Aloha Friday Message – February 9, 2024 – The Sole Soul Cleaner

February 9, 2024

2406AFC020924 – The Sole Soul Cleaner ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

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    Leviticus 13:46 – 46 He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease; he is unclean. He shall live alone; his dwelling shall be outside the camp.

Psalm 32:5 –
5 Then I acknowledged my sin to you,
and I did not hide my iniquity;
I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,”
and you forgave the guilt of my sin. Selah

1 Corinthians 10:31 – 31 So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God.

Mark 1:40-41 – 40 A leper came to him begging him, and kneeling he said to him, “If you choose, you can make me clean.” 41 Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, “I do choose. Be made clean!”

Aloha nui loa, ʻŌmea! Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave himself for our sins to set us free from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen. Before I go another line I have to insert here something that has been tingling in my heart for the past several days. It is a don – one I learned as a  kid – and it says a great deal about “Full- service.” (Please take a look here (↔ Click Link) to see what that means to me.) Parts of this song started tapping on the windowsill of my mind last Friday morning while I was thinking about what to do with this post. Enough jabber-jabber. Here is the song and its lyric.

Take My Life and Let It Be
Consecrated unto Thee (↔ Music Link)

1 Take my life, and let it be
Consecrated, Lord, to Thee;
Take my moments and my days,
Let them flow in ceaseless praise,
Let them flow in ceaseless praise.		 2 Take my hands, and let them move
At the impulse of Thy love;
Take my feet and let them be
Swift and beautiful for Thee,
Swift and beautiful for Thee.
3 Take my voice, and let me sing
Always, only, for my King;
Take my lips, and let them be
Filled with messages from Thee,
Filled with messages from Thee.		 4 Take my silver and my gold;
Not a mite would I withhold;
Take my intellect, and use
Every power as Thou shalt choose,
Every power as Thou shalt choose.
5 Take my will, and make it Thine;
It shall be no longer mine.
Take my heart; it is Thine own;
It shall be Thy royal throne,
It shall be Thy royal throne.		 6 Take my love; my Lord, I pour
At Thy feet its treasure-store.
Take myself, and I will be
Ever, only, all for Thee,
Ever, only, all for Thee.
7 Take my will and my desire,
Purge them in Thy Holy Fire.
Take my spirit unto Thee
There to dwell eternally,
There to dwell eternally.
Lyrics 1-6 Frances Ridley Havergal, 7: Me.
Melody Henri Abraham Cesar Malan

Our Old Testament reading for this week’s Liturgy is from the book of Leviticus. This is a book of the Bible that many people never read, and those who do mostly skip through it. It’s full of rules, precepts, and laws about Ritual Sacrifices. It is the middle book of the Pentateuch, the first 5 books of the Torah and also of our Bible. It is called Leviticus because most of it deals with the tribe of the Levites who have the responsibility for the Priestly service for the Israelites. Honestly, the text really turns some people off. There’s a lot of blood, a lot of sacrificial slaughter, a lot more blood, and endless fire and smoke from the Altar. In addition, there are lots of “guidelines” (significant rules we would today call MYOB-rules) that are designed to guide a thoroughly idol-oriented, pantheistic aggregation of people who have been enslaved for 10 generations into a strong, monotheistic, and cohesive society that can stand on its own as a nation in the midst of really dreadful nations like the Assyrians, Philistines, and the Amalekites. On 21st century maps Assyria would be the region of northern Iraq, northwestern Iran, southeastern Turkey, and eastern Syria. Some people consider the descendants of the Amalekites and Philistines to be Palestinians because in the Bible, those nations vigorously opposed the seizure of Canaan as the Promised Land of the Hebrews. As we well know, that conflict is still raging after 3,300 years, and there’s only one end in sight: The Return of Christ at the End of the Age of the Church. I agree with The Apostle Paul who agreed with Jesus that the End of the Age could be any day now. I think it’s safe to state that that process will be pretty messy for anyone who is unprepared; but, prepared for what, and how?

The “what” is easy: Judgment on the Day of Reward when we collect the wages of the life each of us has led. The how is the thread that runs through our Key Verses: “Be made clean!” In that passage in the Gospel of Mark, Jesus is described as being “moved with compassion.” The Greek word used there is akin to what we would call a gut-level emotional response. The same response appears several times in the Gospels, and Jesus’ response to the Widow in Nain whose son was being carried to his grave is a prime example. (See Luke 7:11-16) Jesus was always moved with compassion when he saw how deep and great was the need for people to be healed, and his administration of healing was not limited to bodily healing, but also included healing of the soul. Acknowledgement of sin and the accompanying repentance are presented several times. We often see that touch is involved in those healings. People would even touch the tzitzits (← Check it out!) of his tallit. In this case, he reached out and touched the leper.

THAT was a big NO-NO! It was forbidden to touch a leper. As you can see from the passage in Leviticus, they were outcasts – literally not allowed to be around other people who were “clean” of the disease. They were excluded from worship because they could not enter the camp (later the city) much less the Tent of Meeting (later the Temple). Again we see that Jesus is doing something intentionally radical: He is going above and beyond the Law to usher in Mercy. That’s a very Godly thing to do, isn’t it, to be Merciful beyond what is required and then all the more beyond what could be expected? That leper, I envision him as a young man in his early 30’s, knew the law, knew what he was supposed to do, BUT he also knew what Jesus could do when confronted with F.A.I.T.H. He admitted his condition – unclean – and asked to have it changed knowing that Jesus would do so if it was God’s Will. It worked. “Immediately the leprosy left him.” Now, look at what we see in the Psalm:

    I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and you forgave the guilt of my sin. Selah When I hear that passage I think of the Pharisee and the Publican (See Luke 18:9–14). There was the self-righteous Pharisee telling God what a good boy he was, and back in the corner stood the Tax Collector – a hated collaborator with Rome. We sometimes see ourselves as “God’s Good Little Child,” and behave as if we have no reason to impute guilt in us. Silly rabbit! What can we hide from God and where would we hide it?!? Let’s face it. We have all tried that, and it never worked. We can tell it never worked because after trying that, we do not feel cleansed of guilt – we feel guiltier for lying! Like the old folk song says, “When Will They Ever Learn?” How has clinging tightly to our sin ever made our lives better? It’s not too hard to understand.  IT’s not something to far away that we can never reach it. It’s not so high above us that we have to send someone to bring it down to us. God himself gives the lesson, the exam at the end of the lesson, and the means to pass the exam They’re all open Book! (Please follow this link and look for the green text.) The preparation is so easy: whatever you do, do everything for the glory of God. now, all we have to do is figure out what gives Glory to God. Hmmm. How about Whatsoever you do? (↔ Music Link) How about Love God and Neighbor (↔ Music Link) with all my heart? In our annual Dedication Mass for our Son Timothy, his part was the last stanza from Christina Rosetti’s Poem A Christmas Carol.

What can I give Him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd
I would bring a lamb,
If I were a Wise Man
I would do my part, —
Yet what can I give Him,
I’ll give my heart.

What does the Lord God want? Only us. Isn’t that simple? We already have everything he wants – us – and all of that “us” is what he gave us to become us. And therein lies the mystery and the key to unlock it. We are his because he made us his by making us like himself. We are not gods, but we are God’s. Let us take up our cross and follow him (↔ Music Link) as ones who are consecrated unto him. You guessed it, Belovéd; it’s the APP.

God gave us himself In The Beginning – “I will be your God and you will be my people.” God gave us a Covenant – and exchange between persons – before he gave us Commandments. God formed and hallowed a Relationship before he gave us any rules about living that Relationship. God made us to be Eternal Beings like him (Yup. YOLO-F) and God made us to be wholly Holy like him as in Leviticus 19:2 – 2 Speak to all the congregation of the people of Israel and say to them: You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. Why would he do that to us? Why would he expect us to be Holy when it is clear we are sinners? One more Psalm and one more song:

Psalm 41:4 –
4 I said, Lord, be merciful unto me:
heal my soul; for I have sinned against thee. (AKJV) [1]

Indeed, the Lord our God is the Healer of my soul. (↔ Music Link)

In Preface III for Sundays in Ordinary Time we will hear:

“For we know it belongs to your boundless glory, that you came to the aid of mortal beings with your divinity and even fashioned for us a remedy out of mortality itself, that the cause of our downfall might become the means of our salvation, through Christ our Lord.” He, our Lord, the Christ of God – Jesus – is the sole soul cleaner, and is eternally available to each and all of us Every Moment Of Every Day (↔ Music Link). He is standing before us, and so we can say, “Jesus, if you choose, you can make me clean.” You and i know in our hearts, in our minds, and in our very souls what he will say next.

“I do choose. Be made clean!”

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

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

[1] Authorized (King James) Version (AKJV) KJV reproduced by permission of Cambridge University Press, the Crown’s patentee in the UK.

 

Aloha Friday Message – February 2, 2024 – Good hopes for Better

February 2, 2024

2405AFC020224 – Good hopes for Better ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often. Do you know someone who enjoys Bible study, or who might like to read this? Ask them to email us or to subscribe on our blog-site.

    Job 7:6-7, 16-19 –
6 My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle,
and come to their end without hope.
7 “Remember that my life is a breath;
my eye will never again see good.
16 I loathe my life; I would not live forever.
Let me alone, for my days are a breath.
17 What are human beings, that you make so much of them,
that you set your mind on them,
18 visit them every morning,
test them every moment?
19 Will you not look away from me for a while,
let me alone until I swallow my spittle?

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!) This weekend we will be hearing a passage from the Book of Job. This is a very ancient piece of literature, probably composed around 2500 B.C. – and many believe it came into being even earlier than that in the 7th, 6th, or 4th centuries B.C. The passage above is from the Judeo-Christian Tradition, but there is also a so-called “Babylonian Job” called The Ludlul-Bel-Nimeqi. There are a few similarities, but generally the two are quite different. The one thing they both have in common is the apparently unjust and horrific suffering of a genuinely righteous person. Both stories take up an old, old question: “Why must there be suffering?” Rabbi Harold Kushner took up the question again in 1978 with his book When Bad Things Happen to Good People. He concluded that basically God was not powerful enough to eliminate evil. We saw some time ago in Isaiah 59:1 See, the Lord’s hand is not too short to save, or his ear too dull to hear. He does have the power, and chooses not to use it. Still, suffering and evil are mysteries we deal with in our daily lives – daily lives. We can’t help but ask, “WHY?” This is an especially important question if the one suffering is us. At the outset we need to recognize that some suffering is a mystery meant to be offered lovingly to our Abba on behalf of others. The Apostle Paul had this to say: Colossians 1:24 – 24 I am now rejoicing in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am completing what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church. This redemptive suffering is our participation in the sufferings of Christ, and can always be offered in the hope of better for all.

Many times this question takes the form of “Why is God doing this to me?” Another form is “How can a supposedly loving God allow this to happen?” I want to focus on those two questions first. “Why me” is rooted in the idea that God uses suffering as a punishment for evil. The Old Testament is often cited as a proof for this supposition, and superficial reading makes it appear God is old and vengeful. Perhaps the most elaborate construct of this idea is the conquering of Canaan by the Israelites. Think back to our lesson on Jonah (↔ Click Link). The Ninevites were a thoroughly evil people. God had it in mind to destroy them. Nonetheless he sent Jonah to warn them. The Ninevites repented and were spared – for a while. When they reverted to their evil ways, they were destroyed (click here for an insightful look into Nahum 3). Yet it took centuries of opportunities to change before their demise was accomplished.

The same was true for the inhabitants of Canaan. They too were thoroughly evil and had many opportunities to change. They did not. In fact, in the case of the Amorites God gave them roughly 450 years to get it together. My point is that we are not being punished. God is getting our attention by correcting us, by showing us the consequences of our choices to be stubborn and selfish. In the book of Proverbs we read at Proverbs 3:12 – For the LORD corrects those he loves, just as a father corrects a child in whom he delights. (New Living Translation). Paul cites this passage in Hebrews 12:6-7 – “… for the Lord disciplines those whom he loves, and chastises every child whom he accepts. Endure trials for the sake of discipline. God is treating you as children; for what child is there whom a parent does not discipline?” We are given an opportunity to change. We can choose to do so because we have free will.

