Smoke and Mirrors

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Have you ever felt you were surrounded by fluff and froth? The hype, the posturing, the flaunted pretenses? Just think, did Jesus have a public relations team? Did Jesus worry about His image and issue press releases? Umm, no.

One of the greatest blessings of being a discipleship Christian is that the Lord strips away the pretension, the falsehood, the insincerity that’s so naturally a part of the landscape of this present world. The Lord has ways of putting us through the fire to burn away the dross and the immense vanity that is the accompanying baggage of virtually every person in this world.

The Lord said He would have us be as children with their guileless innocence and their nearness to the fundamentals of life. But the farther we go in “the course of this world” (Ephesians 2:2), the more we take on what Jesus called “leaven” (Luke 12:1). That’s not a word used or understood much anymore but it refers to the yeast that bakers would use back then. The yeast “leavened” the bread. It made it rise and be bigger but it didn’t really add much in the way of substance or nourishment.

The Bible said it so simply 2000 years ago that people get “puffed up”. But when that’s all that you can see anymore, it becomes the new normal, “par for the course” and the emperor’s clothes that everyone is suppose to see. But a few still blurt out that there really isn’t anything there!

I can’t tell you how thankful I am for the pureness and reality that can be found in a life of following the truths of the Bible. As so many poets, song writers and thinkers have said through the generations, this present world is an upside-down, backwards fantasia that we all have to navigate through each day. And it’s a battle for the people of faith as we’re just humans of like passions and can easily succumb to the sirens of Satan that seem to be virtually on every corner and on every web site.

And the funny thing is, nearly everyone is still strangely aware that something is not quite right. So many things have a funny ring to them. Or, like food, you bite into it and you can just tell there is nothing there; no nourishment, no value, just fluff. So I am dumbfounded that somehow the high God has made it so that I can turn back to the truths that were revealed to me when I was 21 years old. I can go back to the Bible verses I memorized at that time and find that they still strongly resonate with me, like dear old friends whose companionship is still as strong and real as it was when I first met them long ago.

To be honest, perhaps all of us of the people of faith get hit with the idea every so often, “I guess I’m a little weird.” Ha! Do you think Moses in Egypt ever thought that? Or Noah before the Flood? I guess that’s the price we have to pay for being “strangers and pilgrims on the earth” (Hebrews 11:13).

But here’s a thought. Pity the multitudes of pitiful “sheep” in this present world, people who are mingled among the great mass of humanity in these present times but who don’t really know the Lord yet. That was how I was. I was a sheep of God but I didn’t know it. So I tried to run with the wolves and the people who are truly comfortable with the darkness and the valueless vanity of these times.

I just didn’t fit in, although I really tried. I was a sheep of God but I didn’t know it. And there are still multitudes like that now, misfits, “queer” characters who don’t know who they are until somehow the voice of God breaks through to them. It could be someone who shared some snippet of the truth of God with them, some Christian song they heard, some dream they had, something that awakens them out of the present darkness and draws them into the light of God’s truth and love which is what they were actually looking for all along.

But really, how can any of us discern the fluff from solid, tangible truths and realities? For the people of faith, we have the measuring stick of God’s truths in His Word and personal contact with the Spirit of God who can “lead us into all truth” (John 16:13), even in times such as these.

Thankfully there is an alternative to the smoke and mirrors, bells and whistles and façades and charades of these times. There is the blissful resonance of the truth to be found in the Word of God. There is the warmth to be found in the matchless love that the Lord can bring to you through a fellow Christian. Without the truth and reality of the Lord, those of us who are His would not be able to withstand the forces of the insanity that is upon the world at this time.

Perhaps that is why there’s such an increase in suicides and drug use. May the Lord help us all to continue to be His light and salt, to be His hands to reach out to help the immense number of people who are fainting and dying in this time that’s so lacking in truth and flooded with shadows.

Truth us, oh Lord!

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Can “truth” be a verb? Can God “truth us”? I never thought of that before. But, my gosh, how we need God to truth us. What darkness we live in, what confusion, what banality. But God can truth us. He can just almost blast us with the truth, blowing away the clouds and the gloomy uncertainty.

