DOORS

I recently made paintings of the front and back doors of the Bedford, Massachusetts house I grew up in.

When I was done, I made an analysis of how these doors were used and who used them.  The front door was only for formal occasions and was rarely used.  The side door was for general family use and for the reception of visitors and businesspeople.  There was a cellar door too but only used for family activities.

I thought of other doors of houses in which I have lived and their uses.  Our house in Gotha, Florida had three doors and we used all of them.  The front for Family but also for receiving people.  The side was for in-and-out access to the car and for play.  The back door was for in-and-out and play but also to dispose of trash.  Our current house in Windermere, Florida has two doors.  The front is for reception and general in-and-out.  The back is for family arrival and departure and access to garage.

You can think of our souls having doors too.  There is a front door, which might be only for formal users.  There might be a back door which may be hidden from most people.  It might be only for family, or it might be closed but for a very few special people.  It might be heavily guarded and never used by anyone but yourself.  Or there might be many doors for other specialized users.

There is another door that is always present, the one God uses.  You might not think of it as a door because what and who we are always open to God.  God has this right to his door because he is the owner of the house.  Most of the time he allows us to live thinking no one sees us, no one knows.  But God always sees, and always knows. 

God will never break  your doors down; He gives you a choice of how you will live.  There will be a time, however, when God repossesses your house and you will meet him face-to-face.  We do not have the capacity to be fully ready for that day, there will always be some embarrassing mess we should have cleaned up.  That is why we need to accept Jesus as our redeemer and trust He will keep his word:  that if we believe he died in our place for our sins and rose again and He will receive us into everlasting live with Him.  That is a door we can jointly own with God and will never be shut to us.

MANAGEMENT GIFTS

1 Corinthians 12, a lesson in management

This speaks of diversity of gifts but same spirit, differences of administrations but same Lord, diversity of operations but the same God.  We can say that the Father represents operation, the Son represents administration and the Holy Ghost represents gifts.

Manifestation of the spirit can be in every (Christian) man or woman:
1.   word of wisdom
2.   word of knowledge
3.   faith
4.   healing
5.   working of miracles
6.   prophecy
7.   discerning of spirits
8.   tongues
9.   interpretation of tongues

This is how a whole company or organization could be organized:
   Operations - what we should do, where we should go
   Administration - how we shall accomplish what the operator directs
   Gifts - providing the things and services needed for getting the job done. 

God is the manager and the supplier of all we need, and the equipment with which to do it.  But he does it in a more meaningful and life-giving way than merely producing automobiles or frozen dinners.  He supplies the reasons for being and the abilities to “do life”, to turn our existence into value.

SMALL FROM ALTITUDE

When I was working, I flew to many places in the country.  As I looked down upon the earth from 35,000 feet the things of men were so small that only the largest buildings were obvious.  It would have been difficult to pick out a semi-truck when looking at superhighways.  Indeed, I never saw one.  If a person were to stand in the middle of an intersection, and you were told where to look, you could not possibly see him.  From the sky as the eye wanders over the rest of the earth you realize how insignificant the person would seem.  The smallness of that person, that place, becomes astounding.  Yet through such a means God saved the world.  Think of God, Jesus, being in one human body. 

The vantage point of the plane demonstrates a small part of the expanse of Gods comprehension.  He comprehends what the human eye in the plane sees, and much more.  Think of this single man Jesus who, while in the flesh, has the vantage point of the plane.  ". . . and the Word became flesh and dwelt  among men."

TREE ON CLIFF

Here is a painting I did titled “Tree on Cliff”.  The idea came from a photograph of an actual tree I saw in a business trip to Washington state.  It looks precarious does it not?  It looks to be hanging onto the cliff.  What are roots holding onto?  Are they deep enough?  Can they hold on?

This reminds me of the parable of the seed sower.  As you remember, the sower spreads the seed into four types of places:  the wayside where birds ate them up immediately; the stony soil where the seeds could not last long;  the soil among weeds where the competition and distractions were too great;  and the good soil where the plants became well established and fruitful.

The good soil represents Jesus.  He provides source of nourishment and a place to firmly anchor roots.  The good soil results in much fruit.

The actual tree was smaller than the one the one shown in this painting.  Other trees in the photograph had actually started to fall.

What does the picture make you think of?  Will this tree eventually fall into the Water?  If on rocky soil it will fall over into the water.  If it is on good soil the tree will remain anchored and fruitful no matter how steep the cliff is.  Jesus is good soil and allows us to hold in any sort of difficulty.

