Today’s Scrip-Bit 16 August 2012 Ecclesiastes 3:14

 

Ecclesiastes 3:14.    I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be forever: nothing can be put to it, nor anything taken from it: and God doeth it, that men should fear before him.
 
Oh Friends, I just got a zeppo, (smile) a brainwave, a message from on high, that the action of God is now flowing through us in a pattern of success! Wow! What a wonderful way to greet a new day, one already filled with blessings, LOVING-kindness, mercy and forgiveness! That means we’re certainly dressed for success my brethren! There’s no better way to ignite a storm of passion in our souls for Jesus! And that passion we badly need in these lean and mean times. What’s amusing here though is that the positive action statement I opened with, sits on my desk, right in front of me, printed in large white letters on a blue background, surrounded by several slips of small paper with fortune cookie sayings on them. That means it’s highly visible, and every time I sit at my desk, I ought to see it. But the reality is that very often I don’t notice it at all. I’ve grown so accustomed to it, that even if I see it with my eyes, it doesn’t register in my mind. And sadly Friends, that’s how a lot of things are in our too busy, not properly focused lives. We put up things to serve as reminders, activators and encouragers, but there comes a time when we just look right through them without them registering on our mental apparatus. And the only reason why I noticed that saying just now is because the action of God, His Holy Spirit was truly moving through me and pointed it out, no doubt bringing it to my attention so that I can bring it to yours. Besides being a wake up call for us my people, I believe God is here highlighting our less than stellar areas of reliability; of mental concentration, of self-discipline and self-control, of how we can’t stick to things for any length of time, but continually jump from one thing to another, of how quickly we tire of things that we so desperately wanted and had to have, and crave change just for the sake of change itself. Meanwhile, as Cousin Sol wisely says in our Bit: ‘I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be forever: nothing can be put (added) to it, nor anything taken from it: and God doeth it, that men should fear before him.’ Now that’s all irrefutable truth my people! Our God doesn’t change, and whatever He does, lasts forever. We can’t add to, or subtract from it. Unfortunately though, we can’t say that about our sinful, wishy-washy human nature. And that my Friends is why we have to believe, trust, surrender and have faith in the Lord our God. We can’t do very much in our own strength, and the little we can do never lasts, as we’re always in some sort of quandary as to how to do it, or how it’s going to look. Our heavenly Father doesn’t have that problem, and consequently, we believers don’t need to worry or be anxious about our shortcomings, because our great God, in His awesome power and LOVE, has everything under control and keeps us together if we live in His will. He does all those things so that we can appreciate and reverence Him, truly behold His glorious majesty, and sincerely trust, worship, adore and serve Him. Now let’s listen to some scriptures that authenticate our Bit: We’ll start with words from James, Jesus’ half-brother. And he decisively tells us: ‘Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness (variation), neither shadow of turning. Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.’ (James 1: 17-18) All of that is gospel truth my people! So let’s sow those seeds of God’s power, His unchanging nature, His goodness to us, whom He made to be champions, deep in our hearts and minds nuh mih breddren. For that in turn gives us the power to walk this evil earth unafraid of Beelzebub and all his evil cohorts. Now hear Bruh David from Psalm 9, Praise for God’s justice: ‘But the Lord shall endure for ever: he hath prepared his throne for judgement. And he shall judge the world in righteousness, he shall minister judgement to the people in uprightness.’ (Ps.9:7-8) More confirmation of God’s eternal attributes, and His devotion to righteousness and justice. And from Psalm 102, a cry in distress, we hear the psalmist truthfully declare: ‘My days are like a shadow that declineth; and I am withered like grass. But thou, O Lord, shall endure for ever; and thy remembrance unto all generations.’ (Ps.102:11-12) So why do we weak mortals, sculpted from the dust of the earth, continue to believe that we’re such hot shots eh, when in the twinkling of an eye, the Lord God Jehovah, Creator of this universe and all therein, can so easily snuff out the breath of life that He, first breathed into us? Now hear some more wise and applicable words from Psalm 102: ‘I said, O my God, take me not away in the midst of my days: thy years are throughout all generations. Of old hast thou laid the foundation of the earth: and the heavens are the work of thy hands. They shall perish, but thou shalt endure (continue): yea, all of them shall wax (grow) old like a garment; as a vesture (cloak) shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed: But thou art the same, and thy years have no end.’ (Ps.102:24-27) Oh Friends, that ought to wise us up and show us that the true and only way to find peace and prosperity on this earth is by faithfully worshipping and serving Jehovah God. By the way, the author of Hebrews repeats those same words as justification for his belief. (Heb.1:11-12) So my people, let’s end today just as we began nuh; by believing that the action of God is now flowing through us in a pattern of success. And that’s the living truth! Much LOVE!…Jesus Christ…the same …yesterday…and today…and for ever… (Heb.13:8) 
 

 

Today’s Scrip-Bit 27 May 2012 Isaiah 42:1

Isaiah 42:1.    Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgement to the Gentiles.