Oh, how we need that. Left to ourselves, we would be quickly overcome with the onslaught of bewilderment that assails us every day. No wonder many people just leave all to go live alone in the woods. Maybe they hope to find their sanity again there. Or they reluctantly take their little children out of public school because they realize how much darkness now dominates those formerly happy halls of learning.

So we need a powerful infusion of truth, the same way people die without an infusion of oxygen. It’s that serious in these times. Maybe that’s something I like, strange as it may seem, about this present indescribable war in Ukraine. I lived in eastern Ukraine for 18 months just over 10 years ago so I know those cities , those roads, those fields, those people and those children and orphanages. But, strange as it may seem, the war in Ukraine has brought a glimmer of sanity back into the Western world and the world overall.

When your personal friends who you know and love are face to face with one of the strongest armies in the world, when they could die any day along with the hundreds of people who they are regularly ministering to in a city you once lived in, then the whole question of “fake news” and what the “elites” are doing really fades out of the picture.

I don’t know what’s happening in Ukraine from the mass media. I know from what my personal friends are telling me from there. And this is good because for far too long so many of us have been imposed upon to live in some kind of fantasia “la-la land” where there virtually is no truth but everything we hear and read is doubted and questioned. I don’t question the war in Ukraine. I wake up every morning to find if my personal friends still in Kharkov, Dnipro and Kiev have survived the night and are alive this morning.

The Bible says “God is not the author of confusion” (I Corinthians 14:33). But then who is the author of confusion? Truly, it’s the devil himself. He thrives on sowing confusion at every opportunity and that confusion is so much a hallmark of our present times.

We need the Lord to truth us, to just be that powerful that His love, His truth and His reality will be that much greater than the confusion and insanity of this present evil world. I’m so thankful for the promises of God in His Word that He will tell us the truth, that we will be able to continue with a “sound mind” (II Timothy 1:7) and that the onslaughts of the enemies of God, as well as the meandering confusion of the lost sheep, goats, snakes, foxes and wolves of this world will not be victorious over the truth of God that He continues to pump into His children.

Lord help us all to hold onto the truth of God the way an underwater diver holds on to their oxygen mask. Truly we are like that, under water in this world of misinformation, confusion and lack of absolutes. So we need our good Godly helpers in the Spiritual world on the surface above us, like as if they were in a boat above us in the water, to keep that spiritual oxygen pumping to us, so we can stay alive down here in these present depths.

As strange as it may seem, this is perhaps how those in the spiritual world and God’s great hereafter view us who presently live in these realms below. That we are totally dependant on the armor of God, sustained by the lifeline from above of truth-giving Spirit and life itself that only comes from God. Thus we survive and can function here in this alien world but only as we work together with our life-giving sustainers, the angels of God and the Sustainer Himself, God’s Holy Spirit.

Stay alive brethren. Don’t get “the rapture of the deep” where you just get enchanted with the strange underworld we presently live in and decide to go sauntering off into it. Keep the vision that we are not of this present underworld. Keep breathing the oxygen that is from above, pumped down to us by God’s blessed Holy Spirit through the mask and piping of His salvation so that we can continue to exist in this strange reality that we now dwell in, “as strangers and pilgrims” (Hebrews 11:15).

And may the Lord continue to “truth us”, to powerfully pump His truth to us so we can make sense of things and keep our heads while all about us others are losing theirs. So it is for now. Amen, Lord truth us!

Do you ever feel dumb?

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Do you ever feel dumb? Sometimes I do. But Jesus said, “The children of this world are in their generation wiser than the children of light.” (Luke 16:8 ) He also said, “Be wise as serpents and harmless as doves.” (Matthew 10:16) The Lord closed His thought with the injunction not to be dumb sheep but instead wise, even wise as snakes. Clearly, it’s not that the Lord wants us to just be ignoramuses.

But some people want to portray us as uneducated, bigoted, racist dummies. Sadly, at times they are able to do that because some Christians just default to simplistic, under-educated clichés or sound bites. And they sadly are prone to being uncharitable towards folks who are not of their race, background, nationality or education. Let’s face it, this happens. And it shouldn’t.

