Planting Seed

Posted on by korgrocker

Those who plant in tears
will harvest with shouts of joy.
They weep as they go to plant their seed,
but they sing as they return with the harvest.
Psalm 126:5-6 NLT

What are we planting? I don’t mean physical seeds, like carrots for a crop later in the year. Or perhaps an orange pip, in the forlorn hope it will grow into a tree here in Scotland. No, we can plant lots of other things. Positive things like good advice. A school teacher instilling an education into often unwilling pupils. A minister preaching the good seed of the Kingdom from the pulpit. But we can also plant negatives in the way we speak to people, or the opinions we populate social media with. There has been many a child, or adult even,  driven into depression or a poor opinion of themselves, or worse, by bullies and trolls planting negative seeds about them on Facebook or the like.

When I read these two verses I immediately thought of the times parents plant seeds in their children. Seeds of good advice. Seeds of discipline. Seeds of life. And so often they are planted in tears, to a rebellious child or teenager exhibiting all the qualities of stony ground. Planting in tears. My wife and I fostered difficult children for many years. We certainly shed many tears as we tried to plant good seeds in lives so overgrown by the harvest from bad seed that there was little room for a good harvest. But with some, the good seed prevailed and we are in contact with several children, now grown up, who have produced a good harvest. Harvesting in joy indeed.

In our pilgrimage through life, we will come up against many attempts by others to plant seeds in us. Both good and bad. We need discernment and faith, to ensure that we only receive good seed. But we also need to be careful about what seeds we are planting in others.  The Bible is a book full of good seed. And we plant this seed in any opportunity that comes our way. Tell someone that Jesus loves them. Good seed. Tell someone that Jesus heals. More good seed. And these seeds will grow in someone’s heart, producing a harvest of great joy. We need to start in our spiritual potting sheds, culturing seeds through prayer, through Scripture, getting ready for the season of planting. Afterwards, we may never see the harvest – someone else will perhaps experience the joy. But we plant anyway. One day we may be very surprised seeing people in whom we tearfully planted seeds standing with us in Jesus’ presence. A good harvest worthy of a song or two?

The Rule of the Wicked

Posted on by korgrocker

“The wicked will not rule the land of the godly,
    for then the godly might be tempted to do wrong.”
Psalm 125:3 NLT

This is an interesting verse with its thought about the wicked ruling a nation of Godly people. Back in the Old Testament days, the nation of Israel was at times a Godly nation, and ruled by Godly kings. But at other times it behaved in a wicked way, and from the Biblical accounts we see a succession of wicked kings taking the people into ever deepening levels of depravity. And there were times when the nation of Israel had a wicked king, but it contained Godly people. As I write this, I remember the story about Elijah who, after the Mount Carmel experience, was afflicted by depression, and he called out to God to take his life, saying he was the only Godly person left. And God later reminded him that there were 7,000 people in Israel who hadn’t bowed the knee to Baal. Godly people shining as beacons of God’s light in an otherwise wicked nation.

Britain used to be a Godly nation, in that it was through the influence of Christianity that many of our morals and laws were established. But recent global surveys have indicated that the UK is one of the most irreligious countries in the world, with less that 30% of the population claiming to be religious. And in addition to that, people claiming to be Christians in the UK make up less than 10% of the population. So perhaps it could be claimed that the sentiments expressed in this verse do not apply in the UK – perhaps we are already in a situation where the Godless rule a largely Godless nation. The wicked rule.

There is the story in the Bible, told in Genesis 18, of Abraham pleading with God over His proposed destruction of Sodom. It is a sobering thought, that God will not allow wickedness to continue for ever, though the glimmer of light was that He wouldn’t destroy Sodom if a very small minority of the people were righteous. We don’t know the population of Sodom at that time, so the percentage of righteous to unrighteous people can’t be calculated with any confidence. Jesus had something to say about the role of Christians in society and we read His teachings in Matthew 5. He said that we are “salt and light” in our communities. In our families. In our nations. What does that mean? It means we take every opportunity to propagate the goodness and Gospel of God wherever we are. But He also reminded us that if we don’t we are like salt that has lost its saltiness. A worthless commodity.

