Proverbs 29:22. An angry man stirreth up strife, and a furious man aboundeth in transgression.
‘Saturday, O glorious Saturday! What shall we do this Saturday eh? Take a walk in the park, or a drive out into the country and admire God’s handiwork in nature? Visit the open air markets and country fairs? Or just sit at home and do nothing, relax, take a break from the madding crowd that’s out and about this weekend?’ Oh Friends, there are any number of things we can do today, but there’s just one proviso to whatever it is we intend to do; make sure it includes Jehovah God, for without His active involvement, our actions have the sure potential to turn into disasters. And here’s an interesting quote from an anonymous source. ‘When you dig another out of trouble, you find a place to bury your own.’ And that’s oh so true, my people! I’ve experienced it, and so have many of you. When you help someone with their troubles, yours just seem to naturally fade into the background, at least for the time that you’re helping the other person. Then you’re more concerned with the unfortunate plight of your fellow man, than with your own. But this act of helping must be done out of selflessness, and not merely because it’s the right thing to do, or it will make us look good. That’s because helping others is an integral part of our faith and our general mission in life as followers of Jesus. We have to do it from a spirit of LOVE and obedience. Remember the Good Book tells us that Jesus spent His days going about doing good and healing people, (Acts 10:38) and so too should we. But unfortunately that’s not always possible on account of the negative attitudes some of us hold, as our Bit so wisely points out. ‘An angry man stirreth up strife, and a furious man aboundeth in transgression.’ That’s the gospel truth Friends, as many, or most of us can attest to, since we’ve been there and done that. Oh my fellow believers, anger is a dreadful poison. It’s possibly the most potent weapon in Lucifer’s arsenal, since so much negativity flows from it. Just look at all the turmoil and strife in the world right now; the many wars and rumours of wars, the mistrust and contention, most of it can be traced right back to anger. And too often that anger has been passed down through the ages, constantly simmering and flowing out like molten lava from a volcano. It’s so prevalent that in many cases the ones involved in the strife today couldn’t tell you why there’s such antagonism between their neighbours and themselves, just that it has always existed. And the sad part is that oftimes it began over some petty action or remark, but the human spirit is so aggressive and warlike in its natural state that the strife has been handed down through numerous generations. Friends, I’m putting it to us today that that’s no way to live! Unfortunately though, our world is currently programmed to produce anger: what with the sorry downturn in all areas of our once so prosperous lives, the busyness and inherent impatience born of that same busyness, as well as the egotistical pride and selfishness that’s running rampant. It’s a veritable breeding ground for instability, lack of self-disciple and control. And an angry man is certainly an unstable man. When we’re angry is the worse time to make important decisions, for then our out-of-sync emotions are in control instead of our reason, and we’re liable to do all kinds of crazy, negative things. That means, as the second half of our Bit points out, we’re liable to engage in much wrongdoing, since then it’s the prince of darkness who’s controlling our sprits and not God or wise reason. Cousin Sol wrote an interesting analogy earlier on in Proverbs 26. ‘As coals (charcoal) are to burning coals, and wood to fire; so is a contentious man to kindle strife.’ (Prov.26:21) And there’s a whole lot of truth to that statement Friends! Most of the young people nowadays won’t even know what coals or charcoal are. I don’t even know for sure how the coals was made, since I was a town boy (smile) and we just bought the ready made coals to fire up the coal-pot. I just know that it was made from burning wood in some form and fashion. And a lot of people would contend that food cooked on a coal-pot or wood fire, tastes sweeter than that cooked on a stove, that’s why so many people are enamoured of their barbecues. But as far as I know the new fangled coals used in barbecues is somewhat different to what we grew up with in the West Indies. But just as coals and wood are very combustible, likewise a bickering, contentious, unreasonable person has a great tendency to cause or kindle strife. And what does strife do? Just cause negative things like bitterness, resentment, hatred, anxiety and fear to creep into our souls and set up shop. And once we have those negative emotions festering in us, we can never be satisfied, contented or happy, and will therefore be unable to lead a productive life based on the teachings and principles of Jesus. And Friends, that’s definitely no way to live this earthly life! It’s rough enough without us making it rougher. That’s why it’s so important to stay away from strife, anger and all the bitter pills they produce, as well as the people who like to induce them. Listen to this guideline Cousin Sol gives on the subject. ‘A wrathful man stirreth up strife: but he that is slow to anger appeaseth strife (contention).’ (Prov.15:18) But my people the only sure way to avoid and/ or control that negativity caused by those emotions of darkness is to immerse ourselves in the body of Jesus; accept Him as our Lord and Saviour, read His Word, learn His statutes, and try to live our lives using His earthly sojourn as our example. When we do that, then the myriad of negative emotions won’t have any place in our lives. Instead, worthwhile attributes like peace, LOVE, mercy and forgiveness will reign supreme in our souls. So please, let’s seriously consider today, what part anger and its negative counterparts play in our lives, and penitently ask the Lord to help us get rid of them, so we can walk in the brilliant light of His Son Jesus Christ. Therein lies abundant wisdom! Much LOVE!… the best way to avoid the dangers of anger…truly LOVE our God… sincerely LIVE our Faith…and diligently SPREAD His Word…
Today’s Scrip-Bit 18 May 2013 Proverbs 29:22.