Are you planted in good soil?

WAITING TO EAT

1 Corinthians 11:21
I wonder if this verse is saying the Corinthians have church communion suppers at which people eat when they arrive without waiting to eat all together?  Therefore there are times when one is full (drunken) and others (who have not yet eaten) are hungry.  This shows a selfishness of one Christian not caring enough for another to eat together.   "I’ll do what I do for me and let the others catch up".  This type of thinking is only of yourself and what you can get or do for yourself.  But we should be discerning of the body of the Lord Jesus when eating together as a Christian group.  Everything should be done in a decent order as the Bible says.  God, through Paul, sets up many ways of prayer proper Christian action,
- - Manners
- - The Lord supper
- - Tongues
- - Who to fellowship with

In verse 33 he instructs to "tarry one for another". 

Some who are rich can well afford to wait, but do not.  Some who are poor, who really need the food and arrive at the supper late, may not get fed because all is gone.  Many others are not even thinking of the Lord at all. 

HOW TO TELL THE TRUTH

Romans 16;17
There are those who cause divisions and offenses (stumbling blocks) because they proclaim something else other than the doctrine we have learned.  We might use the example of Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, or Catholics (who go too far into Mary). 

What we have left us is doctrine, a tradition of how scripture should be interpreted.  We see how it has been interpreted by men.  But is this tradition right?  Men sometimes change things as it has been passed from one to another.  Has it changed over the years? 

Much of what we know about God is how he has been passed to us through other men.  God works in man: they write about it.  Scripture is not just a collection of men's writings about, it is a reporting of what God did in their presence.  How close were these men to actual events?  Were they eyewitnesses?  Had they lived within 200 years after Christ lived?  There have been many such writings.  Out of all available writings who decided which were good and which were not? 

In the development history of a Bible translation I am reading I look for:
- -  Is it a translation or a paraphrase?
- -  Was it done by a group of people, or was it done by just one person?
- -  Was the group qualified to know the meaning and intent of the original languages?
- -  Has the translation lasted for a long enough time for it to become known as trustworthy?

Here is why I think these points are important:
- -  A translation is an attempt to recreate in the target language what was said in the original languages.  A paraphrase is an author’s opinion about what a translation is trying to say.  He is not working with original languages.
- -  A translation by a group of people must me more reliable than a translation by a single person for one team member can test the others for accuracy and intent of the original language.
- -  Each member of the translation team must have expertise in the language being translated.
- -  A translation that has been in existence for a length of time has given opportunity for mistakes to surface and be corrected.

I will trust a translation for these reasons listed above.  For years I have read the King James Version and lately I have been reading the New American Standard Version.  When I was first saved I acquired and read a New English Version.

Except for being careful about the origins of a particular version, the version does not matter nearly as much as actually reading it.  It is important to read the Bible - - and not just once in your lifetime.  If it is God’s Word to us it should be important enough to read many times. 

I read from the Bible every day.

THE CHURCH DISTRACTING

Today (Sunday 7 June) I listened to two church services: one given via YouTube from the church I go to, and the other via YouTube from a large church in Orlando.  There are reasons I go to one church and not to the other.  I will talk of the large church first.

I will not attend the large church because of the music.  It is too LOUD.  Loudness does not make music more worshipful; it just makes it uncomfortable.  To enhance the uncomfortable music, they use lighting.  They use spots, moving beams, and streaming visual effects.  To make these effects more visible they use smoke.  This is all staged as a rock concert.  For example, they use different stage levels for the musicians.  All the vocalists stand in front in a line.

All this seems to me to be showmanship.  They look excited, they jump, they yell the lyrics.  Are they truly excited or is it just a stage act?  What is the difference between this and a rock concert?  This extends too to the announcements which seems to be hyped with faked excitement.

They also transition between the different segments with videos.  Is all this technology necessary for an effective worship?  Must this be done to reach today’s people?  Will people not listen unless they are entertained?

Yet the actual preaching was well done.  It had good content and was well delivered.  All the stuff that went before (music, etc.) was a barrier to the content.  Yet at the end of the preaching, while transitioning out to what followed, there was a keyboard droning behind the words muddling the speech.  Why is that necessary?

The church where we attend is small, so it is possible to know everyone.  The music is done by various people, not the same group every Sunday.  The preaching is not always by the pastor but is sometimes done by others.  The preaching today, for example, was well done by another, and very helpful.  This type of freedom presents ministry opportunities to every member of the congregation.