Things are very serious now. Incredible battles are being waged in local school board meetings across America where the forefront of cultural/spiritual battles are being waged for the future of the children and grandchildren of this nation. Astonishing inroads have been made into the curricula of public schools to where books that are just gorged with filth and infested with perverse indoctrination are freely available to elementary school kids in school libraries, as well as being put forward by some teachers.

It’s not a time to default to dummy-ism. If you study history, you’ll know that there’ve been some extremely smart Christians over the centuries who’ve championed the cause of Christ in the secular world and have helped to turn the tide of evil in their day.

A few days ago I saw a movie that really spoke to me, maybe you’ve seen it. It is called “Amazing Grace” and it is the story of William Wilberforce who was an implacable foe of the devil and fought for the love of God and the liberty of African slaves 200 years ago in Great Britain. It’s a tremendous movie and really spoke to my heart.

Is there ever a time when a fully dedicated, consecrated Christian who is seeking first the kingdom of God should take his efforts into what could be considered the political sphere?

Wilberforce deeply struggled with this question. But his friend, the future Prime Minster of Britain, William Pitt the younger, was instrumental in persuading Wilberforce to use his considerable speaking talents and his passion to champion the cause of the ending of the slave trade in the British parliament.

It is an amazing movie and an amazing story, probably very seldom told in secular modern education since it so much glorifies the truth of God and those who follow it. I do recommend it, especially at this time when Christian values are being overwhelmed by “identity politics” and so-called “Progressivism” which is working successfully as a carnivorous beast to destroy Christian values as fast as it can across most of the Western world.

If ever there was a time for parents to stand up, and grandparents, against the forces that are successfully proselytizing and seeking to convert our children and grandchildren openly in public schools across the supposedly advanced world, it is now.

But you’re going to have to be sharp. They are. And they will eat your lunch if you let them. If you haven’t done your homework and are just pratering away with weak platitudes about “the Left”, “the Communists” or things like that, they’ll make a fool of you and utterly defeat you in the realm of public discourse. And this is important because all kinds of people have not made up their minds.

No, everyone has not already made their decision. Multitudes are heart-stricken by what’s going on in public schools. But they need to be informed of the facts without being forced to join one camp or the other on the political left or right.

It’s a great time for those who’ve spent years in the struggle for the cause of Christ to recognize this fight that’s presently raging. It doesn’t at all have to be a matter of “Left’ verses “Right”. I strongly resist being labeled that way.

But when it comes to our poor children who are being indoctrinated with perversion in public elementary schools and then they are told to not tell their parents about it, this is outrageous . And it seems to me it needs the intervention of seasoned veterans of the cross to enter the fray and fight for the survival of our children and grandchildren, right in our own nation, states and cities.

Chinese Video: “历史上 预言的力量”

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I’ve been able to complete in Chinese the beginning video in the Prophecies of Daniel series, which in English is called “An Introduction to Prophecy in History”. In Chinese this video is called “The Power of Prophecy in History”.

For many people, Biblical prophecy is something they’ve never heard of and have no knowledge of. In the video I try to introduce this phenomenon as it frequently was seen in the history of ancient Israel. This class also sets the stage and background with the history of ancient Israel, against which chapters in Daniel repeatedly foretell the future to come. The video can be seen at this link:

What if the wolf was really there?

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What if the wolf was really there? In the end, the real wolf showed up in the story of the little boy who cried wolf. But people had become so skeptical, they didn’t believe it. Folks and friends, the wolf is there. No, he doesn’t show up all the time and there are lots of people falsely crying “wolf” nowadays. Nevertheless, the wolf is real.

That’s what bothers me. At the end of the movie “Don’t look up”, as the doomsday apocalyptic comet is striking the earth and vast earthquakes shake the planet, the scientist played by Leonardo DiCaprio is having a “last supper” with his family and he pauses to say whimsically to everyone, “We really did have it good, didn’t we?”

