What About Sarai? 

     Abraham is getting all the attention. What about his wife, Sarai?

     The Lord said, "She will be Sarah (princess) and I will give you a son by her. She will be a mother of nations...this time next year."

     That's 12 months away. Hmmm.

     Abraham "...fell facedown; he laughed and said to himself, 'Will a son be born to a man a hundred years old? Will Sarah bear a child at the age of ninety?'" Sarah laughed also. 

     Abraham said to God, "If only Ishmael might live under your blessing." 

     God tolerated this moment of unbelief - it was reasonable. "Sarah will bear you a son and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him." 

     "As for Ishmael (God hears)," Abraham's son by Sarai's maid, "I will surely bless him... He will be the father of twelve rulers and I will make him into a great nation."    

     More delay. Abraham and his nephew Lot had separated because their flocks grew too large. That led to Sodom (where Lot then lived among those with "grievous sin.") Lot reluctantly evacuated before God destroyed both Sodom and Gomorrah (with burning sulfur).

     Abraham, yet untested, moved into the region of the Negev where he almost wrecked God's plan. He said Sarah was his sister, because Abimelech liked her looks (age 90 !!!), and the king would kill him if he knew the truth.     

Next: How will Abraham get out of his (and her) predicament?

Exalted Father to Father of Many

     Abram may have been a normal person, but his name meant "exalted father." 

     Since we last saw him at the covenant - we're not sure what he saw given the "dreadful darkness" - Abram lived in Canaan 10 years, to age 86. Then at 99 (Genesis 17) he still hadn't faced his ultimate test. Will he die before God gets around to it?

     Not a chance. The Lord said, I am God Almighty (El Shaddai, all powerful). Walk before me and be blameless. I will confirm my covenant between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers.

     Your name will be Abraham (father of many), for I have made you a father of many nations. I will establish my covenant as an everlasting covenant and your descendants after you for the generations to come. 

     As for you, you must keep my covenant, you and your descendants. Then God added a sign of the covenant, circumcision. 

     The Lord's promise to be their God was a promise on which all other promises rest. God unreservedly binds himself to his faithful people...to be their God, shield, reward, with grace, pardon, promises, protection, guidance, goodness, help and blessing...in love. 

     Fair enough?  

  Next: They laughed? Seriously? 

Dreadful Darkness Over Abram

     Abram "cut the animals in two and arranged the halves opposite each other..." Ready for the covenant. 

     Wait. Who is going to pass between the halves? Sun was setting. "Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him." 

     If that wasn't scary enough, the Lord said, "Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years" (it was 430). 

     "But I will punish the nation...and they (Abram's descendants) will come out with great possessions. You however will be...buried at a good old age" (it was 175)   

     "Darkness fell. A smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces."

     "The Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, 'To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates - the land of the..."  (all the -ites).  

Next: One Exalted Father

Note: In Jeremiah 34:17-18, the Lord was angry with those "who have violated my covenant." He will treat them "like the calf they cut in two and then walked between its pieces...the leaders, court officials, priests, and all the people who walked between the pieces of the calf." 

God's passage between the halves, Genesis 15: He considers all Abraham's descendants as having passed through the covenant procedure with himself. 

 Will Abraham Pass the Test?

     Yesterday > the plan. We miserable creatures hope for mercy and grace. One man will be tested. If he passes, "the way" will come to pass...eventually. And after "the way" comes, each of us must pass our own test. 

     Genesis 14:13: Abram the Hebrew. Hebrew may have referred to people who wondered as nomads. Later, it came to refer specifically to Abraham and his descendants. 

     Genesis 15: After Abram's battle with the kings, God spoke to him in a vision: Do not be afraid. I am your shield, your very great reward.

     That was okay...apparently, but "O Sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless? You have given me no children."  

     The word of the Lord: ...a son coming from your own body will be your heir. He told him to count the stars, if he could. So shall your offspring be. "Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness." So far so good. 

     Then God said he would give Abram possession of the land he was in. Puzzled again, "O Sovereign Lord, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?" 