But back to today’s verse. Obviously, the Psalmist lived in an age when there were wicked leaders. And it is the same in the world today. The righteous leaders have always been greatly outnumbered by the unrighteous. So the verse must have a prophetic meaning. One day God will bring about His rule and reign in this world. The Ultimate Righteous Leader will rule and there will be no more temptation for His Godly people. The most popular prayer, the Lord’s prayer, petitions God to bring His Kingdom and will to this earth. And every year, every day, every minute, brings it a little closer. Come Lord Jesus!

The Fowler’s Snare

Posted on by korgrocker

“If the Lord had not been on our side
    when people attacked us,
they would have swallowed us alive
    when their anger flared against us;
Praise be to the Lord,
    who has not let us be torn by their teeth.
We have escaped like a bird
    from the fowler’s snare;
the snare has been broken,
    and we have escaped.“
Psalm 124:2-3,6-7 NIV

Life was a bit grim in the Psalmist’s day. To be afraid of the peoples and nations around them, in fear of attack, was not a comfortable place to be. In fact, the Psalmist attributed his safety, and the safety of those with him, to the Lord being on their side. And he offered his praises to the Lord who saved him and his fellow pilgrims, something they remembered on their ascent to Jerusalem. But his use of the word-picture of a fowler’s snare is very descriptive. Birds were caught in those days by using some form of trap or net, where food was put out to attract them, and then the presence of birds either triggered the trap to operate, or it was triggered manually. We can only wonder if a similar trap was set out for the Israelites by their enemies, an ambush perhaps or some form of deception that became a trap for them.

We must never forget that we too have an enemy who sets traps for us. He baits the snare with some form of temptation, often something that we are particularly sensitive to. And we succumb to the bait and end up sinning, discouraged and frustrated. Feeling that once again we have let God down.

The Psalmist recorded that the snare had been broken and him and his people escaped. Our snares were broken by the amazing love of Jesus; He came to this world to take upon Himself all our sins. He lived amongst us and experienced the temptations that we experience. And even though He didn’t sin Himself, He was able to empathise with our plight. And as we know He provided the remedy at Calvary. We may be trapped in the enemy’s snare, but Jesus broke it and released us. So we join the Psalmist in praising God who has rescued us.

In our pilgrimage through life we will come up against many traps and snares. Some people never escape, and remain trapped for the rest of their lives. Lives stunted and violated by sin. People unable to realise their full potential in God. And all the time they never reach out to the One who has broken the trap. They never realise that they are free to walk out of it at any time. Their prison cell door is unlocked. We may be amongst them, so let’s reset our lives today, asking God to forgive us for whatever is keeping us ensnared, and then walk out into freedom. Into a fresh start with God. His love will always win in the end.

Loving God

Posted on by korgrocker

“O God-Enthroned in heaven, I lift my eyes toward You in worship.
The way I love You
    is like the way a servant wants to please his master,
    the way a maid waits for the orders of her mistress.
    We look to you, our God, with passionate longing
    to please You and discover more of Your mercy and grace.
For we’ve had more than our fill of this scoffing and scorn—
    this mistreatment by the wealthy elite.
    Lord, show us Your mercy!
    Lord, show us Your grace!”
Psalm 123:1-4 TPT

How would we describe how we love God? Wanting to please Him? As a servant waits for instructions? With passionate longing? Wanting to discover more of His “mercy and grace“? The very nature of this Psalm exposes the dichotomy between those that love God and those that don’t. Between those that have an intimate relationship with Him and those who would deny His very presence. But we who are His children love Him. How do we love Him? As it says in Deuteronomy 5:6, “And you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your strength.” A completeness surpassing all other loves. A commitment surpassing all other commitments. A relationship surpassing all other relationships. We love God. There is no alternative.

