When an enemy pretends to be a friend, it is ten times worse than if a friend declares himself to be your enemy. There are many enemies of God who are pretending to be friends of God. On the surface, they do all of the God-fearing platitudes. However, their hearts are as stone in terms of their relationship to God. They know who they are, God knows who they are, and you should pray that God reveals them to you. In Jesus' name, the betrayers all need to be revealed and separated from God's people.
0 Comments
"Pennies From Heaven" is a popular American song introduced by Bing Crosby in a 1936 movie of the same name. In one musical rendition of the song, two actors are seen gracefully and elegantly dancing in the street under a cascade of pennies while singing "Every time it rains, it rains pennies from heaven."
The most effective methodology for dealing with any circumstance that you view as negative is to associate it with something else that you view as positive. If you are not a farmer or living through a drought, you probably don't enjoy dealing with rain. In this movie, however, rain is associated with free cash from heaven which produces dancing instead of groaning. Similarly, whatever circumstances you encounter that are or appear to be impossible for you to change can be recharacterized. Focus instead on a positive corollary that you know will definitely occur or is scheduled to occur. Doing so will blunt the negativity of circumstances over which you have little or no control. A couple of days ago, in the Blog titled Ashes To Ashes, I wrote about the widely practiced custom of priests and pastors administering Ash Wednesday ashes by dipping their thumb into ashes and making a cross on the forehead of attendees at Ash Wednesday services. Saying "Ashes to ashes" is very different from saying "Dust to dust." When a priest says to you "Ashes to ashes" he is indicating that he believes your soul is mortal. When he says to you "Dust to dust" he is indicating that he believes your body is mortal.
While under ordinary circumstances humans are mortal, if they have received the indwelling Holy Spirit of God, they will become clothed with immortality. Thus, a more appropriate phrase would be "Dust and ashes to immortality." If you know that you have received the indwelling Holy Spirit of God, and you can see the light of his presence in your solar plexus, then God's promise of immortality should be your focus. You should avoid hearing, receiving, or acknowledging anything that contradicts the Scriptures. You also should speak out against any doctrinal issues you encounter that contradict the Scriptural commands. When you are preparing to have a meal that includes potatoes, one of the first things you do is to peel or remove the skin from the potatoes. Real potatoes that have not been genetically modified need to be peeled. Similarly, when you are preparing for an encounter with God, you must become vulnerable, which requires that you peel off the outer layer of sin and dirt so that you can become one with him. We become one with him not by being forcefully consumed by him, but by independently and deliberately choosing to become like him in every respect. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, we choose to become perfect, as he is perfect (Matthew 5:48).
During Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, many Catholic and Protestant priests and pastors schedule church services during which they administer ashes to each person by using a thumb dipped into ashes to make a cross on each person's forehead. As they administer the ashes, they generally would say, "Dust to dust, ashes to ashes" as a solemn reminder of humanity's fate. Although I sometimes attend church services on Ash Wednesday, I have been administered ashes on the forehead only once in recent memory, and my spirit vowed never to accept it again. I now know why I had such a powerful revulsion to the ashes and to the phrase quoted above.
The quoted phrase suggests that physical death is the end of the matter, but God reminds us in 1 Corinthians 15:54-56 that death is not the true victor, as we eventually will realize when those once deemed mortal become clothed with immortality. My hope is that the year 2017 will mark the final year in which Ash Wednesday ashes are administered. Perhaps instead of administering ashes, we could have immersion baptisms and a reaffirmation of our vows to God. The Lord determines the times and places where we should live so that men and women may seek him and find him. Anyone who seeks after God will find him. Anyone who genuinely desires to have a relationship with him may have one. No one is ever denied an opportunity to be on God's team, or to draw closer to him, regardless of where they have been and what they have done. If you ask his forgiveness, he always will forgive you. He always will give you an opportunity to begin anew. And he never will remind you of the past.
|
Archives
December 2020
Categories
|