     "So, the Lord said, 'Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram...'" A covenant meant taking slaughtered animals, cutting them in half, and the halves placed opposite each other. The two parties would walk between the halves. If they didn't keep the covenant, they would perish like the slain animals.   

 Next: Who will walk between the carcasses? 

It's a New Day 

     Now begins the Word of God...again. Former years were mostly trouble, with no one seemingly in charge. 

     Following Noah, new settlements...Nimrod...a tower in Babel. Still there was hope! 

     A normal man...God will test, and if he passes the test, a blessing offered to people (made of dust, living on cursed ground) the world over. 

     God wants to redeem and save humanity. If the man he chooses serves him faithfully, a family will follow, ultimately a chosen nation of people separated from ungodly ways of other nations. And from this nation will come the Messiah, Savior, the promised offspring of the woman (see yesterday's blog, Genesis 3:15.) 

1. Abraham's call began with separation from his people. He became an alien and stranger on earth (Hebrews 11:13). A principle for all time.

2. His blessing would affect all nations (missionary efforts).  

3. His call included a heavenly home, where he would live forever in a city built by God. (No more dust or pain.)  

4. Obligations: God required obedience and commitment from Abraham. This included trust in God's Word, and a sincere endeavor to live a righteous life. 

5. God's promise and blessing extended to believing Jews and all who in true faith follow the "seed" of Abraham, as his heirs (Galatians 3:14, 16).

6. Abraham is declared a foremost example of true saving faith. Any profession of faith that does not involve obedience to the Lord is not Abraham's faith.

Next: Will he pass the test? 

  

Why Not Noah?  

     Let's back up!

     Maybe we left the Garden of Eden too soon. Does the original sin really matter? 

     The serpent, "craftier than the other wild animals," entered the garden before Adam and Eve conceived their first child. Creation was complete. This was the second beginning...the gift of human life.

     Genesis 3:15: Following their trip-up - believing the serpent rather than God - God lowered the hammer. He told the serpent he would put "enmity (hostility) between you (Satan) and the woman, and between your offspring and hers. He (the Messiah) will crush your head and you will strike his heal." 

     Women would have "pain in childbearing." As for Adam, "cursed is the ground," it will require "painful toil..." If that wasn't rough enough, God added: "...until you return to the ground since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return."

     And so here we are, friends, on cursed ground, in January 2024. 

     Abram was a routine man for 75 years, without hearing from God that we know of. Why didn't God choose righteous Enoch to be father of the nations? Why not Noah, the only father alive, true to God, after all the hard work he did building God's ark?  

     What we know: God chose one of us, Abram, gave him an awesome promise, and obligations, and waited to see if he would obey.

Next: What Abraham's call meant 

     

Japhethites, Hamites and Semites 

     These are the clans of Noah's sons. 

     Everyone spoke the same language, convenient for... "building ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves..." Does that inclination sound familiar? It should.

     The Lord confused their language so they ... stopped building the city. 

     Genesis chapter 11 includes more genealogy. Life expectancy had lowered to between 200 and 500 years. 

     A man named Terah lived 205 years. One of his sons was named Abram, who married Sarai, his half-sister. They had no children. 

     Does the name Abram sound familiar? Of course. 

     This is all we know about him, in chapter 11. If there is a divide in scripture, we have come to it. Men...not God...divided God's Word into two "testaments." In Genesis chapter 12, verses 1-3...

     The Lord said to Abram......I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing .......and all people on earth will be blessed through you. 

      Imagine being the human, at that moment. I can't. But can we somehow relate to Abraham as his story unfolds? 

      Abram was 75 years old when God spoke. He, his wife and his nephew Lot set out for a land occupied by Canaanites. God told Abram, "To your offspring, I will give this land." What's he to do in the meantime? A severe famine is in the land. 

 Next: Why Not Noah?

 

The Lord Was Grieved 

     We know God is capable of emotion, disappointment and reaction. Everyone on earth was about to experience...anger. But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. 