18 May 2013 Leave a comment
in Christian Thoughts and Inspiration., Daily Devotion, Daily Inspiration, Inspirational Living, Spiritual Living Tags: a furious man, abundant wisdom, an angry man, anger, bickering, bitter pills, bitterness, busyness, charcoal, coal-pot, coals, contented, contention, forgiveness, God's handiwork, happy, human-rights, impatience, LOVE, mercy, mistrust, molten lava, nature, negative emotions, obedience, peace, petty actions, prince of darkness, resentment, rumours of wars, satisfied, selflessness, spirit of LOVE, spirituality, stirs up strife, strife, transgressions, troubles, wars, worthwhile attributes
Today’s Scrip-Bit 24 March 2013 Isaiah 51:12
24 Mar 2013 Leave a comment
in Christian Thoughts and Inspiration., Daily Devotion, Daily Inspiration, Inspirational Living, Spiritual Living Tags: asap, bitterness, blessed day, disastrous pit, drought, earthly hell, faith, faithful prayer, famine, fleshly lust, forces of destruction, glorification, great deeds, great LOVE, heavenly Father, joblessness, LOVE, loving kindness, negative forces, no time to lose, noble emotion, poverty, praise, resentment, rule the roost, rumours of wars, Saint of the Little Flower, sickness, sincere repentance, son jesus christ, spiritual rebirth, spirituality, St. Therese, strife, The Lord who comforts, trust, wars, workers of iniquity, worship
Isaiah 51:12. I, even I, am he that comforteth you: who art thou, that thou shouldest be afraid of a man that shall die, and of the son of man which shall be made as grass.
Oh Friends, isn’t it most excellent to see another blessed day on God’s wonderful earth? It certainly is! So let’s all take a deep breath, hold it for a moment, then slowly let it out, while simultaneously contemplating the miracle of life that exists in us, and the goodness of God that enables us to keep on breathing minute after minute, day by day. And having done that, and realizing what rich and exquisite gifts the Lord has bestowed on us, both through ordinary physical life and spiritual rebirth, reconciliation through His Son Jesus Christ, all His earth bound children declared a heartfelt: ‘Thank You Lord! We LOVE You and praise Your Holy Name! We know that it’s nothing we’ve done, but Your monumental, unconditional LOVE for us that causes You to continue looking upon us with such awesome and amazing LOVING-kindness. We faithfully pray that our wonderful LOVE relationship will continue forever, throughout eternity. In Jesus Name. Amen.’ Yes Friends, what a great LOVE our heavenly Father bears towards us, and consequently desires us to bear to each other. No wonder St. Therese of Liseux, the Saint of the Little Flower, emphasized in her short, rough but productive earthly sojourn, that ‘What matters in life, is not great deeds, but great LOVE.’ And if that isn’t an undeniable truth, then I don’t know what is! Sadly though, of all the emotions, that noble emotion of LOVE, which we need the most, is what we have the least of. Granted, the word is constantly bandied about, but there’s no true substance to it. It’s used mostly in a worldly, carnal manner, oftimes as a synonym for fleshly lust. But when coming to true LOVE for God, and true LOVE for our fellow man, our world is sadly lacking. True LOVE for God doesn’t mean continually disparaging Him and removing Him from our society. And true LOVE for our neighbours certainly doesn’t mean the worldwide strife, resentment, bitterness and other stressful emotions that currently dominate our days and nights. And unfortunately my people, without real LOVE, we’re just spinning our wobbly wheels in self-destruct mode. That’s because the negative emotions opposed to LOVE aren’t conducive to building or creating, but are all forces of destruction. And if we keep letting those negative forces rule the roost, then we’ll just keep going the way we are now…falling, falling, falling into the disastrous pit of an earthly hell. It doesn’t take a genius to see that my brethren. But it does take a wise, considerate and LOVING human being to want to do something to stop the carnage, the ever-quickening downward trend. And as I keep reminding us, it’s only the true believers who are capable of catching the reins of this runaway horse and carriage