(Matt. 25:1-13; 24:40-41; I Thess. 5:1-3)
Not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father Who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name and driven out demons in Your name and done many mighty works in Your name? and then I will say to them openly, I never knew you; depart from Me, you who act wickedly (Matt. 7:21-23).
We live in a time of convenience and short cuts to everything. Computers are the master mind of things we used to do yesterday. The age of high tech has indeed handicapped the mind of men. We only have to know how to click or press a button for things to happen. The sad thing about it is not only that our brains have become lazy and shrinking, but it has affected the spiritual side of things too. We can only tolerate teachings that tickle our ears. It has to be convenient for us to follow in line with our life styles. Conviction is a thing of the past. “I am okay, you are okay.” All our sins have been forgiven, no need to cry over them with repentance. The Word of God says that we must be born of the Spirit to be considered being born again. It is the only way that we can receive the image of God. His image is His Holy Spirit, Who is given at that time of our spiritual birth.
We may spend our life in church, teaching Sunday- School, preaching the Gospel, visiting the sick, we may never miss a day going to church, we may perform healing, prophesy, even casting demons out and still not being born again. We may impress the world with our look of humility and sacrificed life, but we can never impress God with all we do outside of Him. YAHSHUA said to a Pharisee, “You must be born again”. He assured Nicodemus that unless a person is born again, he cannot ever see the kingdom God; unless a man is born of water and [even] the Spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of God. What is born of the flesh is flesh; what is born of the Spirit is spirit (John 3: 3,4-6). Born of the Spirit, is when the Holy Spirit of God indwells the person. His indwelling is the sign that we are born again. The results are seen in the way we think, act and behave. His indwelling is the Seal, also a guarantee of our inheritance, in anticipation of its full redemption and our acquiring possession of it (Ephesians 1: 13-14).
Heavenly Father,
I enter the courts of heaven
To draw near and listen to You.
I will regard Your name holy
And will worship You
In spirit and in truth.
Let Your kingdom
Come to my life
And Your will be established
In me as long as I live,
For I am crucified with
Your Son; live not I
But His Spirit lives in me.
Nineveh, the capital of Assyria, was under God’s judgment for its wickedness.- violence and immorality. God in His mercy however, warned them through the Prophet Jonah before He destroyed it. But Jonah wanted nothing to do with it and ran way from His order. He faced the sea in its storm, was swallowed up by a great fish God had prepared to host him three days and three nights. There, Jonah repented and prayed for deliverance. The city of Nineveh received Jonah’s warning and repented from its sins with sackcloth and ashes. Jonah entered the city uttering judgment onto the city saying, Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown. The people believed in God and proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth from the greatest of them even to the least of them (Jonah 3:4-5). God saw their works, that they turned from their evil way; and God revoked His [sentence of] evil that He had said that He would do to them and He did not do it (Jonah 3:10). As a matter of fact, a decree was sent out by the king that neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything let them not feed nor drink water; but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and let them cry mightily to God. Yes, let every one turn from his evil way and from the violence that is in his hands. Who can tell, God may turn and revoke His sentence against us and turn away from His fierce anger so that we perish not (Jonah 3:7-9).
The calling on the name of the Lord YAHSHUA for deliverance and salvation, is for sure a way to be delivered. To call on the name of the Lord has its meaning to call out to, to cry out to. It is to invoke Him by name in distress, to receive mercy and to be saved. Psalm 3:4 says, With my voice I cry to the Lord and He hears and answers me out of His holy hill; be merciful and gracious to me, O Lord, for to You do I cry all the day (Ps. 86:3); You heard my voice; O hide not your ear at my prayer for relief (Lam. 3:56); Romans 10:13, for everyone who calls upon the name of the Lord [invoking Him as Lord] will be saved. The people of Nineveh were given another chance when they repented of their sins. No sin is too great that God could not forgive; no sin is greater than the loving-kindness of our Lord God. All it took was for them to acknowledge their sins and repent before God. A broken and contrite heart, the Lord will not forsake.