Sometimes, though, it is true that the things that happen to us are not our fault. They are not God’s fault either. Sometimes something painful happens so that something better replaces it. In his book, A Grief Observed, C. S. Lewis wrote, “What do people mean when they say, ‘I am not afraid of God because I know He is good’? Have they never even been to a dentist?”  He continues with more examples: Have you ever had a broken bone that had to be  reset by a doctor?  Have you ever seen a marble sculpture? Sometimes painful things result in better things. Sometimes the things that hurt make us better in the long run. We have to look beyond the hurt and accept that good comes from it. Here are some additional insights from The Apostle Paul:

Romans 8:18 – I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us.

2 Corinthians 4:16-18 – So we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all measure, because we look not at what can be seen but at what cannot be seen; for what can be seen is temporary, but what cannot be seen is eternal.

Romans 8:28 – We know that all things work together for good (↔ Music Link) for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. Another way to say that is in all things God works for Good. “Eat your spinach. It’s good for you!” may seem like suffering at the time, but it’s nothing compared to having a healthy body which comes from healthy eating.

Sometimes the suffering we have to endure comes from the way others have treated us. There’s no denying that there have been gaggles of parents who abused their children but claimed “it was only discipline.” The same goes for other interpersonal relationships – siblings, spouses, children, other relatives, elders, coworkers, supervisors, authority figures, or neighbors. We would be disingenuous to say that such abuse does not exist and does not seriously impact many lives. This reality is often the root of that second question, “How can a supposedly loving God allow this to happen?” That question is especially relevant when innocents suffer at the hands of great evil as when parents murder their own children (especially when they are unborn children), or when sociopathic killers torture and murder people. One I see quite often these days relates to ISIS and Hamas and the horrific and egregious acts of terror they commit. How can people, in the name of a god (whom they call Allah), do those things? As I have said here before, these acts are committed by heretics, and Allah is not Jehovah. At some points in history just about every major religious – and even antireligious – group has committed atrocities. Whoever the perpetrators are, it is still atrocious, still evil, and still a choice. We are not commanded to annihilate the earthlings that are different from us. We are commanded to love and forgive them.

Hebrews 12:15 – See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble, and through it many become defiled.

Ephesians 4:32 – and be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you.

1 John 1:8-10 says, 8 If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

Matthew 6:14-15 – For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

Matthew 22:37-40 – He said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment.  And a second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.”

In 1 Thessalonians 5:12-22, Paul tells us to be at peace with all men, return good for evil (not evil for evil), to take care of the weak and be patient with everyone (not only others, but ourselves as well), to pray without ceasing and “in everything give thanks,” so as not to quench the Spirit, and to abstain from all appearance (and practice) of evil. That’s a pretty tall order! Yet throughout the entirety of our Bible, God tells us to love him and each other.

So, does “love your neighbor” mean we complacently allow these evil persons to perpetrate crimes against us? Of course not! We have a moral responsibility to combat evil. The Two Greatest Laws do not say “Do No Harm.” God’s Law says to put God and neighbor first and we are to follow the whole Law. One commandment (5th or 6th depending on how you number them) forbids intentionally destroying human life. Some argue that this forbids war. Yet there are times when the so-called “just-war doctrine” compels us to take a stand. In this question, too, the key consideration is that we have a choice, and our choice should be guided by Christ’s Law of Love. Still, enduring evil and suffering – even if we do so within the guidelines of Scripture – is not easy, and we nevertheless want answers. Let’s return to Job and see how he was answered.

In the book of Job, God never tells Job why he was suffering. When we read the first part of the story of Job – Job 1:6-12 (← Read this) – we see that Satan – the Accuser הַשָּׂטָ֖ן ha-Satan {häś·śä·ṭän} – obtains permission to demonstrate his belief that Job is a good and upright man only because God has surrounded Job with divine protection. Equally important in the story, Job consistently denies that the reason for his suffering is his sin. In answer, God comes down in a whirlwind and asks Job dozens of questions, and all of them are unanswerable! See Job 38:1 – 42:6 (←FASCINATING READING!). God never tells Job to stop complaining, either; even though the suffering we looked at in the beginning of this essay is pretty harsh, God never said Job should stop. Job listens in silence and his response is also silence. He is humbled before God, and that is the posture we need to take when our lives seem to be only suffering, evil, and pain. We always have that choice to defer to him, to reverence him, to kneel in awe before him, and to surrender everything to him. What do I mean by everything?

By “everything” I mean whatever we have in our lives that is contrary to the Life God created in us. Can we and do we say “I hate!”? Then we have not surrendered that act of unlove to God. Do we and can we claim that God has given us more than our share of suffering and that none of it is the consequence of our own choices? God does not give us suffering. God does permit us to feel the consequences of separating ourselves from him in the hope that we will choose not to make that separation the choice we select for eternity after our resurrection. “Why is God doing this to me?” “How can a supposedly loving God allow this to happen?” “Why doesn’t God fix this/me/them?” We have seen that some of the heinous evil that brings great suffering is the consequence of the same free will which makes Love possible. We know that the end of our life on this Earth is not the end of everything, because we are created in the image of God and are therefore eternal beings. We know that God can (and will always) bring great good out of great evil – think of the stories of Joseph in the Old Testament and Jesus in the New Testament. God does not cause evil, he redeems evil. The bottom line is that suffering and evil – like salvation, creation, the trinity, and other Divine Mysteries – are things we just cannot understand. Whatever our appeal to God’s Mercy is, this one thing is clear about evil and suffering: It does not come from God. It comes from our fallen nature and is part of our journey back to the life God intends for us – eternal, sinless, and glorious just like him. We know this because we know God truly does understand our suffering. Look to the life, passion, death, and resurrection of his Only Begotten Son. There is Hope for our reunion! (↔ Music Link) Check out Sirach 40:26 (← Try it! You’ll like it!)

Belovéd, the suffering we are enduring now in Ukraine, Gaza, Nigeria, Darfur Province, and tens-of-thousands (← IMPORTANT learning link!) of other locations look like a game of “Farmer In The Dell” compared to what the Assyrians in Nineveh did. Jonah had right reasons to fear them; nonetheless he accomplished God’s goal – albeit with much reluctance and pouting – and from that, not only was Nineveh so thoroughly destroyed so that even today we’re not sure where it was, but also God brought better things from the good he created by removing that evil. Today, there is yet another evil which flourishes in that area which is near and in the city of Mosul. That is near where ISIS made its last stand in 2022 before moving to Nigeria and Northern Mozambique. That may not seem good, but it IS better. Our work is not yet done. We must confront and destroy evil wherever we find it, even if it means a Just War. One other consideration previously reported here:

  • The World population is around 1 BILLION (↔ Click Link)
  • The number of persons who claim to be Muslim is around 2.1 BILLION, about 26% of the World’s population
  • The estimated percentage of terroristically militant members is around 2% which comes to about 40,000,000 (FORTY-MILLION) willing to kill, maim, and torture non-Islamic entities. The 9/11 attacks were committed by 19 al-Qaeda terrorists.

Be humble before God. Seek justice, mercy, and obedience (↔ Music Link) instead of prejudice, persecution, and rebellion. For each of us, our perception of what is evil can be countered by our reception of all that is Good. Everything that is Good is of God, and God is always better than good. Therefore we must See to it that no one fails to obtain the grace of God; that no root of bitterness springs up and causes trouble, and through it many become defiled. Furthermore, and be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ has forgiven you. If all the available choices are evil, be the Good that changes that. Choose the Hope of Peace. (↔ Music Link)

Oh! And don’t forget to read Nahum 3 !! Whatever is Good (or even Best) can still be made Better through HOPE! It’s in the Absolutely Perfect Plan.

Whatever, whenever, wherever, whoever, however, if ever, forever —
at your service, Belovéd!
Please pray with us here at Share-a-Prayer.

 

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

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

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.

Aloha Friday Message – January 26, 2024 – A Word to the unwise

January 26, 2024

2404AFC012624 – A Word to the unwise

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often. Do you know someone who enjoys Bible study, or who might like to read this? Ask them to email us or to subscribe on our blog-site.

   Deuteronomy 18:15 – 15 The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from among your own people; you shall heed such a Prophet.

Psalm 95:7 c – 8 –
O that today you would listen to his voice!
8   Do not harden your hearts, as at Meribah,
as on the day at Massah in the wilderness …

1 Corinthians 7:35 – 35 I say this for your own benefit, not to put any restraint upon you, but to promote good order and unhindered* devotion to the Lord. * (ap-er-is-pas-toce’) without distraction, without being distracted – having full devotion; being completely undistracted, without hindrance or reservation.

Mark 1:23-27 – 23 Just then there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit, 24 and he cried out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” 25 But Jesus rebuked him, saying, “Be silent, and come out of him!” 26 And the unclean spirit, convulsing him and crying with a loud voice, came out of him. 27 They were all amazed, and they kept on asking one another, “What is this? A new teaching — with authority! He commands even the unclean spirits, and they obey him.” (emphasis added)

May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Aloha nui loa, ʻŌmea! Has anyone ever introduced a word of advice to you by saying “A word to the wise?” The entire maxim appears in the Talmud as, “A word to the wise is sufficient, but for a fool not even a stick helps.” Sometimes, perhaps in a social-media post or TV show, we see someone behaving foolishly and say “They walk among us” meaning that their brainpower is somehow less-than-normal. If we are honest with ourselves, we will surely admit that there are times when we substitute poor judgment for rational thinking. If you’re nodding your head right now, you’re probably remembering a dark moment or two in your past; me, too. If we take but a moment longer, we may be able to recall several such times of poor judgment.

How is it that we know what is right but still do what is wrong? Is it not true that many of the times when we fail most miserably, it is because we are being prideful – which is a form of selfishness – and we are self-certain that what we are doing is right? Now, it is also true that sometimes we truly are ignorant about a certain situation, but act on what we reason to be right – only to find out our reasoning is flawed. And sometimes, Belovéd, we just don’t know what we’re into and shouldn’t be into it because we are ignorant about how to proceed. Imagine trying to bowl overhand because it seems more efficient. If we can judge among ourselves – or indeed within ourselves – about what is right and what is wrong, what is prudent and what is foolish, then how much more must we turn to God to obtain his judgment, his Wisdom? If we catch ourselves out as being foolish, should we not know that God sees it infinitely more clearly? Let’s look at a couple of examples. Some of this may require a quick off-the-page excursion as in this example from Numbers 12. In this account from the Journey in the Wilderness, Miriam and Aaron are angry because Moses has married a Cushite (Ethiopian) woman. God overheard them (of course!) and called them out. He told them that when he calls Prophets, he speaks to them in visions or dreams, but not so with Moses. He tells them he speaks to Moses face-to-face, not in riddles, and Moses can even behold his form – something no one else can do without dying. Because Miriam – Moses’ sister – spoke out against him, she was covered with leprosy and cast out of the camp for seven days. Though that was harsh in that setting, she actually got off easy. You don’t dis God’s friends and expect to get away with it. Sometimes we forget that good advice. What, then, shall we do?

   “If today you hear his voice, (↔ Music Link) harden not your hearts.” When we hear that line of poetry, we recall Moses and the Hebrews in the desert when God brought forth water from the flinty rock. That was in last week’s post. Here is an excerpt from that episode: Exodus 17:7 – 7 He [Moses] called the place Massah [Test] and Meribah, [Quarrel] because the Israelites quarreled and tested the Lord, saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?” The Apostle Paul echoes that in the third chapter of his letter to the Hebrews, especially starting a Verse 7 where The Apostle Paul warns against unbelief. He clarifies that those words were spoken by the Holy Spirit. That seems like a Source to whom we should also pay attention! After all, the Hebrews had seen when God sent plague after plague on the Egyptians, then the Passover, crossing the Red Sea, manna and quail miraculously supplied, the renewal of the Covenant at Moab, and the Bronze Serpent which prefigured the “lifting up” of our Lord at Calvary.

There’s a great verse in the book of Wisdom about that episode in the desert: Wisdom 16:11 (GNT) [1]– 11 They were bitten** so that they would remember your commands, but they were quickly rescued, in order to keep them from forgetting you completely and depriving themselves of your kindness. ** By the seraph serpents. This refers back to Numbers 21 (↔ Learning Link) and the story of the Bronze Serpent where the Israelites rebelled against Moses and against God. God sent the “fiery (seraph) serpents” and many people were bitten and died. Moses – at God’s command – made a “bronze serpent” on a pole and whoever Looked on the icon in faith, God would heal them. They had claimed God’s Gifts of manna, quail, and water were “miserable.” Can we imagine anything given by God as being contemptible? Wouldn’t we look at that and say, “What were you thinking?!?” More appropriate, perhaps, would be “How can you think that?” The obvious answer to that question is, “That’s just wrong.” There is a follow-up on that story of the bronze serpent. Years later, the Israelites forgot that God did the healing when they looked at the serpent in faith. instead they started worshiping the lifeless metal serpent and believing IT healed them!! King Hezekiah was forced to destroy it so quash that foolishness.

