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Monthly Archives: February 2012
Names of God Study: Jehovah-sabaoth
It’s time for another post in the Names of God series. We have done a little study on the names Elohim, El Elyon, El Roi, El Shaddai, El Olam, Adonia, Jehovah, Jehovah-jireh, Jehovah-rapha, Jehovah-nissi, Jehovah-mekoddishkem and Jehovah-shalom. Now we will look at Jehovah-sabaoth.
We are introduced to this name of God through the lips of a woman named Hannah. In 1 Samuel 1 we read of woman who was unable to give her husband a child. Her husband had taken another wife and she had given him children. This other wife, because of her children, and I am sure also her jealousy toward the husband’s love for his barren wife, was tormenting Hannah.
Hannah lived with another woman who was giving her husband what she could not… I cannot even begin to imagine her pain. Here, in 1 Samuel, we are given a glimpse into the grief and anguish of Hannah’s heart while she is in the temple. We find her crying out to God, praying that He would give her a child.
Here Hannah cries out for Jehovah-sabaoth, the LORD of hosts. She cries out for Him to deliver her from this pain. From her lips and out of this pain is where God chose to reveal this beautiful name.
Sabaoth means mass, and refers to a mass of angels, the heavenly host, an army.
We need to remember that at this time there were temples and altars throughout the land to a myriad of gods. Many of those were fertility gods. If you were to go to China today you would still find a Buddha temple that is set aside to pray to in order to have a child. There is even one to specify whether you want a boy or a girl.
But Hannah did not cry out to a fertility god. She did not seek out an idol to pour her heart out to or to put her hope in. She cried out to Jehovah-sabaoth, the God of gods.
We see this name of God come again from a young man named David.
In 1 Samuel 17 we read of how Israel is at war with the Philistines. The Philistine army has Israel at a standstill as the giant Goliath stands over them mocking them and their God. David has been sent by his father to check on his older brothers who are at the battlefield. David is shocked by what he sees. There is not a man in all of the Israeli army that is willing to go head to head with Goliath. Therefore David says, “I’ll do it”
Goliath stands before David and laughs in his face. He mocks David and he curses him by his Philistine gods and he insults David’s God. David is not frightened by this giant and he is not impressed by his big mouthed threats. David knows that this giant comes at him in the power of his strength and the non-existent power of his false gods, while David comes at him with Jehovah-sabaoth.
1Samuel 17:45-47
We know that David received the victory. Goliath, as big and mighty as he appeared, was no match for God.
God will always be victorious.
The Mighty One of Israel, declares,
“Ah, I will be relieved of My adversaries
And avenge Myself on My foes.
Isaiah 1:24
We can be certain that we will all face our own “goliaths” in this life. There will be people and problems and trials and tribulations that we all will face. There will be those who mock us for trusting in our God. There will be those who hate us and seek to destroy us and our witness. Rest assured that Satan is looking for every opportunity he can to devour you, but not even Satan is a match for Jehovah-sabaoth.
Precious one, also remember that David was able to defeat Goliath because he was willing and able to face to him. He was ready to take him head on. He was ready because he had prepared for this battle by his daily walk with God. He knew God by name, by character, and by personal experience with Him.
David never doubted God. He believed God was who God said He was. All the others standing on the sidelines, shaking in fear… they doubted God. They doubted that God would deliver them, therefore they were not willing to face this fear.
My friend, get to know your God.
His name, Jehovah-sabaoth is only a small part of Him. Get to know every part of Him that He will reveal to you. If you are just stepping into this study I implore you to scroll back up to the top and get to know these other characteristics of our God that He so graciously reveals to us in His Word through His name.
ABC Poem of Praise
I wrote this as I was studying through the book of Psalms and learned that some of the Psalms had been written with each line beginning with a letter in the Hebrew alphabet…
Almighty God, in You do I trust.
By Thy hand I am guided,
Comforted by Thy touch.
Deliver me, my Father
Encompass me in Your arms.
For in Thee, my LORD, I shall not remain in harm.
Great is Thy faithfulness,
Honored is Your name.
In Thee be all majesty in glorious display.
Justice and righteousness alone are found in You.
Kindness and mercies,
Love, every morning they are new.
Mighty and awesome, before Thee I bow,
Not a God besides You,
O LORD, in Thee all things be, in, from, and through.
Peoples and nations shall one day Your name confess.
Quickly come my Saviour,
Redeem Thy saints from all distress.
Salvation is found in Thy name alone.