     In Noah God had a man who sought communion with him. By God's grace he lived by faith (Hebrews 11:7). He was another preacher of righteousness (2 Peter 2:5).

     Unlike Enoch, taken up, Noah was told to work, to build an ark 450 by 75 by 45 feet...with no blueprints or lumber companies to supply material. And no experience.

     Noah was 600 years old by the time he and his three sons with their wives were ready to launch, to shove off, to weigh anchor, to... Okay. Noah didn't even have to close the door himself. The future of civilization was at stake, and God was Captain...of everything. 

     Months later the ark settled on dry land - somewhere - and the people, animals, critters and birds all disembarked. 

     God blessed Noah and his sons, giving them the right to "everything," except meat with lifeblood still in it. 

     He would also, "surely demand an accounting for...the life of a fellow man." Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man (Genesis 9:6). 

     Then God established a covenant with Noah and his sons and their descendants, and with all living creatures. Never again would he cut off life by flooding. He set "my rainbow in the clouds," a sign of covenant between himself and the earth.  

     God was no longer angry. We think maybe he was sad. 

 Next: the great divide

The genesis of this multi-part series

     It began orderly, and it was "good." 

     Then the first couple let a talking "serpent" lie to them. Just a bite. The Owner evicted them from his exceedingly bountiful property. 

     Some religious people don't think that Adam's failure introduced the fixed law of sin and death for the human race...all of us. Why is it written? In any case, the first couple isn't to blame for our failures. 

     We are born with the same innate desire to go our own way. No matter how "good" we may become, we are never good enough to enter the exceedingly bountiful property above. No way! Unless...

     More about that later.  

     Civilization began to form. Did they ever! Adam lived 930 years. Seth: 912. Enosh: 905. Kenan: 910. Jerad: 962. Who was counting?

     Jared's son Enoch only lived 365 years. Cancer? No. Enoch walked with God as a prophet who warned the ungodly (Jude vv. 14-15) and God translated him to his kingdom above. 

     Before he departed, Enoch fathered Methuselah, who set the record, 969 years. Talk about family genes... 

     All that longevity produced civilization, but wickedness grew as well, and every inclination of the thoughts of his (man's) heart was only evil all the time (Genesis 6:5). 

Tomorrow: Noah, who also walked with God

     

Isaiah, the Yo-Yo Book 

Chapter subtitles

34 - Judgment Against the Nations 

35 - Joy of the Redeemed 

37 - Jerusalem's Deliverance Foretold 

40 - Comfort for God's People 

41 - The Helper of Israel 

42 & 49 - The Servant of the Lord

43 - Israel's only Savior ... God's Mercy and Israel's Unfaithfulness  

44 - Israel the Chosen

46-47 - Gods of Babylon ... The Fall of Babylon

48 - Stubborn Israel 

50 - Israel's Sin and the Servant's Obedience 

51 - Everlasting Salvation for Zion ... The Cup of the Lord's Wrath

52-53 - The Suffering and Glory of the Servant

54 & 60 - The Future Glory of Zion 

55 - Invitation to the Thirsty 

56 - Salvation for Others

57 - Comfort for the Contrite

58 - True Fasting 

59 - Sin, Confession and Redemption 

61 - The Year of the Lord's Favor 

62 - Zion's New Name 

63-64 - God's Day of Vengeance and Redemption ... Praise and Prayer

65 - Judgment and Salvation

66 - Judgment and Hope 

Next: New Testament fulfillment 

  

  

The Up & Down Book 

Following up on Isaiah 9:6-7, it might be interesting - and educational - to explore the subtitles of Isaiah's 66 chapters, written in 700-680 B.C.