But too late. He had been the scientist trying desperately to tell the leaders of America that they had 6 months to take action against a “planet killer” comet that was in alignment to strike the earth. But to no avail. Like Jeremiah of old, he was mocked and dismissed by the leaders of his country, while making little headway with the general population who in DiCaprio’s case were overwhelmingly preoccupied with the technological delicacies of our times, along with the glitzy glamour of the modern media.

In the end, the wolf got them because they’d been lulled to sleep by their hardened hearts and increasingly skeptical perceptions so that reality in its most true form was not really able to be perceived anymore. That’s one reason why I got a lot out of that movie.

A verse that came to me about it after watching the movie was, “The wages of sin is death” (Romans 6:23). It just shows the enormity of the sin that is upon this nation and so many others in our times to which virtually all are oblivious to. When someone shows up who’s telling them verifiable, objective, in-your-face truth about a coming reckoning unlike any before, were they believed? No.

Unbelief and reprobate, hardened hearts were unable to come to grips with simple truth-tellers and so the window of time they had to take action in was frittered away. And, in the end, the planet was virtually destroyed.

It so much reminds me of the obscure but deeply haunting verse at the end of the second book of Chronicles. Talking about the all-encompassing judgment on the nation of Israel 2600 years ago, as the Babylonians closed in to devastate and destroy the nation that had represented the God of Abraham for around 800 years, the text describes the situation in Israel as this. “But they mocked the messengers of God, and despised His words and misused His prophets until the wrath of the Lord arose against His people, till there was no remedy.”  (II Chronicles 36:16)

They had been warned, repeatedly. It’s not for the faint-hearted but if you think you can take it, read the first chapters of the book of Jeremiah and see if any of it reminds you of modern America or the Western world at large.

My friends, in the case of the people of those times, the wolf came. And God allowed it. He had warned them, repeatedly. But an increasing dullness and darkness had settled upon and entered into the hearts of the vast multitude of people so that the lone truth-tellers were looked on as cranks and fools.

The wolf came but they didn’t believe. What a warning, what a lesson. I just wonder who will have taken this to heart? Actually, we don’t have to look back 2600 years to see this process in action. If there was ever a “wolf”, it was Adolf Hitler and the Nazi movement in Germany in the 1930’s.

But the clear historical record shows that so many people in the Europe and even in the America of that time just vehemently didn’t want to believe that it was really that bad. “Surely we can work out around this. Surely there will be ‘peace in our times’.” That was the popular and majority opinion. But in this case, it was the British statesman Winston Churchill who with flint-like resolution continued to sound out a warning to all who would listen about the mortal threat of Hitler and Nazism.

Was Churchill listened to? No, not for a very long time and almost until it was too late. Churchill said that at one point in the late 1930’s he could count on the fingers of one hand the number of friends he had in the British parliament. But Churchill was proven true. The wolf was real, he was there and it was just almost too late before the people of Britain awoke to this truth.

Do you know of any Churchills around today? Sadly, I don’t. So we get our warnings from wherever the Lord can somehow engineer them to get to us. I’m sorry if I end this on a sad and foreboding note. But that movie, “Don’t look up” struck me personally to very accurately portray the dithering, distracted, weakened, sin-soaked souls of what seems to be the majority of the peoples of the Western and northern worlds at this time. May the Lord help us all and have mercy.

Seeing light through the mists

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Without God, life can be like being nibbled to death by ducks. The enemies of our soul want to exhaust you and wear you down with distractions, vanities, “rabbit trails” and meaninglessness. Without God, you ultimately crumble, surrender to the fog and become numb within the mists you’ve come to live in. Certainly, this is not the will of God.

But then tonight, it was like a fresh wind from God that blew through the house. We watched the movie about the “Free Burma Rangers”. It’s the story of a man from Texas who was raised on the mission field of Thailand but then felt led to become a soldier. After having become an elite “Rangers” member of the US military, he felt the call of God to use his training and Christian/military background to help the marginalized peoples of Burma.

It specially spoke to me as this man, with his wife and 3 children beside him, has lived a life of zealous Christian discipleship which has been similar to what I’ve experienced at times in my life on the mission field.

