SCRIP-BITS

And then there was one! Yes Friends, it’s Christmas Eve! One day before the big ONE! There are such great expectations in the air, let’s hope people aren’t disappointed after the big build up. Although how could we ever be disappointed in Jesus eh, with all the wonderful, selfless, life saving things He’s done and endured for us? We’d be somewhat ungrateful if disappointment shows up on our radar screen at all. That would only prove we’re not really interested in Jesus, but the things of the world. Just think back some two thousand years ago nuh, to poor Joseph trudging along the country roads in the cold, with pregnant Mary, close to term, possibly riding a donkey, all the way from Nazareth to Bethlehem to pay taxes.  I have to laugh when I consider the irony, for in the next couple of months we too will be rushing to make sure our taxes are in order. So apparently the person who declared that there are only two things in this life we cannot escape, death and taxes, did know what he was talking about. But thankfully Jesus was born, died and resurrected so that we could escape one kind of death, the spiritual kind. Therefore Friends, let us be very thankful as we celebrate His Birth, and do as our Bit cautions: ‘Give glory to the Lord your God, before he cause darkness, and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains, and, while ye look for light, he turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross darkness.’ Sadly though my people, darkness – spiritual, emotional and physical – is currently covering much of the earth and its people, because in our selfish, egotistical, conceited ignorance and independence, we have turned away from the Lord God Jehovah to worship instead the things of Lucifer and this fallen world. We have become as Isaiah says when he talks of national corruption and consequent suffering. ‘Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood: their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; wasting and destruction are in their paths. The way of peace they know not; and there is no judgement (justice) in their goings (tracks): they have made them crooked paths: whomsoever goeth therein shall not know peace. Therefore is judgement (justice) far from us, neither doth justice (righteousness) overtake us: we wait for light, but behold obscurity (darkness); for brightness, but we walk in darkness (gloom, blackness).’ (Is.59:7-9) Yes my brethren, that’s a very true and accurate picture of our world today. No wonder the Lord is asking, like he did in Jeremiah’s time? ‘Thus saith the Lord, What iniquity (injustice) have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me, and have walked after vanity, and are become vain? Neither said they, Where is the Lord that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, that led us through the wilderness, through a land of desserts and of pits, through a land of drought, and of the shadow of death, through a land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt?’ (Jer.2:5-6) Now those are very good questions Friends, which we should all individually ponder, asking ourselves why we have personally gone astray? That’s because we can’t answer for anyone else’s deviation from God’s path, only our own. Oh my people, this is a most opportune time, with Christmas and the approaching New Year, for all of us, believers and non-believers to consider our ways and see where we have fallen away from God and ascertain the reasons why our world so closely resembles this word portrait of Isaiah: ‘And when they shall say unto you, Seek unto them that have familiar spirits (are mediums), and unto wizards that peep (whisper), and that mutter: should not a people seek unto their God? for the living to the dead (should they seek the dead on behalf of the living)? To the law and to the testimony: if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them (they have no dawn). And they shall pass through it, hardly bestead (hard pressed) and hungry: and it shall come to pass, that when they shall be hungry, they shall fret themselves (be enraged), and curse their king and their God, and look upward. And they shall look unto the earth; and behold trouble and darkness, dimness (gloom) of anguish; and they shall be driven to darkness.’ (Is.8:19-22) Yes Friends, this is the perfect time for serious contemplation and change, if we expect out world to come up aces again. Much LOVE!…to open their eyes…and to turn them from darkness to light…and from the power of Satan unto God… (Acts 26:18a)