New Life'n

The fish that caught a man

From inside the belly of some kind of big fish (yes, it's a miracle -- I wonder if the miracle included Jonah not smelling like the inside of a fish once he was out?):

those who cling to worthless idols forfeit the grace that could be theirs -- Jonah 2.8

You mean it's one or the other?  And I get to pick? 

But, I'll bet when I pick the worthless idol, that's not what I call it.  I probably call it my opinion, or my money, or my judgment, or my expectations.  Jonah called it, no thank you God, I think I'll just take off in the opposite direction! 

You wouldn't normally say it was good to be thrown overboard, almost drown and end up inside a giant sea monster thing for 3 days.  The experience sure wasn't good.  But getting you to come to your senses might be.  120,000 people turning to God might be.  Engraving permanently into a book of granite the message that God loves everybody, and is willing to show mercy to anyone, no matter how bad you are, might be. 

Would that make it worth being part of fish vomit?

The power of meek

       Blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit the earth -- Matthew 5:5

A.W. Tozer -- Pursuit of God:

"The meek man is not a human mouse afflicted with a sense of his own inferiority. Rather he may be in his moral life as bold as a lion and as strong as Samson; but he has stopped being fooled about himself. He has accepted God's estimate of his own life.

He knows he is as weak and helpless as God has declared him to be, but paradoxically, he knows at the same time that he is in the sight of God of more importance than angels. In himself, nothing; in God, everything. That is his motto.

He knows well that the world will never see him as God sees him and he has stopped caring. He rests perfectly content to allow God to place His own values. He will be patient to wait for the day when everything will get its own price tag and real worth will come into its own. Then the righteous shall shine forth in the Kingdom of their Father. He is willing to wait for that day."

Unpuffiness

He didn’t just try to say something that sounded good.  He didn’t try to use what he said to make money.  And he didn’t look to be recognized and honored, even though he deserved it and could have demanded it.

He had been to this incredible place nobody else had been to, and had been told things nobody else had been told (and by God himself, one-on-one), and  even before that he was already far ahead of most everyone else in knowledge and intellect.  So how did he treat people?

Like he was a momma.  And a daddy.  He was like a gentle mom with her kids.  He was a dad, encouraging and urging them to live lives worthy of God.  It made him happy not only to share the truth of what Jesus Christ had done for them, but to share his own life, his whole self.  He had a dear, fond affection for them.  He loved them. 

He worked extremely hard, day and night, so he wouldn’t have to depend on them at all, and so that nothing would distract from the benefit he wanted to be to them.  He showed complete integrity in his life with them, with nothing to hide; he had no secret private life that was no one else’s business. 

Where did this humble, gentle, selfless attitude toward those who were his spiritual, educational and intellectual inferiors come from?  Partially from HERE -- the very thing he asked God to fix.

A cherished object of divine diligence

(photo by Joel Sartore)

Aren't those beautiful words?  But the diligence involves the diligence not only of the divine but also of someone on earth.  Know anyone like this?  They

• take care of other people -- not just themselves
• strengthen the weak
• help heal the sick
• bind up the injured
• bring back the strays
• search for the lost
• don't rule harshly or brutally
• don't let people wander and scatter and become like food for wild animals

Hopefully, you do know someone like this and hopefully they are in your church (or maybe it's you!).  It's a description of a shepherd of people.  There's also some scary news for shepherds who don't act like shepherds, and encouraging news for sheep.  You can read it HERE. 

Is this a big deal?

From A Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23:

So when the simple -- though sublime -- statement is made by a man or woman that "The Lord is my Shepherd," it immediately implies a profound yet practical working relationship berween a human being and his Maker

It links a lump of common clay to divine destiny -- it means a mere mortal becomes the cherished object of divine diligence

One of the ways the divine diligence is applied to the cherished object -- is the shepherd.

Do you know why sheep wear bells?

Right makes might

     A wise man is full of strength -- Proverbs 24:5

I think he's saying strength is knowing what to do -- and doing it.  Knowing and not doing isn't enough.  He who is slack in his work is brother to one who destroys, but doing without knowing can be zeal without knowledge.

A wise person does both.  Knows and does.  Strength moves things, builds things, maintains things.  But not just anything; the right thing.

If I'm lazy, it isn't physical -- it means I lack judgment.  That's what I think THIS says.  I don't think he's talking about cleaning up the yard, but that any area where wise judgment is not applied could look like this --

The most important thing

If you knew that there was one thing that was more important than anything else, you might pay close attention to that one thing, eh? THIS says the most important thing is that Jesus died, was buried and came back to life...

How could that be so important?  How is that relevant to today and living?  Well, if...

• you're going down the dark lonely road, a blind prisoner of sin, or
• you're living in malice and envy, being hated and hating others, or
• you need a cure to the habit of gratifying the cravings of your sinful nature and following its desires and thoughts, or
• you need a remedy to sexual immorality, lust and greed, or
• you need to be rescued from being an object of God's wrath

...then a cure might be really relevant. 

"Calvary is the secret of it all. It is what the Lord Jesus did there that counts, and what He did becomes a growing force in the life of the believer when it is seen, and rested in by faith. This is the starting point from which all godly living must take rise. We shall never know the fact of the Lord Jesus' victory in our lives until we are prepared to count upon His work on the Cross as the source of our personal freedom from the dominion of sin and the old man within. There is no liberty for us that was not first His. The beginning of spiritual growth is faith in that fact." -- Hungry Heart #9 - 11

More HERE

How does God guide us?

Pastor Mark D. Roberts is answering that question HERE.  He'll add more every day for awhile.

The view from above

You're going along, doing what you're supposed to do, and then -- wham.  How did this happen?  Where did you turn wrong?  Isn't life tough enough without this?  It's not fair.  (video is :47)

But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead...On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us                 -- 2 Corinthians 1:8-10

Gross!

 

That's what our grown daughter said about the analogy comparing Bible reading and meditation with a dog gnawing on a bone.  You've probably heard the same thing -- or sometimes it's described as a cow chewing its cud.  She thinks that's gross, too.  Everybody laughed when she said, why can't there be a home decorating analogy?  So here it is:

Reading the Bible for a few minutes and then moving on with your day is like putting a coat of paint on a wall -- it's wet, and can be easily wiped off, although some will stay on the wall. 

Reading the Bible and giving yourself a few minutes to think about what it says and what it means -- that's like the paint drying to the touch. 

Praying about what you read, and sitting still and having a hunger in your heart for it to be real in your life -- that's the paint ready for a second coat. 

And when you find yourself sitting and staring, and being reminded of something and turning the pages and reading that, and then staring and praying and hungering some more, and turning more pages, and this goes on until at some point you seem to wake up and go, what time IS it? -- that's when the paint has become so bonded to the wall you can't get it off.  It's digested -- oops, I mean scrubable.

The cure for worry -- your Monday morning pep talk

We listened to this in church yesterday morning.  Towards the end I was ashamed yet mightily encouraged.  I had tears in my eyes and the first guy I talked to when it was over had tears in his.  It builds...and builds...

The speaker is S.M. Lockeridge -- all I've been able to find out is he was a preacher in San Diego and this was recorded in Detroit in 1976.