This movie touched me on so many levels. While I‘ve not had exactly the same life as this man and his family, I could very much relate to their commitment to the Lord and their willingness to put their lives on the line for Him in very extreme situations in the hinterland of Myanmar (Burma) for years and then in northern Iraq at the height of the ISIS threat there.

It made me reflect on where I’m at now. I’m still amazed at what the Lord has done in the last year to make it possible for me to get the first house I’ve ever owned in my life, against the backdrop of a crazy housing market in central Texas at this time. Plus the Lord has put me together with a couple I met barely a year ago who now rent two rooms from me here who I get along with very well and with whom I share a background of Christian discipleship faith. So “the Lord has done great things for us, whereof we are glad.” (Psalm 126:3)

At the same time, this movie about these dedicated people at the very front of Christian discipleship in Burma and Iraq helped remind me to not “sit at ease in Zion” (Amos 6:1), as is so normal and acceptable to do here in Christian circles in America. The movie reminded me of my calling and background, my experience and all that the Lord has invested in me and all I can still be used by Him to do, if I will be cautious to not get comfortable and settled in this present wonderful situation I’m in.

Desperation often brings on a clarity that comfort and ease really doesn’t. There’s so much confusion and vanity that every person here in my country is mightily assailed by every day. It’s like living in mists that effectively obscure spiritual realties. So we can end up quibbling about trifles while the starkest realities of the spiritual world mostly escape us in all the Babylonian chatter of our daily lives.

But this movie tonight about this dear, precious man was a bit of a shakeup and a reminder of my calling and life up to this time. Jesus said, “No man having put his hand to the plow and looking back is fit for the kingdom of God.” (Luke 9:62) Or it’s like the old prophet and the young prophet (Kings 13). The young prophet was really going great for the Lord. But then he took time out to rest under the shade of a tree, in direct disobedience to God, and this was his undoing.

One of the greatest dangers to Christians in my country is the incredible surge of sickening swill and sludge that flows at us night and day through every organ of the media. It’s virtually all tainted, brackish and deeply polluted by any number of agendas and outlets, trying to sell you their viewpoint or product.

Strange as it may seem, counter-intuitive as you might think it to be, those dear people in the jungles of Burma or the poor souls who were assailed for years by ISIS in Iraq and Syria had a leg up on many of us here. Because they didn’t have to try to sort out reality from fiction. The enemy was right there, real and clear and in their faces, ready to literally kill them physically right then.

It wonderfully concentrates the mind in situations like that. I haven’t experienced it a lot but I definitely have from time to time in my encounters on some far flung mission fields. It quickens you, clears your mind and mostly gets you very desperate as you are face to face with forces greater than you. And you realize perhaps as much as ever before how very much you desperately need at that moment the presence and power of God. Or you may die in the next minute. [Here’s an article I wrote about when I was about to venture into a city on the Syrian border when ISIS was at its peak and how desperate prayer was a life or death matter.]

But are most people in my country experiencing that right now? No. Sadly another manifestation of Satan assails them and for the most part utterly defeats them: lulling distractions, “the pleasures of sin for a season” (Hebrews 11:25), meaningless political debates and diverse vanities that suck the air out of our lives and the clarity of the Spirit out of our hearts.

It was a real wake up call for me tonight to watch “Free Burma Rangers”. I’d better not get drawn in to the allurements and futility of “this present evil world” (Galatians 1:4), but instead keep my eyes on the Lord and my commitment to His cause.

 

Hindi Video: “इतिहास में भविष्यवाणी की शक्ति”

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I’ve been able to complete in Hindi the beginning video in the Prophecies of Daniel series, which in English is called “An Introduction to Prophecy in History”.

For many people, Biblical prophecy is something they’ve never heard of and have no knowledge of. In the video I try to introduce this phenomenon as it frequently was seen in the history of ancient Israel. This class also sets the stage and background with the history of ancient Israel, against which chapters in Daniel repeatedly foretell the future to come. The video can be seen at this link:

A note on the tenor of the times

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Many of us know just how fast and far things have plunged into darkness. The whole trend of light being called darkness, truth being called a lie and love being called hate has already permeated the society I live in and is almost taken for granted in everyone’s lives.

