All posts by Glen Jackman

The love songs of the world

But fornication and all uncleanness or covetousness,
let it not even be named among you, as is fitting for saints;
neither filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor coarse jesting,
which are not fitting, but rather giving of thanks. (Ephesians 5:3-4)

When sitting in a restaurant, I prefer to hear instrumental music: classical baroque, flamenco, or light jazz. Unfortunately, I often hear young singers crooning out heart-throbbing lyrics related to wanting love, lamenting the loss of love; being loved, or making love.

The premise behind the music is a crying quest for love, albeit the fantasy of love to be or love despairingly lost. The world bases its love on what they get out of it. The lyrics, the movies, the romance novels, and TV series string people along into chasing an illusion of finding that perfect love. But that love is primarily selfishly conditional — it is full of lust, sexual innuendo, and self-pleasure — certainly not God’s intent for true marital love. It’s Satan’s perverted delusion of God’s love, which He prefers is shed abroad in our hearts. His love for His children is forgiving, unconditional, and self-sacrificing.

Little wonder the songs bellowing from these young singers sound so shallow, selfish, sensual, and often sexual.

The Servant Leader Shuns Unbiblical Thinking

The following is a sermon from John MacArthur:

Today it’s considered noble for someone to say they have an open mind. But is it really virtuous to leave our thinking so exposed? We have doors in our homes to keep some things out and other things in, and we open the doors at our discretion to make that distinction. A wise man guards his mind in the same way—only a fool would leave his mind open to anything and everything.

That’s why God’s Word places so much importance on discernment. Scripture takes the naïve, inexperienced, immature, uninformed, ignorant person whose mind is an open door and teaches him when to shut it.

The apostle Paul had that goal in mind when he instructed Timothy to “have nothing to do with worldly fables” (1 Timothy 4:7). “Fables” is a translation of the Greek word muthos, from which we transliterate the English word myth. Second Timothy 4:4 says that some “will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths.” So Paul considered truth and myths (or fables) as opposites. The Christian should gain spiritual nourishment from the truth and shun that which opposes it.

The identification of fables as “fit only for old women” (1 Timothy 4:7) has a cultural meaning. Philosophers used the phrase as a sarcastic epithet when they wanted to heap disdain on a particular viewpoint. It conveyed the picture of an old lady with aging faculties telling a fairy tale to a child. The expression also generally referred to things that lacked credibility.

The mind is a precious thing. God wants those who serve as spiritual leaders to have pure minds saturated with the truth of God’s Word. There’s no place for worldly fables or unholy contradictions to the truth. Yet somehow contemporary society would rather follow any of those than biblical truth.

The mark of theological scholarship in some circles is no longer how well a man knows the Bible but how well he understands the speculations of the secular, academic establishment.

When I was considering completing a doctoral degree in theology, the representative of the graduate program looked over my transcripts and concluded I had had too much Bible and theology in my undergraduate work. So he gave me a list of two hundred books I was to read before the school would admit me into its program. I ran the list by someone familiar with the titles and learned that the whole list contained nothing but liberal theology and humanistic philosophy—it was full of worldly fables passed off as scholarship! The graduate school also required me to take a course called Jesus and the Cinema. That involved watching contemporary movies and evaluating whether each was antagonistic to or supportive of what they termed “the Jesus ethic.” That course had reduced the divine Jesus to an ambiguous ethic. I met with the representative again and said, “I just want to let you know that I have spent all my life to this point learning the truth, and I can’t see any value in spending the next couple of years learning error.” I put the materials down on his desk and walked away.

Conversely, a friend of mine who lacked firm truth convictions went to a liberal seminary to prepare for ministry. He came out a bartender. The confusion of liberalism had destroyed his motivation to serve God.

I’m grateful to God that from the beginning of my training right on through to today, He has allowed me to fill my mind with His truth. My mind is not a battleground of indecision about what is true and what is false, over things “which give rise to mere speculation rather than furthering the administration of God which is by faith” (1 Timothy 1:4). I can speak with conviction because there’s no equivocation in my mind. I have conscientiously avoided the plethora of supposed intellectuals and scholars who disagree with biblical truth.

Your mind is precious, and it needs to be kept clear from satanic lies. The faithful shepherd maintains his biblical convictions and clarity of mind by exposing himself continually to the Word of God.