 
Oh Friends, it’s a fact, a blessing; we’ve been granted one more day of life on Mother Earth to enjoy all her bountiful pleasures! All praise and thanks be to the great God we serve and worship, for without His invaluable input, we’d now be mere dust! And I won’t get into much preamble because I have a lot of interesting and enlightening scripture to share. Hopefully this will be the last day for this particular Bit since some of you like to have a different Bit every day. But sometimes that’s just not possible, for some Bits, like this one, have so much to say that you can’t get everything from them in one sitting, especially with the short attention spans of today. (smile) Now here’s our fabulous Bit: ‘Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect (my chosen one), in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgement (justice) to the Gentiles.’ Ah mih people, though I knew this scripture before, in dissecting it over the last few days, I’ve learned even more than I expected. That’s the beauty of studying God’s Word! There’s always so much more to it than what meets the naked eye! Now let’s check out the last part of the Bit: ‘I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgement (justice) to the Gentiles.’ And the first scripture dealing with that comes from good, ole Isaiah, re the righteous reign of the branch of Jesse: ‘And there shall come forth a rod (shoot) out of the stem (stock or trunk) of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots (bear fruit). And the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord.’ (Is.11:1-2) Yuh hear all the different spirits, or strengths with which that Branch of Jesse will be endowed? But first and foremost, the overseer Spirit of the Lord, which encompasses all the others. And I want us to specifically note the last one, ‘the fear of the Lord,’ because though Jesus was a part of the Godhead, down here on earth there’s one thing He did above all others; that’s revere and respect His heavenly Father. Now in light of that, how could we, mere mortals, not do likewise eh, especially if we claim to be followers of Christ? And that’s one of the major problems of our day; not enough people hold Almighty God in true reverence. We tend to write Him off as being unimportant, irrelevant to our modern times. But that’s a major mistake my Friends, a lie perpetrated by the evil, cunning Lucifer. No wonder our world is in such a mess! Anyway, the next scripture about putting His Spirit on His elect, is one we well know and have already covered. That’s when Jesus was baptized, and when He came up out of the water; ‘lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him.’ (Matt.3:16) Then we have the revealing testimony of John the Baptist on that very situation: ‘And John bare record (witness), saying, I saw the Spirit descending from heaven like a dove, and it abode (remained) upon him. And I knew him not: but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto me, Upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending, and remaining on him, the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. And I saw, and bare record (witness) that this is the Son of God.’ (John 1:32-34) Oh my brethren, there’s absolutely no disputing that testimony! Later on, during a dispute between a group of Jews and the disciples of John the Baptist, re purifying, John again testified to Jesus being the true Son of God, telling them that Jesus must increase while he decreases, because his purpose was only to introduce Jesus to the world. ‘For he whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God: for God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him. The Father LOVETH the Son, and hath given all things into his hand.’ (John 3:34-35) That means Friends, that the Lord doesn’t or rather didn’t play stingy with the giving of His Spirit to Jesus. Likewise He’ll be very generous in giving His Spirit to us, who believe in His Son. That brings us to an interesting comment from the scholars. ‘God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto him:’ Some manuscripts read: ‘He gives the Spirit without measure,’ which would then refer to the sending of the Holy Spirit (Acts 1:5, 11:15-16; John 7:37-39) And we going to end with that last reference to the giving of the Holy Spirit. Hear these marvellous, inspiring words of Jesus! ‘In the last day, that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly (heart) shall flow rivers of living water. But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.’ (John 7:37-39) By the way, the scripture that Jesus referred to there was a prophecy of Moses: ‘The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken.’ (Deut.18:15) And that’s it for today Friends. I sure hope that you all got something worthwhile from the teaching today. I know that I did. Please ponder it in all seriousness. There was actually some more stuff I wanted to share on the Spirit, but will leave that for another day. Don’t need any criticisms about it being too long and involved. (smile) So till we meet again, God willing, let’s truly LOVE our God; sincerely LIVE our Faith and faithfully SPREAD His Word. Much LOVE!…what a drastic, but wonderful change occurs in man…when the Holy Spirit comes to dwell in him…

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