One example stood out to me tonight, not even that much of a major but I was seeing it as an endemic example of the times we’re living in. I was reading about “fat shaming”, maybe you’ve heard of that. Simply put, someone ends up saying something to someone who has become “morbidly obese.”

There’s another relatively new word. When I was a kid, I had a good friend and his grandfather weighed 300 pounds (about 135 kilos). It was the kind of thing you said under your breath. That was the outside edge of what anyone ever weighed when I was 12 years old. Nowadays that’s pretty much within the range of normal here.

But the issue is that to say anything, to even “speak the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15) to someone who’s been unable to restrain themselves and who has become morbidly obese, this effort to say anything to that person is now called “fat shaming”. I don’t know if it has become a felony yet but I could certainly see how that could happen.

Maybe I’m old fashioned but I don’t see it as being wrong to try to find a way, in sincere and humble truth, love and wisdom, to speak to someone who’s been overcome by their physical desires to the extent to which they’ve become vastly overweight. Certainly here in America this has gone on to the extent to which it is not even mentioned or almost even noticed. It’s not unusual to see people weighing 300 to 600 pounds (about 270 kilos), barely able to carry themselves about because of their girth.

Of course for Christians and actually for everyone, it should go without saying that to tease, mock or in any way make someone feel condemned for their looks or their weaknesses, this is not what I am talking about. Jesus taught love and love is totally different from mean-spirited taunting and teasing.

But it’s now a negative thing for anyone to say or do anything to help any of these people to try to be delivered from this dilemma. You’ll be accused of “fat shaming”. Honesty, I don’t even know if this article will survive the surveillance of the internet powers that be as this may be a bridge to far in the way of social/Christian commentary and observation. Possibly therefore it may be banned from the platform. Being “deplatformed” is the risk one runs for making comments like this.

But, are we “our brother’s keeper”? It’s a fundamental tenet of the New Testament that we are.  And we are to speak up in order to be a help to others who are struggling with human weaknesses, whatever they may be. Obesity is a leading cause around the world of a shortened life span.

When someone suffers an early death because of struggles with any number of cravings and addictions, it’s not just the victim that dies. They often have children, parents, brothers and sisters or friends who miss them dearly as their life is snuffed out prematurely through their “flesh”, as the Bible calls it, getting the best of them and ruling their lives.

But in the modern atmosphere, if any of us speak up, we’re likely to be called out as the guilty ones, guilty of “shaming” someone which is seen as a modern aggression, when actually it’s an effort to admonish and reason with someone who’s been “overtaken with a fault” (Galatians 6:1).

What’s the point? None really, but just an observation, a reflection on the deeply perverse nature of this time that to do good, to try to help recover someone from a series of choices and a lifestyle which can easily mean their death, to do that is seen as an affront and an aggression against the poor soul that needs someone to speak lovingly but plainly about how their choices are leading them to destruction.

Quite possibly some reading this know exactly what I’m talking about. What I’m presenting here is not even that much of a big issue. But it just fades into the overall bedarkening of our times where, on the right hand and the left, the Christian voice of conscience is powerfully hushed by the tenor of the times, the mood of “tolerance”, a mood of independence to the neglect of responsibility and of where doing basic Christian good can now be framed as ethical, moral evil, even to the extent of being criminal.

Christians everywhere are being confounded by these kinds of confrontations in their lives to what the simple prompting of the Holy Spirit would lead them to do. Common decency and brotherly love would lead someone to speak up to a friend or loved one to bring to their attention their being defeated by the desires of their flesh. But in these times, to do that is to invite strong censure from the society which tries to frame that as aggressive cruelty, rather than an act of loving kindness. And this kind of thing is seen everywhere.

What can anyone do? For one, they can recognize it. We are our brother’s keeper. Lovingly admonishing another in order to try to help them is the will of God and is a natural product of common, even human love for another.

As the darkness deepens, it will be decisions like these (against the mood of the times) that will be necessary for true Christians to make, if they’re to follow the leadings of the Lord through the Holy Spirit in our daily lives. God help us all.