(Adapted from John MacArthur’s The Master’s Plan for the Church and Final Word)

The Current Real Power of Pentecost

Recently Catherine and I noticed the day of Pentecost in our Christian calendar and determined to keep this day in remembrance of our Lord, not because of any church rule, but because we wanted to bask in the Trinity’s glory via Christ’s Spirit — with the Father, Son and in their Spirit.

At Pentecost (Acts 2:1-4) the Holy Spirit was made available to all who believed in Jesus. Jesus promised this to his disciples prior to his ascension, when he returned to heaven to sit down at His Father’s right hand.

I am going to send you what my Father has promised but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high. – Luke 24:49 NIV

This gift is for every Christian believer who follows Jesus Christ as Saviour and Sovereign Lord in this wicked world. We all received the Holy Spirit — when baptized within him — when we receive Jesus Christ. The unifying baptism of the Holy Spirit must be understood in the light of his total work in a Christian’s life as He builds his church and sustains it.

The Spirit firstly marks the beginning of the Christian experience. We cannot belong to Christ without his Spirit (Rom. 8:9); we cannot remain united to Christ without his Spirit (1 Cor. 6:17).

We cannot be adopted as his children without his Spirit (Rom. 8:14-17; Gal. 4:6-7). We  are in the body of Christ insofar as we receive the baptism in the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:13).

The Spirit empowers our new lives to overcome sin and remain united in Christ amidst our life’s journey — throughout the inevitable ups and downs. He begins a progressive, lifelong process of change as we become more like Christ (Gal. 3:3; Phil. 1:6).

By receiving Christ by faith, we begin an immediate personal relationship with God.  The Holy Spirit works in us to help us become like Christ.

The Spirit unites the Christian community in Christ (Eph. 2:19-22). And the Holy Spirit is to be experienced by all, as he works through all His church family. (1 Cor. 12:11; Eph. 4:4).

We must cooperate with the Spirit’s work of sanctification

 

  • Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God. (2 Corinthians 7:1 ESV)
  • Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord. Heb. 12:14
  • I [Job] made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a young woman. (Job 31:1 NIV )
  • But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure. (1 John 3:2-3 NIV)
  • The body is not meant for sexual immorality, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the body. And God raised the Lord and will also raise us up by his power. Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? (1 Corinthians 6:13-15 ESV)
  • We prove ourselves by our purity, our understanding, our patience, our kindness, by the Holy Spirit within us, and by our sincere love. We faithfully preach the truth. God’s power is working in us. (2 Corinthians 6:6-7 NLT)But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (Matthew 5:28 ESV)
  • Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world. (James 1:27 ESV)
  • Who shall ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false and does not swear deceitfully. He will receive blessing from the Lord and righteousness from the God of his salvation. Such is the generation of those who seek him, who seek the face of the God of Jacob.  (Psalm 24:3-6 ESV)
  • He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To him who overcomes, I will grant to eat of the tree of life which is in the Paradise of God. (Revelation 2:7 NASB)
  • Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. (James 4:8 ESV)
  • There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. (Romans 8 ESV)

 

The very present danger is upon us, NOW

Part 2 for Insight into our collective dilemma facing the world today:

Though this is a long read, Joseph Mercola’s insights are a helpful synopsis which I have edited down a bit for the main nuts and bolts. I was impressed that he is also culling from the Economist, a great fiscal magazine. Looking back, Joseph interviewed primarily Christian doctors with deep insights into health in general and covid survival. Make sure you read down to the excerpts from the Economist.

The very present danger is upon us, NOW:

Across the world, experts and analysts are now warning of skyrocketing food prices and catastrophic food shortages. In mid-May 2022, United Nations chief Antonio Guterres said the world is facing years of famine, and urged Russia to “permit the safe and secure export of grain stored in Ukrainian ports” to ease shortages.1,2

Blame for this global food shortage is, officially, being laid at the feet of “climate change,” the COVID pandemic and the Russia-Ukraine conflict.3 But while all of those have played their role, other factors are also contributing to bring our food system to the breaking point.

For example, between January 2021 and April 2022, at least 20 food processing facilities have gone up in flames,4 and a string of barn fires has also impacted farmers.5,6 While most of these fires have been blamed on equipment or safety failures, and fact checkers insist fires are common in these kinds of facilities, there were only two such fires in 2019, and at least some of the barn fires at the end of 2021 were suspected arson.