True is Your word, perfect is Thy law,
Upright are Your judgments, before Thee I fall.
Victory is found in Jesus Christ my Lord.
Worthy is the Lamb who was slain before the world.
Xplained by all creation, for creation Thy did create.
You uphold all things by the power of Your word.
Zion is Thy mountain, O come my King and reign!
>Calling His Shot
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Amen
God Doesn’t Swing
This FB status lost me a few FB friends…
If you are married to Jesus (Eph 5:31-32), why are you still having sex with the world (Jam 4:4), God doesn’t swing!!(Heb 10:26-31, Ex 34:14)
So I followed the status with a FB note:
In the Scriptures God refers to Israel as His wife and the Church as the bride of Christ. God first instituted marriage in the beginning. It is the first blood covenant recorded in Scripture. When a man and a woman are joined together as “one flesh” there is in this act the shedding of blood. This act was designed to take place under the marriage covenant, the seal of this covenant being the shedding of blood that occurs at first intercourse.
A covenant is a lifelong binding agreement. That is how God designed marriage. One man, one woman, one flesh, one life. This marriage covenant has and always will be one of God’s illustrations of His relationship with man.
When Israel entered into her covenant with God at Mt Horeb it was inaugurated with blood from that moment on God referred to Israel as His wife. When Christ shed His blood on Calvary it was His blood that inaugurated the new covenant by which we are redeemed, justified, and become from then on His betrothed.
In the Old Testament Scriptures Israel’s unfaithfulness to God is spoken of as harlotry, as adultery. A wife unfaithful to her Husband. You can read the books of Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea so many of the prophets and you see the truth illustrated.
In the New Testament Scriptures the church as the bride of Christ is there in Ephesians, Revelations, and weaved in and out throughout the books of the New Testament. Don’t take my word for it, read it for yourselves.
So therefore if we are married to Jesus why should we be having sex with the world. In other words, bride of Christ, why are we intimately joined, playfully engaged, flirtatiously indulged, sensually entertained, by those things that we sought forgiveness, this world that held us captive, this flesh, this nature, that put our Bridegroom on the cross?
There is a difference between willful and unwillful sin.
God knows the difference, and I believe so do we.
James 4:4 calls those who play with the world adulteresses. You cannot be a friend of this world and a friend of God. You cannot sleep with the enemy and sleep with the Friend that sticks closer than a brother. God will not allow you to continue to hop in and out of His bed. He wrote Israel a writ of divorce. She can only return to Him through a new covenant (Jer 33), the New Covenant, through Christ.
Yet those who claim to be the church, the bride of Christ, if we commit adultery through whom shall we return? Hebrews 10:26 says “if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice of sins…”
First of all ask yourself am I truly married to Christ?
Have I forsaken all others and cleaved only to Him?
Do I love, honor, cherish, and obey Him, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, for better or worse, till death us unite?
If you can say yes to these questions then know that just as our physical marriages have ups and downs, fears and failures, joys and sorrows, so does our marriage with Christ. Just as we seek forgiveness and healing and growth and intimacy in our physical marriage so we do in our marriage with Christ. He is perfect but we are not, but He is also mindful that we are not, and He is a patient, loving, compassionate, and merciful spouse.
He promises to never stop loving His bride and His faithfulness is forever (Psalm 89:19-37). Our physical marriages sometimes fail, but our marriage to Christ will never fail. “Love never fails” (1 Corin 13:8) and “God is love” (1 John 4:16). The question is will you try with all that is within you to be His faithful bride? He would and has died for you. Will you do the same for Him?
Oh do not be one who is a dog that has returned to its vomit (2 Peter 2:17-22)
Oh do not be the virgins who delayed in filling their lamps with oil and missed the Bridegroom (Matt 25:1:13)
Oh do not be those who were too preoccupied with the things of this world to go to the wedding feast or the man who showed up for the wedding feast without being properly clothed (Matt 22:1-14)
Today is the day of salvation (Hebrews 3-4)
Today is the day of repentance and forgiveness (1 John 1:5-10)
Today is the day of reconciliation (Romans 5:1-11)
Today is the day to be clothed in Christ (Romans 13:14)
Casting Crowns has a song “While You Were Sleeping” and these are some of the words:
United States of America
Looks like another silent night
As we’re sung to sleep by philosophies
That save the trees and kill the children
And while we’re lying in the dark
There’s a shout heard ‘cross the eastern sky
For the Bridegroom has returned
And has carried His bride away in the night
America, what will we miss while we are sleeping
Will Jesus come again
And leave us slumbering where we lay
America, will we go down in history
As a nation with no room for its King
Will we be sleeping?
