A cloudy mirror ( Isaiah 55 v 8-9)

I have a little book called,'The  Valley of  Vision',it contains,'Puritan Prayers and Devotions',I read it occasionally ,I read the following,'Nothing can befall me,without God's permission,appointment,and administration'. These are very challenging words,and because God is sovereign they must be true,as you read this,you mind find it hard to accept those words.Consider Job and what happened to him,he had 10 children,they were all meeting together ,feasting and drinking and a very strong wind blew the house down ,and they all died.He lost servants when they were attaked by people called the Sabeans ,he had a vast amount of livestock he lost them also,then lastly he became seriously ill.God permitted all that ,and his wife told him to curse God and die,he replied, 'shall we accept good from God,and not trouble'His answer fits in with the opening words,what God permits what comes into our lives.I was praying for Christians who are suffering greatly,and I read how a believer was beheaded by Islamic extremist,it really upset me,and I cried.Let us not judge God whose ways are past finding out,All I can say is what Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 13 v 12.'Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete,but then I will know everything completely,just as God now knows me completely'

                                                      

                                              

There is hope.( Colossians 1 v 27)

 Humanity has accomplished so much ,they sent a rocket into space with people in it and went round the moon and back again,a tremendous achievement.There are cars that don't need a driver,most of us have wonderful TV's,of course there are countries that  are not so well off.There are still many homeless,and violence is everywhere,in so many countries there are serious conflicts going on.In Bob Dylan's song,'Blowing in the wind',he asks a lot of serious questions,like ,'How many deaths will it take 'tll he knows,that two many people have died?'.Inspite of all humanities achievements,it will never change,I wish I could say it will change,but it won't,the kingdoms of this world will not change,they will only invent more sophisticated ways of destroying one another and cheat one another.Is there any hope?,yes it comes through Jesus,who came to bring people into a kingdom that's not of this world,it is called the kingdom of God,it offers to everyone a wonderful opportunity to be a citizen of that kingdom by trusting Jesus as their Saviour.They will live and reign with Him for all eternity,in perfect peace and harmony.

Our great high priest ( 1 Timothy 2 v 5)

Writing on Jesus our great high priest in Hebrews 4 v14-16,the writer declares,'Therefore,since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven,Jesus the Son of God,let us hold firmly to the faith we profess' Hebrews is written to Jewish believers,who were struggling,the new covenant had come in, replaced by Jesus,who is the Son of God,in otherwords He is divine,no more sacrifices,no more trying to be justified by keeping the law.A new way has opened up before them, the way of faith ( Genesis 15 v6) ,The old covenant is absolete it was but a shadow of the good things to come (Heb 10 v 1) That goes for the Aaronic Priesthood it was never meant to be permanent,it would replaced  by a new Priesthood Cp  Gen 14 v18/Psalm 110 v4. and that is Jesus,who is now in Heaven,interceeding for us before God.This is what we read about Him,'For we do not have a high priest who is unable to feel sympathy for our weaknesses,but we have one who has been tempted in everyway just as we are,yet He did not sin.Let us then  approach God's throne of Grace with confidence,so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need'. (Heb 4 v15 -16)

Being presumptuous. (Psalm 19 v14 )

                                                     'Keep back your servant from presumptuous

                                                      sins; let  them not have dominion over me!

                                                      Then I shall be blameless,and innocent of

                                                       great transgression.  (Psalm 19 v 13)

So wrote king David,and it's good instruction,he is asking God to stop him from deliberately disobeying him.He is asking God for strength to stop sinning willfully.In the devotional 'Word for today' published by UCB) the writer is dealing with prayer where he asks for grace that he may walk neither in self-doubt nor in self- confidence because we know that apart from Christ, we can do absolutely nothing'  (John 15 v5 ) No one is immune from sinning,David was guilty,Peter was guilty,the list goes on.We often hear of ministers falling ,the nicest people can fall,you and I can,you may have.Count the cost of sinnig,whatever reputation you had as a man or woman of God will be no longer.People will remember you not for the good you have done,but the sin you have committed.The good news is God will forgive your sins no matter how bad they have been,and He will not hold that against you if you trully repent. 

God's choice (Matthew 19 v 16-26)

In Mark 12 v 37 we resd,'And the common people heard Him gladly',in  India a land of 1.46 billion people 80 percent are Hindu;approximately 2-5 percent Christian. More than half of India's Chritians are Dalits (the lowest status according to the Hindu caste system) John Wesley's writes of a group people whom he labled as the great vulgar, they were the well of people.He speaks of them as being rude,rough,vulgar.He writes how he could deal with colliers,or with 'honest Welshmen'',but he could not plumb the emptiness of the gay trifiers.He went on to say,'It is hard to get a rich man to heaven, hard to get a fool there; and as for a rich fool,there seems to be no hope for him'.In  1 Corinthians1 v26 'Not many wise after the flesh,not many mighty, not many noble,are called.'They make their choice but God makes His choice,the foolish and the weak ( 1 Cor 1 v 27),the poor of this world rich in faith (James 2 v 5)

The word of God is ( Psalm 119 v 89)

Psalm 119 has 176  verses by far the longest psalm,it has 22 equal stannzas,each headed by a letter from the Hebrew alphabet. The main  theme of the Psalm is the word of God,the writer stresses many things,the law of God,which is God's wholly loving boundaries, that are for our well being,look at the evils in this world,  anything  seems to be acceptable and where many do what's right in their own eyes,but not so in God's eyes.I just want to hightlight verse 105 ,which reads ,'Your word is a lamp for my feet,a light for my path'. Our Saviour said,'If then the light within you is darkness,how great is that darkness.(Matthew 6 v 23) the religions of the world have their so called holy books, how great is there darkness.They have there so called holy men,how great is their darkness,the atheist  hides in the darkness of his own mind,how great is that darkness,the evolutionist believe that this universe just happened,how great is their darkness. William Plumer comments ', The word of God can solve a thousand doubts'It alone gives effectual comfort in the day of distress,It  preserves our feet from forbidden paths.'.

                         

There is mercy ( Psalm 6)

One writer puts the following words over Psalm 6, 'Prayers and Tears' He points out that this psalm is the first of the seven so called ,penitential psalms' David is concisous of wrongs that he has done and he pleads for mecy,he appears to be suffering from some illness an affiction from God and so he cries unto God to relieve him of his affliction. David was a man beloved of God ,a man after God's own heart (1 Samuel 13 v14/ Acts 13 v27) But God has no favourites ( Romans 2 v11)It is in  Hebrews 12 v 6 we read ,'For the Lord disciplines those He loves,and He punishes each one He accepts as His child.'Be it David, be it you be it me.It ends on a happy note for we read,'The Lord has heard my plea;the Lord will answer' v 9. If you have sinned,which we all do ( 1 John 1 v 8) ,repent and seek His forgiveness and mercy through Jesus Christ our Saviour.