Massah and Meribah

In reading the Scriptures this a.m. I cam across These two words. They are found in Exodus 17. They mean "Massah"-(Testing) and "Meribah" (complaining) . The Israelites had been doing this since God had saved them and had brought them out of Egypt. It seems amazing to us that they would do this, since God had showed himself to be so powerful and since God had provided them with everything they had needed. I am about to read more tomorrow and I think Moses is about to get in trouble. One last thought.
I am sure glad that we never act this way. I just finished thinking how wonderful it is that we, including me never test God, , we never complain that He is not doing things the way we would like Him to. We never blame Him when life is difficult. How encouraging it is to read a passage and to be able to say, "wow we have come such a long way from that"!-

Could I have asked for better Kids ?

Psalm 119:29

"Remove the false way from me, and graciously grant me your law." Psalm 119:29

What if this were our prayer?

We all have the tendancy to operate out of false motives, or at the very least we tend to decieve ourselves. All I know is that I want to operate in truth. It seems that this is a function of God and His Word. So the action step is not just to pray that God would do for you as David asks, it is that, in addition, we must seek the Lord and be in His Word.

Psalm 119:10-" With all my heart I have sought you"

What if evangelism looked like this?

" Evangelism is not an activity to be squeezed into our busy schedules. It becomes an intention that we carry with us throughout our day. The same is true of church, If church and mission are redefined in relational terms , then work, leisure , and family can be viewed as gospel activities. Ordinary life becomes pastoral and missional if we have gospel intentionality."


What do you think, Agree? Disagree?

Quote from article by Francis Chan

"Honestly, a nonbeliever can accomplish a lot of what you’re doing. Pray that God would lead you into tasks that can only be done by the power of the Spirit. Pray for results that can’t be explained humanly. Ask Him to do what only He can do through you. Pray in faith (James 1:6) and stop looking at the men of Scripture as unattainable superheroes. “Elijah was a human being, even as we are” (James 5:17).

As I read this, i started to think. How much do I try to "do" church without His Holy Spirit? How much do we all think we can do without His empowering? I seem to remember in John 5, Jesus saying "apart from me you can do nothing". Let us not forget that we truly need Him. Also let us not forget how truly wonderful it is that the God of Heaven seeks to have relationship with us!

The Peace ! Philippians 4:7

I was reading Philippians 4: 7 recently and I started to wonder. We often pray for this "peace" for people. I guess praying that the peace of God would be available is not such a bad thing, but here is the question . Is there a prerequisite to said "peace"? If you start reading in Verse 1 you see that Paul gives the admonission to "stand-firm in the Lord" Verse 2 instructs to "live in harmony" , verse 4 gives the imperative to " Rejoice in the Lord" , and finally we are told to unanxiously and in everything "present our requests to God". So here is my thought, is the peace that is promised in verse 7 based on the aformentioned items, in other words it seems that this " peace" is available to those who are in pursuing relationship with the Lord? Maybe we do not stop praying for God's peace, but perhaps we realize that true peace is available to those who are intentionally "rejoicing IN the Lord"

The Elder Son Luke 15:28-32

This story is so much more rich that I have ever understood. The elder son would have known that the day of the prodigal's return would have been the greatest day of the Father's life. As a matter of fact it would have been the responsibility of the elder son to the the key reconciler between the father and the rebellious son. What I have found is that a primary theme in the parable is distance from the father's heart. Keep in mind that over half of the parable is about the elder son. If the story were truly about the prodigal only, would not it have ended upon his return? The story is about 2 sons who both attack the unity of the family, and who are both alienated from the father.

We see the younger son doing things that put him in the lost category, Jesus however points out that the elder son is just as lost! So we sort of learn that there are two kinds of lostness.

As I was studying this it occured to be that perhaps we have misdefined something. The text says that the younger son went of to a "distant country" we have understood this to mean that he left his family and went far away. In other words, he was far from the father. We even say that in our own Christian culture do we not? We say, " Well , I was far from God" Of course usually this is said in the context of us being involved in ,

1. Sexual sin
2. Some other addiction
3. A religious search
4. Maybe just living for ourselves,

Whatever the case, most would agree that if one is involved in one of the aforementioned, he is "far from God"

I started thinking, and the time in my life when I was "sinning", this is not the time where I felt the furthest from God. Honestly, it was when I was choosing sin that I was most cognizant of His presence. Now mind-you , I was never as "far-off" as the prodigal son. For me, the time when I felt the furthest was when I was in seminary, preparing for ministry. This was the time when I was learning the Greek and Hebrew and the do's and don'ts of church life. This was a time in my life where everything I learned was used to judge those who did not know what I did. My faith and Christian walk felt the most mechanical and fake, rarely did I feel close to God. I share this because I believe we have misunderstood the idea of being "far from God" We are far from God when our hearts are distant. We are far from God when the father does not concern us. We are far from God when we have a bible in our hands, a backside in the pew, while at the same time our hearts have no concern with the things of God or a passion for His people. Its a little like loneliness, often times you feel the most alone when surrounded by hoards of people. Just because you are around Christians or just because you are in church, does not mean you are close to God or share His heart!