Dear one, are you sleeping? (Song of Solomon 5:2-16)
>Kingdom Seals
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Pharaoh’s refusal to listen to his magicians leads to the next plague, swarms of insects. This plague is an attack upon the Egyptian god Khepfi, who was worshiped as the god of insects and dung beetles. The Lord sends this fourth plague upon the land of Egypt.
However, this time God is making a distinction in the land. This plague will not touch the land of Goshen. Goshen was the land in which the Hebrews lived. It was given to them by the Pharaoh whom Joseph served when Jacob and the rest of his sons came to live in Egypt during the famine (Genesis 47:6).
The last three plagues affected all the land of Egypt, including the Hebrews land of Goshen, but this plague shall not. God has always drawn a distinction between the righteous and the wicked. He does this so that we may know He is God. He does this so that we may know that His way is right and good.
We all live in this fallen world, the righteous and the unrighteous. We all, whether believer or non-believer, experience both good and evil. We all deal with the consequences of sin, our sin and the sins of others. Yet there will always come a time when the plumb line is dropped (Zechariah 4:10).
We read in the book of Ezekiel about God’s judgment on Jerusalem. The temple of God had become a place of idol worship. The priests of God were worshipping false gods within the walls of the temple and there were women prostituting themselves at the temple gates. God had finally had enough, but before He brought His judgment, He marked His remnant.
God will continue to spare His righteous ones even until the end of the age. In Revelation 7:3 we read of an angel crying out after the breaking of the sixth seal “saying, ‘Do not harm the earth or the sea or the trees until we have sealed the bond-servants of our God on their foreheads.'” After the breaking of the seventh seal we read in Revelation 9:4 how God protects those who serve Him, those with the seal on their foreheads, and He would not allow the plague of locusts and scorpions to harm them.
In Psalm 37:25 David wrote “I have been young and now I am old, yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his descendants begging bread.” My friend, God knows those who are His, and He will not forsake them. He has promised us over and over in His Word that when the righteous cry, He hears and He delivers them out of their trouble in His time and in His way (Psalm 34:17).
Oh precious one, the question that remains is are you His?
Do you wear His mark on your forehead?
Do you sigh and groan over the abominations you see committed around you?
Is your righteous soul oppressed and tormented day after day by the lawless deeds and sensual conduct of unprincipled men (2 Peter 2:7-8)?
Do you wear His seal or are you more the “fellow citizen” we read about in Ezekiel 33…
who talk about you by the walls and in the doorways of the houses,
speak to one another, each to his brother, saying,
‘Come now and hear what the message is which comes forth from the LORD.’
They come to you as people come, and sit before you as My people
and hear your words, but they do not do them,
for they do the lustful desires expressed by their mouth,
and their heart goes after their gain.
Behold, you are to them like a sensual song
by one who has a beautiful voice
and plays well on an instrument;
for they hear your words but they do not practice them.
My friend, we can sit in church every Sunday and sit before the pastor and claim to be a child of God, we can sing our songs of worship with our arms lifted up, but if we refuse to practice what we hear and sing then all we have to look forward to is judgment.
What is even worse, is that with every word, with every song, with every refusal, we harden our hearts. Every opportunity we have to believe and we do not do it, we harden our hearts (Mark 8:16-17, Hebrews 3:15-16).
Perhaps you feel you are offering up to God a good effort, that you have found a good compromise. You are after all there, and maybe you serve in an area, possibly you even tithe regularly. Maybe you feel you can rationalize and excuse your disobedience in other areas of your life by holding up your list of works. Oh precious one, we can see through God’s dealings with Pharaoh that our God just does not accept compromise.
God has sent this fourth plague upon the land of Egypt. He has made a distinction between the land of Goshen where the Hebrews live and the rest of the land of Egypt. God is demonstrating His power and authority once again before Pharaoh. God is giving Pharaoh another opportunity to hear and to be obedient.
Pharaoh offers a compromise up to Moses and tells him that his people can sacrifice to their God in the land of Egypt, but Moses refuses because that is not what the LORD commanded. Pharaoh concedes and says that he will let the people go. However, as soon as Pharaoh experiences the relief of the mercy of God, he once again goes back on his word.
Mercy has hardened him again. He professed to obey God out of the desire for his own comfort. His obedience had nothing to do with surrender from the heart. It was fake. It was for selfish gain, but my friend do not think that this took God, or even Moses, by surprise.
