The Spirit in the Old Testament          

     And afterword, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and your daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days. - Joel 2:28-29

The Spirit in the New Testament 

     John (the Baptist) said, "I saw the Spirit come down from heaven as a dove and remain on him (Jesus). The man...is he who will baptize with the Holy Spirit. ...this is the Son of God. - (the disciple) John 1:32-34      

     Years later: When the day of Pentecost came, they were all together in one place. Suddenly, a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. 

     They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit enabled them.

     Now there were staying in Jerusalem God-fearing Jews from every nation under heaven. When they heard this sound, a crowd came together in bewilderment, because each one heard them speaking in his own language. Utterly amazed, they asked: Are not all these men Galileans? Then how is it that each one of us hears them in his own native language? - Acts 2:1-8

Verses 9-11 mention 13 nations and regions.

     ...we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues! Amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, "What does this mean?" 

NOTE: We find the Spirit in numerous Old Testament books, beginning with chapter 1 of Genesis, verse 2. Later, God may have given Joel a forecast of the Pentecost event, or maybe he was combining that and other occurrences to follow. Only God would know. 

  

One Firey Furnace

     King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, the "head of a statue" in his dream of world leaders, was mighty for sure. Not that he cared for others. Talk about ego! His forces had dragged most of the Jews off to Babylon. 

     When God enabled Daniel's three friends to become administrators, Babylonian officials were jealous. Meanwhile, the king was so egoistic after the dream, he had a 90-foot image of himself erected. When the music began, everyone was to fall down and worship him.

     Not sure where Daniel was, but his three Jewish friends - Babylonian names Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego - refused to worship the king. Astrologers went to the king and ratted on them. The king was so furious he threatened to throw his servants into a blazing furnace unless they worshiped him.

     They answered that their God was able to rescue them, but even if he didn't, "O king, we will not serve your gods or worship the image..." 

     The furious king ordered the fire overheated, and the flames killed the soldiers who threw in the men. Then the king in amazement asked his advisers, "Weren't there three men? I saw four men walking around in the fire, unbound and unharmed, and the fourth looks like a son of the gods."  

     He called them out of the fire, untouched by the flames and heat. The king immediately gave their God his due and threatened anyone who says anything against him "be cut into pieces and their houses turned into rubble." Just never learned the word "freedom" did he?

What a doctor!  

If God can out-perform a fire, Jesus the Son can heal leprosy, paralytics, the blind and mute, the demon-possessed, and raise a girl from the dead. He also calmed a storm...all in Matthew chapter 9.

Valley of Dry Bones

     People of Israel and Judah were in exile. Their hope had died as they were dispersed among foreigners. The prophet Ezekiel wrote, the Spirit of the Lord set me in the middle of a valley. Beginning at chapter 37:4...

     Then he said to me, "Prophesy to these bones and say to them 'Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin. I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord."

      And as I was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling sound and the bones came together, bone to bone. I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them. Then he said to me, "Prophecy to the breath...'This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Come from the four winds and breathe into these slain that they may live.'"

     So I prophesied...and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet - a vast army.  

     Ezekiel continues: ...the Lord will bring back "my people and I will put my Spirit in you..." (in the end times).  

Birth of Jesus 

     Matthew 1:18 - This is how the birth of Jesus the Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit.

If God can grow an army out of dry bones - or just convince Ezekiel that he saw and heard this - he can plant a seed in a virgin. After all, he created sperm in the first place. 

         Jimmy

 

Cave Men 

     That is, men who cave...to cultural approval, or to immature voices, to social media mobs, to activists, to biased, uninformed voters. 

     Empathy is a good thing. But 'go along to get along' leads to mission drift. Hello failure. This is so for leaders in education, religion, government, business and parenting. 

     Nick Eicher in WORLD magazine contrasts compassion - offering a hand to someone drowning - with "untethered empathy," jumping in and getting swept away. 