In our Key Verse from 1 Corinthians 7 (← Read this), The Apostle Paul has been telling the Church in Corinth about love and marriage. He counsels that whatever we do with regard to celibacy, abstinence, or matrimony, we should do it in, with, and for the Lord. He expressly says to consider carefully how to live with or without a spouse so that our devotion to Christ may be unhindered. I put a note there about the Greek word he used – ἀπερισπάστως (ap-er-is-pas-toce’) – because it means having full devotion; being completely undistracted, without hindrance or reservation. Matrimonial and family life can be distracting, but TOGETHER (husband, wife, and children) we are to give our full and undivided devotion to God; it’s like J.O.Y. – Jesus, Others, You. To do otherwise would be foolish. That is why God consistently and constantly gives advice to the unwise – that’s all of us y’all – and it’s up to us to heed his advice. Since we have Scripture that is from front-to-back and top-to-bottom inerrant, we can conclude that God is serious about forsaking Wisdom in favor of Folly. If a word from Jesus can cast out a demon, resuscitate the dead, make the blind see and the lame walk, or cure a leper who asks to be made clean, then we must also listen when he – through ALL of  Scripture – tells us to be faithful, thankful, joyful, prayerful, and dutiful to God in and through Christ Jesus. Would it not be foolish to hold forth that “he didn’t really mean that.”? God says differently. Here’s  a look at something from the beginning of The Book of Proverbs:

Proverbs 1:30-33 – (GNT) [Wisdom speaks] 30 You have never wanted my advice or paid any attention when I corrected you. 31 So then, you will get what you deserve, and your own actions will make you sick. 32 Inexperienced people die because they reject wisdom. Stupid people are destroyed by their own lack of concern. 33 But whoever listens to me will have security. He will be safe, with no reason to be afraid. Now, doesn’t that sound like something a loving father would say to a rebellious child? That is Our Father, God, speaking to us! Note that we say he is OUR Father! That was a way of seeing God that was considered blasphemous at Jesus’ time. Our Father wants us to listen to him, not to our minds, not to our hearts, not our Aunt Suzy, not some guru, but to God and God alone. “Who is God that I might listen to him, and where can he be found that I might see him?”

God is our Creator, and he is Spirit and Truth. He listens to all our prayers as well as everything else we say. He also speaks to us through his Creation, through his Word, through his Church, and in our own hearts and minds we can hear him directly – if we only listen. That he listens and speaks to us incessantly is incomprehensible to us as humans, but that’s because God as Divine is incomprehensible. His Word is not like that. It is in and through his Word that we see, feel, know, and even understand God’s place in our lives. The demon said “I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” We know who he is too, so if we wish to truthfully and spiritually claim that we recognize Jesus as the Holy One of God, well, … “What we do says who we are. Actions speak louder than words.” That’s a genuine Word to the Wise. The best Word to the unwise in this essay is “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” We’ve just got to be somewhere listening (↔ Music Link), and that “somewhere” can be anywhere (↔ Music Link) and any time (↔ Music Link). After all, we have been told “The Lord your God will raise up for you a Prophet like me from among your own people; you shall heed such a Prophet.” So, with a Song in the air, (↔ Music Link) God sent his Son. Jesus is the archetypal Priest, Prophet, and King. We heed him. We need him. We can choose to be wise, and not unwise, by heeding whatever fools ignore. Never fear. Jesus is near. There is work to be done for God’s Only Begotten Son. He has called  us by name. He has chosen us. (↔ Music Link)  John 15:16 – 16 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. Only a fool would not answer the call.

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

Creative Commons License
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.

 

 

Aloha Friday Message – January 19, 2024 – Turnarounds

January 19, 2024

2403AFC011924 – Turnarounds (←😊 Podcast)

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often.

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Mark 1:14-15 – 14 Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15 and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent*, and believe in the good news.”
*metanoeite (←Click) – Reconsider, “think differently after,” “after a change of mind“; to repent (literally, “think differently afterwards”) In short, do a 180°.

1 Corinthians 7:29 a, 31 b – 29 aI mean, brothers and sisters, the appointed time has grown short, 31 b the present form of this world is passing away.

Psalm 25:8-9 –
8 Good and upright is the Lord;
therefore he instructs sinners in the way. (↔ Music Link)
9 He leads the humble in what is right,
and teaches the humble his way.

Jonah 3:4-5, 9-10 – 4 Jonah began to go into the city, going a day’s walk. And he cried out, “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown!” 5 And the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast, and everyone, great and small, put on sackcloth. 9 Who knows? God may relent and change his mind; he may turn from his fierce anger, so that we do not perish.” 10 When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil ways, God changed his mind about the calamity that he had said he would bring upon them; and he did not do it.

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!) Today we come to another extraordinary set of readings on repentance. You’ll see I have them in reverse order – Gospel, Psalm, Epistle, and Old Testament. Yup. That’s the first turnaround in this post. I suspect it will not be the last.

The words for repent, repentance, turn, turn around, and reconsider occur over 140 times in Scripture. That’s enough times to make us realize God is serious about this command. And yes, it is a command! “Turn [around] to me and be saved”(↔ Music Link) isn’t a question or a suggestion – it is a direct order. In this Great Battle against The Darkness who would dare disobey? In the New Testament, John the Baptizer socked it to the Pharisees and Sadducees coming for Baptism in Matthew 3:7-12 – (Follow this link) and refers to them as a “brood of vipers.” Now, remember that a brood is a group of young critters born around the same time – like a brood of baby birds or reptiles. Jesus echoes these words in Matthew 12:34, and 23:33 (↔ Click it).

The inference drawn from that by the Pharisees, Sadducees, listeners, and Disciples (including us) is that they are sons of “that old Serpent, Satan.” That’s a pretty serious insult, but also well-deserved. Because why? Because they were unrepentant. We’ve commented here often about this being the first message of the beginning of the Gospel, the start of the Good News. Repentance is called for and presented in all of the Gospels including the Gospel of John. Nitpickers will complain that even though the noun for repentance {Metanoia} occurs 22 times in the Old Testament and the verb for repent (metanoeó) occurs 34 times, neither of those words occur in John’s Gospel. However, as an old aphorism states, “Absence of Evidence Does Not Mean Evidence of Absence.” John uses a more direct phrase – “sin no more,” to tell  sinners  to turn about from their former life of sin and to live in surrender and obedience to God.

In the Gospels, then, we have a continuation of God’s command to turn back to him, to make a turnaround in our lives, as this symbol represents permission to make that sort of reorientation. Let’s think about what this means for a moment. If I am in traffic and see this sign, I know it is permissible form me to cease going forward, to cross the center line dividing traffic flow, and to begin traveling in the opposite direction. Nowhere on this sign do we read, “When safe,” or “When appropriate,” “On green arrow only,” or even “When necessary.” We are left to use common sense to make this maneuver safely. We know to be careful when we do this because someone else in the oncoming traffic might not expect us to turn around. In The Kingdom of God, we are instructed to make a U-Turn regardless of the oncoming traffic. Now, as some of us know, that can still be a dangerous thing in some situations. Take the example of abusive relationships.

It could be said that deciding to get out of a situation like that is like making a U-Turn; I think of it more as taking an exit ramp without using a turn-signal. It could also be said that making a U-Turn in an abusive relationship could mean staying and battling back by being more assertive or even equally aggressive. That could be as dangerous as turning into oncoming traffic which might not yield to our change of position. With God, though, when it comes to sin, we are dealing only with God and – usually – only with oneself. That is because repenting of our own sin requires taking responsibility for our own behavior. Earthlings have always found that difficult to do. Recall that Eve blamed the snake, and Adam blamed Eve. It’s a tendency as old as Creation, so how do we get to that curve in the Road Back Home?

Well, the most obvious reason, it seems to me, is to weigh the consequences. The Apostle Paul has some sage advice, as usual, in our Key Verse from 1 Corinthians. I’ve “telescoped” the language there, so please use this link to see the passage in context. He is talking about the condition, the state-of-living, of his readers. He counsels them on the basis of his experience not to make any changes in whatever circumstance they find themselves as earthlings. If married, stay married; if unmarried, stay unmarried; if employed as a servant, don’t strive to be came a freedman; if free, be a slave only to Christ. The reason for this is what I have presented in our Key Verse – the World as we know it is passing away. Now, we recall that The Apostle Paul and many, if not most, of the Christians of that era sincerely thought that the return of the Lord was imminent – in a couple more weeks and Tah-Dah! We Christians have been believing that – faithfully for sure – for about 1,900 years give or take. IT IS STILL TRUE, but in 2024, the important concept is “the appointed time has grown short.” If it was short in The Apostle Paul’s time, it is even shorter in our time! As we are reminded often, we do not know the day or the hour. (↔ Music Link) All the more reason, then, to listen to what the Lord has in his teaching in the Key Verse from the Psalms.

God is a Good God, rock solid in all his promises. Do you remember the Four Core Attributes of God we have listed before? Our God is known by his Perfect Integrity, Endless Mercy, Everlasting Love, And Eternal Salvation. His integrity is always primary because he is always One, yet his Mercy is endless because his Love is everlasting. Now, that’s really upright! To top it all off, he meticulously teaches us, encourages us, sustains us, and saves us without ever abandoning us. That is why God, and God alone, can require our conformity and authentic commitment to his Law – first as the Law of Governance and – in these final days – as the Law of Love. For millennia, he has instructed us in the way of righteousness for his Name’s sake. The only prerequisite for learning from him is for us to listen and obey as his humble children, and to desire to love him and to serve him all the days of our lives. That can sound like a really big commitment until we accept the fact that he provides everything we could possibly need to handle it. That is the Perfect Integrity of Love, and it is always there for us to employ and enjoy. What a GOOD God we have! Now, let’s turn our attention to a guy who found that out in a very big way, and then got angry about it.

I’m talking about our old friend Jonah. What a life he lived! He was “employed” as a Jewish Prophet. He lived around 785 BC in the town of Gath-Hepher which was in the region of Galilee (Zebulun) not far from Nazareth. He got a call from the Lord to travel to Nineveh to warn them they God was going to destroy them because they were so evil. Nineveh was the capital city of Assyria, and the Assyrians were cruel oppressors of the Israelites. They ruled for nearly 1,900 years over the region from what we would today call Eurasia through the entire middle east, and over into Egypt. Check out this map (↔ Click it) to get a grasp of their territory. Jonah knew how cruel the Assyrians were, and he simply refused to go. We all know the story. He hustled over to the coast to the city of Joppa and caught a ship headed toward Tarshish, 2,200 miles across the Mediterranean. I guess he thought God wouldn’t go that far to find him. Well, after a bodacious storm, getting swallowed by a huge fish for three days, and, making it back to the coast, he set off for Nineveh – a mere 600+ miles from Jerusalem.

This was no easy journey! He had plenty of time to think about what he had to say and plenty of time to imagine what might happen if he said it! Then he started walking through the city. It was about 60 miles across – a three day walk according to the Bible – and 96 miles around. By the time he had made it ⅓ of the way – one day’s walk – announcing “40 days more and Nineveh will be destroyed,” everyone in the city repented, including the animals! So, as we see in our Old Testament Key Verse, God decided to accept their repentance. We read in Jonah 4 that Jonah was displeased with that result and became angry because the Ninevites repented and thereby escaped destruction. He stomped off in a snit and sat under a shady little hand-made booth to see if they would remain repentant or go back to their old ways and still get destroyed. That didn’t work either. God prepared a bush for him, and he was happy about that, but then God sent a worm to wither the bush, so Jonah was angry again. After the sun rose, God sent a sweltering wind so warm that Jonah was about to faint. At every change, he kept saying, “It is better for me to die than to live.” At every change God asked, “Is it right for you to be angry about [this change]?” Finally God said, “And should I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also many animals?” There is the Absolutely Perfect Plan in action!

What is the point of all these turnaround Key Verses? God Loves the heart that is contrite and repents. Whoever will turn around and go back to God will be greatly blessed. Belovéd, is there a turnaround in our future? If not why not, and if so – when? In our Key Verse logo for today, which key-holder is the repentant one? [HINT: The one facing away with the key in his right hand.]

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

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

Aloha Friday Message – January 12, 2024 – He knows you!