In 2020, wildfires also destroyed a number of farms,7 and in in early 2022, bird flu outbreaks among poultry resulted in the culling of millions of chickens, ducks and turkey.8

In March 2021, a massive container ship became wedged across the Suez Canal in Egypt — blocking “an artery of world trade,” triggering a rise in oil prices and leading to fallout that affected shipping around the globe.9

More recently, there was the U.S. infant formula shortage, precipitated by the Food and Drug Administration shutting down one of the manufacturing facilities that is part of the U.S. formula monopoly.

Russia is also withholding fertilizer exports10 in response to the EU’s decision to ban seven of the nine Russian banks from the SWIFT system,11 and anyone who wants to buy Russian oil or gas has to pay in Rubles.12

On top of the fertilizer shortage and subsequent price increase triggered by Russia’s ban on exports, Union Pacific (a key investor in which is BlackRock) is also restricting fertilizer shipments by train, causing shipment delays and higher prices.13 A Canadian Pacific freight train carrying potash (a key fertilizer ingredient) also recently derailed in Alberta, Canada.14

President Biden’s decision to transition the United States away from energy independency by shutting down the Keystone pipeline,15 canceling offshore oil leases in Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico,16 and freezing new leases and permits for federal oil and gas drilling17 doesn’t help either.

We need fuel to farm and to ship food and fertilizer, so rising prices at the pump automatically result in higher outlays for farmers and higher food prices. It also doesn’t help or make sense for the U.S. and U.K. to continue paying farmers to not farm or grow less when a global famine is looming.18 And, let’s not forget the elephant in the room — out of control money printing — which is the real cause of inflation.

Shortages Are Predicted Everywhere

As reported by The Economist:

“Ukraine’s exports of grain and oilseeds have mostly stopped and Russia’s are threatened. Together, the two countries supply 12% of traded calories. Wheat prices, up 53% since the start of the year, jumped a further 6% on May 16th, after India said it would suspend exports because of an alarming heatwave …
Nearly 250m are on the brink of famine. If, as is likely, the war drags on and supplies from Russia and Ukraine are limited, hundreds of millions more people could fall into poverty. Political unrest will spread, children will be stunted and people will starve …
Russia and Ukraine supply 28% of globally traded wheat, 29% of the barley, 15% of the maize and 75% of the sunflower oil … Ukraine’s food exports provide the calories to feed 400m people. The war is disrupting these supplies because Ukraine has mined its waters to deter an assault, and Russia is blockading the port of Odessa …
China, the largest wheat producer, has said that, after rains delayed planting last year, this crop may be its worst-ever. Now, in addition to the extreme temperatures in India, the world’s second-largest producer, a lack of rain threatens to sap yields in other breadbaskets, from America’s wheat belt to the Beauce region of France. The Horn of Africa is being ravaged by its worst drought in four decades …
All this will have a grievous effect on the poor. Households in emerging economies spend 25% of their budgets on food … In many importing countries, governments cannot afford subsidies to increase the help to the poor, especially if they also import energy — another market in turmoil …
Since the war started, 23 countries from Kazakhstan to Kuwait have declared severe restrictions on food exports that cover 10% of globally traded calories. More than one-fifth of all fertilizer exports are restricted. If trade stops, famine will ensue.” 19

Food Prices Skyrocket Worldwide

Globally, food prices increased by 29.8% between March 2021 and March 2022, while meat prices rose 2.2% in a single month between March and April 2022. The map below, posted on Twitter by Marc Ross,20 shows the areas of the world hardest hit by food price increases.

Not surprisingly, poorer countries notice price hikes the most, while people in wealthier nations can afford to pay more without tipping into starvation. Eventually, however, as inflation continues while salaries remain flat, even the middle-class will start to feel it. And, of course, at a certain point, it won’t matter how much money you have because you can’t buy food, at any price, if there is none.

Is the Great Reset Underway?

By now, you’ve likely heard about the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Great Reset and their plan for you to “own nothing and be happy” by 2030. We’re now seeing this plan in motion all over the place.