     He argues many leaders flinch when outrage flairs - whether it's a university giving in to mobs, a church backing off Biblical teaching, or a corporation surrendering to activists. A leadership crisis. Eicher's advice:

1. Leaders must know when they are being tempted to flinch. 

2. Fear God, not man. Only a deep-rooted confidence in God's approval can stabilize a leader challenged by cultural storms.     

3. Maintain mission clarity. Leaders must refuse to be manipulated, resisting the false promise of appeasement. 

     If leaders cave, he writes, they won't keep the peace - they'll just invite more demands. 

Views: We see the difference, currently, in politics. One group is on mission to improve us, fingers crossed, regardless of detractors. The other is a leaderless, hostile bunch, sadly. They don't cave in. They just, as Mark Levin titled his book, "THE DEMOCRAT PARTY HATES AMERICA." 

            Jimmy

Where do I put my confidence?

Fellow Christians: I think I'm doing pretty good. Then I read the apostle Paul's humble letter to the Philippians, chapter 3, verses 7-14. 

     "But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things.

     "I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ - the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 

     "I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his suffering, becoming like him in his death, and to attain to the resurrection from the dead. (Romans 6:3-5; 8:17). 

     "Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 

     "Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." 

😌

Musk Goes to Washington    

     Andrew Carnegie went to Pittsburgh and New York City (see Monday's blog). Elon Musk, the current wealthiest person in the world, has gone to Washington. 

     A private businessman himself, like President Trump, Musk is praised by Republicans and hated by Democrats. He is appointed, without pay we understand, to clean up fraud and waste in government. 

     Musk leads the new Department of Government Efficiency, DOGE. Classified as a "special government employee," he works in the White House complex, where DOGE teams branch out to federal agencies, to gain information and recommend whatever.

     One agency that Musk calls a radical-left, political "psy op" (military psychological operation) is the U.S. Agency for International Development. He blames USAID for a "crazy waste of money." President Trump wants to freeze funding and essentially shut down the $43 billion agency. 

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NEWS FLASH: The Supreme Court on Wednesday voted 5-4 to agree with a judge who ruled the administration cannot do what the president might decide about USAID. We don't know the facts. But how can a judge rule over an administration agency when no laws have been broken?  

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     Democrats despise anything Trump and his appointees do. If the administration miraculously provided peace, good health and prosperity to every soul in the world, Dems would find something to criticize. Rep. Raskin, D-Md. said, "we don't have a fourth branch of government called Elon Musk." Silly. But his voters will buy it. 

     Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said Musk is, "working around the clock to root this out and end it. And it's exactly what President Trump was elected to do."  

     Dems and some Republicans went to Washington for themselves. President Trump went there for all Americans, including Democrats. 

            Jimmy

 

World's Wealthiest Man 

     He was born in Scotland, where his family had basically a one room house. No wonder they immigrated to America in 1848. He was 12. He worked in a Pennsylvania cotton mill, 12 hours a day. That's not how he became wealthy. His pay was $1.20...a week! 

     Next as a messenger boy, spending his Saturdays at the library. From there, he became a telegraph operator, and eventually, superintendent of Pennsylvania Railroad. 

     By age 30 he was a rich investor, a major player in steel production. He invested in railroads, bridges and oil during the Civil War.  In 1901 he sold Carnegie Steel to J.P. Morgan and retired as the wealthiest man in the world. In retirement he gave 90 percent of his wealth to charities. 

Hunger for knowledge led Andrew Carnegie to fund 2,800 libraries in the U.S. and seven other nations. He believed in opportunities for education among common people. His Pittsburgh property on the river is now the site of Heinz Field, Pittsburgh Steelers. 

     Pittsburgh has a Carnegie Science Center, Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon University and a Carnegie Mansion. My dad parked and we walked past Carnegie Library to attend Pirates baseball on Forbes Ave. You see where our interest was. 

     Carnegie funded famous Carnegie Hall in New York City, where he lived for a time, and spent summers in Scotland. He delayed marriage to care for his aging mother, later married at age 51, and died in 1919. His wealth was estimated to be $372 billion.  

     Elon Musk's net worth is only $357.54 billion.  

        Jimmy