January 12, 2024

2402AAFC011223 – He Knows You!  (2nd Sunday in Ordinary Time) ← 😊 PODCAST LINK

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often.
Do you know someone who enjoys Bible study, or who might like to read this? Ask them to email us or to subscribe on our blog-site.

1 Samuel 3:9 c-10 – So Samuel went and lay down in his place. 10 Now [again] the Lord came and stood there, calling as before, “Samuel! Samuel!” And Samuel said, “Speak, for your servant is listening.”

Psalm 40:1 –
1 I waited patiently for the Lord;
he inclined to me and heard my cry. {emphasis added}

1 Corinthians 6:19-20 – 19 Or do you not know that your body is a temple* of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God, and that you are not your own? 20 For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body. *   Also translated ‘sanctuary/’

John 1:41-42 – 41 He first found his brother Simon and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated Anointed). 42 He brought Simon to Jesus, who looked at him and said, “You are Simon son of John. You are to be called Cephas [kepha –In Aramaic – Rock]” (which is translated Peter [petra – Rock – in Greek).

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, and to call him by Name as he has called you by your name. (↔ Music Link) The part of that sentence in italics is from Ephesians 1:17. Today I will start with the illustration for the Key Verses. Can you see the label on the gold key? It says “Your Name.” It is our names that unlock much about who we are. “Hi there! What’s your name?” is often the first question adults ask children. We are known by our names. My given name – also referred to as my Christian name, my baptized name, my family name – is Charles Olin Todd, III. Since 1964, the world has pretty much known me as Chick Todd – a name I gave myself. We are not our names. When we say “ostrich” we think of an animal, a flightless bipedal galliform. When we say “That ostrich’s name is Gertrude,” we know the meaning of both of those names. A noun represents (is the name of) a person, place, thing, or idea, but is not actually the essence or corporeality of the object named.

“OK. The grammar police are here again! What’s the point, Captain Wallaby?” The point is that over the centuries, the giving and using of names is an essential part of being in community with one another. If we go back to Genesis 2:19-20, we read 19 So out of the ground the Lord God formed every animal of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name (↔ Music Link). 20 The man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every animal of the field; but for the man there was not found a helper as his partner. So, even to God, the idea of names was and is important. Adam was named because he came from earth (dirt, like I always say) – in Hebrew Adamah. God was Adonai because he was the Master, the Creator.

Let’s look at another famous name – Noah. In Hebrew that is Noach (no-ahkh’) It means “rest.” His father was Lamech, a son of Seth, and in Genesis 7:28-29, Lamech (at the ripe old age of 182) names his son Noach: 28 When Lamech had lived one hundred eighty-two years, he became the father of a son; 29 he named him Noah, saying, “Out of the ground that the Lord has cursed this one shall bring us relief from our work and from the toil of our hands.” What Lamech could not have known was that ALL OF HUMANITY would experience that “relief from work” would be the annihilation of every earthling except Noach’s family. Lamech knew that the world in which he lived was way bad, messed up, gone dreadfully wrong (even worse than today!).

Let’s also recall Jacob whose name means “supplanter” because at birth he was second-born of twins but came out of the womb grasping his brother Esau’s heel. (See Genesis 25:19-28 for this really cool story) Later, he wrestled a being who was an angel, and his name was changed to Isra-El (Yisrael) “God Strives” which comes from a root word sarah which means to persevere or to have power as a prince (or Princess in the case of Abraham’s wife!).

We know in the Bible that names are important, but what about today? Many cultures name children, locations, even animals after natural characteristics or aspirations for future providence. Perhaps we know of parents who have carefully named their children with names that denote Peace (e.g., Katherine), or Richard (Brave ruler). Crucita is named for her father Cruz (“cross” in Spanish) with a female-diminutive suffix “-ita” which means small. My first name means “Strong,” my middle name means “recalls [his] ancestors, our last name means red or fox (from Eastern Scotland), and the III is the designation that I am the third person in my family with that name. (There is also a IV and a V in the family!) My “Confirmation name” is Timothy (which I gave to my son along with “Olin”) and Timothy – from Τιμόθεος – means “honouring God.” Now, perhaps we can recall that God calls us by name.
Isaiah 43:1 –
1 But now thus says the Lord,
he who created you, O Jacob,
he who formed you, O Israel:
Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;
I have called you by name, you are mine. (↔ Music Link)

Did God choose to name me with that name of my ancestors? Perhaps, in a way we could consider that, but the name he gave me which I love the most is “son.” And, Belovéd, isn’t that the name all the children of God treasure most? Even שְׁמוּאֵל – Shemuel whose name meant “Name of God” was literally called by name in today’s Key Verse. If you access the passage in-context, you’ll see that Samuel spoke to God directly the first time God called him by answering, “Here I am.” The next two times he ran to Eli – whom he assumed called him. Finally Eli got the picture so to speak and told Samuel to reply, “Speak Lord. Your servant is listening.” Ah, dearly Belovéd! Would that all of us would quickly answer like that on God’s first call! Sometimes, though, it is difficult to hear his call amid all the distractions in our daily lives. Nonetheless, we can rely on our Heavenly Father to make it easier. When we feel we cannot quite reach high enough to whisper into God’s ear, God helps us out as the Psalmist wrote: he inclined to me and heard my cry. God is always listening, always answering. Why?

Because he loves us! Pretty much everyone knows John 3:16 – for God so loved THE WORLD … and we’re part of everything God Loves because God Loves all that he created. “But what about Noach, and all the people – and everything else! – that died in the Flood? Or what about all the people in Canaan against whom God ordered genocide? And Sodom and Gomorrah?” God Loved them, and gave them many, many chances to repent. They did not cease their sinning; and what are the wages of sin? “But what about mercy? Where was the mercy in all that?” Mercy is the Love and forgiveness we most need and least deserve. Mercy is the outcome of God’s Grace working in God’s Power. Grace is unmerited favor from God, a Gift only he can give, and gift that is ours to accept or reject just like obedience is a gift we can offer or deny to God. For example, God gave us these totally-incredible, living, yet fragile machines originally made from Adamah. He gave them to us in the hope we would take care of them just as he gave the Earth to us in the hope we would take care of it.

Here’s one of the Bible verses we often slide right past: Genesis 2:15 – 15 The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it. – from שָׁמַר (shamar) {shaw-mar’)  to keep, watch, preserve protect, defend. Adam’s job was to defend the Garden and everything in it. He flubbed it by letting in a Serpent who tricked his wife into disobeying God by lying to her. That slicked-tongued beastie should never have gotten into the garden in the first place. When Adam saw it, he should have clubbed it a good one and tossed it outside the Gate. God already had an Absolutely Perfect Plan that immediately went into effect. God did not place the Serpent in the Garden for God tempts no one. The “Angel of Light,” ha-Satan, the accuser, was beautiful and at the same time terrible. Read about his beauty in Ezekiel 28:11-19, and understand that this was no hissing, forked-tongue, talking reptile but instead a magnificent creature on his exterior and a completely malevolent creature on his interior. Our First Parents fell for appearance over substance. We still make that mistake today, don’t we?!? God named that creature as loathsome and abhorrent. We still occasionally see him as beautiful and desirable.

The Apostle Paul reminds us in our Key Verse from the Epistles that our bodies are to be a Temple of the Holy Spirit, the bodies we received from God. We say in our hearts and in the pride of our eyes, “This is my body and I shall do as I please to pleasure me.” The Apostle Paul says, “Do you not know you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body.” And what was that price? Well, it was not a price we had to pay, was it? For those among us in the world who cannot bring their bodies to conformance and their hearts to repentance, the price is ruined health and perhaps physical death. The Eternal price for those sinful choices is eternal Death, and the Eternal Gift for repentance is Eternal Life (Yup. YOLO-F). Seems like an easy choice, doesn’t it? Yet in just one sitting watching or hearing the Syndicated Mass Media Organizations we can be convinced that MOST (yes, I MEAN most) of the World is making the wrong choice. (Singular because there is only one Choice: Obedience or Death.) What shall we do?

How about we follow the example of one of the first evangelists, the Apostle Andrew. Here is our Key Verse from the Gospels: John 1:41-42 – 41 He first found his brother Simon and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (which is translated Anointed). 42 He brought Simon to Jesus, who looked at him and said, “You are Simon son of John. You are to be called Cephas [kepha – In Aramaic – Rock]” (which is translated Peter [petra – Rock – in Greek). First, he understood that Jesus must be the Messiah. Then, he went and found someone to tell – his brother Simon, AND he brought Simon to meet Jesus (and Each-One-Bring-One hadn’t even been invented yet!). Just imagine the surprise of these two brothers when Jesus looked right at Simon and said “You are to be called כֵּיפָא Cephas.” (Κηφᾶς is pronounced kay-fas’ not see’-fus, כֵּיפָא is the Aramaic word Kepha). John politely gives us the Greek equivalent of the Aramaic word Kepha as πέτρα (petra) – a very nice word-play in Greek. Now, if Jesus taught in Aramaic or Hebrew, how could he be doing Greek word-play? Well, everyone in Jesus’ day spoke some Greek. Koine Greek (↔ Significant Learning Link) was the “lingua-franca” in the Roman Empire – a bridge language, also called a trades-language, used throughout the region as a language that could be spoken by nearly everyone so that language barriers were more easily overcome. English is the lingua-franca in today’s World. In English, because of John 1:12, we are named “Child of God.”

Belovéd, it is our name that unlocks our future with God, and if our name is “Child of God” as in John 1:12, then our future is absolutely endless. Use that name, “Child of God,” to unlock the Treasure House of Blessings prepared for us since the Words “Let there be …” were first spoken, and the next-to-the-last thing was us.

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

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

Aloha Friday Message – January 5, 2024 – The Light at the Beginning of the Tunnel

January 5, 2024

2401AFC010524 – The Light at the Beginning of the Tunnel   (Podcast 😊 Link)

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often.
Do you know someone who enjoys Bible study, or who might like to read this? Ask them to email us or to subscribe on our blog-site.

    Isaiah 60:1 –
 1 Arise, shine; for your light has come, (↔ Music Link)
and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you.

Psalm 72:11 –
11 May all kings fall down before him, (↔ Music Link)
    all nations give him service.

Ephesians 3:5 – 5 In former generations this mystery was not made known to humankind, as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit

Matthew 2:9 b –12 – … there, ahead of them, went the star that they had seen at its rising, until it stopped over the place where the child was. 10 When they saw that the star had stopped, they were overwhelmed with joy. 11 On entering the house, they saw the child with Mary his mother; and they knelt down and paid him homage. Then, opening their treasure chests, they offered him gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. 12 And having been warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they left for their own country by another road.

¡Que la bendición esté siempre con ustedes y que Dios los bendiga, Amados! (May blessing always be with you and may God bless you, Belovéd!)  welcome to 2024. At the end of this year we will either finish post 1,000 or be on the brink of it for 2025. I’m inviting you today to go on a journey back through the years as we reorient ourselves to the miracle we are about to celebrate.

Today is January 5, 2024, and in just a couple of days it will be the Feast of the Epiphany. Over the years we’ve always had something to say about that so, for 2024 let’s see what previous years held in store. We will only go back as far as 2012. As you will soon see, that’s way far enough! First, though, why “The Light at the Beginning of the Tunnel?” Our orientation will always be what we read in John 1:1-12 (← Check it out!) Pay special attention to this: “What has come into being in him was life, and the life was the light of all people.” John confirms that the Christ of God was in the beginning and through him all things were made. THAT is the Light at the beginning of the Tunnel. Perhaps we will have something to say about the other end when we get there. As we go, I will leave links (the index numbers NNNAFCNNNN) to the previous posts – JIC you’re operating in Vay-Cay mode and want to do some additional reading. Let me tell you, the Holy Spirit has had some pretty good stuff for us in these preceding years! Here we go!

1201AFC010612 – An Epiphany Message:  An epiphany is a showing forth, or shining forth. It modern times it has come to mean a sudden realization that puts everything into perspective – a paradigm shift where our understanding is “suddenly” brighter and clearer. I put that “suddenly” in quotes, because generally an epiphany comes about after much laborious thinking and working. Those “A-HA” moments are rare, but they are usually preceded by intense effort even if the moment of understanding seems to come effortlessly. Famous “epiphanies” in recent history might include Isaac Newton and Arthur Fry (he invented Post-It Notes), and there have been a few in politics recently which we will not mention today. The basic idea is that genuine innovation comes through inspired thinking based on hard work. They are wonderful experiences whether we feel them ourselves, or watch others “see the light go on.” That experience is the Central Joy of Teaching!

