early at the Garden Tomb where I am convinced Jesus was buried. Just up the way from the tomb is a hill with the image of the skull.
All of the evidences point to this place, at least in my opinion. What a moving experience just to be in that place. Then to have the privilege of leading a devotion and Lord Supper service. I am so blessed that I cannot even begin to express it in words. 
Entered the Old City through the Lion's Gate. Exciting to see the Old City for the first time.
Went to the Pool of Bethesda where Jesus healed the lame man on the Sabbath. How mind-boggling that the Pharisees would get so angry when a man's life is changed.
Walked the Via Dolorosa. It is an uphill walk difficult under the best of circumstances.
Armenian Pizza for lunch. We were told it was the best pizza in the world. Good, but not the best.
Ethiopian Chapels - these are the poorest of Christians, and their chapels stand in stark contrast to the gawdy extravagance of the Catholic churches.
St. Anne's Church - a church dedicated to the Mother of Mary. The acoustics were great. We sang Alleluia and How Great Thou Art. Beautiful experience.
David's Tomb - where King David is buried inside the city. The only person to have that privilege. The amazement was in the Orthodox Jews that stay there reading Scripture and praying constantly.
Church of the Holy Sepulchre - another huge Catholic church where Helena, mother of Constantine, believed Jesus was buried.
I still believe it was the Garden Tomb.
Crossed the Muslim and Jewish Quarters
Saw the wall of Eliakim - more later.
Mt. Zion
The Upper Room - not very dramatic.
St. Peter Galicantu/Caiaphas house - 99.9% sure that this is the place due to the rooms found there and the location. The room where Jesus was held had one entrance and exit -- at the top. The prisoners would be lowered and raised by rope to stand before the Sanhedrin.
Western Wall - a beautiful experience to stand as close as a Christian can stand to where the Holy of Holies once stood. I didn't place any requests into the wall because I think that is merely superstition. I did, however, stand at the wall touching it and praying.
Praying for my family, for the peace of Jerusalem, for my church, and for so many other things. It was a busy day, but wow, what emotion. Seeing and hearing and doing all of that leaves a lasting imprint on you. Realizing how grueling the walk is under normal circumstances demonstrates how difficult it must have been for Christ. Perhaps I will spend some time later filling in the gaps. Suffice it to say that the emotions were overwhelming.
Monday, March 12, 2012
Jerusalem and Bethlehem
Monday morning Jerusalem time
We went to the Pool of Siloam this morning and the Old City. We saw the ruins of David's palace, and the tunnels of Hezekiah
bringing water into the city. It was very steep and slippery and some places were very narrow. Pat took a fall, but he seems to be okay. It is amazing to think that the men in Hezekiah's time dug the tunnel from each side of the city and actually met in the middle. Without the aid of modern technology, they were able to do what is an incredible miracle. In some of the tunnels, the Jews fled the Romans and tried to hide in the sewer tunnels but were speared there. Their blood ran into the pool of Siloam. I was able to put my hands into the water. Amazing. Half of the actual pool is on the Palestinian side, and the people refuse to allow any excavation so that they cannot find evidence that the Jews were there before them. 
At the Museum of Israel, we saw a scale model of the city of Jerusalem. It was a recreation of the city including the Temple. Beautiful.
Now we are heading to Bethlehem. Our guide, Shimon, will not go into Bethlehem because it is likely that he wouldn't make it out. Even the Arab Christians who have lived there for centuries have mostly left the city because of the lack of business/jobs and I'm sure out of fear for their lives. How sad!
Monday afternoon Bethlehem
We have toured Bethlehem. It is a very tense city. Usually you have to show your passports to get in and out, but we didn't have to going in. I don't know about going out. We had a wonderful lunch at a Christian restaurant. The salads were delicious, and the meal was barbecue. Not barbecue like we think of barbecue. It was grilled shishkabobs. We had a choice of chicken, beef, lamb, or a mixture of the three. I had the mixed, and it was wonderful. It came with potatoes, grilled onion, and grilled tomato. MMMMMMMM MMMMMMMM! After lunch we headed to the Church of the Nativity where we viewed "the rock and the manger" where Jesus was born.
You cannot imagine the people who had to touch it for whatever reason. The church is a Greek Orthodox church, and it was extremely gawdy. From there we went to the shepherd's field 
where the angels came down to announce the birth of Jesus. It was definitely not what I expected -- covered with rocks and on top of the hills. And so now we are in line at the checkpoint going very slowly. Maybe we will make it back to the hotel in time for dinner. :)
We went to the Pool of Siloam this morning and the Old City. We saw the ruins of David's palace, and the tunnels of Hezekiah
bringing water into the city. It was very steep and slippery and some places were very narrow. Pat took a fall, but he seems to be okay. It is amazing to think that the men in Hezekiah's time dug the tunnel from each side of the city and actually met in the middle. Without the aid of modern technology, they were able to do what is an incredible miracle. In some of the tunnels, the Jews fled the Romans and tried to hide in the sewer tunnels but were speared there. Their blood ran into the pool of Siloam. I was able to put my hands into the water. Amazing. Half of the actual pool is on the Palestinian side, and the people refuse to allow any excavation so that they cannot find evidence that the Jews were there before them. 
At the Museum of Israel, we saw a scale model of the city of Jerusalem. It was a recreation of the city including the Temple. Beautiful.
Now we are heading to Bethlehem. Our guide, Shimon, will not go into Bethlehem because it is likely that he wouldn't make it out. Even the Arab Christians who have lived there for centuries have mostly left the city because of the lack of business/jobs and I'm sure out of fear for their lives. How sad! Monday afternoon Bethlehem
We have toured Bethlehem. It is a very tense city. Usually you have to show your passports to get in and out, but we didn't have to going in. I don't know about going out. We had a wonderful lunch at a Christian restaurant. The salads were delicious, and the meal was barbecue. Not barbecue like we think of barbecue. It was grilled shishkabobs. We had a choice of chicken, beef, lamb, or a mixture of the three. I had the mixed, and it was wonderful. It came with potatoes, grilled onion, and grilled tomato. MMMMMMMM MMMMMMMM! After lunch we headed to the Church of the Nativity where we viewed "the rock and the manger" where Jesus was born.
You cannot imagine the people who had to touch it for whatever reason. The church is a Greek Orthodox church, and it was extremely gawdy. From there we went to the shepherd's field 
where the angels came down to announce the birth of Jesus. It was definitely not what I expected -- covered with rocks and on top of the hills. And so now we are in line at the checkpoint going very slowly. Maybe we will make it back to the hotel in time for dinner. :)
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