Not easily satisfied

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Often, we’re not easily satisfied. The general of an ancient king came to a prophet to be healed. The prophet didn’t even go out to meet him. Instead he sent a messenger to tell the general to go wash in a small, muddy local river. The general was incensed. “Is that all?” seemed to be the question of his heart.

Scripture explains the incident like this. “But the general was very angry and went away saying, ‘I thought surely the prophet would come out to me and stand, calling on the name of the Lord his God, and strike his hand over the place, recovering the leper.’”

Continuing his complaint, the general said, “Are not the rivers of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel? May I not wash in them and be clean? So he turned and went away in a rage.”

This gets to be rather like what I wrote about in “Does God have a sense of Humor?” We can look at it now and smile at the petulant, pompous commander in his fit of pique. What a patient and loving God we have who could have just gotten fed up with the situation and struck the general dead on the spot. But instead, the Lord allowed the general’s servants to admonish and reason with the him.

The Bible says, “The general’s servants came near and spoke to him, saying, “My father, if the prophet had bid you do some great thing, wouldn’t you have done it? How much rather then, when he said to you, ‘Wash, and be clean‘”?

And it all turned out to have a happy ending. Scripture goes on to say, “Then the general went down and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan River, according to the saying of the man of God. And the king’s flesh came again like unto the flesh of a little child and he was clean.” This is all found in II Kings 5:10-14.

How about you? For that matter, how about me? I’ll admit that I may at times have a little of the attitude of that ancient military commander, Lord help and deliver me. There are times when I want to see some mighty moving of the hand of God in my life or in the world, when instead the message that comes back from heaven is rather like what it says in Zachariah, “despise not the day of small things.” (Zach. 4:10)

When Elijah was on the mountain and it was rent with fire and storm, the Bible goes on to say that the Lord wasn’t in either of those. But then, after the fire and storm, the Bible says that Elijah heard a “still, small voice”. (I Kings 19:12)

Some of us want the storm. I wrote about that recently in “Before the storm”. I don’t think that’s bad in itself. Jesus even named two of his top disciples, “Boanerges” which meant, “sons of thunder”.  (Mark 3:17)

But for all the times in our lives when we are swept up in the mighty power of the Lord, in huge reapings or winings of souls across a nation, miraculous healings, astounding revelations and life changing events, you have to admit that the majority of the time that’s just not how things usually go for most of us.

More often we are to be about our Father’s business in meaningful but simple daily tasks, whether they be physical or spiritual. But it’s easy for some of us to let dissatisfaction creep in. The Bible talks about “patient continuance in well doing” (Romans 2:7). But then we are tempted to “grow weary and faint in our minds” (Hebrews 12:3).

The Bible says, “Moreover it is required in stewards that a man be found faithful” (I Cor. 4:2). But our own wayward heart can find fault in this. We can find the temptation to boredom springing up in the garden of our heart. We can be like the people the Bible talks about who say, “‘My Lord delays his coming’ and they began to eat and drink and be merry” (Luke 12:45).

I wonder if Jesus was ever tempted with anything like this? It says He was “in all points tempted like we are” (Hebrews 4:15). But then I’m struck by the simple adverb that’s repeatedly used to describe the Lord towards the end of His time on this earth, “He set his face steadfastly to go to Jerusalem.” (Luke 9:51)

Steadfast. Not bored, not cynical, not jaded or double-minded, not weary in well doing and fainting in His mind.

Maybe the Holy Spirit is saying to some of us today what the king’s servants said to him long ago, “My father, if the prophet had bid you do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much rather then, when he said to you, “Wash, and be clean?”

We, or perhaps I should just speak for myself, I need to steadfastly continue in all the Lord has already shown me I should be doing, all that He has opened the door for and gotten started already. It’s not smart in any way to get impatient or dissatisfied with the ways of the Lord. It’s good to stay desperate with Him and to desire to stay close to Him. But the main thing is to continue to obey, follow and be satisfied with what He has been directing personally in our lives, as we delight ourselves in Him.