For Christians, Epiphany is the commemoration not so much of the visit by the magi, but the fact that Jesus is revealed to the whole world – Jew and gentile, rich and poor, righteous and sinner, young and old, and whatever other earthling set of opposites you can think up. He came here for every single soul on earth before or after his birth. All of us can turn our eyes toward Jesus and see God with us – Emanuel. That always gives me goose-bumps. God. With. Us. The Manifestation of The Christ. Born of a virgin in abject poverty in a tiny village outside Jerusalem, he grew up in obscure places in Egypt and Galilee, and was anointed with the Holy Spirit at about age 30 (we assume).

   1501AFC010215 – Watch out! (←one of my favorites) Beloved, watch out! Satan is always on the prowl for “silly little, harmless mistakes,” our flirtations with evil, and one by one these little easy betrayals of God build up until – like Samson – we are captured by the very sins we dared to try. That is when we realize that what Paul said about the wages of sin is true. It is death. Better to put the temptation to death by knowing the purpose of the Devil’s deceptions. Remember, his “little mistake” was the sin of rebellion. Read what God says about that in this passage from 1 Samuel as he prophesies against Saul. And Samuel said, “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obedience to the voice of the Lord? Surely, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to heed than the fat of rams. For rebellion is no less a sin than divination, and stubbornness is like iniquity and idolatry. Trusting in occult practices is rebellion.

Don’t.

1701AFC010817 – Showing Up (a personal epiphany) “80% of the job is showing up.”

That’s what we’ve told employees, musicians, teachers, students, and church-goes for years and years. We can’t get the job done, we can’t contribute, and we can’t get the benefits if we don’t show up. Why is that? Because that’s the way God intended it to be. “Oh come on!” you say, “God never said anything like that!” Well, there’s another expression that covers it. “What we do says who we are. Actions speak louder than words.” When God sends people, they show up. When God calls people, they show up. When God blesses people, they show up. When God saves people, they show up – forever! How do we know? We can look at the action God takes when he shows up.

When God calls us, he has expectations. He doesn’t call us to come and sit by him during lunch. He calls us to do something, usually something important to him, and he expects us to show up. Just like members of a band, or a team, or an army, there is a purpose to being called. We are called to ACT, to go and do something. We’ve heard this one: Don’t just stand there. DO something! In Ephesians 6, Paul tells us: “Don’t just do something. Stand there!” (↔ Click it) In this case the “something” we are to do is to “stand firm.” We must definitely show up to do that!

1801AFC010518 – The Fruitful House of Bread A year ago we looked into the idea of Showing Up. The importance of showing up cannot be overemphasized. If you’re not there, you can’t be part of what’s happening. In school, it means you are unavailable for instruction. At work it means you are unavailable for production. In church, it means you are unavailable for praise. In life, it means you’re not available for days, nights, or weekends. In that message from a year ago, we looked into the day the Magi showed up at the house of Joseph, Mary, and Jesus. We don’t know if that house was in Bethlehem – the place where Jesus was born – but we should know a little more about that place – Bethlehem of Ephrathah. It is a very interesting name and an even more interesting place. Let’s start with the word, Bethlehem.

לֶ֣חֶם בֵּֽית־ Beit-Lechem or Beyth Lechem {bayth leh’-khem} means House (Beyth) of Bread (Lechem). What a perfect place for the birth of The Bread of Life! It is the place where Jacob buried Rachael. It is in the Tribal Possession of the Tribe of Judah. That area was very beautiful and fertile, abundant in figs, grapes, almonds, and olives. The country is what we’d call “hilly,” gently-rolling hills. It is just a bit uphill from Jerusalem and about 5.52 miles south of Jerusalem (straight line distance). ]In this post, you will find a table which show the rise in elevation from The Temple Mount (Moriah) to Galilee – a difference in elevation of about 3,314 ft ](← Check it out!)

1901AFC010419 – A Star is Born Belovéd, I’m going to have to skip most of this. I hope you will look at it because it lists the Scriptures that tie up the entire tunnel of The Light from Abram to Mary. I’ll just quote this: What’s a magus?

They were followers of a very ancient religion called Zoroastrianism  Zoroastrianism (↔ Learning Link). Zoroaster, also known as Zarathustra, was an ancient prophet from the region which is what is now southwestern Afghanistan or northeastern Iran. His writings represent what might be called the first monotheistic religion based on the belief that there is only one God. In his writings there were two distinct persons, very much opposite, that held control over all creation and life. They were called Ahura Mazda – he is omnibenevolent (absolutely good), and Angra Mainyu who is his opposite and therefore “omnimalevolent” (absolutely evil)

Abram and his family originated in the same part of the world that Zoroaster inhabited. Perhaps the Magi who came to see the newborn king of the Jews also traveled from that region following a star that hovered over a location somewhere around Bethlehem – the House of Bread – and gave Jesus’ family things they would need later in life when the World came to realize that the King of Kings is the Bread of Life and The Rising Dawn – the Morning Star, the Lilly of the Valley (↔ Music Link).

2001AFC010320 – A King-Size Dose of Reality Psalm 72:10 – 10 May the kings of Tarshish and of the Isles render him tribute, may the kings of Sheba and Seba bring gifts.
Psalm 72:15 –  15 Long may he live! May gold of Sheba be given to him. May prayer be made for him continually, and blessings invoked for him all day long. (Please take a moment to see Psalm 72:10-15 to understand this in context.)
Isaiah 60:6 – 6 A multitude of camels shall cover you, the young camels of Midian and Ephah; all those from Sheba shall come. They shall bring gold and frankincense, and shall proclaim the praise of the Lord.

In these passages, we see the Three Gifts – gold, frankincense, and myrrh. [Explanations of the gifts and their significance are included in this post]

2101AFC010121 – Head for the Light Psalm 72:10-11 – 10 May the kings of Tarshish and of the isles render him tribute, may the kings of Sheba and Seba bring gifts. 11 May all kings fall down before him, all nations give him service. The short interpretation is that this passage signified “the whole world and every nation in it.” In fact, let me suggest that you read Psalm 72 top to bottom; David did an amazing job of describing today’s world. There’s more about today’s world in Isaiah chapter 60 – the source of our Key Verse. (↔ Click Link)

And finally!

2201AFC010722 – In the Beginning Genesis 1:2-4 [1] –
 2 The earth was barren,
with no form of life;
it was under a roaring ocean
covered with darkness.
But the Spirit of God
was moving over the water.

The love of God is like the ocean, you can see its beginnings but not its end. The Grace of God is the Ocean of His Love. He is the source of the Ocean of Grace. When you acknowledge Him, it is as if you are submersed in a vast ocean being fed by a fountain of purest water. You are standing in that fountain in the center of the center of the Crystal Sea drinking from a crystal cup of the Endless Grace and Love, and this is available to every human soul alive today in Heaven and on Earth who chooses to stand in the Grace of God .  This is “so that God may be glorified in all things through Jesus Christ. To him belong the glory and the power forever and ever. Amen.” And that’s the TRUTH!

And so, at the end we have The Beginning, the Light at the Beginning of the Tunnel. Stand in the Light, Belovéd. It is there, shining for thee (↔ Music Link) just like the star in Bethlehem, the House of Bread where was born the Bread of Life. Like that star, let the Light of Christ shine in you like a beacon. (↔ Music Link) That Light in you is the Light of Christ (↔ Music Link)  at the end of the tunnel. It’s all in the Absolutely Perfect Plan. YOLO-F!

 

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

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

[1] Contemporary English Version (CEV)

Copyright © 1995 by American Bible Society For more information about CEV, visit www.bibles.com and www.cev.bible.

 

Aloha Friday Message – December 29, 2023 – A Promise IS a Promise

December 29, 2023

2352AFC122923 – A Promise IS A Promise

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often.
Do you know someone who enjoys Bible study, or who might like to read this? Ask them to email us or to subscribe on our blog-site.

  Genesis 21:3 – 3 Abraham gave the name Isaac to his son whom Sarah bore him.

Psalm 105:5-6 –
5 Remember the wonderful works he has done,
his miracles, and the judgments he has uttered,
6 O offspring of his servant Abraham,
children of Jacob, his chosen ones.

Hebrews 11:17-19 – 17 By faith Abraham, when put to the test, offered up Isaac. He who had received the promises was ready to offer up his only son, 18 of whom he had been told, “It is through Isaac that descendants shall be named for you.” 19 He considered the fact that God is able even to raise someone from the dead—and figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.

Luke 2:36-38 – 36 There was also a prophet, Anna the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was of a great age, having lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, 37 then as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She never left the temple but worshiped there with fasting and prayer night and day. 38 At that moment she came, and began to praise God and to speak about the child to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem.

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. Wishing you a Joyous Fifth Day in the Octave of Christmas – without the Five Golden Rings. 😊 Today we are going to pluck up some Scripture and see what’s underneath and/or behind it. You may have heard some of this before; I’m like a broken record because I’m a broken person. Nonetheless Jesus redeemed me from my brokenness. When I reflect on that I realize I need Jesus, the Lord, and so I pray, I need thee every hour. (↔ Music Link)

Yesterday, December 28,2023, was the Feast of the Holy Innocents – a commemoration of King Herod’s horrific decision to have all the male children under the age of two in Bethlehem slaughtered so as to preserve his rule of Judaea (↔ Click it). Did you know there was a prophecy about that? It’s mentioned in Matthew 2:17-18 (Stop here and read this.) Here is what that prophecy says: Jeremiah 31:15 – 15 Thus says the Lord:
A voice is heard in Ramah,
lamentation and bitter weeping.
Rachel is weeping for her children;
she refuses to be comforted for her children,
because they are no more.

Herod made that decision based on incomplete information. He had been visited by the Magi who told him they were looking for the newborn King of the Jews. Herod asked all the Chief Priests and the Scribes where this Kin was to be born. They gave him only part of the answer! What he heard in this quote from the Prophet Micah is shown here in green print. The part he did not hear is in standard print.

Micah 5:2-5 a –
2 But you, O Bethlehem of Ephrathah,
who are one of the little clans of Judah,
from you shall come forth for me
one who is to rule in Israel,
whose origin is from of old,
from ancient days.
3 Therefore he shall give them up until the time
when she who is in labor has brought forth;
then the rest of his kindred shall return
to the people of Israel.
4 And he shall stand and feed his flock in the strength of the Lord,
in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God.
And they shall live secure, for now he shall be great.
5 and he shall be the one of peace.

Perhaps if Herod had heard the rest of the prophecy, me might not have made such a hasty and harsh decision about the little town of Bethlehem. (↔ Music Link) Then again, he really wasn’t a very nice guy about anything – a real politician in those days. Nonetheless the Lord, God Most High (לְא עֶלְיֽוֹן El ʿElyōn) allowed that. We can see that this whole cycle of events was given in Prophecy centuries before Jesus’ birth. Now, we know that Prophecy is the spiritual gift of proclaiming God’s word. The test of Prophecy is whether or not it comes true, and it can only come true if it is based in Truth. For example, “He shall be called Emanuel” is Prophecy and “Scorpio, your day will be memorable” is false Prophecy because astrology is not based in Truth. Because Prophecy is based in truth, we consider them to be promises. That’s the purpose behind today’s Key Verses – they all contain or refer to PROMISES. Whenever we promise a loved-one that we will do such-and-such a thing, it is like a very simple Prophecy – if we follow through it is a true Prophecy; if we flub it, then it’s a false Prophecy (also known as a lie). Promises are for keeping because they stir up Hope. False promises are for false hopes (also known as heartbreak). Alright, we have an idea of what’s up so let’s look into which promises are contained in today’s Key Verses.

Let’s start with Isaac. That name means “he laughs” or “laughter.” When God told Abram that he and his wife Sarai would have a son, Abram was 99 and Sarai was 89. Of course they laughed (although I would not recommend laughing at anything God tells us!). Sarai was “called barren” and Abram was “nearly dead.” Being able to conceive a child under those conditions might seem laughable, but – as Gabriel told Mary – “With God,c all things are possible.” Now, if you listen intently, you will hear the names Abram and Abraham in the passages from that reading in Genesis. That is because there is a big chunk of the story missing. In the first few verses (Genesis 15:1-6), God calls him Abram. In the second section (Genesis 21:1-3) God calls him Abraham. God gives Abram then new name of Abraham in Genesis 17:5 (Stop here are read this.) There is a lot of really GOOD reading in Genesis, Chapters 15-21! Try it someday; you’ll definitely like it. Here’s the Express-Stop Play by play: In Genesis 16, Sarai decides to give Abram a child by sending her servant Hagar (possibly meaning forsaken flight) because Sarai is barren. The result is Ismael. Hagar and Sarai snipe at each other because Ismael was teasing Isaac (Genesis 21:9) and eventually, Abraham sends her off with only a few provisions. An angel appears to Hagar and tells her to go back. Ismael is also a true descendant of Abraham, and as such is also the father of many princes (signifying peoples). Ismael will be a wild onager (↔ Important Learning Link) of a man who will live in opposition to everyone and everyone will be against him, particularly his brother’s descendants. The children of Ismael became the Arabic Peoples and the children of Isaac became the Israelites, “offspring of his [God’s] servant Abraham.” We can see, a promise is a promise.