1 - A Rebellious Nation 

2 - The Mountain of the Lord ... The Day of the Lord

3 - Judgment on Jerusalem and Judah 

4 - The Branch of the Lord

6 - Isaiah's Commission 

7 - The Sign of Immanuel 

8 - Fear God

9 - To Us a Child is Born ... The Lord's Anger Against Israel

11 - The Branch from Jesse 

12 - Songs of Praise 

13-21, 23, 28, 30, 31 - Prophecies Against Other Nations

22 - A Prophecy About Jerusalem 

24 - The Lord's Devastation of the Earth 

25 - Praise to the Lord 

27 - Deliverance of Israel 

29 - Woe to David's City 

33 - Distress ... Help

Continued tomorrow

Humanity: Solving the Problem 

     "The book of Isaiah is like a yo-yo, up and down. The Lord goes from righteous judgment to gracious reconciliation, and back around. 

by Janie B. Cheaney

     "In human terms, this is the Divine Dilemma. Parents: If there is love for your child, though complicated, there is also pain. Love is risking oneself amid the unknown. 

     "It is hard enough for parents when a child turns on them. But what do you do if you are God? 

     "One choice: Let the 'children' destroy Your house, ignore Your rules and leave Your righteousness in the dirt. Another choice: Judgment. Stop everything and punish. You are still God. You win...but not really. Your grand experiment fails and Satan laughs.

     "Third option: For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. Notice the extravagant language: mighty God, everlasting Father.   

     "The child is promised to a virgin who wonders, "How can this be?" 

     "Amid agonized and wrathful pronouncements against Mt. Zion and all surrounding nations, a Man emerges:  

     "A promised child, like Isaac and Samson,    

         from the seed of Jesse, like David,    

            a servant and prophet, like Moses,    

                a sacrificial victim,  ...like no one else. 

"He alone is the resolution and reconciler for an impossible dilemma."

Isaiah 9:6-7

 

We Thought Covid Was Bad

     Is a greater killer coming? To kill the elderly? To transform America?

     Twice we've seen Sen. Rand Paul on TV answering questions about "research" in China. The effort to experiment with deadly disease - for what purpose? - is underway in several locations, including the military! 

     Does this interest anyone?

     We have heard, and Sen. Paul said, it is estimated this disease would kill anywhere from 5% to 50% of people on earth. Take us back to the 14th century. Oh well, the lucky people would carry on. 

     No. If half the population is doomed, that could mean half the health care, the military, law enforcement, those who provide food, those who run the economy...and you can complete the list. 

     Chaos. Weakness. 

     Why did China give the world covid? Never mind their own citizens who also paid the price. Was it a test? Will this precede our election? 

     Why is the National Institute of Health tight lipped? Why does the U.S. fund this "research?" Why do American leftists want our population to shrink? Good for the climate? No! Vulnerable elderly are more conservative voters. The younger...more easily influenced.  

     China has been sending fentanyl, resulting in tens of thousands of deaths. President Biden asked them to stop, pretty please? Can we believe them? Was he serious?

     China thinks they are the center of the world, and they have the right and duty to rule. So why wouldn't this godless nation want to weaken us without firing a shot?  

     If only 5% die, 6 million, we'll consider that a blessing???  

          Jimmy

 

we invite God to the blog

Come all you who are thirsty... 

     Isaiah 55: God invites Israelites to return to him... promises salvation to those with spiritual hunger and thirst for forgiveness and a right relationship with God, based on the sacrificial death of the (Servant-Lord > Isaiah 52).

Seek the Lord... 

     while (in captivity) there is still the promise. ((Jeremiah 29:13-14). A day is coming when he will refuse to be found.   

See, I have made him a witness...

     You (missionaries) will summon the nations...that do not know you, they will hasten to you, because of the Lord our God, the Holy One of Israel...

Seek the Lord while he may be found...

     Let the wicked forsake his way and the evil man his thoughts... (warning: Hebrews 3:7-11)

My thoughts are not your thoughts... 

     Human minds and hearts seek him...our thoughts and ways begin to conform to him.

As the rain waters the earth...

     so is my word that goes out...it will accomplish what I desire...

As the heavens are higher than the earth...

     so are my ways higher than your ways... 

So is my word that goes out from my mouth...

     it will not return to me empty, for I will accomplish what I desire...