At the big church ONLY the pro singers and musicians and ONLY the pastoral staff present the worship.

WHEN COMFORT IS DANGEROUS

John 21
The disciples had been fishing all night and had nothing to show.  While standing on the shore Jesus tells them to cast the net on the right side.  They had already been fishing all night with no success.  Now this stranger yells out to them to “Cast the net on the other side.”  (As yet they had not recognized Jesus.)  This was more work after a whole night’s work, what could this guy know, but they did it anyway.  Now they caught so many the net broke.  Sometimes it is not good to give in to comfort when a little more work needs to be done.

Jesus warned Peter that he would be persecuted when he was old; that he would, “be carried whither he would not.”  This is after Peter had been told three times to feed the flock.  Did he have to be told because it would be hard to keep himself focused on his work for God during persecution?  When the persecutors would be seeking after him too “carry him” he would have the remembrance of “feed my lambs, feed my flock” to keep him applied to godly work, rather than saving his own skin - - or worse:  giving up some godliness for the sake of comfort and peace.

STILL WORKING ON DEVOTIONS

John 20
At 76 years old I’m still not one for a strong personal devotional time period, i.e. reading by myself.  Yet all these married years, and a little before, 47 years in all, I have had family devotions, a daily Bible reading.  This small thing has been great in my life .  As God said, it has been the mustard seed that, though a tiny seed, grew to “a great tree with branches that the fouls of the air may nest in.”

Jesus, by the sacrifice, asks how important is your [job, animals, wealth, self-esteem, power, etc.] to you?  More important than me?  He answers the question of how important are we to him:  we are important enough for him to give his only begotten son, important enough for him to die himself for us, important enough for him to give his spirit to dwell in us. 

One thing I have confidence about:  I KNOW what God thinks about a lot of things.  Some would take me aside as being a “Christian Bigot”.  They would say, “How can you be so arrogant as to say you KNOW what God thinks?”  I would say to them, “What principles are a guide for your life?  Any?  Some favorite author or politician?  Some particular group you belong to?”  From reading the Bible I know right from wrong, good from bad, profitable from unprofitable.  Each time I read the Bible I get yet more from it.  I have been a better man to the world because of it – even to those who would say it's  “just another book”.

PUT THE BALL IN SOMEONE ELSE’S COURT

[[ To continue some thinking from a previous blog of 4 April 2020 .  .  . ]]
John 19

Pilate cared nothing for Jesus life; that mattered not at all to him.  If Pilot could quickly get Jesus to admit he was King he could get a quick, easy judgment.  He brought him out before the people in “Kings clothing” saying, "behold your King".  But he had no evidence, only the troublesome fact that Jesus had said he was the son of God.  Now pilot was sucked into Jewish religious matters.  He tried to release him until the Jews said that Jesus made himself King in the place of Caesar.  That was enough to let pilot off the hook and get Jesus crucified.  In all this, the fact that an innocent man might die had no effect on Pilot’s thinking.  He didn't want to do anything that would embroil him in legal wrangling for months to come.  He wanted out of the Jewish religious arguments.  Let it not be said that Pilot upheld a Jewish religious discrimination suit in a Roman court.  That was a career-stopper.

BUILDING BY LIZZIE

My wife has a blog called BUILDING BY LIZZIE. I own the domain name "Submissionisnotsilence.com" and intended to re-direct all clicks to it to the "Bulding by..." site.  But I mistakenly directed it to "submissionisnotsilence.blogspot.com"  Try the BUILDING BY LIZZIE site, it's more current. 

STORE TROUBLE IN PRISON OR DEATH ROW

John 18
At the time of his trial no one handling Jesus cared anything about the truth - they all had other purposes for dealing with him.  The Pharisees wanted him dead while Pilot just wanted this troublesome incident out of the way. 

Pilot wanted Jesus off his back.  Pilot couldn't get the Jews to handle him.  The Jews wanted him crucified but under Roman rule they had no authority for capital punishment.  They had to contrive some way to get it done by the Romans.  So, they told Pilot he was claiming to be a king.  This required a death sentence – no one could be king but Caesar.  Taking up the Jews’ line he started by trying to get Jesus to admit he was a King.  He was trying to get Him to admit some guilt, to accuse himself.  “So, you’re a king then,” said Pilot.  “You’re the one saying that,” said Jesus.  Pilot could not get Jesus to incriminate himself.  Finally he made a public statement that he found no guilt in Jesus.  This apparently riled the people enough to make for a possible riot.  Now a good Roman Governor can not have riots on his record so he released Jesus to the executioners. 