(Job 23: 10,14)
Although I walk through the valley of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me (Ps. 23:4). In life’s challenges there is the thought that we are in that situation alone. Everyone around us seem to be indifferent to our cry for help; our voice seemly muffled by their indifference. We pray, but help does not come fast enough for us. To the contrary, we feel that we were not heard, and life goes on in that mode for as long as our trouble lingers. Like Job, we cry, Oh, that I knew where I might find Him, that I might come even to His seat! I would lay my cause before Him and fill my mouth with arguments; I would learn what He would answer me, and understand what He would say to me (Job 23:3-5). In the pages of Psalm 139: 13,15-16 we have a beautiful, significant and trustworthy statement from the Lord to us through David, to assure us of His involvement in our life from the beginning, when He was forming us in the womb of our mother: For You did form my inward parts; You did knit me together in my mother’s womb. I will confess and praise You for You are fearful and wonderful and for the awful wonder of my birth! Wonderful are your works, and that my inner knows well. My frame was not hidden from You when I was being formed in secret intricately and curiously wrought in the depths of the earth; Your eyes saw my unformed substance, and in Your book all the days [of my life] were written before ever they took shape, when as yet there was none of them.
YAHSHUA was dead; His body was not in the tomb, Mary Magdalene puzzled over what she was seeing, without understanding what had happened on that early morning of the first day of weeks. Without any delay, she ran to tell Simon Peter and John about it. Anxiously and worried, Mary related to the disciples that they had taken YAHSHUA’S body; she did not know where to. Her heart was disturbed and fearful with the idea that YAHSHUA’S body had disappeared. While the disciples went to verify her report, they left also puzzled, for not having understood the words of YAHSHUA concerning His resurrection in three days. Meanwhile, Mary remained at the tomb sobbing, overtaken by her emotion at the thought of Him been gone. She stood at the tomb alone, for the disciples had left at the reality of the empty tomb; they pondered over the fact, for their understanding was veiled with unbelief. As of today, not all Israel has yet been unveiled to see and perceive YAHSHUA been risen from the dead. But for Mary Magdalene, that was all a different story. Delivered from seven demons, she lived her freedom displaying her gratitude to the Lord, as in together with other women, she ministered to and provided for Him out of her property and personal belongings (Luke 8:2-3). Her love for YAHSHUA was clearly genuine, even when she thought Him to be dead.
In the beginning of time
A perfect garden was created
With beauty untold
Where sin was not a thing
To be found
In that sinless world
Man and animals harmonized
With nature in a song of perpetual
Purity and joy, as God walked
Among them in the breeze of time
Planted by the hands of God
The Garden of Eden
Blossomed with trees, flowers
Birds and butterflies, too
While a river kept it green
It was a home for Adam
To work it and care for
With a command
You must not eat certain fruit
Or you will certainly die!
Who else had heard it
If not the cunning serpent
With ideas not so good
To confuse and misguide
The mind of man?
Life in its entirety is empty without the desire to know its Author. When the Creator walked this earth, many rejected Him, although His life was a beam of light, comfort and healing for all who met Him. From blindness to the lifeless unto life, YAHSHUA stood tall and confirmed Who He was. The masses followed Him and few had to struggle to see Him, as Zacchaeus for being short in stature, as the woman with the blood flux, could only touch Him to receive her healing. Without the help of the media, the world in those days depended very much on word of mouth. YAHSHUA was so sought for, that sometimes, He had not even the time to eat. The Samaritans asked Him to remain with them a while, after His encounter with a Samaritan woman at the well. Two days He remained with them at their request, for the harvest was truly ripe. People upon hearing about Him, came from far places to see Him. The Greeks in particular, who went up to worship at the Feast; they came to Philip, and made the request, Sir, we desire to see YAHSHUA. Philip together with Andrew told YAHSHUA (John 12:21-22). It is not registered if they had a chance to see Him or not, but the fact remains that their desire was to see YAHSHUA, even though, their theology was polytheistic; they assumed that there were many gods and goddesses. The Apostle Paul when in Athens, was grieved in spirit when he saw that the city was full of idols; Acknowledging their theological obsession, he addressed them by saying, Men of Athens, I observe that you are very religious in all respects. For while I was passing through and examining the objects of your worship, I also found an altar with this inscription, to an unknown God. What therefore you worship in ignorance this I proclaim to you. The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands neither is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all life and breath and all things (Acts 27:16, 22-25). It was that God, the only true God that the Greeks desired to see. It was the “Unknown God” Whom they wanted to see and know.
Light from the Word 