Aloha Friday Message – June 21, 2024 – Lock Down That Storm!

June 21, 2024

2425AFC062124 – Lock Down That Storm! ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

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Job 38:1, 10-11 (GNT)[1] – ¹ Then out of the storm the Lord spoke to Job.
¹⁰“I marked a boundary for the sea
and kept it behind bolted gates.
¹¹I told it, “So far and no farther!
Here your powerful waves must stop.” (See above link for full context)

Psalm 107:28-29 –
²⁸Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble,
and he brought them out from their distress;
²⁹he made the storm be still,
and the waves of the sea were hushed.

2 Corinthians 5:17 – ¹⁷So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!

Mark 4:36 – Leaving the crowd, they took Jesus with them in the boat just as he was. And other boats were with him.

Aloha nui loa, ʻŌmea! May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope. After sailing through Lent and Eastertide we have “suddenly arrived” at the Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time. When we look at the Gospel, we might think this is a familiar story; it is, in a way familiar, but probably not the story we think it is. This is not the account of The Apostle Peter stepping out of the boat to walk across the water to Jesus who has walked at least halfway across the Sea of Galilee – walking across the water! – to catch up with his Disciples.

As you can see, every Key Verse for today has something to do with the sea – even the reading from 1 Corinthians because walking on the water was certainly something new! Here’s a little illustration about walking on water. In the Bible only Jesus and The Apostle Peter walked on the water, but this image (↔ Click Link) sorta-kinda makes it look like there might be a third. “Skin for skin! A man will give all he has for his own life.” – Satan. Job 2:4

Moral of the story: When the situation calls for it, we will walk on water.

The third was … Ivan Givaldo.

Well, yes, of course I’m being silly. This Great Escape happened in that strange and chaotic event in Pamplona – the running of the bulls. Some folks (mostly guys) try to escape by jumping into the water. As you can see here, that may have limited success, because the chaos is following close behind. In fact, one of the things most of us can agree upon when considering the effects of chaos is that chaos seems to be just half-a-step away most of the time. Believe it or not – and this is absolutely true – less than a second after I hit the period in the previous sentence, the electricity went off! Talk about great (sic) timing! All of us have chaotic moments in our lives. Mostly they stir up fear because they are unexpected and unpredictable – which is why chaos is chaotic. Sometimes the chaos in our lives pushes us into grief and sorrow, sometimes anger, or worry, or doubt. Scary stuff that – doubt. The doubt caused by chaos urges us to let loose the sea-anchor and ride out the storm facing into the wind, like this:

“Facing into the wind? That doesn’t make any sense.” The purpose is to keep the bow facing into the wind and waves so that the boat will not capsize. Why would I put something in this essay about a sea anchor? Because often times the best way to deal with chaos is to face it head-on. Curling up in a corner like a whimpering child is probably a close antithesis to that. There’s another aspect of this that we could attribute to the Captain of our ship –

He can master chaos better than anyone and we are never alone in facing the dangers of chaos because HE is always with us. Take a look at that first Key Verse. What does it tell us? Hopefully you have used that link to see all 11 verses in this passage. God and his servant, Job, are speaking to each other. Job’s friend, Elihu, has been extolling God’s majesty and power. Elihu then asks Job if he can do any of the things that God can do. (See Job 36-37, fascinating stuff!) Next, the Lord himself speaks to Job from within a whirlwind and asks him the kinds of questions we saw last week – can you make a flower, can you lay out the foundations of the Earth, can you put the Sea where it belongs and hold it there by your own authority? I can!” Now, let’s think about that last bit which is our Key Verse from Job for today. God Most High – El Elyon, Almighty God – El Shaddai, the Eternal Everliving God – El Olam, the God of The Fathers, stopped chaos with a Word: BECOME! The Lord commands it, and it is. God controls the weather from the first command of Creation – “Let there BE …!” And immediately, chaos is vanquished! Now, put a pin in that thought and hold it in place as we turn to the Key Verses from Psalm 107. This Psalm begins “O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so …” In the Key Verses above we have something that sounds a lot like this account in the Gospel of Mark.

In our Gospel, we see persons who are redeemed, saved from the storm, by a single word: BECOME. Jesus was, incredibly, asleep on a cushion in the stern of the boat as it is tossed about in the waves and filling with water. The panicking Disciples cried out to him, “MASTER! WE’RE GONNA DIE!!” Jesus woke up and REBUKED the Sea and said Siōpa – Silence! Pephimōso Put a muzzle on it! Look what the Psalm says: Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he brought them out from their distress; he made the storm be still, and the waves of the sea were hushed. He put the Sea in its place … just as God his Father had done when he said “Let there be!” Chaos was Mastered by the Master of Peace – God, made flesh, still all the same El Shaddai-Olam. Now we begin to understand that this is not only an account of an amazing miracle by Jesus, but also a parable about the absolute Truth: Jesus is the Lord God, the master of all Creation!! Belovéd, he chastised the Disciples for their lack of faith, for failing to understand that he held God’s authority because he is God. Now, look at this:

There is a similar meme that asks, “Lord, why are you taking me through troubled water?” He replied, “Because your enemies can’t swim.” Same-same, yes? We’ve all heard the adage, “If God will bring you to it, God will take you through it.” Do we really believe that, I mean, really-really? I DO! Because it has happened to me. You have probably experienced that in your life as well, que no? And what happens when El Shaddai-Olam saves our skin? You know the answer! EVERYTHING CHANGES! So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new! When we are in Christ, we share in his victory; we are more than conquerors; (↔ Music Link) we are his chosen ones. We are his Disciples, as were the other men in the boat with him. There were other Disciples in other boats during that squall, and they too were fearful of the chaos that threatened to cost them their lives. We don’t know who, or how many, or why they were with the boat from which Jesus commanded the wind and waves.

Everyone who had been in that storm which came up so suddenly was as dumbfounded as Jesus’ Disciples when – just as suddenly as the storm came up – a dead calm settled across the entire expanse of the water! No sign of the storm remained! In its place were only wonder and awe. Jesus looked out over the water and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” These are words of command. Click HERE (↔ Music Link) to hear a Hymn about this. I sang this often in Sunday School at Corona Presbyterian Church in Denver. Let’s fire up that little movie screen we all have on the inside of our forehead and watch as the people in the other boats – you know, the ones that did not hear Jesus’ command against the chaos – and let’s try to imagine which would be more terrifying: Being caught in a terrible storm and in imminent danger of drowning, or being suddenly sailing on calm waters in a gentle breeze. Jesus’ Disciples asked each other, “Who is this guy?!?!” The folks in the other boats might have asked, “Wha-a-a-a-t just happened?” I confess it reminded me of the Israelite’s first reaction to the manna. Remember? “Manna” means “What’s this?” Well, another question we should probably be asking is, “What do we do when suddenly plunged into chaos?”

How about turning to The Word in Isaiah 30:15 ^c – in quietness and in trust shall be your strength. Do we ever feel like the Poor Wayfaring Stranger (↔ Music Link)? Could we Trust God enough to allow him to be the Healer of My Soul (↔ Music Link)? On that movie screen we used a moment ago, see a baby bird hatched the morning after that storm. A baby bird eats only what it is given. It refuses nothing because all that is given to it is given for its good. The baby bird eats and grows without concern for the taste, texture, or value of the food it is given; and, it does all this without having to know why its parents feed it only that which is good. I cannot recall ever seeing a baby bird spit out what it was given, can you? Isn’t God a bit like that Papa Bird who gives us only what is good for us? Isn’t God a bit like that Mama Bird who covers the baby during the storm and protects it from the chaos? And at times, Adelphos, are we a bit like a baby bird that spits out what God provides and then says to him, “Get offa me! I feel trapped and smothered!”?

They took Jesus in the boat just as he was, tired, probably hungry, exhausted after teaching all day; so tired, in fact, that in the midst of chaos (which he knew in advance), he fell asleep in the back of the boat. The Disciples asked, “Master, don’t you care that we’re about to die here?” Belovéd, have we the F.A.I.T.H. to believe that God – HE who made the seas full, but only just full enough – really does care if we are terrified of the chaos we see in the evening news every day? Do we have the courage to know that in Christ all things are made new? Can God really calm the storm in my life, in your life, in our lives, and in the lives of those who don’t even know God is working RIGHT NOW to save them? “O give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; for his steadfast love endures forever. Let the redeemed of the Lord say so!” Believe it or else, (↔ Learning Link) ʻŌmea. When trouble comes knocking at your door, just say, “Jesus, can you get that for me?” When the storm of chaos whipped up around us by the Foe threatens to pull us under, just say, “Jesus, please Lock Down That Storm!” Isn’t it True, Belovéd, that God always has and always will be (↔ Music Link) our Help, our Hope, our Home, our Peace, and our Joy? Joy is always the first product of Love, and God IS Love. Be calmed and Trust God.

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!

Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

Unless otherwise indicated, all scripture passages are from the New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE) New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

[1] Passages marked (GNT): Good News Translation (GNT) Good News Translation^® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition)^© 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. For more information about GNT, visit www.bibles.com and www.gnt.bible

Posted in Aloha Friday Messages, God's Absolutely Perfect Plan, Links, MUSIC!, Podcast, Prayer Requests
Tags: Art, Biblical Languages, For sharing, Miracles, MORE Music!, MORE Scripture!, Multiple Scripture references on topic, Music, PODCAST, Prayer Request, Scripture study, Stories

Aloha Friday Message – June 14, 2024 – There’s an APP for that.

June 14, 2024

22424AFC061424 –

There’s an APP for that. ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

Ezekiel 17:24 –
⁴All the trees of the field shall know
that I am the Lord.
I bring low the high tree,
I make high the low tree;
I dry up the green tree
and make the dry tree flourish.
I the Lord have spoken;
I will accomplish it.

2 Corinthians 5:10 – ¹⁰For all of us must appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each may receive recompense for what has been done in the body, whether good or evil.

Psalm 92:12 –
¹²The righteous flourish like the palm tree,
and grow like a cedar in Lebanon.

Mark 4:26-27 – ²⁶He also said, “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, ²⁷and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.

I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him. We do want to know him, don’t we? After all, he knows us better than we know ourselves, and since he created us to know him and to love him and to serve him, oughtn’t we too “come to know him?” Of course, we all know the answer to that; we must put everything we have into knowing him more and more even though we understand that we can’t really completely know or understand the God of all Creation. In fact, sometimes we find ourselves mighty frustrated by our efforts to know him and to love him and to serve him. In Deuteronomy 6:4-9, source of the Shema, we read in verse 5 – You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. How? Many times when we talk about the Majesty and Power of God we hear the word “ineffable” – beyond description, undefinable, exceeding our capabilities of perception. There is more to God than we can handle, more than we can understand, more than we can appreciate, and way more than we can imagine in our puny earthling brains.