we call modern-day life and bringing it to a halt and then reversing its sordid direction to that which leads to sincere repentance, praise worship, glorification and LOVE for our Creator, Jehovah God. Ah mih people, unless this reversal of directions happens, and happens soon too, we’ll all end up in dire circumstances. The terrible plight of our world is there for all to see; what with the tough and getting tougher economic situations creating worldwide joblessness, the immense poverty, sickness, homelessness, famine, drought, climate change and all the other negatives now consuming us. None of that speaks of real LOVE, especially when there’s more than enough of everything to go around. And we haven’t even mentioned the numerous social uprisings, the wars and rumours of wars that are concurrently taking place alongside all the other disastrous situations. Oh Friends, what a mess we’ve made of God’s wonderful creation! And it all stems from a sad lack of LOVE. The unfortunate thing about LOVE though, is that it takes time to build, because it needs trust and faith, things that cannot be had instantly. Meanwhile, hate, anger and strife can be raised up immediately and produce immense destruction at the proverbial drop of a hat. Anyway my fellow believers, the moral of the story, the purpose of this epistle (smile) is to have us wake up and realize that it’s imperative we get the ball of LOVE rolling as quickly as possible. There’s absolutely no time to lose, since Lucifer and his wicked cronies already have a substantial head start on us. That means we have lots of ground to make up, before we can even think of forging ahead of the evildoers. So please, if we seriously and sincerely LOVE Jesus and want to please Him, want to help build His glorious kingdom, then let’s get it together nuh. Let’s cut out all the pussyfooting and blah blah blah, and get some real action going. We can’t allow the immense sacrifice of Christ’s sinless life on Calvary’s cross to be wasted, to go for naught under the evil onslaught, because we’re too comfortable, lazy and/or afraid. Remember Bruh Paul’s strong assurance to Timothy: ‘For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of LOVE, and of a sound mind.’ (2 Tim.1:7) Therefore, as true believers, we ought to come out swinging, giving no quarter to the workers of iniquity in this LOVE Revolution, if we want to see a return to God and all the things that make for a safe, satisfied, wonderful, godly and righteous life. Now let’s allow our Bit, and the three verses after it, to take us home, so that we can ponder on the truth contained in them, and how our lives reflect that truth. ‘I, even I, am he that comforteth you: who art thou, that thou shouldest be afraid of a (mortal) man that shall die, and of the son of man which shall be made as grass; And forgettest the Lord thy maker, that hath stretched forth the heavens, and laid the foundations of the earth; and hast feared continually every day because of the fury of the oppressor, as if he were ready (preparing) to destroy? and where is the fury of the oppressor? The captive exile hasteneth that he may be loosed, and that he should not die in the pit, nor that his bread should fail. But I am the Lord thy God, that divided the sea, whose waves roared: The Lord of hosts is his name.’ (Is.51:12-15) Oh my people, please let’s contemplate today on those harsh words of our mightily displeased God. Yes, He is mightily displeased because we’re doing just like, and even worse than the Israelites of old, to whom Isaiah directed those words. And having pondered them, let’s then rise up and do better. If not for our sakes, then for Jesus and our children’s. It’s the wisdom of the ages. Much LOVE!…he who has ears to hear…let him hear…otherwise he’ll surely feel the wrath of God…
Today’s Scrip-Bit 22 September 2012 Zephaniah 2:1
22 Sep 2012 Leave a comment
in Inspirational Living Tags: antagonism, Democrat, depression, forgiveness, gather together, humility, LOVE, manna, mercy, one accord, oppression, poverty, repentance, Republican, righteouness, rumours of wars, sickness, tearing each other apart, the Lord's anger, wars, wisdom
Zephaniah 2:1. Gather yourselves together, yea, gather together, O nation not desired.