CORONA VIRUS, SHAMONA VIRUS!

We have lived a long time: have seen many things, experienced many things, and learned many things  We have had the pleasure of seeing our grown children themselves diligently raising a family.  We have had the pleasure of reading the Bible together aloud every day for all our married life, so we know what’s in there  We have benefited from the fellowship of many believers and non-believers  Both of us have been close to death’s door yet have been granted more engagement with life.  Neither of us were afraid at those times since we knew what lay on the other side, and that that place is better than this 

So, Corona Virus, Shamona Virus!  God’s plans for us on this side the door or the other are excellent plans.  And they are the best possible plans  Jer_29:11  "For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end"  

Yet the young among us (meaning those less that fifty years old) may have trouble thinking this way.  I understand the anxiety of being absent from their friends and family.  What will happen to them?  It is sometimes hard to really trust that what God may do is for the best.  How can hardship be for the best?  Some questions and doubts will never be answered until we are walking with Jesus in heaven.

WHERE IS ZERO ON THE TIMELINE

John 17:6
This appears a very "Presbyterian" section because it speaks of some people in the world who are the Father’s, and some who are not.  “. . . The men which thou gavest me out of the world:  thine they are . . .”  And yet it does not say for sure there are only certain prescribed ones who will believe.  The ones who are "the father's" may as well be the father's because they exercised their will to believe.  God predestined the possibility for men to make a choice for him.  The ones who did became the “predestined”. 

God is the god of all time.  He exists in the past, present and future.  For him time is just another created thing that is controlled by him.   How else can we explain the witness of the Angel in Revelation saying, “. . . there will be time no more . . .”

I can somewhat comprehend the pre knowledge of God in this manner: I am 75 years old.  I know that at 75 that I have been in the Navy, have married, have had children, and worked for the US government.  If I was like God, and time was something I created, I would exist also at the time I was born as well as the time period we call “Now”.  Time is like a dot moving along a line.  Creatures subject to time must stay on the dot, but God stands back a distance from the line and can see the dot, the beginning and the end of the line, and eternity before and after.  So if I were like God, I could stand back from the line, while the dot was at 75 years, and see clearly the spot on the line at zero years and know that I would be in the future: be in the Navy, get married, have children, and work for the US government.  If I were like God, I could proclaim all this to the zero year spot on the line.  It would sound to the 0-year-old created me like predestination.  It actually would be a recitation from an all-knowing source, who lives outside our boundaries of time, of the things I had done as a result of the choices I made.

SMALL OR LARGE STEPS

Psalm 18:29 says,  "For by thee I have run through a troop; and by my God have I leaped over a wall".  (Second Samuel 22:30 says the same thing.)  Here the writer has done impossible things having been empowered by God.  Although possibly literal, I believe the actions described could be figurative.  He has accomplished a seeming impossible task as if he had just “run through a troop”.  These tasks are framed as if done in a very short time, perhaps instantaneous.  They could also have taken an extended period.  Was it be done suddenly on impulse, or was it done through many small steps over a long period of time?  Will we look back one day and see we have "run through a troop" because of our consistent, diligent steps?  The language of leap suggests one understanding, one instantaneous act, not a prolonged period.  Yet we cannot play the piano instantly.  We do not learn a new language instantly.  When we can play the piano or speak a new language we can truly say,  "I have come through a troop and have leaped over a wall".

Small. steps or large steps; walking or leaps; instants or long-term effort; we will need all these efforts during our lives.

ACCEPTING GOD’S SERVICE

In John 13:8 Jesus’ response to Peter when Peter did not want him to wash his feet was, "If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me."  Jesus was saying it is not on an option about accepting God’s service to us.  We must accept his personally serving us.  Even though we know him to be God  - -  greater than any person  - -  we must allow him to serve us, even as we would one who is much lower than us.  So serving others is not an activity we should avoid. Because we are to be like him, we should do as he does.

Right after talking about serving, Jesus tells us, “The servant is not greater than his Lord”.  Why does he say this?  Is it that we might get thinking, after serving one another, how noble and giving we are?  Perhaps more noble and giving than anyone else in the whole world ever was?  Perhaps more a servant than God ever knew how to be?