But there you have it; we’re earthlings (remember, made from dirt?), and from the very Start, we always try to figure it out for ourselves. I’m sure all of us know at least one person who has invented their own image and likeness of God and used that image to come up with their own religion, their own explanations of what’s what. Joseph Campbell found extraordinary success by gathering together mythologies and “belief systems” from the most ancient cultures to the most modern gurus and “life-influencers.” Often some of us (alright, me in particular) grouse about “CAFETERIA CATHOLICS” (especially politicians, sports and cinema celebrities, and even clergy!). These self-professed Catholics have their own formulae for fitting God into the box they create for him. As if! We’re going to look into some of those pathetic DIY “spiritualities” and see if God has a way to work outside our boxes.

“Oh, I’m a very spiritual person! I believe the Universe returns to you exactly what you put into it.” Cool. But by now, you and I know that is like a broken pencil – pointless and therefore useless. There are some very spiritual persons who take a little astrology, a smidgen of Buddhism, maybe a dollop of Ancient Druid Magick, and blend it all together to create rituals from their personal intentions and appetites. The resulting phantasmagoric pish posh apparently makes them feel happy because they will self-righteously defend their ignorance by redefining Truth: “What’s true for me may not be what’s True for you.” Come on! Really!? Is it ever possible that there is more than one Truth? (↔ Learning Link for “As Frank Peretti has said,”) Belovéd, we know there is only One Truth (at least we’d better know!), and that Truth is knowable. Learning the Truth is worthwhile and doable. Believing the Truth is actually easier than believing our made-up baloney sandwiches. (If we’re going to live on baloney, why not make a meal of it?)

But those of us who know the B.I.B.L.E. also know that whatever goes on, into, out of, or next to our lives, God has an Absolutely Perfect Plan (THE APP) for ALL of it. Where we get tripped up so often is when we look at that APP, and say something like, “Hm. I really think he meant that little part there should look more like (rustle, biff, bop, ka-ding!) THIS! Our Key Verses for today are chosen to counter that sort of nonsense. The Prophet Ezekiel authored the first of our Key Verses. This is the Period of the Exile when King Nebuchadnezzar captured and deported the King of Israel, Jehoiachin, and Ezekiel is describing how God’s Absolutely Perfect Plan will ultimately restore the People to their homeland and their Temple. But, first he will allow everything he had given them to be destroyed and desecrated. Nevertheless, the restoration will be directed and accomplished by God, not by them. God will do what needs to be done (as he has done, and will do, eternally). They made up their own way to worship and it was false. It was sinful. It was deadly, because … the price of sin is death. God uses the images of trees to convey that he alone can choose what to restore and where and how it will be restored. Then, he follows up with I the Lord have spoken; I will accomplish it. ʻŌmea, if God created all the universe with just a few words, then we should be able to understand that what God speaks happens. Everything from radiolarians to roses exist because of him. Could any of us make either of those?

Who can make a flower, (↔ Music Link) or the dewfall, or a caterpillar, or a mustard seed, or a walking fish, sunshine, rainbows, polliwogs? Who can make manna, win a battle with only 300 soldiers fighting against a vast army, heal the lame and mute and blind? Who can give us seed for sowing and bread to eat? Who can anoint a Conqueror as an implement of Peace? Who has given us YOLO-F and allowed us to choose where we spend it? Shouldn’t we be following The Shepherd of Souls (↔ Music Link) instead of our own grimy imaginings? How do we share the Gospel, the Seeds of Truth? Adelphoi, there’s an APP for that! Our assignment is to gather the seeds and then sow them. And just where are these seeds? In the manual for the APP of course – the B.I.B.L.E. And how do we control what those seeds do? We don’t! It’s in the manual: “The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on the ground, ²⁷and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed would sprout and grow, he does not know how.” There’s no DIY hack for that, no genius solution to turn baloney into fillet mignon. I mentioned recently the “well-maybe” reasoning – “well, maybe it works like this instead of that.” Hear what the Prophet Isaiah had to say about that:
Isaiah 45:9-10 –
⁹Woe to you who strive with your Maker,
earthen vessels with the potter!
Does the clay say to the one who fashions it, “What are you making”?
or “Your work has no handles”?
¹⁰Woe to anyone who says to a father, “What are you begetting?”
or to a woman, “With what are you in labor?”

I remember a time in Washington Park in Denver watching a man fixing the playground carousel. He pulled some odd-looking tool out of his tool-bag and I asked him, “What’s that for?” “Oh,” he said, “it’s to make little boys ask questions.” The lesson I learned from that response is still one of the most important things I ever learned: Stupid questions deserve stupid answers. Now, before that big breath you just sucked in causes your baloney sandwich to explode with “There are no stupid questions! Every question is a learning opportunity!”, I’ll just ask you to decide whether or not it makes sense for the clay in the potter’s hands to protest and question the potter about his intent, or arrogantly suggest a better way to use that clay. How about asking a mom in labor, “Whatcha doin’ there, Mama?” Yet, we don’t mind one little bit about opening our God-box and saying, “What’s going on in there? That’s not what I had in mind!” In my mind’s eye I can see our Father in Heaven just shaking is head. I can also see him reaching for the Operators’ Manual and pointing out the Shema … again.

“Maybe it’s like …” Nope. It’s like – ¹²The righteous flourish like the palm tree, and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. Just like that low tree made high, God will do what is right and in accord with his Absolutely Perfect Plan, not mine, not yours, not ours, not theirs – only God’s. I want to quote one more thing from Fr. Jim Sichko’s Mission, #60MIN4JESUS. (↔ Learning LinkS) “Where the world sees failure, God sees future. Trust that God will provide it, then wait for it quietly.” Do we, can we, believe and trust God when he tells us I the Lord have spoken; I will accomplish it?

By now I am confident you understand that that old maxim “Let go and let God” is more than just a clever turn of phrase. It’s actually a warning to avoid Do-It-Yourself Religion which leads to Do-It-Yourself Salvation. Ain’t happening, adelphoi. Another old adage that sticks with me is “There is an answer for every question in the universe. Unfortunately, many of those answers make no sense whatsoever.” That’s where we sometimes jump right into the sausage grinder and come out baloney. We say, “God’s answer makes no sense. That’s not what I wanted at all. God didn’t get it right, this time.” O-o-o-o-oh, brothers and sisters! Talk about not making any sense! We are clay, shaped by and for the potter. WE don’t tell the potter, “I don’t want to be an amphora! I want to be a teacup.” Why are we clay? DOH! God used the clay he created to form the earth from which he made earthlings, and he made earthlings so he could fill us up with his treasures. 2 Corinthians 4:7 – ⁷But we have this treasure in clay jars, (↔ Music Link) so that it may be made clear that this extraordinary power belongs to God and does not come from us. In earthen vessels, “whom all the world cannot contain comes in our hearts to dwell.” (↔ Music Link) Does that make any sense? Of course it does! It’s in the APP. 1747AFC112415 – DDIY (←Follow this link) and you will find more information about DDIY – Don’t Do It Yourself. One more quick illustration – dew.

Can we make the dewfall? You’ve heard about manna, so here’s something to think about. Exodus 16:13c-14 – … in the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. ¹⁴When the layer of dew lifted, there on the surface of the wilderness was a fine flaky substance, as fine as frost on the ground. Then Jesus told us: John 6:51 – ⁵¹I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.

The Bread from Heaven comes upon us quietly, evenly; it refreshes us and renews us in the same way that the dewfall renews and refreshes the land. In the first Epiclesis in the Canon (Eucharistic Prayer 1) and the remaining three Eucharistic prayers we hear the Priest pray for the coming of the Holy Spirit on the gifts we offer – the bread and wine. He says, “Make holy, therefore, these gifts, we pray, by sending down your Spirit upon them like the dewfall.” This recalls for us the manna [1] in the desert – quiet, mysterious, not overbearing, not weighty, always just enough, never leading to a surplus, but always refreshing, invigorating, and nourishing. Can we make manna? No. Can The Bread of Life be confected at the Altar? Yes. And it becomes Holy as quietly and effectively as the dew comes to water and nourish the land. God does everything in his Absolutely Perfect Plan – every day, all day – for us because he Loves us. All he wants from us is to share the Bread and to leave the baloney and all the condiments away from it. He wants to feed us what we need more than he wants to give us what we want. Whatever there is we need, there’s and APP for that. whatever there is we want might come along to us – if it’s in his Absolutely Perfect Plan. Rejoice in what we have. Count the blessings, (↔ Music Link) and let God be God – One Truth, One Bread, One Body, One Love Released. (↔ Music Link)

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!

Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

Heaven’s Joy Expanded

Heaven is now your home m’ita. See you soon!

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

[1] Hebrew: mana See Psalm 78:24 and Exodus 16:15 – man`ə in the manner of “What is this?” Israel ate of the manna for 40 years until they ate the first fruits of the Promised Land.

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Aloha Friday Message – June 6, 2024 – All in the Family

June 6, 2024

2423AFC060724 – All in the Family

Genesis 3:12-13 – ¹²The man said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.” ¹³Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this that you have done?” The woman said, “The serpent tricked me, and I ate.”

Psalm 130:3-4 –
³If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
Lord, who could stand?
⁴But there is forgiveness with you,
so that you may be revered.

2 Corinthians 5:1 – ¹ For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

Mark 3:31-35 – ³¹Then his mother and his brothers came; and standing outside, they sent to him and called him. ³²A crowd was sitting around him; and they said to him, “Your mother and your brothers and sisters* are outside, asking for you.” ³³And he replied, “Who are my mother and my brothers?” ³⁴And looking at those who sat around him, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! ³⁵Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.” *adelphoi – brethren

May Peace always be with you and may God bless you, Belovéd! Right off the bat, let me say this has nothing to do with Archie Bunker!

Nobody is going to sing “Those Were The Days.” Today we begin with our Key Verses from the Gospel. We start there because of that phrase “Your mother and your brothers and sisters are outside.” A great number of people cite that as “proof” that Jesus had siblings, children of his Mother and foster father. It works like this:

The Greek word used for brothers as well as brothers and sisters is “adelphoi.” This Greek word for brother – “brethren” (singular ἀδελφός adelphos; plural ἀδελφοί adelphoi) can be translated as a sibling – male or female. It can also be understood as a brother, whether born of the same two parents or only of the same father or mother or a person who has the same national ancestor, belongs to the same People, or a fellow countryman., and – of course – a member of the same religious community, especially a Christian community. The problem in understanding this arises when one presumes that “brethren” refers only to biological siblings. The counterargument is usually “the word refers to cousins, nephews, other close relatives, and even fellow citizens.” The response to that is that Greek has specific words for each of those relationships, and if it were true that the persons with Jesus’ Mother were not siblings, the writer would have used those specific terms. That is another presumptuous conclusion. Let’s take a still-closer look at Scripture.

Matthew 13:55-56 – ⁵⁵Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? ⁵⁶And are not all his sisters with us? Where then did this man get all this?” Note the names (without surnames) mentioned here. To help sort this out, let’s look at John 19:25 – Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. In the same part of the Crucifixion narrative in Matthew 27:56 we read – ⁵⁶Among them were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee. The sons of Zebedee, we know, were the men Jesus named “the sons of thunder,” James and John. OK, flip back to Matthew 13, and we can see that among James and Joseph and Simon and Judas, two of them are cousins of Jesus and offspring of the woman The Apostle Matthew calls “the other Mary.” (See Matthew 28:1 and CCC 500) Most non-Catholic commentaries will list some of these chaps as the “half-brother of Jesus.” In addition, in Matthew 23:8 [1] we read that Jesus tells the Disciples to avoid the appellation “Rabbi” because they have only One Teacher, and they are all equally brothers and sisters (adelphoi). This “warning” is understood in light of Luke 14:11 – ¹¹For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. To wrap this up, we need only look at what Jesus himself said in Mark 3:34-35 – ³⁴And looking at those who sat around him, he said, “Here are my mother and my brothers! ³⁵Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother.” Yes, indeed, that is how the Family of God is formed!