Amazingly, God loved us before we even knew Him. Romans 5:8 says,  “But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.” He showed us a love that transcends anything His creation can devise or implement. Any response from us cannot even register on the Richter scale of what love means. But we try. We respond to God as best we can, but how? We are drawn to Him by the Holy Spirit that dwells within us, but there’s more.

The Apostle John understood more than anyone about God’s love. He was the disciple that Jesus loved (John 13:23). And it was a love that transformed his life. We read in his first epistle (1 John 4:11-13 from the Passion Translation), “Delightfully loved ones, if he loved us with such tremendous love, then “loving one another” should be our way of life! No one has ever gazed upon the fullness of God’s splendour. But if we love one another, God makes his permanent home in us, and we make our permanent home in him, and his love is brought to its full expression in us. And he has given us his Spirit within us so that we can have the assurance that he lives in us and that we live in him.” We can’t get away from it, folks – because God first loved us, we can only respond by loving one another. And John said that when we love one another, God makes a permanent home in us. Sadly, the world would say that the only person worth loving is ourselves. No home or even a room for God there.

In our Psalm, the writer briefly shifts his adoring gaze away from God onto those around him, the God-deniers, who scoff and scorn. On our pilgrimage through life we will find plenty of them. And not just the “wealthy and elite“. And the Psalmist was so desirous to respond to God in the correct way, that he cries out for grace and mercy. And we echo his call – O Lord, please show us more of Your grace and mercy so that we can love others. Amen.

Peace in Jerusalem

Posted on by korgrocker

“Pray for peace in Jerusalem. 
May all who love this city prosper. 
O Jerusalem, may there be peace within your walls 
and prosperity in your palaces. 
For the sake of my family and friends, I will say, 
“May you have peace.” 
For the sake of the house of the Lord our God, 
I will seek what is best for you, O Jerusalem.”
Psalms‬ ‭122:6-9‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Why should I pray for peace in Jerusalem? After all, I don’t live there; in fact I live a long way from it. The city of Jerusalem appears in news reports every now and then, usually in a context of war, strife and civil unrest. The alternative name, Zion, is a name that invokes hatred in other parts of the world. Surely this is a place to avoid.

The Psalmist probably intended for his thoughts and prayers to apply to peace and prosperity in his society; Jerusalem was often the focus of strife even all those years ago, but when it enjoyed times of peace the people flourished. So he prayed for peace in Jerusalem, much as we would pray for peace in our lands, in our societies. A land at peace flourishes.

If we transpose the theme here into spiritual terms, we are very much a part “of the house of the Lord our God“. And there will come a new Jerusalem, that we read about in Revelation 21 and 22. In John 14, Jesus encouraged His disciples that He was going ahead to prepare a place for them. So as Christians we have a very strong connection to Jerusalem. One day, in its reincarnation, we will be part of it. And we pray for peace to be there, both now and in the future. For the sake of the family of God in all its facets, in all its peoples, whatever nation or ethnic groups they come from. As we pray, God’s peace permeates all levels of His family, all over the world. Persecuted Christians in North Korea, Iraq, Afghanistan, wherever. And our prayers will lift the yoke of hardship from their shoulders, bringing to them “what is best“.

As a pilgrim through this life, we trudge on, come what may. But ever in our gaze is the New Jerusalem, the Heavenly home of our Lord and God. And somehow as we lift our eyes toward it, our steps are lifted. Our spirits are encouraged. Our journey becomes a concatenation of joy and hope, faith and trust, peace and prosperity. And as we meet fellow travellers we share the “peace of Jerusalem” with them. Enriching their lives as we have been enriched “seeking what is best for you, O Jerusalem“.