Oh Father,
As I live in this world I am surrounded by both good and evil. This plague of sin is all around me. I fight it from within and without, but I fight to win. I know that you see my heart. I know that you see whether I am oppressed and tormented by my sin and the sin of others or whether I secretly seek it for pleasure and put on a face of hating sin for show. Oh Father, open my eyes to any disobedience that is within me. Purge me of all iniquity. Let me not deal deceitfully with You, with others, or myself. May my heart be pleasing to You.
My Jesus, it is in Your name I pray,
Amen
>Be Nice, Be Nice, Be Nice
>Well today I am going on my third day without Internet access in my home.
There are two things that usually can get me in a tizzy… at&t customer service and credit card calls.
So I have been hanging on the thread of be nice, be nice, be nice… for the last three days as I stand my ground with this company and try not to be rude and obnoxious to the poor person on the other end of the line that has the unfortunate job of delivering the bad company policy to my ears.
The deal is a bad modem
This is our 4th modem in 4years with at&t. The modem was recalled, though we received no notification of a modem recall, and now the modem is out of warranty and at&t refuses to replace it. The phone call resulted in me being hung up on in a transition to speak with getting back on dial-up because I refuse to pay for another modem on top of our monthly service bill.
I understand I might be being stubborn… but it makes no sense to me.
So I called again to attempt to reason with this company and was then informed that if I had been paying an extra $8 a month for an insurance plan, they would send me a new modem for free. Hmmmm so if I had of paid them an extra $96 they would have sent me a “free” $75 modem…
See my frustration?
Yes I struggle with the whole money=security thing, so I am constantly checking my heart at this time to see if I am standing solid ground or biting my nose off to spite my face.
More of my frustration is that we have been loyal customers to this company for over 13 years. This includes a mobile with them, Internet with them, home phone with them, and satellite tv with them. Yet our loyalty to them does not warrant a modem which is required to use the service that we are paying monthly for…
So Friday night I was ready to unbundle the satellite, buy out the mobile contract and cancel the Internet… the home phone went 2 years ago… yes all over a $75 modem.
I am still not so sure that this won’t be the path we take… it all lies in tomorrows phone call to the service department.
So, if you miss my random craziness, and moments of revelation, and product and book reviews… I have not gone AWOL… I am fighting it out with my Internet provider and my own heart as I try to discern whether this is the stubborn red-headed female in me… or a flat out loyalty issue and bad business.
So I will be taking deep breaths tomorrow and saying over and over to myself… be nice, be nice, be nice… as I try to stay focused on the fact that I am having a problem with a policy not the person on the other end of the line and praying that in the process I don’t disqualify myself in this race of life from being an accurate witness of my Christ.
Hopefully you will still respect me in the morning!
>Pride Falls
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Pharaoh’s hardened heart and his refusal to keep his word leads to another plague upon his land. This third plague that the LORD sends upon Egypt, is a plague of gnats or lice. This plague was an attack upon the Egyptian god Geb, worshiped as the god of the earth.
Moses strikes the dust of the earth with his staff and the dust becomes the gnats. We do not know how much time passed between the plague of frogs and this plague of gnats. Quite possibly the plague of gnats from the dust of the earth have come while the piles of frogs are still stinking up the land of Egypt.
I am sure that Pharaoh is slightly annoyed by this point, but I am also sure that he is still smug in his attitude. I can picture him walking arrogantly into his throne room while he struggles to not slap and scratch at the lice covering his body. I can hear him loudly summon his magicians once again, expecting them to diminish his hidden fear.
How arrogant we humans can be when we do not want to be humbled. So many times we would rather struggle in our sin, suffer in our consequences, and sink deeper in our pits than just admit we are wrong. Proverbs 16:5 declares, “Everyone who is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD; assuredly he will not be unpunished.”
The magicians come and they pull all their tricks out of the bag. They try, but their secret arts cannot bring forth gnats. The magicians look at their Pharaoh and they say, “This is the finger of God.” (Exodus 8:19) God is through playing games. The magicians now realize this.
They now fully understand that the power of trickery and illusion that they held in their hands is no match for the One True Living God. They now understand that they are not dealing with a false god that they have created, that they have given power through their own manipulation, but they now understand that this God is real.
The magicians attempt to convince Pharaoh that he needs to listen to this God. His heart is so hard that he will not hear, and he hardens it further still.