Oh Friends, another day has dawned bright and beautiful, though a bit chilly in my area, but still with all the blessings that our faithful God has promised, and has faithfully provided everyday. Blessings like life, mercy, manna, LOVE and forgiveness, just to name a few. But for some reason, many of us either don’t know about, or seem to appreciate these daily blessings, which unfortunately keeps us at loggerheads with each other, which in turn wreaks havoc in our society. Listen to the chorus of this song I recently heard on a T&T radio station. It’s an old fashioned type calypso, apparently penned for T&T’s fiftieth anniversary of Independence, celebrated this past August 31. It says: ‘My prayer dear Lord, is that you keep us in one accord. And if there is a plan, for the destruction of our land. Ah beg you, dear Lord, please stay your hand. My prayer to you dear Lord. Please don’t allow us to continue tearing each other (our nation) apart. Dear Lord, that’s the prayer of my heart.’ Oh my people, that’s a prayer that can be raised up to heaven for almost every nation in our world, because almost all of them are in some sort of turmoil. It can therefore be also applied to our entire world, which is in a truly sad state, with wars and rumours of wars abounding; economic depression, gross poverty and untold sickness in a world of plenty and marvellous medical science, religious confrontation and oppression, and generally speaking very few areas of agreement. Why are we so antagonistic towards each other eh, even in the smallest group, the family? I guess with the exceedingly quick pace of life nowadays, and with all the modern technology and the numerous distractions now available, plus the lack of godly instruction in homes and schools, it’s harder for even families to see eye to eye. And if the smallest and supposedly most close-knit group are at such wide and varied odds, what does that say for the society as a whole eh? It surely doesn’t instil much confidence that we’ll be getting better any time soon. A glaring example of that is the current U.S Presidential campaign. Firstly it’s very partisan, either Republican or Democrat, with no middle ground. Then it’s become so nasty, expensive and more focussed on the personal lives of the candidates, than the numerous serious problems affecting the country and their plans to fix them. Neither side seems truly concerned about the effects that style of campaigning is having on the country, but are both merely concerned with pushing their own agenda in the wild grab for power. And sadly, though not as much as before, as the U.S. goes, so does the rest of the world. So is there no help for us, you ask? Oh yes Friends, surely, for while there is life, there’s always hope. But what’s the help? My people, we can find it in our Bit and the two verses that follow it. ‘Gather yourselves together, yea, gather together, O nation not desired (undesirable nation). Before the decree bring forth (is issued), before the day pass as the chaff, before the fierce anger of the Lord come upon you, before the day of the Lord’s anger come upon you. Seek ye the Lord, all ye meek of the earth, which have wrought his judgement (upheld his justice); seek righteousness, seek meekness (humility): it may be ye shall be hid in the day of the Lord’s anger.’ (Zeph.2:1-3) Yes Friends, Zephaniah was desperately calling on the meek to seek the Lord, because of Judah’s ungodliness, and letting them know how terrible it would be when the Lord’s anger strikes. But they paid no heed and when the conquering forces of Babylon ravished them, everybody just held their heads and bawled. But Friends, it was too late then, and if we don’t smarten up and truly seek the Lord today, we will eventually face the same unwanted, but much deserved fate for our ungodly, evil way of life. Oh my brethren, the day of the Lord will not be forestalled, and the scope of divine judgement will be worldwide and truly harsh. Only the meek and righteous will stand a chance of not being utterly consumed. A lot of societies today take the Word of the Lord for a joke, heaping ridicule on it, but if we really looked at the horrible situation the children of Israel faced for their disobedience in the Old Testament, we wouldn’t take it so lightly. And what do you think will be the Lord’s reaction to those who refused to place their faith in His Son Jesus Christ, whom He innocently sacrificed so that His fallen children could be reconciled to Him? I doubt that His reaction will be very wonderful, for although He is indeed a God of LOVE, mercy and forgiveness, Hs is also a God of justice and righteousness and cannot tolerate sin around Him. And we’ll end with some interesting words from Joel, when he called Judah to repentance and fasting because they were living the same wicked, unrighteous lives that we’re now living. ‘Blow the trumpet (ram’s horn) in Zion, sanctify (consecrate) a fast, call a solemn (sacred) assembly: Gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children, and those that suck the breast (nursing babes): let the bridegroom go forth of his chamber, and the bride out of her closet (dressing room). Let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, Spare thy people, O Lord, and give not thine heritage to reproach, that the heathen (nations) should rule over them: wherefore should they say among the people (peoples), Where is their God?’ (Joel 2:15-17) Oh my brethren, we certainly don’t want the heathen to rule over us, or to feel the Lord’s full anger, we’re already feeling some with all the calamity that’s befalling our world. So I implore us to all try and improve ourselves, by raising our individual righteousness and humility, thus setting a good example, then start to encourage those around us, friends, families and co-workers to do the same. That’s what we need to do, if we want to see brighter days. It’s the wisdom that’s called for in these turbulent times. Much LOVE!…humans divided…whether in families or nations…will never achieve God’s greatest promises…
SCRIP-BITS 