Whenever we do the will of God, we are adopted into the Lord’s family, and we discover how sweet it is to call our Teacher, our creator, our Almighty God and cry out “Abba, Father!” (↔ Music Link) Just for a moment, let’s close our eyes softly and sing along with that hymn while considering the intensity of the Apostle Thomas’ declaration “My Lord and my God! And, just as we also inwardly rejoice at being just one of the billions of Jesus’ Brothers or Sisters, let us acknowledge that the Family of God (↔ Music Link) will be The Family Forever (yep, that’s YOLO-F).

Jesus told his followers (including us) that to be a part of the Family of God, we must do the will of God. That has always been hard, because all of us are born under the authority of The Prince of the Air, Satan, who is also the Ruler of Earthly Systems and has dominion over everything Adam was given to subdue for the use of Man because Adam gave away his coregency with God in order to exalt himself. What this means is that some members of the Family of God, some of our own adelphoi, are not under God’s dominion, but Satan’s! Though Baptized and endowed with the Holy Spirit, they countermand the will of God by exalting themselves. These modern-day adelphoi behave in the same ways the Apostle Paul warned about: Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers; every kind of wickedness, evil, covetousness, malice, envy, vaunted pride, murder, strife, deceit, craftiness; they are gossips, slanderers, God-haters; insolent, haughty, gluttonous, boastful, inventors of evil, rebellious toward parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, and ruthless.

They know God’s decree, that those who practice such things deserve to die – yet they not only do them but even applaud others who practice them. (See Romans 1 and 1 Corinthians 5) To that list we must shamefully add murders of millions of innocents – babies, elders, political enemies, ethnic pogroms, and intentional destruction and failure of stewardship for our only home, Earth. ʻŌmea, that is not how The TRUE Family of God BEHAVES, because such behaviors are not the will of God! They are the will of The Foe of God, and when we act in those ways, we become the prodigal child, the errant brother or sister, that refuses to accept the responsibilities – as well as the immense powers – that come with being adelphoi.

Unless.

Unless we repent and believe and Live the Gospel. How does that help? Well, let’s go back to that passage from Genesis. When Adam was caught out, what did he tell God? “It’s not my fault! It’s this woman you gave me. She’s the culprit here, not me!” Belovéd, does that sound like repentance to you? Me, too. Not even close. Eve’s excuse wasn’t any better. “That sneak of a snake tricked me! I thought that since he was so beautiful he’d help me. Then this oaf, standing right beside me watching, took a bite, too.” Have any of us ever wondered why no one said, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have acted like that.”? And so it was that the first Community of God set in motion all that is going on in this bruised old world of ours. I’d like to ask you to call to mind that L O N G list The Apostle Paul put together in Romans and 1 Corinthians. Does any of that ring a bell with you? I’d guess we would all say “yes, it does.” There’s something important that we must remember about that list. The Apostle Paul is telling us that if our adelphoi in Christ act like that, they are not really our brothers or sisters in Christ.

Check out 1 Corinthians 5:9-11 – ⁹I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral persons — ¹⁰not at all meaning the immoral of this world, or the greedy and robbers, or idolaters, since you would then need to go out of the world. ¹¹But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother or sister [adelphos] who is sexually immoral or greedy, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or robber. Do not even eat with such a one. “Are we just supposed to shun people like that, refuse them fellowship with us?” We can partially answer that with 2 Thessalonians 3:14-15 – ¹⁴Take note of those who do not obey what we say in this letter; have nothing to do with them, so that they may be ashamed. ¹⁵Do not regard them as enemies, but warn them as believers. [adelphoi].

This flies in the face of the current globalist DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) recommendations for “anything goes” morality – if it feels good, do it. That’s right back in the pocket of exalting self over other. Someone out there is saying I’ve got it backwards. “Being kind to people by letting them be ‘who they truly are’ is elevating them, not us.” Nah, when we give people permission to defy the will of God, we are giving our own hearts and mind permission to do the same. “See? I’m just like you. It’s not our fault. THE DEVIL MADE US DO IT!” That might work for Flip Wilson’s Geraldine, but it’s a no-go in The Family of God. What to do, what to do, what to do?

Psalm 130:3-4 –
³If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities,
Lord, who could stand?
⁴But there is forgiveness with you,
so that you may be revered.

You’ve got that right – repent! And believe and Live the Gospel. How about a quick comparison? Let’s recall Absalom, third son of David, killer of David’s first-born son Amnon, also tried to claim the throne as leader of a revolt against his father. His name means, “my father is Peace.” For the crimes he committed, he would not repent. He ended up hanging by his hair in a tree so that one of David’s Men of Valor was able to strike him dead. How about another of David’s sons, Solomon? His name means “Peace.” He was the son of David by Bathsheba (one of David’s biggest failings as a husband, king, and father), and the third king of Israel. He was the wisest man that ever lived, but made the very unwise choice of being disobedient. He had 700 wives, 300 concubines, thousands of chariots, charioteers, and horses, and was led to worship other gods to appease his wives. He did not repent. He died in his sins. His father, David, repented and “slept in Peace with his fathers” and in Peace with God. Absolom and Solomon lived lives of unrepentant disobedience. David lived through many battles for good and succumbed to many battles with evil, but he always repented. Because of that, we now have a King on the Throne of David who is King Forever – Jesus, the Christ of God. We are part of The Family of God that Lives in the Eternal Tabernacle, the sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers, nephews and cousins – all the Brethren, the Adelphoi – of the “One God, the Father Almighty, maker of Heaven and Earth, of all things visible and invisible.” We – the adelphoi, the anawim – must not wait for Jesus’ return away from the House of the Lord (God’s family), but rather be in the Presence of the Lord in the land of the living: Psalm 27:13 – ¹³I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. ʻŌmea, we joyfully wait and watch, and do that together like ʻohana [family] and as those who gladly do right instead of making excuses to exalt our lives. We cannot be the servant of all if we make ourselves “first come, first served.” Remember, to repent one mist first STOP, and then do a 180 back to God and The Family of God.

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!

Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

[1] Use this link to see multiple translations of this passage. Thanks!

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Aloha Friday Message – May 31, 2024 – Mutiny Over The Bounty

May 31, 2024

2422AFC053124 – Mutiny Over The Bounty

Exodus 24:7 – ⁷Then he took the book of the covenant, and read it in the hearing of the people; and they said, “All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient.”

Psalm 116:12-13 –
¹²What shall I return to the Lord
for all his bounty to me?
¹³I will lift up the cup of salvation
and call on the name of the Lord

Hebrews 9:11-12 – ¹¹But when Christ came as a high priest of the good things that have come, then through the greater and [more] perfect tent [or tabernacle] (not made with hands, that is, not of this creation), ¹²he entered once for all into the Holy Place, not with the blood of goats and calves, but with his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption.

Mark 14:22-26 – (GNT) [1] ²²While they were eating, Jesus took a piece of bread, gave a prayer of thanks, broke it, and gave it to his disciples. “Take it,” he said, “this is my body.”
²³Then he took a cup, gave thanks to God, and handed it to them; and they all drank from it. ²⁴Jesus said, “This is my blood which is poured out for many, my blood which seals God’s *covenant. ²⁵I tell you, I will never again drink this wine until the day I drink the new wine in the Kingdom of God.”
²⁶Then they sang a hymn and went out to the Mount of Olives.

*Some translations and ancient authorities add “new” here. Covenant : diathḗkē (from 1223 /diá, “thoroughly,” intensifying 5087 /títhēmi, “place, set”) – properly, a set-agreement having complete terms determined by the initiating party, which also are fully affirmed by the one entering the agreement.

John 6:50-51 – ⁵⁰This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. ⁵¹I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”

E pili mau na pomaika‘i ia ‘oe a me ke akua ho’omaika‘i ‘oe, ʻŌmea! (May blessing always be with you and may God bless you, Beloved!) Ahhhh, I have looked forward to this post! This coming Sunday is The Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ or Corpus Christi. It is the third and final of the major post-Easter Solemnities. The previous two were Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord on May 12, and Pentecost Sunday on May 19. Next Sunday we begin the long stretch of “Ordinary Time.” We can begin this post by explaining the title. Most of us will remember there was a book (and later a movie) called Mutiny on The Bounty. There were three successful books as well as three successful movies about that event centered on the HMAV Bounty in April 1789, while sailing in the South Pacific under the command of William Bligh. Now, what is the connection between a historically famous and historical act of defiance, and a Solemnity honoring the Real Presence of Christ? I hope by the end of this you will not think I’m crazy.

Just as a refresher, here’s an image of the HMAV Bounty. There are plenty of stories about the “Tall Ships,” the era of stupendous naval battles, nefarious pirates, and dauntless explorers. Some of the tales passed down through the centuries are dramatic and fanciful. The great ships that were committed to these adventures were marvels of craftsmanship, ingenuity, and daring. There is much debate to this day about the events surrounding the fate of The Bounty. It seems incredible that crew members who participated in the mutiny were committed to an idea that Bligh was unfit for command and listed evidence of his harsh cruelty to his crew. It’s a bad rap that has very thin evidence historically. Still, the mutineers rebelled against what they believed was intolerable and assented to what they believed was justifiable. They knew they could be severely punished for their failure to conform to the “Laws of the Sea.” There were standards of conduct for Commander and Crew, and each thought the other had failed to live up to those standards. Here, then, is the connection which comes from our Key Verses from Psalm 116:12-13:

¹²What shall I return to the Lord
for all his bounty to me?
¹³I will lift up the cup of salvation
and call on the name of the Lord

We can see that the word “bounty” is also the name of that ship. If you click on the link for that passage you will see three different words in the position of “bounty” – bounty, benefits, and goodness. In this → collection of the same passage at Bible Hub → (Psalm 116:12), we also see precious blessings, bountiful dealings, good, rewards, great good, acts of kindness, and so on. The gist of it is, “How can we give recompense to God for all the great and wonderful Gifts he has given us?” I’ll give you the short answer: We can’t. What we can do – at the very least – is try, try, and try again to be and to do better. If this connection still seems a bit tenuous to you, let’s go back to the mutiny momentarily and ask, “Why was (is) mutiny a punishable crime?” One of those “rules of the sea” was that the ship’s commander was always the ultimate authority on board. His due was to be respected-as-ranked regardless of his personal qualities. There were specific remedies for “lousy commanders,” but they were much milder (and less effective) than mutiny. The mutineers decided that their recompense to the commander was to ditch him at sea. Bad guys deserve bad endings, we might say.

Now, a short detour to present-day realities.

