When I was eight years old, through hearing the preaching of the Word of God, I realized that I needed to be saved from my sin. It was His glory to demonstrate my need for a Savior. It was His glory that His Spirit convicted me of that need through the preaching of the word. It was to His glory that I believed and received the Savior. In the decades that have followed I have been learning to love Him. I have not completely arrived yet, but I am working on it. In our culture we are quick to say that we love something or someone. But the Lord says here and other places that our love is only as strong as our obedience to His commands. Because He loves me, He chastens me. Sometimes that chastening is designed to force me to see my own heart as to how much I really love Him. To His glory it is designed so that once I see my heart, I will trust Him to change my heart. Through the decades I have learned of His great love. My learning has not come apart from His Word or His Spirit. That is what this chapter is all about. No we no longer need tie literal packages of His word to our forehead. You see we have His written word. But like the Israelites, we need daily to be tied to His word allowing His Spirit to teach us and change us and mold us. When that truly happens, it is to His glory. Indeed we serve a glorious King. Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
PROVERBS 7
25Do not let your heart turn aside to her ways, Do not stray into her paths; 26For she has cast down many wounded, And all who were slain by her were strong men. 27Her house is the way to hell, Descending to the chambers of death.Why would anybody leave the pleasures of the glory of the Lord for something else? The lure of pleasure has always been the trap of Satan and our own flesh. Even in the perfection of the Garden of Eden, where Eve saw the glory of the Lord, Satan caused Eve to think that the fruit was good for food, pleasant to the eyes and desirable for food. 2 Cor 11:3 says that the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness. She thought the pleasure of the food and wisdom were better than the pleasure of the glory of the Lord? Wow! The power of deception even in the midst of perfection must really be strong! Yet 1 Timothy 2:14 says that Adam was not deceived. Why would Adam choose fruit above the glory of the Lord if he was not deceived? Hmmm. . . I think that Adam was afraid of losing the pleasure of intimacy with Eve, and so he chose her over the glory of God.
Researchers have studied what affect the “True Love Waits” campaign has had upon the sexuality of evangelical kids. The result is that while evangelical kids say they believe sex outside marriage is wrong, the percentage rate of evangelical kids engaging in pre-marital sex is the same as the general population. We say we believe that it is wrong, but we do it anyway. Hmmm. . . Sounds like Adam. Solomon says, “Do not let your heart turn aside to her ways, . . . Her house is the way to hell, Descending to the chambers of death.” And he was as guilty as any of us. Here is arguably the wisest of all men, save Jesus, a man who saw the glory of the Lord in a vision, a man blessed immeasurably by the Lord, yet he is a man who willfully ignored His own wisdom. Yet in some measure, are we not all like him?
Where is the glory of Christ in this chapter? Yesterday we learned that our sexuality is meant to be a mirror of the passionate, committed and joy-filled love that exists between the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and love between the Son and His bride, the church. The Son remains committed to His church. We the church ought to remain chaste and committed to Him. We must not let our hearts be turned to other lovers. When we remain chaste, we are allowing the purity of His love to be seen through us. When we are unchaste, we obscure His glory like that of a promiscuous fool. Let us remain chaste toward Him. Let us feast upon His glory! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
JEREMIAH 2
Living in the USA, we know very little of the tragedy of the lack of clean water. Most of walk to our kitchen or bathroom and with the turning of a knob we have all the clean water we desire at a temperature of our choosing. We know little of having to store water or boil it in order to drink it. Cisterns in some places in the world are common needs. While in Kenya in 1975, I helped rebuild a house so that some nurses could move in and start a dispensary. It was at Mucaa, a remote village in the mountains in the south. Kilimanjaro was sometimes visible way off in the distance. Because of its remote location, there was no water system. The house used gutters to feed the rain runoff into a giant cistern. We received our water from the cistern. But even with the cistern, we still had to filter and boil our water before using it. In contrast, in south central Oklahoma, in the Chickasaw National Recreation area, there are a number of springs that boil up out of the ground on their own. They produce thousands of gallons per minute of clean clear cold water. The water is extremely refreshing. If had the choice of drinking from a mud puddle, a cistern, or spring of clean clear cold water, guess which one I would choose.
Here in Jeremiah our Lord describes Himself as a fountain of living water. In the Gospels Jesus beckons us to come and drink freely from Him and to allow His well of water to spring up through us into eternal life. This is eternal life: that we might know the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, whom He has sent. In Jeremiah the Lord describes His people as having rejected His living fountain and having gone to build their own cisterns. Not only had the built their own cisterns, but they were cisterns that could not hold water. They were reduced to mud puddles. When they were reduced to mud puddles, they then pursued other sources such as Egypt or Babylon. Why do we forget the great fountain of living waters and pursue other things that never could and never will satisfy? What an insult that is to our Lord! Only He can satisfy our thirsty souls! Indeed we serve a glorious King! Speak His glory to someone today!
--Pastor john
JOHN 17
This chapter is often spoken of as "Jesus' High Priestly Prayer." He intercedes for His disciples before His travail in the Garden and His arrest. His theme and passion seems to be His glory and His desire to share it with us. I see three things that He asks concerning His glory.
1. First, in 1-4, 10 He asks to be glorified because He is about to complete the mission for which He came to earth. After dying and rising again on our behalf, to purchase eternal life, the Father is going to give Him all authority in Heaven and Earth. Jesus has the authority to give eternal life to as many as the Father gives Him. His glory is increased as He gives eternal life. He is worthy of the reward for whom He died.
2. Second, in 5 He asks to regain the glory He had with the Father before the world was. Indeed, before He added the nature of a perfect man to His person, He was in the form of God. As such, He was constantly adored as holy. (See the June 1 meditation). On this earth He was scorned, despised and rejected. But now that He has returned to heaven, He once again is adored by all the creatures in heaven.
3. Third, in 22,24 He asks for us to share in His glory. Can you imagine that? We can share in His glory, the glory of the King of the Universe, the maker of all things, the one who has all authority. Think about this: if part of His glory is doing what it takes to give us eternal life, if He has left us with the command to make disciples in all nations, then how do you think He wants us to share in His glory?
Our King is worthy of His glory! Let us share in it with Him! Speak His glory to someone today!
-Pastor john
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