More psalms were devoted to complaining 

than any other single category.

Maybe this is good news for us.

You crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals.

Awake, O Lord! Why do you sleep? 

Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever.

Why do you hide your face and forget our misery and oppression?

How long, O Lord, how long?

Old Testament scholar Ellen Davis wrote that

in the ancient world, complaint prayers are 

without parallel in other religions. 

Others made requests, offered worship, cursed their enemies.

Only Israel prayed their complaints.

Only Israel believed that God cares that we are in pain,

and can be expected to do something about it. 

When we are passionately honest with God,

when we are not indulging in self-pity, 

when we hope that God can be trusted,

our hearts make resting in his presence possible again. 

GOD IS CLOSER THAN YOU THINK

For more information, read about Job's complaints

and especially the Lord's answer.

  

 Where is God when everything is going well?

The same place he is when it's not going well.

Pain doesn't mean God is absent.

Years ago, John Ortberg, Ph.D., clinical psychology,

surveyed thousands of people.

The number one reason they gave for spiritual growth was pain.

The big difference between us and God, he writes, 

is that God doesn't think he is us. In pain, we get that clearly.

Don't miss Sunday's follow-up.

Purpose or Chance?  

   Are we God's purposeful design, or complicated creatures that somehow evolved out of something that somehow evolved out of something that somehow evolved out of...?

   In a WORLD magazine article, STANDING ON GENESIS, Rachel Aldrich explains, "The Bible shows that God made the universe and life with purpose." 

   "Darwinism is purposeless. The Bible opens with a statement of intention: 'In the beginning, God created...' The Bible also says, 'I Praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.'" (Psalm 139:14) 

   "Darwinism speculates (scientists cannot 'know') that some cells survived; others did not. The Bible (written over 15 centuries) speaks of the goodness of a loving Creator, his world being 'very good.'"

   "Careful balances in biology, physics and more allow life to exist. Not random chance." 

   "The intelligent design community's existence contradicts the notion that science equals evolution," she writes. "You don't to have a commitment to Christianity (or any other religion) to recognize that the world didn't spring from blind selection."

   "Paul wrote, 'For his invisible attributes, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world.'" (Romans 1:20)

~ ~ ~

It's far more than an intellectual debate.

Every human life is eternal.

Belief leads to eternal salvation. Disbelief leads to eternal doom.

It is impossible for human eyes and other systems to have evolved. 

God knocks on our front door. (Rev. 3:20) But we must hear and open it.

 Jimmy

Someone Said...  

God who does not violate

our wills has a thousand

  ways to move upon them.

How often the great interests

of society are sacrificed

to the vanity, to the conceit,

and to the obstinacy of individuals.

   Christians are to live - not as judge and jury of our neighbors - but as believing all things (1 Corinthians 13:7) regarding their potential. The Lord is not finished with my neighbor any more than he is finished with me. 

   Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters (Luke 11:23) says the Lord, the only qualified Judge.

Too Easily Pleased

American culture says that real life requires the gratification of our desires.

Distorted spirituality says real life requires the elimination of our desires,

Buddhism, for example.

Jesus says that real life requires the transformation of our desires.

If you are thirsty - unsatisfied desires - "come to me."

Desire itself is an invitation to seek God's presence.

C.S. Lewis wrote,

"Indeed, if we consider the staggering nature of the rewards 

promised in the Gospels, it would seem that 

our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak.

 We are far too easily pleased."

- John Ortberg

GOD IS CLOSER THAN YOU THINK

Conducting

14 years working in a Westinghouse transformer plant

taught me a few things about invisible electricity.

Alternating current never leaves the power plant.

A generator generates pressure in electrons.

A "power" transformer increases the voltage along copper lines.

Near the customers, "step-down" transformers gradually

reduce voltage, as current increases.

The "electrons" you use tomorrow will be the same you used today.

From start to finish, voltage and current is "conducted." 

Little did I know then that I can be a conductor.

I say, "As you wish," and the invisible Lord does as he pleases.

Unlike electricity, there is no "charge."

2,000 years ago people wouldn't have understood,

so Scripture says, (invisible) "streams of living water will flow from within."

The Holy Spirit is the generator, the power, and also a conductor.

Does He dwell in you?

His Dream; Our Knowledge, conclusion

Iron and Clay

   Nebuchadnezzar - dictator that he was - fell prostrate before Daniel, the Hebrew exile. He was swept off his feet. 

   The young man had miraculously described his awesome dream. The king promoted Daniel in his royal court. And he made his three friends rulers over the entire province, along with the "wise men" he had nearly executed. 

   In Daniel 4, see the king's "humble" letter to the world, concluding, Now, I ... praise and exalt and glorify the King of heaven, because everything he does is right and all his ways are just. And those who walk in pride he is able to humble. 

   Do we believers - knowing the rest of the story - praise and exalt and glorify our Lord and Savior?

   The head of gold represented the Neo-Babylonian empire (605-539 B.C.). From there came astrology. 

   The chest and arms would be the Medo-Persian empire of Cyrus (539 B.C.). From there came ethics.

   The belly and thighs represented the empire of Alexander the Great (330 B.C.). From the Greeks came art and philosophy.

   The legs and feet would be the Roman empire, law and peace-by-military strength (about 67 B.C.). Rome (iron) subdued the known world (including reestablished Israel) as no previous empire had done. 

   Get ready: Our commentary says feet and toes "probably represent nationalistic states in the area of the Roman empire since it fell." More accurately - dissolved into a continuing rise and fall of strong and brittle states.  

   Did the USA adopt the values of the above four empires, paying lip service to God? 

   In the last chapters of Revelation read how our age concludes, followed by the rule of the Rock (Messiah), then the "powder" of the universe blown away, and finally the new heaven and earth.

   World philosophy and values must be completely destroyed before Christ's kingdom (the fifth) is established. Don't love your possessions too much.