Many of us have heard in recent years of a Pew Research Center survey (see summary) finding that a bit less than ONE-THIRD (31%) of Catholics believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Nearly half (43%) believe that it is the Church’s position that this error is actually the Church’s teaching! About one-fifth (22%) disbelieve the action of transubstantiation is actual even though they know that’s what Scripture, Apostolic Teaching, and the Magisterium profess in the Catechism of the Catholic Church – CCC 1374: The mode of Christ’s presence under the Eucharistic species is unique. It raises the Eucharist above all the sacraments as “the perfection of the spiritual life and the end to which all the sacraments tend.” In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist “the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really, and substantially contained.”

“This presence is called ‘real’ – by which is not intended to exclude the other types of presence as if they could not be ‘real’ too, but because it is presence in the fullest sense: that is to say, it is a substantial presence by which Christ, God and man, makes himself wholly and entirely present.” When we say we do NOT believe in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, that is NOT what the Church believes, teaches, and requires as what is due to God in Christ Jesus. It is essentially mutinous to say, “I don’t care what the Church wants be to believe. I can only believe what I can believe! You cannot tell me how to worship! I know what you want, but I don’t want what you want; I want what I want!” Very dangers words indeed!! That’s basically the same argument used by Lucifer.

The Worship of God is what we offer with the utmost sincerity and honor as is his due – and his requirement. Remember, Jesus stated the two Greatest Commandments – You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the Prophets. (See Matthew 22:36-40) To Love and Obey God, Jesus tells us we must give him the reverence, respect, awe, and worship he deserves and expects. That includes participating in the Eucharist in full faith knowing that we are experiencing the Real Presence of Christ’s Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity. If we are going up to Communion with anything less in our hearts, we are mutineers and at risk of severe condemnation.

When we say we believe that Christ is “consubstantial with the Father,” we mean that he is of the same substance as the Father. So it is also with the elements of the Eucharist – they are of the same substance of the Christ of God – they are The Real Presence. He is indeed present to us “through him, with him, and in him” as O Sacrament Most Holy (↔ Music Link). Thus, the Eucharist is the perfect core and operating system of the Absolutely Perfect Plan, God’s own APP. We are One Body in this One Lord! (↔ Music Link) For non–Christians, this idea is absurd, even bizarre and disgusting. Even among the early Disciples of Jesus, this teaching offended many and they just said, “That’s enough! I’m outta here.” I took some time to discern whether or not to add this passage – rather than just a link to it – and I believe it’s important to plant it firmly here (another mystery). One of the Key Verses for today is from John 6. Here is that passage in context:

John 6:50-65 – ⁵⁰This is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that one may eat of it and not die. ⁵¹I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats of this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.” (↔ Click Link for full content)

This is the revelation of the Mystery of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ. If I TRUST what God tells me, I believe Scripture, know it comes to us through Apostolic Tradition, and is presented to us through the Magisterium of the Church. (See more on TRUST below) We can believe it, or not. In my case, it’s sort of like “believe it or else.” The “or else” for me would be to contradict what I see in Scripture:
TABLE:

τοῦτό ἐστιν τὸ σῶμά μου
touto estin to* sōma mou
this is* the body of me
* “omnitemporal” was, is, will be

That is in my mind whenever I receive the Precious Body and Precious Blood (↔ Music Link). It is neither my goal nor my desire to convince you, dear reader, that this and this only is correct. I believe it is TRUE. IF you believe as I do, what I have written here should not offend you. IF you do not believe as I do, what I have written here might, perchance, offend you – scandalize you – but my purpose here is only to state my slight understanding of a Great Mystery (mystērion) of Faith. Further, after much searching interiorly and exteriorly, I am convinced that

If the road to Hell is paved with good intentions,
then the road to Heaven is paved with good works.

Not that one is saved by works, but that good works arise from the actualization of good intent – they are a product of F.A.I.T.H. in action. More than wisdom, more than religion, more than rites and sacrifices, God commands us to Trust, Love, and Obey him. On that point I want to share with you something I learned earlier this week at our Parish Mission. For those of you who are unfamiliar with that term, it is usually a guest speaker brought in to conduct inspirational instruction for a Parish Community.

Our Mission Director was Fr. Jim Sichko who can be described as “Priest, Preacher, Papal Missionary of Mercy, Evangelist, Event Planner & Sauce Maker (See www.frjims.com) He was selected by Pope Francis I to travel the world to deliver the Gospel in every corner – as Jesus commanded. Here is a very brief summary (including commentary from the Holy Spirit as he spoke) of his explanation of TRUST during #60MIN4JESUS:

T for Time – if we are to TRUST God, that means we spend time with him. I find that the more I trust him, the more time I spend with him.

R for Relationship – We learn to speak our heart and mind to God, and then we learn to close our mouth and listen. You have 168 hours a week available to be with him. Use it.

U for Understanding – God never promised he would give us everything we want; however, he does give us everything we need. Sometimes that includes pain in ways that help us grow closer to him and to each other.

S for Surrender – Let God be God, not us. It is God’s Will which we must Trust, Love, and Obey, not ours. God IS God, and we are not.

T for Try – Try to make the effort to stay reconciled with God in the Sacraments. Tell the priest whatever you need to repent. And remember, repent means to turn around, and in order to turn around you first have to stop.

When I take notes during a Homily or a Mission, it’s always a three-way conversation. There is what the Holy Spirit is telling the speaker, what the speaker is telling me, and what the Holy Spirit helps me write down as we listen. Over the past 20 or so years, not one speaker has ever told me, “Hey, you! Put that notebook away!” It is also true that often “The Healing Word” (↔ Learning Link) suggests part of the content of an MBN post. In this post, God has given me the Bounty of his love and direction so thatI will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the name of the Lord instead of throwing my own little mutiny about his extraordinary generosity. We can TRUST in God because Jesus has paid the full price for our sinfulness with his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption. We are reminded of that every time we see this:

If we are unwilling to surrender to God our gratitude for the Sacrifice of his Only Begotten Son as expiation for our sins, then we are participants in a mutiny that deserves – and will receive – isolation from the source of All that is Good. Instead let us strive to join all who have gone before us marked with the Sign of Faith, and pray to Our Father, “There, with the whole of creation, freed from the corruption of sin and death, may we glorify you through Christ our Lord, through whom you bestow on the world All that is Good.”

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!

Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

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Aloha Friday Message – May 24, 2024 – Famous Last Words

May 24, 2024

2421AFC052424 – Famous Last Words ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

Deuteronomy 4:39 – ³⁹So acknowledge today and take to heart that the Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other.

Psalm 33:6-9 –
⁶By the word of the Lord the heavens were made,
and all their host by the breath of his mouth.
⁷He gathered the waters of the sea as in a bottle;
he put the deeps in storehouses.

⁸Let all the earth fear* the Lord; *reverence
let all the inhabitants of the world stand in awe of him.
⁹For he spoke, and it came to be;
he commanded, and it stood firm.

Romans 8:12-15 – ¹²So then, brothers and sisters,* we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh — ¹³for if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. ¹⁴For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. ¹⁵For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba!** Father!”
* Greek adelphos – brethren ** Aramaic word for “Dad”

Matthew 28:18-20 – ¹⁸And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him. This weekend we will celebrate the Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity. (↔ Music Link) This is one concept that baffles us. There is a saying, “If you have faith, you don’t need proof. If you need proof, you don’t have faith.” It seems to me that all Mysteries are like that – black or white, true or untrue, avoidable or unavoidable. If we accept the Truth of a Mystery we are called gullible or astute. If we deny the Truth of a Mystery we are called … gullible or astute. What, then, are we to do with this fundamental Mystery of Faith – One God in Three Persons, Blessed Trinity? (↔ Music Link)

Perhaps the most basic question is “How would we know?” How would we know if God is Three Divine Persons? How do we know if God is? If God’s True Name is I AM THAT I AM, and the Shema says “Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One,” then I AM is One. The Catholic Encyclopedia (↔ Click Link) states: An absolute mystery is a truth whose existence or possibility could not be discovered by a creature, and whose essence (inner substantial being) can be expressed by the finite mind only in terms of analogy, e.g., the Trinity. Logically, one cannot be three; but Mysteries are not logical, and so no logical explanation is possible. We have to use another source to understand Mysteries, and that source is also a Mystery: Scripture.

2 Timothy 3:16-17 tells us – ¹⁶All scripture is inspired by God and is useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, ¹⁷so that everyone who belongs to God may be proficient, equipped for every good work. God’s Word is inspired by God, and as such would not exist had God not decreed it. Yep. Circular logic. If we know God, we believe his Word. If we believe his Word, we know God. for that to be True, God must be Universal, and SURPRISE, SURPRISE, Moses told the Israelites that “The Lord is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath; there is no other.” In our Key Verse from the Gospel, Jesus tells the Apostles and Disciples, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.” Jesus has the same authority as God, so is he a “second God” who is Holy and Worthy of Praise? (↔ Music Link)

No, that is a heresy; in fact that supposition might fit into a number of the many heresies that plagued the Church over the past 2000 years. I refer to this kind of heretical supposition as “superstitious knowledge.” The folks who come up with this baloney (mostly men!) claim to possess knowledge imparted specifically to them as unsurmountable proof of their convictions which are rarely (if ever) actually “inspired by God.” In other words, their “guesses” about the nature of God are based on no substantive reality. It’s kind of like saying a clock tells time “because maybe the rays from the sun move the hands on the clock.” Should we all claim to be agnostic then? Is God so unknowable that we shouldn’t even try? Who can answer that for us? The answer is – and is not – surprising.

God – our Triune God – can answer all the questions we have. Let’s take a look at Romans 8:26-27 – ²⁶Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. ²⁷And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. Christ has the authority of God over Heaven and Earth and there is only one God with only one authority, and that God is the Holy Spirit who intercedes with the Father and the Son on behalf of all Believers. The Apostle Paul begins this proof by pointing out the testimony God has given to us about himself in Romans 1:18-21 – ¹⁸For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and wickedness of those who by their wickedness suppress the truth. ¹⁹For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. ²⁰Ever since the creation of the world his eternal power and divine nature, invisible though they are, have been understood and seen through the things he has made. So they are without excuse; ²¹for though they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their senseless minds were darkened.

“The Truth is out there,” and in our hearts and minds as well. We only have to look and see. I’m going to hop in the Wayback Machine to 2012 for a bit where I wrote about radiolarians.

Here’s what my heart and mind tell me: Whether you’re talking about Intelligent Design and Irreducible Complexity or Random Systematic Evolution and Natural Selection or “In the Beginning, God…” it all comes down to “How do I know God exists?” I personally see and feel the evidence of His existence which he has placed before me. I recall a time at Huntingdon College during my Junior Year when for the first time I saw a radiolarian through a microscope. The one I saw looked a lot like this one:

One type of radiolarium

This is a living microscopic protozoan called a radiolarian (↔ Learning Link). Well, it was alive once. The one I saw was fixed and stained on a microscope slide. There were others like it on the same slide, and other radiolarians that were quite different. There are so many different kinds of these things that one wonders how they were ever given names. And there are people who devote their lives to finding, studying, and classifying these amazing microscopic critters that end up as part of the plankton soup that runs the oceans. When I saw it, I recall saying, “I don’t see how anyone could look at this and not believe in God.” Now someone else can look at the same critter and say, “I don’t see how anyone can look at this and not believe in Intelligent Design.” Or even, “I don’t see how anyone can look at this and not believe in the power of evolution.” What’s the common factor in all of those statements of belief? Give yourself a few seconds here to think up an answer.