For example, in the first quarter of 2021, 15% of U.S. homes sold were purchased by corporate investors21 — not families looking to achieve their American dream. Seemingly without warning, we’ve entered an era where home ownership is becoming out of reach for many, and that’s a first step to “owning nothing.” As noted in a tweet by Cultural Husbandry:22

“This is wealth redistribution, and it ain’t rich people’s wealth that is getting redistributed. It’s normal American middle class, salt of the earth wealth heading into the hands of the world’s most powerful entities and individuals. The traditional financial vehicle [is] gone forever.
Home equity is the and BlackRock, a federal reserve-funded financial institution is buying up all the houses to make sure that young families can’t build wealth … This is a fundamental reorganization of society.”

Indeed, and it’s right in line with plans for societal reorganization described under banners such as The Great Reset, Build Back Better, Agenda 21, the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,23,24 and the Green Energy movement. These agendas all work together toward the same goal, which is a global monopoly on ownership and wealth, with a clear separation of the haves and have-nots; the owners and the owned; the rulers and the ruled; the elite and the serfs.

If meat consumption, frozen foods, fossil fuel use, home appliances, air conditioning and single-family homes are ‘unsustainable,’ it stands to reason that the goal of any sustainable development scheme is to eliminate all of those things, and this process of elimination is now well underway. In 1992 at the Earth Summit, under-secretary-general of the Convention on Climate Change and executive director of the UN Environment Program, Maurice Strong, stated that:25

“Current lifestyles and consumption patterns of the affluent middle class, involving high meat intake, consumption of large amounts of frozen and convenience foods, use of fossil fuels, appliances, home and workplace air-conditioning, and suburban housing, are not sustainable.”

If meat consumption, frozen foods, fossil fuel use, home appliances, air conditioning and single-family homes are “unsustainable,” it stands to reason that the goal of any sustainable development scheme is to eliminate all of those things, and this process of elimination is now well underway.

It’s All About Creating Forced Dependency

Understand, The Great Reset involves the destruction of supply chains, the energy sector, the food supply and the workforce, to create dependency on government, which in turn will be taken over by private interests and central banks through the collapse of the global economy.

A large-enough war would accomplish all of these aims, which is why the possibility of world war cannot be discounted. An anonymous correspondent recently wrote about this on WinterOak.org:26

“Welcome to the second phase of the Great Reset: war. While the pandemic acclimatized the world to lockdowns, normalized the acceptance of experimental medications, precipitated the greatest transfer of wealth to corporations by decimating SMEs [small and medium-sized businesses] and adjusted the muscle memory of workforce operations in preparation for a cybernetic future, an additional vector was required to accelerate the economic collapse before nations can ‘Build Back Better.’”

The current conflict between Russia and Ukraine is a big catalyst for the World Economic Forum’s Great Reset agenda, facilitated by an interconnected web of global stakeholders and a diffuse network of public-private partnerships.”

Disruption to supply chains fit right into this plan, while food shortages, driven by the many factors discussed and, perhaps, orchestrated attacks on food plants, will accelerate the acceptance of synthetic foods, such as lab-grown meat, which has also been championed by Great Reset front men like Bill Gates.

Are there solutions?

There are solutions, but we have to jump on them now. In my previous article, “Why Food Prices Are Expected to Skyrocket,” I review how biodynamic farming can help us out of these dilemmas, as it doesn’t use synthetic fertilizers and requires far less water. I also discuss new investment opportunities that can support regenerative agriculture projects. On an individual, more immediate basis, however, some key areas of basic preparation include:

  1. Food — Grow some of your own food, make friends with local farmers, create or join a local CSA, and shore up your long-term food stores. (Rather than panic buying mass quantities all at once, consider spreading it out and just buy a little more than you need for the day or week each time you go shopping. You can build up a backup supply rather quickly that way)
  2. Water — Identify sources of potable water and make sure you have one or more ways to purify questionable water supplies
  3. Power — Consider how you might power some of the essentials in your home if there are rolling blackouts, or the electrical grid goes down altogether
  4. Firearms training for self-defence and hunting — Learn how to use, store, carry and clean a firearm and work on your marksmanship. Other forms of self-defence training can also be useful, if nothing else, to make you feel more competent and confident in potentially high-risk situations
  5. Communications — Give some thought to how you will communicate with friends and family if cell towers and/or the internet goes down
  6. Medicine — Stock up on nutritional supplements, medications, how-to books on alternative home remedies and first-aid supplies
  7. Money — Keep cash on hand, including smaller denominations. Both power grid and internet outages can eliminate your ability to buy without cash. For more long-term protection against inflation, consider buying physical precious metals such as gold and silver

Remember to consider and include analog devices and manual tools in your preparation. We’re so used to having unlimited electricity and continuous wireless communications, it can be difficult to imagine the restrictions you’ll face without them. If need be, turn off the breakers in your home for a day or two, ditch all wireless devices, and see what challenges come up. Then, figure out what you need to solve them.