Abraham was 75 when God told him Sarah would give birth to Isaac. He waited 25 years (25!) for that promise to be fulfilled. Then, around 12-13 years later, God asked Abraham to take Isaac to the top of Mount Moriah and to sacrifice him there as a burnt offering. Abraham took the lad up there. Abraham carried the knife and the fire; Isaac carried the wood (a prefiguring of the Way of the Cross). When Isaac asked his father, “Where is the lamb for the  sacrifice?” Abraham replied, “The Lord will provide the sacrifice.” As he was about to put that knife to use on Isaac, the Angel of the Lord stopped him because there was a ram caught in a nearby thicket. Abraham called the place “The Lord will provide” (Jehovah Jahre ↔ Learning Link). “ He considered the fact that God is able even to raise someone from the dead—and figuratively speaking, he did receive him back.”

We should not skip over the Promise that was a Promise made in the Holy Spirit – a promise made to Simeon, a devout worshipper of God, and a man to whom God had promised he would live until the Messiah was born. Sure enough, when Mary and Joseph went to the Temple in fulfillment of the Law (“Every male child who opens the womb shall be dedicated to God), Simeon – filled with the Holy Spirit – recognized the baby Jesus as the long-awaited Messiah. Here’s a handy little video about that – the story of The Presentation of Mary. (↔ Video Link!)

Now, let’s finish up with Anna, the prophetess, daughter of Phanuel of the tribe of Asher. (see the ☆ ˜on the map) Let’s begin with her name – Anna. This is a variation of Hannah, Channah, meaning “favor” or “grace.” In 1 Samuel, chapters 1 & 2, we read that Hannah was one of Elkanah’s wives and the mother of Samuel. For the period of about 19 years without children, she prayed consistently for a son and was eventually favored by God, hence the meaning of her name. We know her as an example of faithful, reverent, and consistent petition followed by joyful acceptance of God’s will. She kept her promise to give her son to the Lord, and the Lord kept his promise to make Samuel a servant of God. Her father was Phanuel whose name means face of, or vision of, God. He was from the tribe of Asher. Asher was one of the sons of Jacob, and Joshua allotted to Asher the coastal region of western Galilee (see map). The “blessing of Asher” by Moses said “Most blessed of sons be Asher; may he be the favorite of his brothers, and may he dip his foot in oil.” (Deuteronomy 33:24) Anna the Prophetess was 84 years old. She had been widowed after 7 years, so if she got married around age 13 – as was the custom then – she would have been a widow 64 years.

84 is a number which can represent the fullness of Israel (7 X 12), and Anna  and Simeon (the name means “to hear”) bore witness to the Christ Jesus was only 40 days old (Celebrated February 2, and also called “Candlemas”). Their “joint declaration” signifies that there is a New Covenant to be established, and this infant about whom they gush is the One Messiah they – and all of Israel – have watched for and waited for all these millennia. You see, a promise is a promise, and they believed in and SAW that promise fulfilled. Perhaps the folks who knew these two very old people shook their heads and clucked their tongues at the news they proclaimed. Maybe a few folks remembered the stories about shepherds around Bethlehem. The distance between Jerusalem and Bethlehem was about 6 miles, so the shepherds might have “come to town” bearing “tidings of great joy.” From Jerusalem to Nazareth was around 90 miles. Mary and Joseph had plenty of time to discuss things on the way back. Perhaps they stayed in Bethlehem with some of Joseph’s relatives for a time – long enough to be found by the Magi. We don’t know for sure, but we do know that God made a Prophecy he would “bring his son out of Egypt,” and that’s what happened when Herod ordered all the Innocents massacred.

There we have our story pretty much full circle. Belovéd, a promise is a promise just a a Prophecy is a Prophecy which is a Promise from God. God said it, I believe it, and I’m stickin to it! Why? Because I [1] repent and believe the Gospel (metanoia), [2] and I know God has promised us Eternal and Everlasting Life. (YOLO-F) Here’s a thought on that.

I think of “eternal” and “everlasting” as slightly different connotations. They are synonyms for each other, of course, but for me eternal carries a connotation of perpetual or even better interminable – it can’t be stopped. For me, everlasting connotes something that is constantly renewed. It never ages. It is not subject to temporal progression. It is always instantly renewed. I tend to envision eternal as “over yonder, beyond the River, past the Pearly Gates.” But my image of everlasting is more “here-side” – it is happening right now as you read these words if you believe in Him. If you believe Jesus is the Christ, the risen Lord, the living and only begotten Son of I AM, then your life is constantly renewed moment by moment in His saving grace. Even when you are living “over yonder” the process of instantaneous perpetual renewal never changes. That is one very good and perfect Promise!! Wanna see another one? Try this link. That is God’s Absolutely Perfect Plan!

 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

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

 

Aloha Friday Message – December 22, 2023 – A Heart-Healthy Life

December 22, 2023

2351AFC122223 – A Heart-Healthy Life  (Fourth Sunday of Advent) ← Podcast

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often.
Do you know someone who enjoys Bible study, or who might like to read this? Ask them to email us or to subscribe on our blog-site.

    Luke 1:38-b – “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.”

John 2:5 – 5 His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.” (← Check it out!)

2 Samuel 7:16 – 16 Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me, your throne shall be established forever.

Psalm 89:3-4 –
3 You said, “I have made a covenant with my chosen one,
I have sworn to my servant David:
4 ‘I will establish your descendants forever,
and build your throne for all generations.” Selah

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. I also pray that all of us will seek the Life that brings us a heart like King David’s heart, a heart after God’s own heart. Some days that seems to be to be an impossible goal. In fact, “some days” is a massive understatement. You may recall that in his youth, David lived and worked with and in the Holy Spirit … until he didn’t.

You might know that David committed some VERY BIG sins! So we wonder: how could a man whose heart was like the heart of God sin so terribly and still find favor (Grace) from God?  We can sum it up in one simple word: Repentance. David did indeed adhere to an important two-step  process: [1] He admitted his sins, and [2] he repented. You probably recognize that pattern as it comes up often in these pages: Repent and Believe the Gospel. For us, then, it is a three- step process: [1] believe the Gospel,[2] acknowledge our sins, and repent. Q: Why put “believe the Gospel” first? A: Because it is The Word of God and especially the Gospel which instructs us in the means of repentance. It is the same process which David used: honor the Giver by accepting the Gift.

The Gift is Life, the Giver is God, and the way we honor the Giver is by Gifting Him our obedience – our entire life as our “yes” to his Absolutely Perfect Plan for us. When God called, David said yes. He became a warrior, a ruler, a Prophet, a poet, a sinner, and he still was a man after God’s own heart because he loved God’s Word, and wiling and properly repented when he rejected the Gift of Grace. He turned around and went back to God and said, “Here I am, the servant of the Lord.” Whenever he made any accomplishment as a warrior, he always credited the victory to God. If he was sent out in a role of authority, he behaved wisely because he understood the way of God. David served God well in the pinnacle of his kingship, and even before he was anointed by Samuel in the sight of his father and brothers, God had determined that the Ultimate Messiah would be “of the house and lineage of David.” This is why God promised David, “ Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me, your throne shall be established forever.“

Now, we might say, “David had an edge! God had already clothed him with honor and all David had to do was keep coming back whenever he failed to keep his honor.” Isn’t it the same with you and me, Belovéd? Are we not already anointed Priest, Prophet, and King? Isn’t it true that all we have to do is keep coming back whenever we fail to keep our honor? Well, then perhaps it is too difficult for us to keep our honor. “Yeah! What did David have that I don’t have?” Do you mean other than a heart that was like unto God’s heart?  Well, David had that alright, but he possessed something out of God’s Treasure House even before he was anointed King. He loved, lived, breathed, dreamed, honored, cherished, studied, memorized, contributed to, and prophesied in God’s Law. The Word of God was the body and soul of his life. Ah, yes, he was a prodigious sinner! He was also a humble servant who knew the secret of being humble. Wanna be in on that secret?  COOL! Here we go!

Here comes one of those invitations for you to go “off-post” and do some reading on your own. Please follow this link to 2 Samuel 22, (↔ Click Link) especially verses 22-25 and 29-33. If you recall from last week’s post, this is a song that is not in the Book of Psalms, therefore it is referred to as a Canticle. It will take less than 2 minutes to read the whole thing and less than 1 minute to read the referenced selection. Please, pause here and give it a try.  I’ll wait. {/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\} Thank you! Wasn’t that terrific? Now, try remember what Mary sang after she entered the home of her cousin, Elizabeth? YES! “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, …” Mary’s response was a canticle of praise and thanksgiving.

Why? Is there a connection between the kind of heart King David had and the kind of heart the Virgin Mary had? You have answered rightly, ʻŌmea! They were both chosen by God and both had humble hearts that loved God. we know quite a lot about David’s life, but not much about Mary’s. Let’s digress for a moment and see what we do have.

Mary’s early life is not recorded in the canon of Scripture, but there are some pious traditions from other sources which are not part of accepted Scripture. They are fun to read, but only as fanciful anecdotes about that part of her life. There are many such speculative and alleged non-biblical materials that are interesting to read but cannot be rightfully woven into the Biblical Narrative such as the Book of Enoch, the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, The Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Laodiceans, and several others. We do not encourage reading them. We have enough wonder and mystery presented to us in the biblical canon of Scripture (Greek kanon / Ancient Greek: κανών – a straight stick used for authoritative [official] measuring, hence the canon is the authorized collection of scripture). For Catholics that includes 73 book, for non-Catholics 66 books, and for all the world the Bible is one of the most read and most sold books ever. Somewhere around 4,000 – 6,000 years ago, the ancestors of Noah were in what would be later called Canaan. There is some evidence that homo sapiens were migrating out of Africa about 60,000 years ago. For our purposes, though, the World began with Genesis 1:1, and someday it will be dissolved in fire. (← Check it out!) I expect all of us would rather not witness that!

Now, there is another interesting word that connects with people who have hearts that are meek and humble, full of Love, and devoted to God. They are the witnesses, the martyrs, whose lives “magnify the Lord and rejoice in God our Savior.” When we encounter Jesus, or his Mother – or indeed any of the Saints who have gone before us – our souls, our hearts, and our entire lives conform to the healthy-heart state of joyful service, adoration, thanks-giving, and praise. In this actuality, we readily respond to Mary’s instructions to the servants at the Wedding in Cana: “Do whatever he tells you.” O, Dearly Belovéd, how often we hear that humble command and reply in our best four-year-old voice, “NO! I DO IT MYSELF!” Isn’t that what our First parents said? Isn’t it true that even David said something like that in his heart as he gazed upon Bathsheba, or when Abram and Sarai decided to get ahead of God’s Absolutely Perfect Plan and the result was Ishmael? Isn’t true that we must all admit that that willful child within us whose name is Pride is the most susceptible part of us when the Tempter and his henchmen come around? How can our hearts be healthy like David’s or Abraham’s, or Enoch’s, or Mary, or … Jesus, our Lord and our God?

“Well,” we might say, “Jesus and Mary were made perfect by God, but we lost our individual perfection a lo-o-o-o-ong time ago!” True again, esteemed scholar, so how do we restore that messed up heart to its proper health? How do we reclaim the heart with which we were created when we prefer to make excuses, rather than ask for help? (↔ Music Link) I bet you saw this one coming!