<<<<<<PAUSE>>>>>>

Yes, you are correct. None of those statements say, “I don’t see how anyone can look at this and not realize it created itself.” Did it evolve? Some think so. Did the Id of Creation make it? Perhaps. Did God do that? Probably; but, I only say probably because it is only one radiolarian. When I know there are bazillions of them just within a mile of the coasts of Kauai, and then think about how many are in the entire width, breadth, and depths of all the saltwater oceans of the world and have been there since the time oceans first existed, I see something bigger and better than Intelligent Design, or Evolution; I see Creation, and that is the beginning of the dawning light. Remember I said (See the previous post at 1222AFC060112), “If you, as a human being, take on any part of the ‘Is God Real’ question, you ultimately end up buying into the entirety of the Mystery of Faith” earlier in this post? That’s one first-part and there are about as many ways to find a first-part idea as there are radiolarians in the sea. The evidence for God and his Creation are everywhere. From the inside of our bodies, to the entirety of the ocean, to the immensity of the universe. The evidence is there. God is not the Universe (nor is it the other way around). God is in the Universe and in everything that is in the Universe (including you and me), but he is separate from everything in and of the Universe. How do I know? The Bible tells me so. (↔ Music Link) “Yeah, but who can believe the Bible? What kind of argument is that?” It is precisely the kind of argument The Apostle Paul warned us about in Romans 1. In fact, if you can find a good Bible study about the book of Romans, get it! We’re going to close with the best evidence God gave us to help us understand that he is God and we are not.

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba!** Father!” John 1:12 – ¹²But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God. 2 Timothy 1:6 ^b-7 – ^{6 b} I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands; ⁷for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice, but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline. Jesus’ Power is the Universal Power of our One God in Three Persons. He clothed the Apostles with his Universal Power by giving them a Universal Mission – to make disciples of all nations. When we believe in God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, we are united with the Most Holy Trinity through the Rite of Baptism by baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. That is because For he spoke, and it came to be; he commanded, and it stood firm. All of that brings us to the beautiful and famous last words of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew: And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age. How could he be with us as Emanuel unless he is here? I know, it’s a Mystery. AMEN.

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!

Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

Dearly Belovéd, please join with us in prayer for our Great-Niece Marie A. Johnson. A recent very serious illness has decimated her health. She is being moved to hospice. Please pray for her family – husband and son and daughter – as well as her mom, sisters, cousins, aunts, uncles, friends and all of us who have been the beneficiaries of her steadfast Love. A miracle is not out of reach. Thank you.

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

Posted in Aloha Friday Messages, Links, MUSIC!, Podcast, Prayer Requests, Something new, Something Old
Tags: Art, Biblical Languages, For sharing, Multiple Scripture references on topic, Music, PODCAST, Scripture study

Aloha Friday Message – May 17, 2024 – Spirit of the Living God

May 17, 2024

2420AFC051724 – Spirit of the Living God ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

Acts 2:1 – ¹ When the day of Pentecost had come, they were all together in one place.

Psalm 104:30 – ³⁰When you send forth your spirit, they are created;
and you renew the face of the Earth.

1 Corinthians 12:3 ^b – … no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except by the Holy Spirit.

John 20:21-22 – ²¹Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” ²²When he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”

Aloha nui loa, ʻŌmea! Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. The holy Season of Eastertide is drawing to a close. This coming Sunday is Pentecost Sunday, and therefore the Birthday of The Church. It’s a very familiar story – or at least it certainly should be – and so today we’ll skip the descriptions of that miraculous event, and just talk about what the Holy Spirit has to do with these posts, the coming celebration, and why I hold it in such high esteem.

If you read these messages regularly, you know I keep a list of favorites.

Favorite Psalm – 138
Favorite Solemnity – The Ascension
Favorite Gospel – John
Favorite Gospel verse – John 3:17
Favorite Old-Time Hymn – Ivory Palaces

One of the reasons I treasure Pentecost so much is that it goes back millennia to the Festivals decreed by God in Leviticus 23. (See 1221AFC052512 Pentecost for details. There is a lot of good information for you there.) Also – if you’ll go back and look at the post from 2012 – Pentecost is in the middle of the 7 Feasts or Festivals, (Shavu’ot: The Feast of Weeks or Festival of Harvest). Whenever God puts something in the very middle of what he wants or what he creates (same-same those are), it turns out to be very special and important. Pentecost comes at the end of Eastertide, and it’s a pretty long wait – 50 days like the name says – so it’s like a really big reward for that wait. In more recent times, it commemorates what is perhaps the defining moment in the history of Israel: the Giving of the Law to Moses. All those connections serve to hold my fascination with this important day in World History. Something that many of us never really think about is the situating of the event. Everybody is involved. No occupational work, a full day of celebratory rest – much like Shabbat (the Sabbath). A day to honor the Lord by giving him the firstfruits of everything. As we see in our Key Verse from the Second Chapter of Acts, everyone was together in the same place. This aspect of Pentecost also affirms one of the quintessential aspects of God being The I AM – it is done as community, for community, in community, because God is community. In my heart that is just way-far cool.

Not many things are cooler than that, at least not without God’s putting it into the Absolutely Perfect Plan, and so on the Feast of Pentecost God the Father – who gives us the firstfruits of his community, Jesus – follows up with “The Lord, the Giver of Life.” You’ll remember that in Genesis 1, the Ru’ach – the Spirit or the Breath of the Lord was the Power-in-motion at the start of “In The Beginning.” Jesus had told the Apostles gathered into the Cenacle (The Upper Room) that they would receive Power when the Father sent them the Holy Spirit. Whenever I try to imagine that day, I end up grinning at their astonishment of what’s happening because it is absolutely astonishing! It started off big and then got BIGGER, AND BIGGER! The World was changed in a matter of minutes. That’s not a throw-away sentence. It’s a FACT! God sent forth the Spirit, and the face of the Earth was renewed. Wouldn’t we all want to be there in that moment? We can, you know.

Many of us will remember this Prayer to the Holy Spirit –

Come, Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of Thy faithful and enkindle in them the fire of Thy Holy Love. Send forth Thy Spirit and they shall be created. And Thou shalt renew the face of the earth.
O God, who by the Light of the Holy Spirit instruct the hearts of your faithful, grant us by the same Spirit to be truly wise and ever rejoice in his consolation.

V. You, O Lord shall open their lips
R. and their tongues shall announce Thy praise.
V. Incline unto our aid O God.
R. O Lord make haste to help us.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Through Christ Our Lord. AMEN.

This is the prayer I always use when I sit down in front of my keyboard to get a post started. The prayer is followed by a short song, another one of those treasures from my childhood, called Spirit of the Living God. (↔ Music Link) Both of these might be prayed aloud or both silently; it is then that I know we are ready to work together. I have learned that this is an important first step, a primary objective toward the goal of ensuring that what goes into the post turns out to be the proclamation, “Jesus is Lord.” The entire purpose of these posts is to make Scripture more accessible so that, together, we give Glory and Praise to Our God (↔ Music Link) He always is Jesus the Lord. (↔ Music Link) The Apostle Paul found very clever ways to plant that seed of faith in the people who would listen to him.

One example we can cite is in Acts 17:26-28 –²⁶From one ancestor [Adam] he made all nations to inhabit the whole earth, and he allotted the times of their existence and the boundaries of the places where they would live, ²⁷so that they would search for God and perhaps grope for him and find him—though indeed he is not far from each one of us. ²⁸For ‘In him we live and move and have our being’; as even some of your own poets have said,
‘For we too are his offspring.’ This was spoken to a crowd of Stoic and Epicurean philosophers on the Areopagus in Athens. The first quote from the Apostle Paul is by a well-known poet of the region, one Epimenides of Crete (or another Athenian poet). Apparently it had its desired effect because some of them indicated they would like to hear more. The Apostle Paul was telling them that all their handmade gods were useless whereas the One, True, Living God was the origin and sustaining of all Life. When he also told them the account of Jesus’ passion, death, Resurrection, and Ascension, some waved him off as more-than-dubious, but the others … well, they were very interested in hearing more. The second quote about being “his offspring” was from a Cilician Stoic named Aratus. In this way, The Apostle Paul led his listeners to consider that their gods (Zeus, for example) might be “shadows” of a Greater God. Whenever we reflect on the spread of the Early church through the Apostles, we see that Jesus’ promise about the Holy Spirit: “the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you everything, and remind you of all that I have said to you.” (See John 14:25-26) the Holy Spirit is sent to us in Jesus’ name to teach and remind us of all that Jesus wants us to hear, and every word of it comes from El Olam – the Everliving God.

At this point, I am going to yield to the Spirit and close with a trio of music links. I don’t wish to overburden you with more words. There is a quote attributed to St. Augustine: “He who sings once prays twice.” Or something like that! 😉 These things are also true:

There is an Absolutely Perfect Plan
YOLO-F is the real (and only) deal
Jesus is Lord
Jesus Loves you, and so do I.
If you like the prayer and the music, save them for future use.

Spirit and Grace (↔ Music Link)

Veni Sancte Spiritus (↔ Music Link)

Come Holy Spirit (↔ Music Link)

Romans 15:13 – ¹³May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Psalm 51:11 –
¹¹Do not cast me away from your presence,
and do not take your holy spirit from me.

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!

Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

Sprit of the Living God (↔ Music Link just in case you missed it)

Indeed, receive the Holy Spirit and renew the F.A.I.T.H. of the Earth!

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

Posted in Aloha Friday Messages, God's Absolutely Perfect Plan, History, Links, MUSIC!, Podcast, Prayer Requests, Reptentance, Something new, Standard Prayers, THE APP, YOLO-F
Tags: Art, Biblical Languages, For sharing, History, Lists, MORE Music!, MORE Scripture!, Music, PODCAST, Prayer Request, Scripture study, Something New, The APP!, YOLO-F

Aloha Friday Message – May 10, 2024 – Believe it or else, too

May 10, 2024

2419AFC051024 – Believe it or else, too ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

Mark 16:6-16 – ⁹Now after he [Jesus] rose early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven demons. ¹⁰She went out and told those who had been with him, while they were mourning and weeping. ¹¹But when they heard that he was alive and had been seen by her, they would not believe it. ¹²After this he appeared in another form to two of them, as they were walking into the country. ¹³And they went back and told the rest, but they did not believe them. ¹⁴Later he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were sitting at the table; and he upbraided them for their lack of faith and stubbornness, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen. ¹⁵And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the good news to the whole creation. ¹⁶The one who believes and is baptized will be saved; but the one who does not believe will be condemned.
Ephesians 1:17-19 – ¹⁷I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation as you come to know him, ¹⁸so that, with the eyes of your heart enlightened (↔ Music Link), you may know what is the hope to which he has called you, what are the riches of his glorious inheritance among the saints, ¹⁹and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power for us who believe, according to the working of his great power.