Also, consider keeping hardcopies of useful books and important documents, such as your most recent bank statements, asset statements, the deed to your home or car and so on.

Entire books can, and have, been written on prepping, and some will take it to extremes. But while you probably won’t need an underground bunker stocked with a decade’s-worth of food, everyone, at this point, really ought to be prepared, to some degree, for food and energy shortages.

Thank you for reading the above. It is pertinent to realize that we have and are facing plague-like outbreaks in the world, famines, heat waves and water shortages in many places including the southwest USA. Many of the underground water reserves are also drying up. It is of great import that a leading Christian preacher of renown John MacArthur, is currently over the age of 80, is emphatically preaching that judgement is upon us — on the church inclusive.

Please share your thoughts on constructive solutions. Glen Jackman

A Very Present Danger

 I figured that I had best spend some time examining why many concerned folks are talking about “The Great Reset” while others believe it is just another conspiracy theory. I had read Chrystia Freeland’s Plutocrats several years back – thus the resonance. This, coupled with friends nudging me to assess Agenda 21 – which I delved into. The stunning issues of hyper-inflation impoverishing the middle class, now confronting us, are so absolutely real, that I thought I’d better delve deeper looking for theological nuance. God helps us wake up when we see the writing on the wall, which often is late in the underworld’s gambit. The Lord is in control. I see this playing out prophetically, and moving at ramp-speed toward the buy and sell restraints that we will all come under, except the very elite.

This calls for patient endurance and faithfulness on the part of God’s people. Then I saw a second beast, coming out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb, but it spoke like a dragon. It exercised all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. And it performed great signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to the earth in full view of the people. Because of the signs it was given power to perform on behalf of the first beast, it deceived the inhabitants of the earth. It ordered them to set up an image in honor of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived. The second beast was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed. It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name. (Revelation 13:10-17)

It is pertinent to realize that we have and are facing plague-like outbreaks in the world, famines, heat waves and water shortages in many places including the southwest USA. Many of the underground water reserves that supply water to cities like Los Angeles are also drying up. It is of great import that a leading Christian preacher of renown John MacArthur, is currently over the age of 80, is emphatically preaching that judgement is upon us — on the church inclusive.

You can read a detailed “up the creek without a paddle” summary by reading the recently published article: The very present danger is upon us, NOW

The vile practice of the ungodly

“In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit” (Judges 21:25).

During the time of the judges, the tribe of Benjamin had scoundrels that raped an Israelite woman who later died. They surround the house where the travelling couple were staying with the intent to have gang sex with her husband! However, the choice was made to toss the girl out the door to the dogs, so to speak.

Sound noble leadership in the current world is negligible. The Christian church is dwindling as the bible is not a standard-bearer for the majority. The gospel is not preached by leaders as it was in the days of Acts. It is often predominately promoting singular differences of doctrine in one church denomination over another. Christ is not heralded with vigour. The result: gender liberality, pornography, and disgusting misogyny abound.

The other tribes got together and attacked and decimated the tribe of Benjamin. The Israelites had sworn thereafter: “Cursed is he who gives a wife to a Benjamite.”

How low can a leadership stoop?

When there are no leaders who are walking in the covenant of  the Lord, chaos ensues: “In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit” (Judges 21:25).

Disdain for the honour of women continues

The Israelites later came up with a game plan that would sidestep the vow. Their gambit would eliminate any loving romantic relationship for many of the father’s unfortunate daughters.

The Benjamite men would be allowed to randomly sneak up and kidnap the Israelite daughters during the girls’ happy dancing at a festival. Why? So the Benjamite tribe would not shrink into oblivion, as there were few if any Benjamin women left after the war with the rest of Israel who attacked them for the sordid rape by the Benjamite gang. Here is their backsliding disrespect for the women:

“But look,” they said, “there is a yearly feast to the LORD in Shiloh, which is north of Bethel east of the road that goes up from Bethel to Shechem, and south of Lebonah.” So they [the Israelites] commanded the Benjamites: “Go, hide in the vineyards and watch. When you see the daughters of Shiloh come out to perform their dances, each of you is to come out of the vineyards, catch for himself a wife from the daughters of Shiloh, and go to the land of Benjamin. When their fathers or brothers come to us to complain, we will tell them, ‘Do us a favour by helping them, since we did not get wives for each of them in the war. You have no guilt since you did not actually give them your daughters.” (Judges 21: 19-22)

Sad calculation by the leaders of Israel of their daughters’ value as children of the Lord: Since you did not actually give them your daughters, you have no guilt.