This will be for the Lord's renown...

     for an everlasting sign, which will not be destroyed. 

     

 Karl Marx's Family 

     According to Mark Levin (one of my few, favorite authors and TV hosts), in his book about Democrats, Marx's relationship with his children does not seem at all consistent with a desire to communally raise children. 

     "He (Marx) greatly enjoyed playing and romping with them and was extremely solicitous for their welfare. Part of the reason for his financial problems was his alacrity to spend beyond his income to provide various amenities for his children, including private tutoring in languages, music and drama. He asked Engles to take over fatherly responsibilities toward his children after he died."

     "Sometimes Marx intervened in his daughters' lives in ways that seem to contradict his role as revolutionary abolisher of families and liberator of children. When Paul Lafargue was courting his daughter, Laura, Marx warned him to keep his distance and demanded he prove he could financially support a wife. He blocked another daughter's relationship and refused to recognize their engagement." 

     "Marx's unashamed hypocrisy is consistent with autocrats of all stripes. They cannot and will not live the life they brutally impose on others. For example, the Obamas who live like royalty, surrounded by luxury and fame, sent their daughters to an expensive, tony, private school, yet still preach contempt for America and spew Marxist propaganda."

     "John Kerry, Biden's so-called U.S. Special Envoy for Climate, flies private, military and commercial flights endlessly around the world preaching the gospel of green energy and economic degrowth." Levin notes how "the Squad preaches defunding of the police," while protecting themselves with private security. 

     "The Democratic Party benefits politically from the breakup of the nuclear family. Its war on the family, the economy, the culture and society is purposeful and malignant."

Just a few lines from THE DEMOCRAT PARTY HATES AMERICA

 Social Justice Fables 

     Economist Thomas Sowell, a fellow at Stanford, dispatches the left's favorite "fallacies" in the book, SOCIAL JUSTICE. 

     "The world does not work as the liberals wish because everyday Americans are rational actors who respond to incentives. Both history and economics show that people are not chess pieces. Yet politicians so often act that way, as though an increase in tax rates will guarantee a corresponding increase in tax revenue... 

     "This 'exaltation of desirability and neglect of feasibility' is one of the 'fundamental fallacies of the social justice vision.' As Christians, we might say policy must be rooted in reality, which includes the nature of Creation and the fallenness of man. This creates problems for the utopians in our midst. 

     "Racialist fallacies are found and refuted throughout the book, a subtle reminder of how central race is to the modern liberal project. 

     "Sowell's writing is Spartan. There is no narrative, or introduction. 

     "Instead, Sowell's style is to pick a topic, a proposition - a social justice fallacy. Recite the typical liberal assertion, and then deconstruct it in two pages of logic, history, academic studies, and facts. Then move on to the next one. It's not meant to be entertaining, though it's hard not to smile occasionally when he lands his best punches. 

     "His style has its audience: those craving the intellectual vindication of things they already believe to be true and right about the world."

 by Daniel R. Suhr

 Solution to Suffering?   

     "We all experience life as suffering," writes Andree Seu Peterson. There are moments of happiness, but they are only moments, preceded by suffering and followed by suffering, she says. 

     She describes her "sixth age" as a time of problems with her nose, side, teeth, eyes, taste...everything." Her children wonder at her happiness. 

     The Buddha's approach was a state of mind of detachment. "Buddha was right up to a point when he talked about cultivating a mindset," she says. "But the mindset that gives freedom is not detachment from reality; it is the embrace of more reality. It is truth that sets free, the whole truth."

     "What my children do not see is that I set my sights beyond this present world and therefore do not grieve as those who have no hope."

WORLD magazine

Who Owns the Land?

     Israel? Palestinians and Hamas? Or...? 

     Activists around the world argue that Israel doesn't belong. Can that many opinions be wrong? Iran threatens a nuclear wipeout. Andree Seu Peterson settles the question in WORLD magazine.

* The UN voted Israel a state in 1947. 