Continue in the things you have known

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Sometimes you don’t know what to do. You seem to be in fog. You become uncertain about your direction and even your vision and goals. I’ve been like that. And tonight I had to really go out and pray about it.

In these times there is a major cacophony of voices and proponents, fervently pointing to what they feel is the way forward. Meanwhile for most folks, it’s like what the verse says about “Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision” (Joel 3:14). What really is the way forward? Who actually does have the high ground when it comes to truth, relevancy and anything close to the voice of God and His love, truth and reason in these strange times?

I’ve been troubled and somewhat weighted down by these things for some months. Meanwhile I’ve been very embroiled in the physical side of making a move and buying house for the first time. I know it’s been the Lord and amazing things have worked out.

But it gets to be a little like what the apostles said in Acts chapter 6, “It is not right that we leave the word of God and serve tables.” (Acts 6:2) There are times when every person is called to just simply take care of things and of other people physically. But usually the Lord doesn’t want that to become our preoccupation. He has other things that are more pressing for the work of the Kingdom of God for us and I’ve certainly been feeling that.

Sometimes we just lose the thread, lose the rhythm and the pace of our lives , lose what we feel the Lord is really leading and doing and what His highest and best is. It’s been that way for me for a while as I try to turn back to more of the will of God overall after months of consolidating this new housing change.

If you’re used to trying to maintain a relatively close link with the Lord, trying to abide in that place where you feel the Lord is leading you presently and specifically, then it can be a troubling thing to feel you’ve not heard clearly from the Lord for some time about what exactly He has for you. Of course some Christians, perhaps many, have never really been taught to try to have that kind of relationship with the Lord.

But for those who’ve had a lifetime of Christian service, you just take it on board that you need to do what you can to maintain a continuing link with the Lord through prayer, where you feel and know you’ve really continued to hear from the Lord personally, His answers coming back to you in response to your desperate prayers.

There are so many verses on this. One of my favorites is “Call unto me and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things which you know not.” (Jeremiah 33:3). I was in a new Sunday school class last week and there was something in the lesson that opposed the idea of “name it and claim it” when it comes to Scripture. So I felt led to pipe up and say that actually there are times when we can and should claim and appropriate Scripture, bringing it before the Lord and claiming a verse in His Word that it will be fulfilled in our lives.

So I personally believe and live by the knowledge that we can get personal answers to prayer, directions, response, feedback and basic communications personally from the Lord to lead our lives and answer our prayers and needs.

That’s what happened tonight. I just really needed to get some response back, some direction from Him as He has done so regularly in my life for decades. I was looking for clarity, direction, some setting of the tone, some flash of lightning on what has been becoming an increasingly dark night.

And the Lord responded. Nothing shocking or profound but as is often the case, rather reasonable and what was almost common sense but also filled with wisdom, peace and strength. It could be boiled down to the verse which says something like “Continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of”(II Timothy 3:14) . The Lord was telling me that I should just continue in all He’s been telling me to do for months and years now. All the projects that He has gotten me started on but that are far from finished, all the articles, all the videos, all the leadings and new directions which He’s already set me in motion towards which I’ve not in any way finished.

“The slothful man roasts not that which he took in hunting, but the substance of the diligent man is precious.” (Proverbs 12:27) I’ve got a lot of stuff like that. Unfinished videos, nearly done, which could be a help to so many people, in over a dozen languages. Articles unfinished, directions that Lord has pointed me down, all of which are like “half baked cakes” which means there is still plenty more to just do what the Lord has already shown me to do for some time now.

It was refreshing to get this feedback from the Lord. I need to continue in what He’s already shown me to do. I don’t have to have some new revelation at this time. If I’ll just continue with all the Lord has shown me already, all that He’s done already, then I will stay on track and continue to proceed towards these visions and goals.

“Then shall we know if we continue on to know the Lord.” (Hosea 6:3) This was a help to give me a little nudge and encouragement to continue to go forward with all the truth, love and direction that I have had already from the Lord. And probably, further down the line as I go forward for Him, He will show me even more. I feel better now, ha!