The Benjamites did as instructed and carried away the number of women they needed from the dancers they caught. They went back to their own inheritance, rebuilt their cities, and settled in them. Judges 21: 23

Our Creator’s commitment to this physical world

With the environmental concerns taking a predominant amount of attention, I thought this would be worth taking a look at. 1

1. The new creation includes the world we live in. “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Genesis 1:1). If God’s eternal purpose was merely to fill heaven (a spiritual, disembodied realm) with souls, then why not start with that? If the physical world has no part in God’s eternal plan, then how do you explain the Bible’s conclusion when John reveals, “I saw a new heaven and a new earth…and I saw a holy city, new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven…?” The last chapters of the Bible describe the world as God intended it to be from the beginning. And clearly, the new creation includes the world in which we now live.

2. The Creator is committed to restoration.So committed to his physical world that to restore and redeem it, he sent his Son to be born as a real man in a real body to live a real life and die a real death (Luke 2:7; Luke 23:33-49).

3. God resurrected the body of Christ. Maybe the greatest demonstration of the Creator’s commitment to his created world is the resurrection of Jesus from the dead (Luke 24). It was not merely the soul of Jesus that was resurrected—but his body as well. During the 40 days following the resurrection, Jesus publically modeled what a resurrected life would look like. He could be touched (Luke 24:39), he ate food (Luke 24:43), and he was recognized by those who knew him before his death.

4. Jesus ascends in physical form. Finally, consider Jesus’s ascension. When Jesus makes his kingly processional to return to his throne (Acts 1:9), he does not shed his physical body to do so. At this very moment, Jesus, who remains fully God and fully man, sits at the right hand of the Father (Colossians 3:1) and for all of eternity will never cease to be the human God-man, the Son of God the father whom we worship.

I’d also like to add that Jesus is King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and will be our judge to whom we must answer and to whom every knee shall bow, answering for our stewardship of His earth, especially created for mankind to abide with stewardship care. For example we were never to farm the land incessantly but allow it to rest one out of every seven years. Only the creator knows best, not Big Agricultural’s corporate conglomerates like Monsanto who seek to make increasing profits and who do not obey scripture. (Genesis 9:7, Leviticus 25:4)

John’s prophecy in Revelation points to a special reckoning by the Lord for mismanaging the beauty of the earth and its continued ability to sustain man: The nations raged, but your wrath came, and the time for the dead to be judged, and for rewarding your servants, the prophets and saints, and those who fear your name, both small and great, and for destroying the destroyers of the earth. (Revelation 11:18)

1 Excerpts from Crosswalk

14 Christian Virtues to Guard Diligently

“To him, that overcomes…even as I also overcame” Rev 3:21

Here is a list of good virtues that I assimilated from Benjamin Franklin, which he had sketched for his son.  As a new Christian, in my 20s, I heard about this book from Mark Johnson, a pastor-friend. I read Franklin’s list and added a biblical perspective with scripture attending and stuck it in my bible’s flyleaf.

In retrospect, it made a lot of sense for a young man with a growing family. It is interesting to look back at your life to see how you thought and applied scripture and lifestyle disciplines. Today, having worked in the Lord’s service as an elder, nearing 70, I realize that I prefer to let the Holy Spirit guide me in my planning, which allows for peaceful contemplation as I seek His will. I also recognize that Franklin’s wisdom had a place in time to help me learn basic discipline especially if the Word can stand behind the thesis without pushing legalism.