We regain our healthy heart – heart like the hearts of the Saints – when we [1] believe the Gospel, [2] acknowledge our sins, and repent. “And what does that have to do with the celebration of Advent, Old Man?” I suppose the best answer I have is …

EVERYTHING! During this time of reflection, prayer, and penance, we can learn to be just, merciful, and obedient so as to live righteously, and to be open to the absolutely astonishing power of God’s Perfect Integrity, Endless Mercy, Everlasting Love, and Eternal Salvation in Christ our Lord. I have often wondered about those shepherds watching their flocks by night. Did they carry the astonishing wonder of the message of the angels all the rest of their lives, and did they share it with their children and their grandchildren? Did a few of them feast on fish and bread in a deserted place near Bethsaida? Were any of them in Jerusalem to witness the Crucifixion? Did some of them influence the content of the Gospels by sharing their own Good News? It’s fun to meditate on those things, but the bottom line is that we, too, have our own Good News that we carry in our own healthy hearts. That Gospel is inspired by the Holy Spirit, and even if it is not canonical, it is restorative for the good of our Souls, and whatever is good for the Soul is good for Heart-Healthy Life. Where does our repentance begin?

Let’s look back at a couple of guys in Scripture that messed up big-time. We’ll go back through time to King David who went to the Source to begin repentance. Psalm 51 (↔ Click Link) is a record of his M.A.P. (← Check it out!) for returning to God. His plea was  His plea was “Create in me a clean heart, (↔ Music Link) O God,”” and his sincere contrition and effective repentance restored his heart to health. Another guy who was greatly blessed before his birth was Samson (Note: There is no letter “P” in the middle of that name.) His name was שִׁמְשׁון – Shimshon from shemesh – Sun. Samson was a Bright Smiling Sun that began the deliverance of Israel from the Philistines. Given the events we see nightly on the News, we recall that the name “Palestine” comes from the Romans, who renamed the area “Palestinia” in 63 BC after Rome conquered Judea and renamed it after the Philistines, Israel’s perpetual enemy. This was a lasting way to insult the Israelites.

Recall now that Samson refused to resist the desire to be tempted and moved closer to the territories of the Philistines. Long story short, he was the Jewish Superman for twenty years, counted among the Judges (foremost military leaders). He kept doing things that were right on the border of temptation; he desired to be tempted, and gave in to that desire one time too often. Samson was deliberately exposing himself to the danger of temptation – instead of fleeing from it – and as a result he got trapped in sin. That eventually cost him his pride, his vision, and finally his life; nonetheless he died repentant albeit it after many years lost in shame. When we constantly place ourselves in the path of temptation – you may recall the phrase “the near occasion of sin” – we are essentially risking our souls for the thrill of confronting God’s law. That’s not healthy-heart living by a long stretch! In the end, David and Samson both ended up winners because they trusted in God’s promise of forgiveness of sin. Samson got rest from his shame and his enemies. David got rest from his enemies and One of his descendants will indeed reign on his throne forever and subdue all enemies, including Death. With Death conquered, everyone will have a heart-healthy lifestyle for ever and ever. YOLO-F, amen! We, too, shall ask for a clean heart, because then – we will have a heart after God’s own heart, the heart of a Servant of God. (↔ Music Link) How do we reclaim the heart with which we were created when we prefer to make excuses? (↔ Music Link) Yes, Belovéd, we offer our El Shaddai our humble and contrite hearts. That is the Heart-Healthy Life God has had in mind since the very first time he said “Let there be …”

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

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

Aloha Friday Message – December 15, 2023 – What shall we say?

December 15, 2023

2350AFC121523 – What shall we say?

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often.
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    Isaiah 61:10-11 –
10 I will greatly rejoice in the Lord,
my whole being shall exult in my God;
for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation,
he has covered me with the robe of righteousness,
as a bridegroom decks himself with a garland,
and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
11 For as the earth brings forth its shoots,
and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up,
so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise
to spring up before all the nations.

Luke 1:46-48-a – 46 And Mary said,
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
47     and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed”

1 Thessalonians 5:16-22 – 16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. 19 Do not quench the Spirit. 20 Do not despise the words of prophets, 21 but test everything; hold fast to what is good; 22 abstain from every form of evil.

John 1:19-23 – 19 This is the testimony given by John when the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, “Who are you?” 20 He confessed and did not deny it, but confessed, “I am not the Messiah.”[a] 21 And they asked him, “What then? Are you Elijah?” He said, “I am not.” “Are you the prophet?” He answered, “No.” 22 Then they said to him, “Who are you? Let us have an answer for those who sent us. What do you say about yourself?” 23 He said,

“I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness,
‘Make straight the way of the Lord,’”

as the prophet Isaiah said.

Aloha nui loa, ʻŌmea! I open with the following greeting with you specifically in mind:

1 Thessalonians 5:23-25 –  23 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. 24 The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do this.  

25 Beloved, pray for us. ⇐ Now, Belovéd, why is that text a different color? SO glad you asked! In fact I REJOICE that you asked! Who remembers the Latin name of this coming Sunday in Advent? Yes! It is Gaudete Sunday. That word means Rejoice, and it is the first word of the Introit (Entrance Verse) at the very beginning of the Mass. In our Advent Wreaths, the “pink” candle will be lit. I put the work pin in quotes because the actual liturgical name for that is “Rose.”

A few paragraphs from now we will look at the different terms in the Bible that are translated as “Rejoice,” but first I ask you, “Who is rejoicing, and why?” What shall we say to that?

In the passage from Isaiah, he starts of by saying, “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord.” Remember that this remarkable collection of prophecies is handed down to us as poetry. In this passage, the Prophet has personified Jerusalem by speaking in the first-person-singular. If you follow the link above, look at the GNT version which says, “Jerusalem rejoices because of what the Lord has done.” Isaiah, numbered among the greatest Prophets in Israel’s history, wrote often about the military and political errors, corrections, the hope for liberation from oppressors, and the famous “Servant Songs” in chapters 40-48. Chapter 61 speaks of the Anointed Bearer of Glad Tidings. He, Isaiah, has been anointed by the Lord to convey the extraordinary news to the suffering Nation that Zion – the Holy city of Jerusalem – will be restored (pray God it will be so again soon!). Isaiah is commissioned by the Lord to announce this news, and what he says does indeed gladden hearts and evoke rejoicing. That spirit of rejoicing is also found in the familiar “song” of Mary spoken when she visited her cousin, Elizabeth. See if you hear something like Isaiah’s words, then say them with her.

Mary said, “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. This is the beginning of the canticle often referred to as “The Magnificat.” Two definitions may be required here for some of our readers. What is a “canticle?” It is a song, like all the Psalms for example. “So, Chick, why isn’t it called a Psalm?” It is called a canticle because it is a song which is not included in the Book of Psalms in which all the song-poem named “Psalm” are recorded. There are canticles in Exodus, Deuteronomy, and 1 Samuel – the Song of the [Red] Sea, the Canticle of Moses, and the Canticle of Hannah respectively. You can find a nice list of Canticles in the Bible HERE. In this Canticle, Mary is not personifying herself as “Jerusalem” as in Isaiah; however, nonetheless, her Canticle echoes the words of Isaiah because in her fiat (unconditional yes), she embraced the possibility of Hope and Redemption for not only Zion, but also for the entire World. What she said was “Scriptural, Biblical, and Spirit-inspired.” It was like that aphorism, “God said it, I believe it, and I’m stickin’ to it!” “Magnificat” is the first word – in Latin – of Mary’s canticle. In this season of the Liturgy, we share our joy as we come together – around the world! – to Joyfully Adore (↔ Music Link) Jesus the Newborn King. (↔ Music Link)

The Key Verse from our Epistle for the 3rd Sunday in Advent is very similar to the passage that gives us the name Gaudete. The introit is based on Philippians 4:4 – 4 Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice. In this passage, the Greek word is Chairete which, as described above, is Gaudete in Latin. (Use that link to see more Bible passages like that.) Let’s pause here for a moment to reflect on what rejoicing is, and what it means for us. We can begin with several of the words found in Scripture which are usually translated as “rejoice.” You can find the list and a fuller exposition of the Gift of rejoicing in 1650AFC120916 – Rejoice already! Here is the improved list list so we’ll know what we say:

Samah – שָׂמַ֖ח – Jubilant, spontaneous dancing, signing (simhach) – 1 Chronicles 29:9
Alaz – עָלַז – Exult – Burst into leaping with joy – Habakkuk 3:17-18 – “Jump for JOY!”
Nagilah – נָגִ֖ילָה – Let us rejoice – Psalm 118:4
Euphraino – εὐφραίνω – To gladden the mind – Revelation 12:12
Kauchaomai – καυχάομαι – Glory in success and boast against – 1 Corinthians 1:30-31
Synchairo – συγχαίρω – Rejoicing together (συγ- -), with others – Luke 15:6
Agalliao – ἀγαλλιάω – Rejoice Greatly, to exult; jump for joy – Revelation 19:6-8
Chairo – χαίρω – Rejoicing over experiencing God’s Grace; be glad in the Lord – Luke 15:32

So, as you can see Belovéd, rejoicing is a very human thing to do because we have so many ways of expressing it. The Apostle Paul tells us at least two dozen times to rejoice, and there are over 260 occurrences of some form throughout the Bible. The Apostle Paul says “Rejoice” because our hearts rejoice “In the Lord” and our spirits “in God our Savior.” O, Belovéd! When we pause to take in the Magnificence and Magnanimity of God, we cannot help but rejoice and be JOYFUL (↔ Music Link) in our adoration of our King and God. And how is it that Isaiah, Mary, Moses, Tobit, David, Solomon, Sirach, Zechariah, and oh so many more could rejoice in God? Right again, fellow travelers! It is in the Power of the Holy Spirit! And what does HE do for us? Well, we can hark back to the Gifts and Fruit of the Holy Spirit to see what The Apostle Paul says about these.

There is so much JOY to be found in The Holy Spirit! We know about the fruit of the Holy Spirit. All of the things mentioned as the Fruit of the Spirit are things that make us happy. We can find them in Galatians 5:22-23 – The Fruit of the Holy Spirit
Love is service and sacrifice.
Joy is balance at the center of the soul.
Peace is good order.
Patience is the ability to endure whatever comes.
Kindness is attentive regard for the other.
Generosity is the habitual disposition to share.
Gentleness is courageous respect for other.
Self-Control is a voluntary check on the appetite for success.

We’ve also explored the Gifts of the Holy Spirit

The Word of Knowledge
The Word of Wisdom
The Gift of Prophecy
The Gift of Faith
The Gift of Healing
The Working of Miracles
The Discerning of Spirits
Different Kinds of Tongues
The Interpretation of Tongues

We have this Fruit and these Gifts to help us learn to be happy – to REJOICE IN THE Lord, ALWAYS! It’s important to remember what it takes to be happy, to be always ready to rejoice. We just have to remember these 7 simple rules for REJOICING:

  1. Free our hearts from hatred and fill our hearts with Love.
  2. Free our minds from worries and fill our minds withs F.A.I.T.H.
  3. Live simply in the rejoicing of today.
  4. Give more for those who have less.
  5. Expect less and rejoice in the wealth of blessings we find.
  6. Share the Joy as we pass The Word along – AND REMEMBER …
  7. Joy isn’t completely fulfilled until it is shared.

We can rejoice alone – and this often happens when rejoicing in the Spirit – but when there is someone to rejoice with us … that is really REJOICING! Now, imagine rejoicing with Jesus – in our houses, in our churches, in our cars, in our hearts – ALL THE TIME!!! Now, think about this: if the Word of God mentions rejoicing so many times, can we conclude it is something our Lord thinks is important? Indeed it is important, and essential, too.  ʻŌmea, will you commit to rejoicing with me in and for and because of HIM? Rejoice with one another, Belovéd. Pray for, with, and about one another (← Start here). Remember what He said: “Whatever you do to the least of these…” and “I AM coming tomorrow.” (↔ Music Link) I want him to find us REJOICING, that’s what I say!! Now, get up and – not say, but – shout HALLELUIAH!! ALLELUIA!! PRAISE THE Lord! (↔ Music Link) Our God – the Holy Trinity – is with us today. Please remember that when we say the name of God here, we mean the entire Trinity.

Carry me …

Only in God will I find Joy. Only in God will I find Justice tempered with Mercy. Only in God will I find forgiveness and the power to forgive. Only in God will my faith sustain me through my trials as well as yours. Only in God is the Father of Lies utterly defeated by the Father of Life. Only in God will I find that all of life’s answers I need were all given to me while shepherds watched their flocks by night and angels from the realms of Glory sang praise to God the Father in celebration of the birth of God the Son, Jesus. And if there were to be no God to be the Giver of All Good Gifts, how and where could I find anything that is Good? Only at the Manger and the Cross do I find the Power of God Who IS Christ Jesus to lay down my life before His Throne. Only through the Grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit can any of us find hope that our sins, as well as the sins of those who sin against us, have been forgiven. God grant us each the sense to use the Grace He gave us to accept this simple fact: The reason for Jesus is us. And now, Belovéd, what say we rekindle the quieter side of our adoration with a gentle lullaby. What do y’all say?