* The old League of Nations mandated a "national home" for Jews. 

* Jews have the oldest and most documented claim to the land of any people regarding any land of any time - the Torah. 

* There is no "Palestinian people." There never was a Palestinian nation. "Palestine" designates a region, not an ethnic group. The Romans renamed the province of Judea 'Syria Palestina' to erase connection with rebellious Jews. No land ownership during the Ottoman Empire. The British used the term "Palestine" to denote a distinct political unit. 

* Jews immigrated in three waves starting in the 1880s. They found hygiene unknown. The land, deplorable. Dirty streets. Regions deforested; plateaus stripped of fertile soil. Jews moved in and made it a garden. 

* "Palestinians" now in Gaza and the West Bank are actually ethnic Egyptians, Jordanians, Lebanese, Syrians and other Arabs. 

* There are 22 Arab nations in the neighborhood in which Arab people may live. 

* Arab citizens enjoy the blessings of Israel's freedom, civic participation and prosperity side by side with Jews. Remove Jews and...?

* Jews have had presence while empires came and went: Assyria, Egyptians, Babylon, Persia, Greece, Rome, Muslims, Crusaders, Ottomans and British. 

* Israel does not insist on the mandate bequeathed by the League of Nations, which included large areas east of the Jordan. Israel has even given back portions of winnings in exchange for peace, such as the Sinai after the Six-Day War of 1967. Who does that? 

     Israel will have a state of its own because God made a promise to Abraham regarding territory "from the river of Egypt to the River Euphrates." God called it "an everlasting possession" (Genesis 17:8). 

     "This is my resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it" (Psalm 132:13-14).

Share this with friends

The Money Trap

     Some nations that benefited from China's lending program now face staggering bills.

     The value of grants and loans made to developing countries is around $1.34 trillion. While China poured money into infrastructure projects around the world, poor nations are struggling to repay debts. China is leveraging the program to expand its influence.

     The number of rail, harbor, highway and other infrastructure projects is about 20,985. 

     165 nations have participated.

     44 countries have debt to China accounting for more than 10 percent of their gross domestic product. 55 percent of the loans have entered the principal repayment period, with interest rates up to 8.7 percent if nations fall behind.

WORLD magazine

 

The First Amendment 

   Excerpts from Andrew Walker

     "The authors of 'Agreeing to Disagree' argue that the original purpose of the establishment and free exercise clauses was not to create an impregnable wall between church and state, wherein the government can have no interaction with religion."

     "It was instead to limit the ability of the government to forge formal relations with religious bodies and to allow individuals of minority religions to live freely."  

     "The Establishment Clause was not to secularize society any more than it was to Christianize it, they write. 'Its purpose was to prevent the government from using its power to mold the society into any particular religious shape; it was to leave the degree and nature of religious practice to the free choice of the people, as nearly as it possible.'"

     "The goal was to make way for an organic religious republicanism whose freedom to operate without the watchful gaze of government would help it thrive." 

     "The Americans United for Separation of Church and State actually opposes the original purpose of the First Amendment."

Truth is incontrovertible.

Panic may resent it.

Ignorance may deride it.

Malice may distort it.

But there it is.

Winston Churchill

A Haunting Alienation

   by Janie Cheaney

     "We can know this: that ever since humans came into being, they've been haunted by Something Else."

     "This is their Creator, breaking through the veil of creation to reach them. The solidity of atomic bonds and molecular structures is no illusion, for 'in him all things hold together' (Colossians 1:17)."

     "Our universe is as real as a snow globe, but a wider Reality holds it, and will one day shake it. We see from inside the globe, as though through smoked glass, but then face to face."

     "Then I and my husband and our brothers and sisters in Christ will finally know ourselves, as we are fully known." 

 

     

Broken City 

Conclusion by Lynn Vincent

     Lynn claims to wake up happy in the morning because the world is ending. 

     "Not happy in suffering. But happy in hope - in God's plan, however inscrutable it may be. 'We may fear that God's designs are all against us,' wrote Matthew Henry." 