Acts 1:10-11 – (NIV)[1] ¹⁰They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. ¹¹“Men of Galilee,” they said, “why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven.”

Aloha nui loa, ʻŌmea! Grace and Peace to each of you from God our Father and our Lord, Jesus the Christ, in the Power of the Holy Spirit. I must compliment you on your excellent memory if today’s title sounds familiar. That same title appeared in a post on May 28, 2021. There may be some similarities, but overall the content is different. Readers who have been reading these posts since 2021 may remember that The Ascension is, for me, the most reassuring passage in Scripture. Why? Because it states unequivocally that Jesus is coming back in the same way he was seen going back up into Heaven. There are many other things in Scripture associated with that event, but for me and my heart they are all secondary to the assurance that he’s going to be coming back. Many in the Early Church believed that his return was even imminent – surely occurring in their lifetimes. Throughout the ensuing centuries, many “Prophets” have assured us that Jesus will arrive on a specific date.

We know better – or at least we should! “It is not for you to know the hour or the seasons …” I’m OK with that because the hour and the seasons are also secondary for me and my heart. He told us he would come back. The “men in White” told us he had been raised and will be coming back. The Church Fathers have told us he’s coming back. That’s enough evidence to convince me; but then, I have 2000+ years of history, teaching, theology, and F.A.I.T.H. under my belt. The Apostles and Disciples present with Jesus at the instant of his Ascension had only about 40 days to get used to the idea that he was leaving now and would be back “later.” To paraphrase a phrase, “We’ve been waiting over two-thousand years. What’s another couple of weeks, or centuries for that matter?” Since we don’t (can’t) know, there exists no reason whatsoever to give up Hope or be discouraged because today is not the day (or is it? Time will tell!) We all know that verse about “a day is a thousand years in God’s sight,” (See 2 Peter 3:8) so for God it could be tomorrow or the day after. I may or may not be a corporeal being when it happens. NO BIGGIE! I’ve already got a good head-start at Everlasting Life. Some of the people I know would be surprised at that. A subset of those would be convinced I was off my rocker and a smaller group would think I was just bragging – or totally ignorant. It does not matter to me. It does, however, matter to God.

It matters because if I fail to believe what God and his messengers (Prophets, Angels, Apostles, and other similarly-qualified persons), then it’s like calling God a liar. Everybody knows that’s a bad idea! Recall the words of Gabriel to Mary: “For nothing will be impossible with God.” (See Luke 1:37) Mary believed that, and so she said “Yes.” I believe it, and I, too, say “Yes nothing is impossible with God.” Again, I reiterate that we have had a lot more time to think about this than the Apostles and Disciples did. We have evidence of this just up the page from our Key Verses in Acts of the Apostles at Acts 1:6 – ⁶So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” Jesus was so patient with them! He knew what would happen when the Holy Spirit came to them at Pentecost. They were still stuck in the Davidic image of the Messiah as a military leader that would liberate Israel from their oppressors – at the time, Rome. Jesus had told them multiple times that he would suffer greatly at the hands of their leaders, would die, and be raised up on the third day. They believed he was the Messiah, that he was the Son of God, but could not grasp the Truth of his Prophecy of death and Resurrection. We read in Matthew’s account of the Great Commission in Matthew 28:17 – ¹⁷When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted.

Even the presence of two Men in White could not convince those who doubted. Their motto would be something like, “I did see it, but I just can’t believe it.” This reminds me of a passage in the book of Proverbs.
Proverbs 11:31 –
³¹If the righteous are repaid on earth,
how much more the wicked and the sinner! This was quoted by The Apostle Peter in
1 Peter 4:18 – ¹⁸And
“If it is hard for the righteous to be saved,
what will become of the ungodly and the sinners?” When I first studied the Ascension back in the mid-50’s, I was using the King James Version. In that translation, the statement is “This same Jesus.” In the translation I usually use, the word “same” is not present. That’s why I put the NIV quote in this post. When I’m serving as a Lector and read that verse, I emphasize the word THIS instead of the name of Jesus – most readers will say, “This Jesus.” It comes out as “T H I S … Jesus” so that the word “same” is replaced by a brief silence, and that emphasizes the demonstrative article “this.” The absolutely undeniable FACT that it will be this, and only this, Jesus is a difference we must be aware of in our F.A.I.T.H. one might say, “Well, isn’t that kind of silly being that specific? I mean, who else would it be?” After the first 2000 years of study, I agree; but back then, “some doubted.” The Greek word – οὗτος – used in this passage is very specific and means this one, the one visibly present here, the one just named and none other than this one. There’s not another one, there’s no way it could be someone else. It will be precisely, exactly, permanently that same guy you just saw take off into the clouds. It is HE who will return to you. (See 1917AFC042619 – THIS is important for more about οὗτος (oútos) {hoo-tohs or oo-tohs} as it appears in verse 11 (↔ Click Link)

At this point I invite you to find and read 2021AFC052220 – What is doubt? Now, of course, all of us know what doubt is. I could even say, “I doubt very, very few people are uncertain about doubt.” But before that, I want to recall some “tough-guy talk.” We’re familiar with the phrase, “Believe it or not” from the long-running newspaper funnies feature Ripley’s Believe It Or Not. Here’s one example. “Believe it or else” is a take-off on that catch phrase. The tough talk was a comeback, “Or else what?” The first place in Scripture that we find the answer “or else this!” is in Deuteronomy 1:32 during the Desert Wanderings. Spies had been sent up into Canaan to assess the threat of the nations they would face. In the verses before this one, most of the spies spread doubt and fear saying that the inhabitants are fierce giants. Only Joshua and Caleb believe Israel can prevail. Despite all that God had done for them to bring them out of Egypt and to protect them, they did not trust God to help them prevail against that threat. The “or else” turned out to be forty years of wandering, a whole generation dying out, and, eventually they still had to fight those people. When the Apostles who had not seen Jesus heard the accounts of those who had, they did not believe it despite all the miraculous things Jesus had already done in their presence.

Again, Jesus was patient with them, but throughout his ministry, he did not chase after those who would not believe. He allowed them to choose between belief and unbelief. For those who chose belief, they experienced the Kingdom of Heaven. Those who chose unbelief did not experience that. These are the same consequences we can earn for the same choices – believe it or else. Belief, F.A.I.T.H., is rewarded with an eternity in the presence of God. Unbelief, F.E.A.R., is rewarded with an eternity outside the presence of God. Believe it or else, or believe it or not. And, of course, it’s in the APP.

Sorry for being late with this. SOMEthing got hold of me Wednesday afternoon and I had zero energy for about 48 hours and slept for about 40 of those.

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!

Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

Posted in Aloha Friday Messages, God's Absolutely Perfect Plan, Links, MUSIC!, Podcast, Prayer Requests, THE APP
Tags: Art, Biblical Languages, For sharing, Multiple Scripture references on topic, Music, PODCAST, Prayer Request, Scripture study, Something Old

Aloha Friday Message – May 3, 2024 – Keeping His Word.

May 3, 2024

2418AFC050324 – Keeping His Word. ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

Acts 10:25-26 – ²⁵On Peter’s arrival Cornelius met him, and falling at his feet, worshiped him. ²⁶But Peter made him get up, saying, “Stand up; I am only a mortal.”

Psalm 98:3 –
³He has remembered his steadfast love and faithfulness
to the house of Israel.
All the ends of the earth have seen
the victory of our God.

John 15:9-17 – ⁹As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. ¹⁰If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. ¹¹I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete.

¹²“This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. ¹⁴You are my friends if you do what I command you. ¹⁵I do not call you servants^[^a^] any longer, because the servant^[^b^] does not know what the master is doing; but I have called you friends, because I have made known to you everything that I have heard from my Father. ¹⁶You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. ¹⁷I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.

1 John 4:7 – ⁷Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God.

Grace, mercy, and peace will be with us from God the Father and from our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father’s Son, in truth and love. Aloha nui loa, ʻŌmea!. Here we are at the Sixth Sunday of Easter. Two more Sundays until Pentecost, and my favorite New Testament reading. More on that later. Right now we have some astonishing Scripture passages to feast on.

Today’s post could have been called, “Who do you know?” I ask you, then, do you know Cornelius?

You see in our Key Verse that The Apostle Peter went to visit a man named Cornelius, a Centurion in the Italian Regiment stationed in Cæsarea. Cæsarea was an important port at the Western shore of Israel. He was a very devout man, perhaps a convert to Judaism but that’s unlikely. He was, however, very generous in giving alms and support to Jews in his area. He had a dream in which a man in brilliant light appeared and told him to send for “Simon who is called Peter” who was staying in the house of Simon the Tanner in Joppa. That’s about 30 miles from Cæsarea. He sent trusted members of his household to bring The Apostle Peter to him.

The Apostle Peter – who had been praying on the rooftop of Simon’s house and was feeling hungry – also had a vision in which he saw a large number of unclean animals – food that was forbidden to devout Jews – and a commanding Voice told him to “Get up, Peter; kill and eat.” This happened three times and each time, The Apostle Peter refused to eat what was profane. Then the voice said to him “What God has made clean, you must not call profane.” Just as that experience ended, the men from Cæsarea arrived, told him what Cornelius wanted, and he went with them. Meanwhile Cornelius was anxiously waiting for their return. We can imagine he would have been a bit rattled by his vision. Roman Centurions saw a lot of gruesome and dangerous things, but a brilliantly shining messenger from God was totally out of his wheelhouse! If the messenger was so spectacular, what indeed must be “Simon who is called Peter” be like!?

We can see that when he finally did arrive, Cornelius fell at the Apostle’s feet in humble homage. The Apostle Peter understood God’s message about the unclean animals. He, an Apostle of Jesus, was no longer to call the gentile profane, for God had created them to be coheirs in the Family of God. He told Cornelius to get up because he, too, was merely a mortal man like him. Cornelius was very devout, very generous and kind, but he did not know Jesus. The Apostle Peter knew Jesus and now was charged with Jesus’ command to “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you.” (See Matthew 28:19-20) “All nations” included all the gentile nations. As The Apostle Peter explained about Jesus’ Gospel and the history of his life and death, while he was speaking, the Holy Spirit welled up in all the gentiles and they were speaking in tongues and glorifying God. The Apostle Peter ordered that all of them should be Baptized as Jesus had commanded.

Now, I’ve given you a condensed version of Acts of the Apostles, Chapter 10 (↔ Click Link), but I strongly encourage you to go back and read it a couple of more times. Cornelius may have been the first gentile convert. He did not fully know or understand the God worshipped by the Jews. He did know that God expected worship, generosity, kindness, and reverence. After meeting The Apostle Peter, he did know God, and shared in the JOY of the Holy Spirit with The Apostle Peter. His life-changing “come to Jesus” moment is a serious lesson for us. It is insufficient to be “merely Christian” (See Mere Christianity by C. S. Lewis ← Seriously, read this book.) All of Cornelius’ good deeds were just that, good deeds. But after he came to know Jesus and was Baptized in Jesus’ name and confirmed in the Holy Spirit, all of his goodness was given as obedience to Jesus’ command to Love.