When we see the obvious power of our God and yet refuse to bow to His authority we, like Pharaoh, harden our heart. Oh precious one, how careful we must be. Let us not excuse, rationalize, or dismiss the obvious finger of our God. Let us not chalk unexplained events up to circumstance and coincidence. Their are no coincidences with God. He is sovereign and is at work at all times.
When Jesus gave up His spirit on the cross it is written that the veil in the temple was torn from top to bottom. It is written that the tombs were opened and the dead arose. It is written that the earth quaked and the rocks shook and darkness fell over the land. It is written that when Jesus yielded up His spirit a centurion who was standing at the foot of the cross said, “Truly this man was the Son of God!” (Matthew 27:50-54, Mark 15:33-39) It is also written that after even all of this obvious finger of God upon this moment in history, many still refused to believe.
Religious leaders came and asked for guards to be placed at the tomb because they knew that Jesus had foretold His resurrection. Then, even after the resurrection, when these eyes saw the risen Christ walking and appearing to many, they still attempted to excuse, to rationalize, to dismiss the obvious power of God. And their hearts were hardened. In Luke 16:31 we read “But he said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be persuaded even if someone rises from the dead.'”
Pharaoh is a man blinded by his own pride. Pharaoh curses and spurns the Lord. He is a man who in the haughtiness of his countenance refuses to seek God or even admit that there is a God besides the god that he himself claims to be (Psalm 10:3-4).
He has seen the evidence of the existence of the God of the Hebrews, yet denies Him still. He has seen the signs of the power of this God, yet still refuses to acknowledge Him as God. He has even experienced the mercy of this God, yet still refuses to give Him praise. Oh how stubborn we in our pride can be.
Oh Father,
Your Word says that “Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before stumbling.” (Proverbs 16:18) How easily I can find myself stumbling in my pride. It was pride that led to the fall of man. It is pride that can keep us from ever getting up from that fall. Oh how the arrogance of our heart can deceive us (Obadiah 1:3). Father, forgive me for the times that I have let pride overtake me. My God, may I always be quick to recognize your power and your work in my life. May I always give You all the glory and praise.
My Jesus, it is in Your name I pray,
Amen
Names of God Study: Jehovah-shalom
It’s time for another post in the Names of God series. We have done a little study on the names Elohim, El Elyon, El Roi, El Shaddai, El Olam, Adonia, Jehovah, Jehovah-jireh, Jehovah-rapha, Jehovah-nissi, and Jehovah-mekoddishkem. Today we will learn more about our God from His name, Jehovah-shalom.
We discover this name of God in Judges chapter six. When we look at the context of this chapter of Scripture we discover that this is a time of great turmoil in the life of Israel. It is after the death of their leader Joshua, the one who brought them into the promised land. It is a time when the children of Israel have decided to do what seems best in their own eyes instead of obeying the God who brought them out of Egypt.
In this chapter we are introduced to Gideon. We find him hiding in the wine press threshing wheat. While he hides, God decides to surprise him. The angel of the LORD pops in and declares that this hiding man is a valiant warrior… yes Gideon is shocked. After a time of exchanges and encouragements Gideon asks the angel of the LORD to hang around for an offering which he complies. When Gideon witnesses how the angel of the LORD consumes the offering, he realizes who he has been talking to…
We can light all the candles we want. We can try to find a place of solitude and quiet and shut out our inner thoughts and outer noise… but we will not find real peace here. We cannot self-will ourselves into peace.
When we try to self-will ourselves into peace or try to control our circumstances in order to get peace we usually end up banging our heads up against the wall in sheer frustration. We may get the peace for a moment, but the second our circumstances change or an interruption occurs that peace is gone.
Lasting peace comes only from God.
And be gracious to you;
And give you peace. Numbers 6:24-26
When our peace comes from God then we have it regardless of our circumstances. Our circumstances may be crazy. Gideon was hiding in the wine press because his nation was in turmoil. He was surrounded by enemies and lived in fear… because he had forgotten who his God was. He had forgotten the promises of his God. He had forgotten the mighty works of his God. He thought the problem was his outer circumstances, but the problem was really in him.
Oh precious one, if you have Christ, then you have peace. Your innards are already full of peace. Christ in you the hope of glory! The Prince of Peace lives in you, never to leave you, never to forsake you. You just have to walk in it. You just have to get this thing going 🙂
Because he trusts in You.
Trust in the LORD forever,
For in GOD the LORD, we have an everlasting Rock.
>Frogs and Mercy and Forgiveness
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