      But as to God's own people, even that which seems evil, is for good. "He will give them the expectations of their faith, the end he has promised, which will be best for them." 

     "When some people of Israel returned from captivity in Babylon, Jerusalem was a broken city. But under God's almighty hand, they overcame corrupt officials, antagonistic historians, and (enemies of the rebuilding)." 

     "Like many of us, they were caught between the way things are and the way they used to be. But pining for the past cannot fix the future. And having only a light for our paths and a lamp for our feet, we cannot see how these evil days will lead to "that which will be best." 

     "My plan is to pray for the welfare of my broken city today and to trust in God for tomorrow," she wrote.

Broken City & False Gods 

Column by Lynn Vincent, praying for our nation today, and trusting in God for tomorrow. 

     "Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare" (Jeremiah 29:7).

     "Pray for Babylon?" the Israelites must have thought. "Pray for our captors? For this broken city with its pantheon of false gods?"   

      "I confess, I don't pray very often for my own broken city, or for America herself. If Scripture is our guide - it is - it seems America may already be under judgment. Might God send us a Cyrus?"

      "The Cyruses of history, along with God's penchant for worthy reversals of fortune, give me hope that evil and unrest are signs that history is unfolding exactly as it should."

     "Scripture says it has to be this way. Things have to get worse before Christ returns. To see the Scriptures being fulfilled in my lifetime builds my faith."

Tomorrow: Lynn's conclusion 

     

Still Wrestling

Conclusion...Janie Cheaney 

     I don't understand such willful obtuseness. To me it says this is much more than a political struggle. It's a spiritual one bound up with the conundrum of Israel itself; a secular nation built upon divine covenants. 

     A people like no other, with a history as fraught and mystifying as their founder's wrestling match with the Lord. Israel wrestles still, with modern day Philistines. And with the Lord. 

     I have no settled opinions on the future of this tiny nation, only that it remains at the center of the world. 

     "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem!" (Psalm 122:6), and especially pray that they be reconciled with their Messiah before He returns. 

      

 Israel, Past and Present

From a column by Janie Cheaney

     Israel's story - from King David to David Ben-Gurion, from Philistia to the Gaza Strip - is always "news." 

     What hold does this land have on our imagination? When Hamas terrorists boiled over the border to slaughter over 1,000 Israeli civilians in October, they sent the world on fire. Such barbaric acts are not unheard of.  

     The bloodlust in Rwanda in the 1990s was equally horrific, and on a much larger scale. Warlords in Africa and drug cartels in South and Central America regularly splash their gore across the news, and then we hear no more about it.

     But every time Israel is attacked, or when it strikes at a target, the world trains a critical eye for weeks. The IDF hovers on the edge of all-out war, while hysterical denunciations rain down on them from all over the world. 

     This much is obvious. Hamas militants didn't suddenly "break out" from under Israeli aggression. They didn't somehow bring about Israelis being "subsequently killed." 

    Rather, Hamas militants butchered and raped and pillaged and returned to cheering crowds in Gaza, parading the bodies of their victims as the Philistines must have paraded a stripped and blinded Samson in the same city.

 Tomorrow: Cheaney's conclusion 

     God's test may contradict reason.

     Obey anyway. 

     God tests the tender parts of my life.

     God's tests are designed for our growth and strength. 

     Fire burns away impurity. 

Prophecy Fulfilled

     Mary's child breathed his last. She saw the sword Simeon had foretold, piercing his body and her soul as well. 

     When the risen Savior appeared to his disciples, he said, "Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms." 

     After he arose, having told them to wait until they were given "power from on high," the disciples and other believers, including women, about 120 in all, spent days praying in an upper room." 

     Among them were Mary and Jesus' half-brothers. This is the last we know about Mary, except for a report that later, she may have lived in Ephesus, where her new "son," John, was ministering. 

     Two short New Testament books are believed to be written by James and Jude, both half-brothers of Jesus.

Tomorrow: Winston Churchill