Maybe it means something else.  Maybe if we are God's children we do not have to do the things the ungodly have to do.  They are servants to sin; they have to serve  - -  that's their place.  But not us, we are God's children.  There are many good works that on the surface appear to be "service works" and therefore we do not have to do them.  But we can never serve as God has served:  allowing himself to be killed by a misbehaving creation so that they could live.  We must be like him.  We are made to serve, not to be served.

HE KNOWS WHO DONE IT

Psalms 9:12 says how God . . . “maketh inquisition for blood, he remembereth them: he forgetteth not the cry of the humble.”  God does not forget those that have been cut down in cold blood.  Perhaps this means more than the physically murdered; perhaps it also stands for those who have been bloodied spiritually.  God will make inquisition - there will be a judgment day. 

GOD DOES’NT JUST PULL THE TIRGGER

John 12
God's shows great loving kindness in that Jesus did not just eliminate those who sought his life.  Maybe some of these very ones would later come to believe - as when Paul encountered the vision on the road to Damascus.  And perhaps he waits for some to come "come out of the closet", such as the timid in verses 42 and 43:  "Nevertheless many even of the rulers believed in Him, but because of the Pharisees they were not confessing Him, for fear that they would be put out of the synagogue;  for they loved the approval of men rather than the approval of God."

God is very patient.  When you look at the world it's obvious it's a created place.  It's obvious that men are the highest creatures because they, as God said, have Dominion.  And it's obvious that without God men are very mean to each other.  God hasn’t pulled the trigger yet, but one day he will.

BUT HE WASN’T THERE

John 11

He was not there when Lazarus died.  When Jesus came to raise Lazarus from the dead much is made of "if you had been here Lazarus would not have died".  By both sisters, by the people, and by Jesus himself when he said for the disciples sakes he was glad he was not here there (see verse 15).  This was for the intent that they should believe.  When he raised Lazarus, it was for the people to see and believe.  He said, “. . . that they may believe that thou [the Father] hast sent me".  This is another miracle done to demonstrate that Jesus is the son of God.  Some believed and some did not.  Why did they not believe?  Because they did not accept that his power was coming from God.  In the perceiving of him they always were biased for some other way of thinking. 

Why was he not there?  To allow Lazarus to die.  If Jesus had been there, a sick man – not a dead man - would have been healed.  Some would have said "he was sick and just got well, he would have recovered even if Jesus were not there."  By rising him from the dead he demonstrated miraculous power. 

Many judged Jesus’ deeds, what he did, by what they already had in their minds.  They had preconceptions and biases.  I suppose we always judge things by the knowledge, history and experience we have in our minds.  This the Pharisees did - and did it wrong.  We know this because they came out against the son of God. 

We must be careful how we judge others.  On one hand we don't want to use wrong concepts, like the Pharisees.  On the other hand, "my sheep hear my voice , and I know them, and they follow Me"

SOME SEE AND HEAR, SOME DON’T

In John 8 Jesus heals a blind man and tells him to go the pool of Siloam and wash.  The blind man was healed and received sight, for he was one who listened for God, did what God said, and allowed his perceptions to be controlled by what God asked, not what tradition demanded.  He was healed because he listened to Jesus.  Later he was brought to the Pharisees who questioned him about the miracle.  The pharisees tossed  the blind man out of the synagogue because he would not back away from what he had just experienced and agree Jesus was a sinner.

The Pharisees were the ones who were really blind because they judged what happened through their tradition.  They saw what they wanted.  They could not recognize a miracle because it occurred in a way that broke some of their arbitrary rules.

Jesus told us the sheep know his voice.  He is the door  -  he is the way people get into the sheepfold.  We know someone is a robber if they come in by any other way than Jesus.  He said, "as the father knows me, even so I know the father".  He lays down his life for the sheep.  He, in the body of flesh, was being wrongly understood and persecuted despite the words he spoke and the miracles he performed.  He suffered the horrible anticipation of his death in every sense that any ordinary man would.  God gives us a world to live in, yet the pharisees of us walk on our own food, pee in our drinking water, and kill the innocent. 

It is God's nature to love and to reach out to his creation.  Who can say that he does not seeing we have food in our teeth and stand by the risen cross of Christ?  There is no way any man can justify himself before God.  God does not stand before us as a cruel or detached or self-serving taskmaster.  He stands as one with an open hand as one who wants a relationship, as one who wants involvement with our lives.