Belovéd, as we well know, that command most definitely applies to every believer. The Apostle John reminds us ⁷Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. We might ask, “Well, didn’t Cornelius show love in all his goodness to the Jews?” Yes, it was indeed a form of love called PHILIA φιλία (philia) {fil-i-ah}. This is a pretty familiar root-word and we see it in other words like “audiophile”, Philadelphia, and Theophilus. It is “brotherly/sisterly love,” and is usually associated with dignity and respect of and for others. The minimum number of persons required for this kind of love is two, and there is no maximum number. What Jesus calls – yea, commands – is AGAPE ἀγάπη, (agápē) {ah-gah-ee}. Agape is the LOVE that transcends all other forms. In the New Testament, this is the verb used to characterize the LOVE that God has. We’ve all heard of AGAPE love, in fact I’ve mentioned it several times in these Aloha Friday Messages. Here, however, is something new and different I learned from Father Al Rubadello many years ago:

Agape LOVE is a love that can only exist for three or more persons. It is a love that grows out of community, not self. God is LOVE and God is Three Persons. When a couple shares agape LOVE, it usually includes him, her, and God; that’s five persons. Agape love is not self-based and as so is not self-serving. Agape love carries with it no preconceptions, no prejudices; it is that kind of love that is usually called “unconditional.” Some folks think that only God can love unconditionally. I do not. My wife and kids prove it. They still love me despite the times I have not have always loved them as well as I could. (See 1519AFC050815 – Do you love me? For details, please.)

So, Belovéd, what can we say about this?: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you.” We’ve said several times that “as I have loved” means “in direct proportion.” We could read this quote from John 15:12 as “This is my requirement for the end-result of my Love: that you love all of each of you in exactly the same manner and degree as I have loved you.” Again: This is my requirement for the end-result of my Love: that you Love all of each of you in exactly the same manner and degree as I have Loved you. And oh, HOW Jesus has Loved us! “As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love.” That’s no easy-peezy sort of Love, is it? As I look at those words on the page, I am convicted of my innumerable failures – some of them monumental – to live up to that one, basic rule that underlies all of Scripture, Tradition, and Teaching: Love God and one another exactly as you have been told and shown. (↔ Music Link) That is consistent with what we heard last week about keeping our connection with the True Vine. We know that God tells us he Loves us constantly. How often we fail to return that Love! How often we let the Foe infest our connections to the True Vine with the devouring spirits of selfishness, greed, and duplicity. Who do we know that can overcome sinfulness like that, and STILL say, “I Love you like Fod my Father Loves you?” I will show you again our Key Verse from the Psalms
Psalm 98:3 –
³He has remembered his steadfast love and faithfulness
to the house of Israel.
All the ends of the earth have seen
the victory of our God.

That victory is the victory over sin and death. There is only one way to claim that Victory, and that is to be in the Army of the Lord wearing our full armor. (↔ Music Link) We must put away all foolishness and weaknesses, all that is carnal within us. Remember what Jesus told his Disciples (that’s you and me, kiddos) “ You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. ¹⁷I am giving you these commands so that you may love one another.” I really want to copy and paste all of Colossians 3 ← HERE, but I will instead implore you to follow that link. It will take less than three minutes to read the whole thing, If you read all the notes and cross-references, it will still take only about 15 minutes of your day, I assure you, that will be time well-spent.

ʻŌmea, we know Jesus. Jesus knows us. He has called us by name and we follow him. Jesus Loves us just as much as God, his Father, Loves him, and together they both love us as much as does the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life. We will close with part of the Second Reading 1 John 4:9-10 – ⁹God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. ¹⁰In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. that indeed is worth repeating – and remembering! In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins. Remember this?

GOD ≡ LIGHT ≡ LOVE ≡ TRUTH ≡ WAY ≡ LIFE ≡ ETERNAL ≡ MERCY ≡ GOD (↔ Music Link – really!)

Who do we Love? Who do we know? Who is it that always Loves us first? Why? Why does HE ask us to Love precisely as he Loves? The answer is mysteriously simple. We are keeping HIS Word to us, HIS command to Love him and each other. “This is my requirement for the end-result of my Love: that you love all of each of you in exactly the same manner and degree as I have loved you and God, your Father, Loves you and ME.” We’ve got his word on it, and we know it is worthy of our trust and obedience. Keep his Word.

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!

Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

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Tags: Biblical Languages, For sharing, MORE Scripture!, Multiple Scripture references on topic, Music, PODCAST, Prayer Request, Scripture study

Aloha Friday Message – April 26, 2024 – Now, cut that out!

April 26, 2024

2417AFC042624 – Now, cut that out! ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

Acts 9:27 – ²⁷But Barnabas took him [The Apostle Paul], brought him to the apostles, and described for them how on the road he had seen the Lord, who had spoken to him, and how in Damascus he had spoken boldly in the name of Jesus.

Psalm 22:30-31 –
³⁰Posterity will serve him;
future generations will be told about the Lord,
³¹and proclaim his deliverance to a people yet unborn,
saying that he has done it.

1 John 3:21-24 – ²¹Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have boldness before God; ²²and we receive from him whatever we ask, because we obey his commandments and do what pleases him.
²³And this is his commandment, that we should believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us. ²⁴All who obey his commandments abide in him, and he abides in them. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit that he has given us.

John 15:1-5 – ¹ “I am The True Vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. ²He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes* to make it bear more fruit. ³You have already been cleansed* by the word that I have spoken to you. ⁴Abide in me as I abide in you. Just as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. ⁵I am the vine, (↔ Music Link), you are the branches. Those who abide in me and I in them bear much fruit, because apart from me you can do nothing.”
*καθαιρει – Cleaned inside and out, renewed for growth. kathaírō – make clean by purging (removing undesirable elements); hence, “pruned (purged)”; eliminating what is fruitless by purifying (making unmixed).

E pili mau na pomaika‘i ia ‘oe a me ke akua ho‘omaika‘i ‘oe, ʻŌmea! (May blessing always be with you and may God bless you, Beloved!) Last week we explored Good Shepherd Sunday. Today, we hear Jesus’ assurance that he is the True Vine. This weekend marks the Fifth Sunday in the Octave of Easter. The first reading this Sunday is not from the Old Testament but rather from the Acts of the Apostles. As we have previously stated, the word Apostle comes from the Greek apostolos {ap-os’-tol-os} word which means sent as in one sent forward with information or under orders. We also recall that Jesus chose 12 men who were at first his Disciples. Please read the following list carefully because you might notice that some persons we call Apostles are not in that list in Luke 6:13-16 – ¹³And when day came, he called his disciples and chose twelve of them, whom he also named apostles: ¹⁴Simon, whom he named Peter, and his brother Andrew, and James, and John, and Philip, and Bartholomew, ¹⁵and Matthew, and Thomas, and James son of Alphaeus, and Simon, who was called the Zealot, ¹⁶and Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor. They were Disciples at first, but when Jesus sent them out in pairs (See Mark 6:7-13, 30) they were then Apostles for they had completed the purpose for which Jesus sent them.

One apostle not in that list but often heard from here is The Apostle Paul who was confronted by the resurrected Jesus on the road to Damascus. There are others who may be considered Apostles because they were sent by the Church in Jerusalem to carry the Gospel to the gentile nations. Several were companions of The Apostle Paul: Barnabas, Silvanus, Silas, Timothy, Luke, and John called Mark (or John Mark, the author of the Gospel according to Mark), and others who served as missionaries. There is an interesting list of Companions of The Apostle Paul that is worth a cautious reading. (The company providing that information is a Travel Agency.)

I tell you all this because in our first reading from Acts of the Apostles, we read about Barnabas taking Saul of Tarsus to the Apostles in Jerusalem. Even though this was after his conversion, “his name and reputation preceded him” so to speak. The Disciples and Apostles in Jerusalem were afraid of him because of his aggressive and even ruthless persecutions of converts to The Way. He was introduced and/or named as Saul of Tarsus 11 times in the book of acts, and it is only in Acts 13:9 does the author of Acts of the Apostles (presumably The Apostle Luke) write “But Saul, also known as Paul.” Some authorities assert that Paul (Paulos in Greek) is the Greek word for Saul. (In the same way that Mary is the Greek form of the Hebrew name Miriam.) One last little detail here: the name Barnabas. In Acts 4:36-37 we read – ³⁶There was a Levite, a native of Cyprus, Joseph, to whom the apostles gave the name Barnabas (which means “son of encouragement”). ³⁷He sold a field that belonged to him, then brought the money, and laid it at the apostles’ feet.

Barnabas, the son of encouragement, spoke up for Saul of Tarsus and – on his recommendation – Saul was accepted into The Way and preached boldly about Jesus. I’ve often wondered if going with the name Paul helped ease the tension between him and the Jews who persecuted him, but there’s no solid evidence of that. Sometimes we are called to speak up for others as Barnabas did. Other times we are called to be a Disciple-maker as The Apostle Paul did with Timothy. It is because of men like these – and many women as well – who spread the Good News that the words in our Key Verse from the Psalms are fulfilled: Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord, and proclaim his deliverance to a people yet unborn, saying that he has done it. Certainly this is true of the Christ of God and his servants who tell the world about his deliverance. What the Apostle John wrote applies to us as well: All who obey his commandments abide in him, and he abides in them. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit that he has given us. That Spirit is the Spirit of Love, and if we really, truly live in the Spirit of Love, then we fulfill what The Apostle John says in 1 John 3:18 – Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. How do we live like that, not merely in word or speech but actually in truth and action?

The key is, of course, in the three short words “let us love.” So easy to say and so difficult (but not impossible) to do. In our words and deeds we must be truthful and not dissemble, we must be honest and not lie, we must walk the walk and talk the talk that brings freedom, forgiveness, pardon, empathy, efficacious help, and joy to others. We are called to bear fruit, fruit that will last. This is what Christ tells the Apostles in John 15:16 – ¹⁶You did not choose me but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask him in my name. It is also what John reiterates in Verse 22 above: we receive from him whatever we ask, because we obey his commandments and do what pleases him. We, too, are commanded to bear fruit, and we, too, are prepared for it because we, too, are called to hear and obey the Good News. “Love one another even as I have loved you.” (See John 13:34) Jesus calls us to the same type of selfless, unpretentious Love he has given to us; but how? How can we love each other as Divinely as Jesus does?

How truly blessed we are to get the answer straight from the Apostle John in today’s Key Verse from his letter: we should believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us. All who obey his commandments abide in him, and he abides in them. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit that he has given us. (my emphasis) Belovéd, this is simpler than it seems. Let me ask you, how many times have you heard or been asked, “Do you have a personal relationship with Jesus?” or “Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your personal Savior?” if you’re reading this, the answer to those questions is most likely “Yes.” (If not, write me. We should talk.) Well, my dear friends in Christ Jesus, then you also have an intimate personal relationship with the Holy Spirit as well as an intimate personal relationship with God the Father. Whenever one acts, they All act. Whenever one is called, All are called.