Be near me, Lord Jesus, I ask Thee to stay (↔ Music Link)
Close by me forever, and love me, I pray;
Bless all the dear children in Thy tender care,
And take us to Heaven to live with Thee there.

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

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

 

Aloha Friday Message – December 8, 2023 – Peace be with you

December 8, 2023

2349AFC120823 – Peace be with you.  (2nd Sunday of Advent) ← Podcast

Read it online here, please. And please – when you visit there – use one of the social media links at the bottom of the page to share this post. Thank you! And remember, we now have a READER VIEW available, so share this link or this email often.
Do you know someone who enjoys Bible study, or who might like to read this? Ask them to email us or to subscribe on our blog-site.

Isaiah 40:3-5 –
3 A voice cries out: (↔ Music Link)
“In the wilderness prepare the way of the Lord,
make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
4 Every valley shall be lifted up,
and every mountain and hill be made low;
the uneven ground shall become level,
and the rough places a plain.
5 Then the glory of the Lord shall be revealed,
and all people shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

Psalm 85:8-10 –
8 Let me hear what God the Lord will speak,
for he will speak peace to his people,
to his faithful, to those who turn to him in their hearts.
9 Surely his salvation is at hand for those who fear him,
that his glory may dwell in our land.
10 Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet;
righteousness and peace will kiss each other.

2 Peter 3:9-10, 14 – 9 The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance. 10 But the day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and everything that is done on it will be disclosed. 14 Therefore, beloved, while you are waiting for these things, strive to be found by him at peace, without spot or blemish

Mark 1:2-3, 7-8 – 2 As it is written in the prophet Isaiah,

“See, I am sending my messenger ahead of you,
who will prepare your way;
3 the voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
‘Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight,’”

7 He proclaimed, “The one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to stoop down and untie the thong of his sandals. 8 I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”

Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord in the fellowship of the Holy Spirit. 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 and Peace. Before we go any further with this post, I wish to pause and acknowledge that today, December 8, 2023, is Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. This celebration is not well understood outside the Catholic Church, and – in all honesty – not many Catholics understand it well. Often when asked what “The Immaculate Conception” means, folks will state it’s when Mary got pregnant by the Holy Ghost. Not even close. The Immaculate Conception refers to how Mary was conceived as the daughter of Saint Ann and Saint Joachim. God prepared her as a special vessel to carry the Christ of God, and he did so before her birth by allowing her to be the first to be redeemed by Jesus’ willing and loving sacrifice on the Cross. Mary was the First Disciple, and the First Apostle because she was the first to know who Jesus was, is, and would be, and because of that God allowed her to be conceived without the stain of original sin. If we think that is difficult to understand, that it is because it is a Mystery of Faith, and we simply must trust that God, who cannot lie, is telling us the Truth about this tender child he chose for a very BIG responsibility. Much to his delight – and to hers and ours as well – she humbly said “Yes. Let all this happen as you have said.” But sixteen or so years before that, she came to this world as a sweet little infant girl-child who grew up loving God and all his works and words. THAT is what we celebrate today, the conception of the Ark of the New Covenant. I believe pretty much every kind of Christian there is in this world can agree with the fact that Mary, as the Mother of Jesus, is a V.I.P. in the inception and spread of Christianity.

Now, let us begin with today’s post. Every day now for over a year, I have prayed for peace in Ukraine with Ukraine remaining independent and Putin disempowered. The war rages on. For months now I have been praying for Hamas to be wiped out and for Israel to honor its moral obligation to minimize noncombatant deaths. The war rages on. For months and months, I have been praying that ethnic-based violence and racial prejudices be eliminated in East Republic of Congo, Somalia and Darfur in Sudan. The war rages on. I have prayed sporadically for years for the Islamic oppression in Iran to end there and around the world. I’d like for all of them to become Christians. It is changing ever so slowly. All of us in some way with some sort of frequency pray for Peace even if it’s only in the General Intercessions on Sundays. Peace always seems to be elusive, perhaps even impossible. “Let there be Peace on Earth” is a beautiful anthem that just doesn’t seem to get off the ground. Recently I came to understand that perhaps it’s because we forget the second line of that prayer – “and let it begin with me.”

Sometime in the late 60’s I wrote a lyric called “Man of Peace.” I mentioned it in a post in 2019 called 1945AFC110819 (←find it here) – ALL For Christ (←read this Scripture first) The gist of it went like this:

I am a man of Peace. I own no other name.
I stand before you, gird about with gifts of Love.
You ask me of my Peace, and how I hold it so.
Good listener, I do not hold my Peace.
I am held in Peace.

During Advent we prepare for the coming of the Prince of Peace, who is the King of Glory, and a Priest in the Order of Melchizedek. As we prepare, we ask ourselves, “Am I ready for him?” Oh, Belovéd! How much of our energy is spent “getting ready for Christmas,” or living for the Happy Holidays, or caught up in the powerful Joy of Chanuka? We know there are other celebrations of other interests that occur during this same time. All of these celebrations celebrate Peace and Brotherhood, and most of them have been taken over by worldly commercialism. The Reason we’re easin’ into the Season is lost in the tinsel, glitz, greediness, and confusion of what to do about a gift for so-and-so. There are cards and letters to send (which reminds me, I haven’t written our 55th annual Christmas letter yet!). Here’s the rub: TOO MUCH HUBBUB! “So, Chick, you’re saying to ignore all that and just get all Holy and everything?”

Well, no, not exactly, but the Key Verses today have some useful ideas about making Advent more than just a shopping adventure. What great amounts of time we waste when we spend hours at the mall, and what small amounts of time we chafe against to spend an hour with the Lord in the Eucharist! [1] We feel anxiety waiting for the FedEx truck because we want granny’s present to be on time, but we can’t watch for Jesus in the people around us. How do we make waiting for the Lord more like Peace?

Take the passage from Isaiah, for example. We all know it – almost by heart we’ve heard it so often. The literal sense is pretty clear: God’s going to do something amazing so we need to get ready. The wilderness is a tough place to be with mountains and valleys and deserts, and bandits, and … Scary Stuff! But if we listen intently to the whole reading this Sunday, there’s a lot to be excited about. God is coming to relieve Jerusalem from all the chastisement they have received for their sin. There is a reason for the sentinels to cry out with joy about the Hope the Lord brings! God the Almighty is coming, but he comes as a wise shepherd who carries the lambs in his arms and guides the expectant ewes with care. That is an Advent of Peace as in “he leads me beside still waters.” You know how to look up that one!

   The Ideal Shepherd Isaiah talks about is the Davidic Shepherd in Psalm 23, and in Ezekiel 34, especially 34:15-23 (←Don’t skip this!). Isaiah portrays this shepherd carrying the lambs (←read this post) with tenderness and care. Little lambs have a lot of energy, but they also tire easily. When they are moving with the flock as they graze, the little guys sometimes get tuckered out and just can’t go any farther. The good shepherd will pick up that little one and carry it for a while so it can rest without being left behind. As for the ewes, especially those still carrying their progeny, they must be led with care – slowly, with an eye toward safe paths, gentle slopes, adequate water, and quietly so as not to endanger their lives. When Jacob and Esau were going through the process of reconciling with one another, Jacob makes a comment that driving the herd hard would kill the future of the herd – the ewes and the lambs they carried. Here’s the thing: If there are lambs around, there will soon be more during the herd’s birthing season. A wise shepherd will lead (not drive) his flock over gentle slopes, still waters, and find rich, verdant pastures. That is the kind of Shepherd Isaiah is speaking about.

Isaiah says to make the roads in the wilderness straight and level. Why that allegory? In ancient times, when an important leader was coming to town, the roads would be leveled out, cleared of debris, the hills would be lowered and the valleys filled up to make the journey of the dignitary easier. Isn’t that somewhat like what we can do with our lives? We can level with God, tell the truth, reduce our pride and fill up our shortcomings with humility. We can stop muting our conscience and tune in to those broadcasts about using moral decisions to map out our lives instead of our materialistic wants. Doing these things only once makes that act an historical moment, but doing that always makes that a lifestyle – a Christian lifestyle. When we get to the sorting of the sheep and goats, Jesus won’t be standing there with a Sorting Hat. He will look for the evidence that we lived according to the Word of Truth. The Book of Life has left and right pages, just as our Judgment has left and right outcomes. And we must remember, it is The Book of Life, so YOLO-F definitely applies. That Word of Truth contains a lot of good information about Peace, so instead of just asking God to do something about it, how about we do something about it?

Let me hear what God the Lord will speak … Steadfast love and faithfulness will meet; righteousness and peace will kiss each other. That’s a pretty big hint, isn’t it? Our Key Verse from The Apostle Peter says when Jesus does return, there won’t be any escape and there will be nothing recognizable left. What is his advice about that? Therefore, beloved, while you are waiting for these things, strive to be found by him at peace, without spot or blemish. How in the World can we do that? (←Trick question!) You are right, camper-in-the-know (or now)! We cannot do that in the world. We can only be found by him at peace by learning to cultivate Peace in all we do. That is so HARD! Indeed. It is surely difficult, but think about another passage about Peace in The Apostle Paul’s Epistle to the church in Corinth:

2 Corinthians 12:10 – 10 Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.

Paul’s statement should not be interpreted as fatalism, or as false humility, either. In his perspective there is a complementary and harmonizing connection between suffering and sanctity. When his mind, his spirit, and his body are at rest in Christ, he is “in the world but not of the world.” The verb translated “content” in the above passage is εὐδοκέω (eudokéō) { yoo-dok-eh’-o} which carries connotations of to think well of, or to choose gladly, or willingly accept, or to think best. It is like our expression “It comes with the territory.” If someone had told Paul that his stance was heroic, Paul would reply much the same way suddenly-noticed heroes do: “I’m no hero. I was just doing my job.” And so, Beloved, we are called to look on our own actions when encumbered with weakness, mistreatment, hardship, persecution, and difficulties suffered for Christ. Do we become histrionic like the Pharisee in the temple, tooting our own horn about how deeply we suffer? Do we become tranquil and self-restrained like Paul? Not that The Apostle Paul didn’t moan and groan a little about his suffering as a prisoner; he let others know he was hurting, but he also let others know that the hurt he experienced was gladly and fervently offered up for the sake of the Body of Christ (← Check it out!). Belovéd: All who are of the Body of Christ are called to serve as Paul served – For the Sake of Christ. (↔ Music Link) NEVER forget! We are the Body of Christ (↔ Music Link) – the Church – because we become what we eat. 1  That’s the Absolutely Perfect Plan.

That Grace-at-work (↔ Music Link) fortifies, enlivens, and encourages us. Through this, we show others the centrality of Jesus in our lives and God is therein glorified. Though on the Road to Calvary, we are also climbing the road to Zion and God’s own Heaven. When we are humble enough to glorify God, we are strengthened in ways that overcome every trial, every false accusation, every painful torment our adversary imposes on us. In that way, also, the adversary is defeated and Christ is victorious.

Philippians 4:5-7 – 5 Let your gentleness be known to everyone. The Lord is near. 6 Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Become the Presence of Christ as an intimate part of the Life of Christ 1. For example, being humble enough to wash and kiss the feet of the outcast, sharing food, giving shelter, being compassionate to all as Christ is compassionate. We can work at living as he lives as a living presence. We are commanded to go tell the Good News, the Gospel, at home, at work, on the soccer field; wherever we are, there we are to share the Gospel by how we live. 1 That is our mission – to be Jesus for everyone around us. Please call to mind the words of St.Francis: “Preach the gospel at all times. Use words only when necessary.” And “Start by doing what is necessary, then what is possible, and suddenly you are doing the impossible.”

We don’t have to limit ourselves to being “with Peace,” as in “Peace be with you.” We can – and should – carry Peace within and around us at all times. That may sound difficult, but it is necessary if there is to be Peace anywhere at all. It is possible to carry Peace with us, and as we do that, we can eventually arrive at an intimacy with Jesus where we are enough like him that we can BE Peace. And so, Belovéd, I say to all of us now:

John the Baptist said, “I have baptized you with water; but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.” We say in return, “Come Holy Spirit, and enter the hearts of thy faithful.”

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

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

[1]  From the Mission presented by Reverend Father Herman Gomes, SS.CC. at Saint Catherine of Alexandria Catholic church December 5-6, 2023. Used with the presenter’s permission.

 

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