ARE YOU FAMILIAR WITH THE CHRISTMAS STORY FROM THE GOSPEL OF JOHN?

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 

The Word

In the beginning, from before the beginning

There was God—the Father, Son and Holy Spirit,

In perfect union, eternal love communing.

He spoke His grace before there were ears to hear it.

He sent His Son, the Word from all eternity,

The fullness of the God-head in maternity.

God spoke the light. He spoke the truth. He spoke Himself.

He spoke the whirling spheres and vast expanse to be.

He spoke the skies and seas and earth with all its wealth.

He formed the world and all in it that lives and breathes.

Every molecule knows the wisdom of His heart,

The plants and living creatures bear His mark.

He spoke His Son. He spoke to men. He spoke to me.

For in His time the Holy One to earth has come.

And in His great love He spoke the cross eternally.

From the beginning was His plan, His grace, His Son.

The wonder of His love the world has seen and heard,

As God declared, “In the beginning was the Word.”

http://watchinginprayer.blogspot.com/

http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/

http://theanchorofthesoul.blogspot.com/

http://writingprayerfully.blogspot.com/

Website

http://daveswatch.com/

YouTube

https://goo.gl/PyzU

Amazon Author Central page.

SLEEPING WITH OUR FATHERS

This is an appropriate week to come to the conclusion of Jacob’s blessing to his children in Genesis 49.

“I am to be gathered to my people; bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite, in the cave that is in the field at Machpelah. There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife. There they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife, and there I buried Leah. When Jacob finished commanding his sons, he drew up his feet into the bed and breathed his last and was gathered to his people.”

I was particularly stirred Sunday morning as we sang, 

“O come O come Emmanuel, 

And ransom captive Israel,

That mourns in lonely exile here, 

Until the Son of God appear.”

Like Israel, we are all subject to death. In Acts 13 we are assured that David died. And like Isaac, he was laid with his fathers.

“For David, after he had served the purpose of God in his own generation, 

fell asleep and was laid with his fathers and saw corruption,”

Acts 13:36

All of us will sleep with those who went before us. This week we celebrate the coming of Jesus who also came to die. But He died in our place. His death brought the promise of resurrection. Another verse of the hymn cries.

“O come, Thou Dayspring from on high,

And cheer us by Thy drawing nigh;

Disperse the gloomy clouds of night,

And death’s dark shadows put to flight.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel

Shall come to thee, O Israel.”

http://watchinginprayer.blogspot.com/

http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/

http://theanchorofthesoul.blogspot.com/

http://writingprayerfully.blogspot.com/

Website

http://daveswatch.com/

YouTube

https://goo.gl/PyzU

Amazon Author Central page.

HANDWRITING IN THE DIRT

 

John 8:3 & 4

The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, 

and placing her in the midst they said to him, 

“Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery.” 

 WRITING IN THE DIRT

“This woman,” they proclaimed, “was caught in adultery!”

We know she is guilty; caught in the act!”

Dumped in a heap of her ignominy,

The measure of her sin a proven fact.

Jesus knelt in their presence and began to write,

Flagrantly ignoring their demands and rights.

They had burst forth displaying their arrogance.

By religiosity they were in control.

They staged this challenge as a public performance,

Grinning behind their hands to watch the play unfold.

His ignoring response they could hardly abide.

He scratched his finger in the dirt of their pride.

They’d planned this event gathering rocks in their hands.

Such a sinful woman would be the perfect tool.

They would trick Him into taking a stand,  

Catch Him in compassion and prove Him a fool.

But kneeling to the ground He scribbled at their feet.

Writing something down in the dirt of their deceit.

They waited on one foot and then on the other.

What was He doing? What was He writing?

Puzzled, they glanced back and forth at one another,

Rolling their eyes, their frustrations biting.

He was stretching every nerve of their irritations,

Writing in the dirt of their impatience.

But they turned away from eldest to the youngest

When He said, “Let him without sin cast first.”

 The oldest in their shame may be wisest among us.

Men who are seasoned can know themselves worst.

 Kneeling down to write, He had them from the start.

Writing in the dirt of their own convicting hearts.

He stood with the woman whose devotion He’d drawn.

“Where are those casting stones in condemnation?”

“None of them is left, Lord. All of them are gone.”

“Then, sin no more in the dirt of temptation.”

He brings forgiveness for those who know His love’s worth.

Have you seen His handwriting in the dirt?

http://watchinginprayer.blogspot.com/

http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/

http://theanchorofthesoul.blogspot.com/

http://writingprayerfully.blogspot.com/

Website

http://daveswatch.com/

YouTube

https://goo.gl/PyzU

Amazon Author Central page.

SHALL THE RAVENOUS INHERIT THE EARTH?

 

“Benjamin is a ravenous wolf, in the morning devouring the prey 

and at evening dividing the spoil.”

Genesis 49:27

I have been struggling with the meaning and application of this prophecy about Jacob's final son Benjamin. What does it mean? What is God saying to us?

In her research, a writer friend of mine ran across the suggestion that the prophecy about Benjamin being a ravenous wolf had to do with the whole fiasco in the final chapters of Judges, beginning with the Levite and his concubine and the wicked deeds done in a city of Benjamin. When the tribe of Benjamin was asked to turn over the criminals, they went to war, instead of allowing perverse criminals to pay for their horrid deeds. This  resulted in thousands of deaths and the almost complete destruction of their own tribe. 

Their dividing of the spoils of war was not in voluntary repentance. They received the spoils from the other tribes who had realized that it would be a terrible thing for an entire tribe to be lost from The Children of Israel.

The theme of those final chapters of Judges is declared in chapter 17 and repeated in chapter 21.

"In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes."

Judges 17:6

As we run our businesses, conduct our politics, and live our lives in a grant no quarter and take no prisoners mindset, we set ourselves up for ultimate destruction. 

http://watchinginprayer.blogspot.com/

http://thinkinginthespirit.blogspot.com/

http://theanchorofthesoul.blogspot.com/

http://writingprayerfully.blogspot.com/

Website

http://daveswatch.com/

YouTube

https://goo.gl/PyzU

Amazon Author Central page.