Do I, do you, do we believe in the name of his Son Jesus Christ and love one another, just as he has commanded us? Why or why not? If we believe, we, too, have fruit that will last. Here’s the thing, though. We must remember that Jesus is The True Vine, and my Father is the vinegrower. ²He removes every branch in me that bears no fruit. Every branch that bears fruit he prunes* to make it bear more fruit. In 2340AFC100623 – Fruit of the Branches, I asked you Q: What do you call a boomerang that doesn’t come back? (Come on, you know this one.) A STICK! Now, what do you call a branch cut off from a tree? You want to say “a stick,” but that’s not correct. A branch cut off of a tree is kindling. Matthew 7:19 – ¹⁹Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So also are branches cut from the vine in the vineyard. We must ask ourselves then, “Am I kindling, or a pruned branch connected to the vine?” if we look carefully we are perhaps both. There are some aspects of our lives that are unproductive and could be cut away. There are other things within that are fruitful and can be pruned a bit to make them more fruitful. How are we serving in truth and action? IF we are not certain about how to answer that, then – since we have an intimate personal relationship with the Holy Spirit – just ask to take a little off the top and around the edges; you know, ask for a quick trim, a little pruning for the Lord. “Jesus, the Holy Spirit showed me this and it is unfruitful. Now, just cut that out, please.” This makes everyone happy because of what Jesus told us in John 15:8 – ⁸My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit and become my disciples. The Apostle Paul repeatedly stated that the Praise and Glory all go to God:

Ephesians 3:20-21
1 Corinthians 10:31
John 17:1–3
Ephesians 3:20-21 and in the Old Testament:
Psalm 145:1-3
Psalm 19:1
And many, many more!

Remember HE is God and we are not, when we Praise and Glorify God (↔ Music Link) rather than ourselves, we are inviting our close personal friend to come and give us a pruning. We are given the Holy Spirit by, in, with, and through our Almighty, Triune God who lives and reigns for ever and ever. Whenever we praise and glorify God we inform ourselves and all the true children of God of our relationship with the One True God. Here’s his own Word on that:

Isaiah 48:12 –
¹²Listen to me, O Jacob,
and Israel, whom I called:
I am He; I am the first,
and I am the last.
Isaiah 49:6 –
I will give you as a light to the nations,
that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.
John 17:11 – ¹¹And now I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one, as we are one.

Here’s another chance to use the M.A.P. (↔ Click Link) as part of God’s Absolutely Perfect Plan so that all of us – you’n’me together – will be united in YOLO-F. Now, I could resist this, but you just might like where I heard (↔ Music Link) some of this – except I know we won’t ever hear “you’ll no longer be mine” because we’re in and of the True Vine! (↔ Music Link) Maybe that’s another way to testify – just don’t gossip – EVANGELIZE! Maybe open a “branch office”?

And now may the God of All Mercies be with you, both now and forever, in all that you think, do, or say.

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License

Posted in Aloha Friday Messages, God's Absolutely Perfect Plan, Links, M.A.P., MUSIC!, Podcast, Prayer Requests, Reptentance, Something new, THE APP, YOLO-F
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Aloha Friday Message – April 19, 2024 – Because we know him

April 19, 2024

2416AFC041924 – Because we know him ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

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Acts 4:11-12 – ^11 “This Jesus is‘
the stone that was rejected by you, the builders;
it has become the cornerstone.’
¹²There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved.”

Psalm 118:22-23 –
²The stone that the builders rejected
has become the chief cornerstone.
²³This is the Lord’s doing;
it is marvelous in our eyes.

1 John 3:2 – ²Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.

John 10:14-15, 18 – ¹⁴“I am the good shepherd. I know my own and my own know me, ¹⁵just as the Father knows me and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for the sheep. ¹⁸No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.”

Aloha nui loa, ʻŌmea! May the God of Peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.

We have arrived at the 4^th Sunday of Eastertide. Sometimes this is called “Good Shepherd Sunday” (↔ Click Link) because of the readings. The 4^th Sunday of Eastertide is smack-dab in the middle of the octave of Easter. Now, I know most of you know that “octave” indicates a grouping of eight. 4 is in the middle of 7, so where is the 1^st Sunday of Easter? Well, that would be Easter. The 7^th Sunday of Easter is usually celebrated as the Feast of the Ascension, but actually the Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord is on May 9^th. May 19^th is 10 days after the Ascension and occurs on the Jewish Feast of Pentecost – and Pentecost (Shavu’ot) The Feast of Weeks or Festival of Harvest – was smack-dab in the middle of the Festivals prescribed by God in Leviticus. Let’s just do a quick refresher on the Prescribed Festivals because they were of great importance to God and therefore also to all Jews (spoiler alert! – Jesus was a devout jew and so were his Disciples).

Passover (Pesach)
Unleavened Bread (Chag Hamotzi)
Firstfruits (Yom Habikkurim)
Pentecost (Shavu’ot) The Feast of Weeks or Festival of Harvest
Trumpets (Yom Teru’ah)
Atonement (Yom Kippur)
Tabernacles (Succoth)

Pentecost is described in Leviticus 23:15-22 as a period of seven weeks – “The Counting of the Omer” (“sheaths”) a week of Sabbaths = 49 days – that were measured off. On the day after the end of the seven weeks, the fiftieth day – a celebration was prescribed by God. The name “Pentecost” comes from the Greek term for the celebration, Day of Pentecost Πεντηκοστή ἡμέρα (pentekoste hemera) {pent-tay-cohs-tay ee-mair-ah} – Πεντηκοστῆς = “of Pentecost,” which means fiftieth day. Originally Shavu’ot was a Harvest Feast celebrating the First Fruits of the wheat. In modern times it is celebrated as the commemoration or the giving of the Law on Mt. Sinai.

It was through these celebrations that the Israelites learned to give Primacy to God in all things. The Festivals collectively help show them and us about the nature, the names, and the nuances of our Heavenly Father. Throughout the ages between now and back to the days of the Desert Wanderings, God has incrementally revealed himself to us. We know that in Scripture, we hear the “voice” of God as his inspired authors recorded his Word as he taught them. They in turn teach us, and the Greatest Teacher of all of his Messengers was of course Jesus his Christ. In our Key Verses today, Jesus tells his followers (and we know that means us as well) that I know my own and my own know me and in John 10:27 he says further My sheep hear my voice. I know them, and they follow me.

This is an excellent description of the intimate relationship between sheep and their shepherd. The shepherd knew each animal by name, and all of them knew her/his voice. One solitary shepherd might tend to a dozen sheep or several hundred sheep. Sheep are fairly obedient – although we tend to think of them as dim-witted and unwise – but they are easily spooked, too. When they are frightened, their tendency to bolt makes it difficult to keep them under control. That is why the familiarity between the shepherd and the flock was so important. The shepherd definitely needed the sheep, but most certainly the sheep needed the shepherd even more. They depended on each other and could do so because they knew each other. That is how we understand the meaning of Jesus’ declaration that he is the Good Shepherd. He names us (I have called you by name), he calls us (come to me … ), he leads us (“If I do not go to prepare a place …), and he loves us as God Loves us ([Heavenly Father,] “you have sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”), and most importantly we read in John 13:34-35 – ³⁴“I give you a new commandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. ³⁵By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (↔ Music Link) We also tend to think of sheep being driven, like other domesticated herd animals. But sheep are better led than driven. The shepherd is at the head of his flock. He knows what they need, goes where they are going, and gets there just before them. He’s gone ahead for us, too.

Because we know that he has indeed set out before us to ensure his flock is safely led, we recall his words, “I AM the Good Shepherd.” This is one of the seven I AM Statements all of which are in the Gospel of John. I want to call your attention to the two highly significant words in each of these – I AM. In the New Testament, these appear in Greek as Ἐγώ εἰμι egō eimi I AM. This phrase, as is, would be an uncommon combination that might not make much sense unless it was an attempt to put an Aramaic or Hebraic term into Greek without losing the impactful meaning of Genesis 17:1 – ¹ When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord appeared to Abram, and said to him, “I AM* God Almighty**; walk before me, and be blameless. *ani I Myself Am Y_WH
** God Almighty – a El Shaddai אֵ֣ל שַׁדַּ֔י šad-day, As you can see in the list below, the Good Shepherd statement is smack-dab in the middle of the seven passages. It seems there is a pattern forming here, right?

Seven I AM Statements

I AM …

1: The Bread of Life (John 6:35, 48-51)
2: The Light of the World (John 8:12)
3: The Gate (John 10:9)
4: The Good Shepherd (John 10:11)
5: The Resurrection and the Life (John 11:25)
6: The Way, The Truth, and The Life (John 14:6)
7: The True Vine (John 15:1 & 5)
All these sayings are like mini-parables. They are statements that illustrate what and who Jesus is, they describe his purpose, and illustrate what he wants the people to understand about God’s plan for redemption through Jesus’ sacrifice which is to lay down his Life for the sins of all earthlings. His life thus becomes the cornerstone of the firm foundation on which his Church is built.

In our Key Verse from Psalm 118 (↔ Music Link), Jesus is described as the corner stone rejected by the builders. Here again, if we take a peek beneath the language used, the word rejected in Hebrew is מָאֲס֣וּ mā-’ă-sū and in Greek it is ἐξουθενηθεὶς exouthenētheis. These words mean to count something as worthless through comparison. We might think of it as if saying, “We see nothing of value in this chunk of stone and it is unworthy to become any part of the foundation for the edifice we have planned.” That’s how they looked at Jesus – just junk along the Grand Highway being built by the Children of Abraham. It seems to me they overlooked those words seen in our Key Verses in Psalm 118. What God did was, and is, marvelous in our eyes. It makes us want to Sing to Jesus Alleluia! (↔ Music Link). When we look at this image of a corner stone, we can more easily understand the strength that comes into our lives when his Life and Love are the cornerstone of our lives.

His Life and Love are Eternal, and that is what El Shaddai has always had in mind for us. We are created in his likeness and image. We are created to be like him – Eternally Holy. Original sin has kept us from that Original Holiness. We recall the truth set down by the Prophet Isaiah in Isaiah 53:6 –
⁶All we like sheep have gone astray;
we have all turned to our own way,
and the Lord has laid on him
the iniquity of us all. This leads us right back to the closing Key Verses in our Gospel passage: John 10:17 _c -18 – “I lay down my life in order to take it up again. ¹⁸No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. I have received this command from my Father.”

We know from the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ Passion the difficulty in that command. Jesus, tortured beyond all endurance, dying by suffocation and exsanguination, cold (about 55°F that time of year) and naked, deserted by most of his friends, slain for being a stone over which many stumbled. Such was God’s command. Obedience to that command confirms that There is no salvation through anyone else, nor is there any other name under heaven given to the human race by which we are to be saved. He knows us and calls us by name. Like a trusting flock we follow him “Because we know him.” Best of all, he knows me, (↔ Music Link) he knows you, he knows us. It is he that made us, and we are his; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. (See Psalm 100 the perfect summation of today’s post.

Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit.

Biblical languages inserts from Bible Hub (Bible Hub: Search, Read, Study the Bible in Many Languages) Visit at http://biblehub.com

Aloha Friday Messages by Charles O. Todd, III is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License