  1. TEMPERANCE:  Eat not to dullness; gain sufficient sleep for the next day. 1 Cor 3:16, 17; Luke 12:45,46; Ps 127:2
  2. PREPARATION:  Take the Word from the morning study with you after you have attained Love, Joy, and Peace in your heart through prayerful meditation. Gain possession of a strong purpose in Christ. Eph 6:12, 13, 17; Gal 5:22; Ps 143:8
  3. HUMILITY:  Walk as Jesus did, free from pride and vanity. James 4:6,10; John 1:35-37; Prov 28:18; Ps 56:13; Ps 89:15,16; Ps 119:45, Isa 30:21; Rom 6:4; Eph 5:2; Col 2:6,7
  4. SILENCE:  Speak not but when it is for the constructive edification of another, through a demonstration of the love of Christ.  If you speak, speak accordingly.  James 3:2; Eph 4:29, 30 James 1:26; Ps 139:4
  5. ORDER:  Let all things have their places; plan each part of your business to have its time and priority. Practice regularity in rising, study, eating, work, exercise, and sleeping. Ps 119:133; 1 Cor 14:33, 40; Col 2:5; Ps 37:23
  6. RESOLUTION:  Resolve to perform what you ought; perform without fail what you resolve.  Do not vacillate. Gal 6:9; Prov 22:29
  7. INDUSTRY: Lose no time; be always employed in something useful; cut off all unnecessary actions. The watchwords of enthusiasm: Love what you are called to do, assume your responsibility; do it now; Rom 12:10, 11; Prov 10:4,5; 18:9; Eph 6:5-8
  8. FRUGALITY:  Make no expense but to do good to others or yourself; waste nothing and stay within the constraints of income. Save 10-20% of your income. Prov 21:20; John 6:11-13
  9. JUSTICE: Wrong no one by slander or hurtful deceit or by omitting any kindness within your power to bestow. James 4:11, 17; 2:14-17; 1 John 3:17-20; Isa 58:6-8; Prov 25:9; 10:18
  10. TRANQUILITY: Patiently forebear resenting injuries so much even as you think another deserves.  Freely forgive all men. Eph. 4:31, 32; 2 Tim 4:5
  11. MODERATION: Avoid dogmatic, critical opinion.  If you are right, persuade through words such as: I see; I imagine it to be…; Seems to me to be so; Seems to be some difference…; It appears to me at present, etc. rather than: no…; I think…; You should…; For sure…; That’s not true, etc. yet stand firm to principle using tact and skillful conversation.  Matt 10:16; Prov 25:11; 1 Thess 2:5
  12. EXERCISE: Do not let a day pass without a twenty-minute walk outdoors and ten for leg raises situps and pushups. Ps 104:24; 3 John 2 
  13. CLEANLINESS:  Tolerate no uncleanliness in body clothes or habitation.  Drink plenty of water. Fast occasionally 2 Cor 7:1; Luke 5:35
  14. CHASTITY: Guard the mind against entertaining the lusts of the flesh.  Be aware of environmental influences. Gal 5:16; 1 Thess 5:6; Eph 6:18; Rev 3:2; 1 Cor 16:13; Matt 5:28; 1 John 2:16; James 1:14, 15

Flyleaf of my old Oxford KJV.

Sharing the love of Jesus Christ

Woman, believe Me, the hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we know what we worship, for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. (John 4:21–23)

When the apostle Paul stood up and preached on Mars Hill, he told his hearers that they were worshipping a Creator they did not know. They lacked understanding. Then he said, “The One whom you worship without knowing, Him I proclaim to you” (Acts 17:23).

A view of Athens from Mars Hill. Photo: Glen Jackman 2002

While we often refer to the gospel as a message, we need to understand something as Christians: in reality, preaching the person of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. We are magnifying the Saviour so that people will flee to Him for mercy, and when they do, their status changes—from His enemy to His friend. Jesus asked the woman to believe Him. While sceptics often look down on believers with disdain, we know that believing has life-changing ramifications.

If you believe that you are drinking poison cool-aid, you will stop. Beliefs govern our actions and believing the gospel changes our eternal destiny.

Today ​you and I may be with people who ignorantly believe in an idea of God. They may lack knowledge. How can you have ​the ​courage to share the truth of Jesus Christ’s love like Paul did? You must convince yourself from scripture to clarify your assurance that you have eternal salvation in Jesus Christ. Then with the same scriptures, you can share the biblical truths as did the apostles in the early days after Christ’s death and resurrection.

Father, today let me see unbelievers or confused believers through your ​loving ​eyes. Help me be prepared to share your grace with others in love that generates hope and faith.

Inspired by: Jesus in Red: 365 Meditations on the Words of Jesus