Mountains

Posted on by korgrocker

“I look up to the mountains – 
does my help come from there? 
My help comes from the Lord, 
who made heaven and earth!”
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭121:1-2‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Psalm 121 was my father’s favourite. As a Scotsman, he was used to the Scottish hills and munroes, though more from a visual perspective than anything strenuous. But he lived for most of his life in the South of England, in the balmier and flatter county of Hampshire. He often wistfully expressed a desire for hills, “to lean on” as he put it. 

The Bible is full of references to mountains and hills. Jerusalem is built on one and we read in Psalm 2 that Jesus will rule from there one day, from His holy mountain. Often people in Biblical days fled to the hills, where they expected to find safety. There is something comforting about hills. But the Psalmist contrasts help coming from mountains with help coming from the Lord. We read in the preamble to this Psalm that it was sung by pilgrims climbing the roads and paths towards Jerusalem, so perhaps the Psalmist was thinking about where the true source of safety and security was, and he wrote down his thoughts. Thoughts full of references to how God looks after us. He brings out thoughts that God continually watches over us, day and night. He is our Protection, keeping us from harm. The Psalm ends with the verse, “The Lord keeps watch over you as you come and go, both now and forever.” This has to be one of the most reassuring passages of Scripture that the Bible contains.

But what about us today, living a long time after the Bible was written. Do we look to the physical world around us, to our government, to our finances and possessions, or to God for our security and protection? Would we still be trusting God if all but He was removed from us? We hope that we will never have to find this out, but many people in the world today have nothing else but their trust in God. For example, Christians in the Middle East are being persecuted to the extent of having to flee from their homes to find refuge where they can; all because of their faith. But they know God is watching over them and that sustains them through times of almost unbearable difficulty. In our own lives there is plenty that we could be fearful of. Particularly in these Covid times there are many who are almost paralysed with fear of illness. Add into the fear-inducing mix energy prices, inflation, illness, family problems and so on, and we have a cocktail of challenges to make even those most robust of people want to “head for the hills”. But there is no remedy there. The only answer to our future is our trust in God. Only He can sustain us, support us, and keep us safe. 

We don’t know what the future holds but we do know the One who holds the future. That’s enough for me.

Gates

Posted on by korgrocker

“Open for me the gates where the righteous enter, 
and I will go in and thank the Lord. 
These gates lead to the presence of the Lord, 
and the godly enter there.”
Psalms‬ ‭118:19-20‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Gates. What picture comes into our minds when we think about gates? There’s the wooden gate at the entrance to someone’s garden. Or the motorised gate that can be triggered remotely to allow a vehicle through. Wrought iron fancy gates are sometimes fashionable. Or perhaps a substantial oak door complete with cast iron studs. The picket gate in the gatehouse, perhaps, at the entrance to a churchyard. But whatever pictures we form in our minds, the Psalmist highlights three things about the gate that is set before him. Firstly, he has to ask someone else to open it – its not something that he can do. Secondly, he has to be righteous to go through it,  and thirdly, once through the opened gate, he can join the godly to enter God’s presence. And the reason he wanted to go through it was to thank the Lord. What a gate that must have been! 

But many years later, Jesus made an astonishing statement. He said, as recorded by the Apostle John in John 10:9, “Yes, I am the gate. Those who come in through me will be saved. They will come and go freely and will find good pastures.” But is Jesus the Gate described in Psalm 118? Is this a prophetic glimpse of the coming Messiah? Well, Jesus is the Gate, the Someone who opens the gate for us. I once was shown around the cash handling hall in a major British bank. To get in was difficult. It needed someone to vouch for me, and sign me into the compound in which the cash hall was located. And this analogy aptly describes what Jesus does for us. He vouches for us, and because we have been saved through His blood shed for us at Calvary, we can securely and confidently enter His gate. You see, to enter the Gate that is Jesus we meet the qualifications required to get in. And the essential qualification is righteousness. Only the righteous can enter into God’s presence. Paul wrote in his second letter to the Corinthian church, “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God“. Because Jesus took on Himself all our sins, past present and future, we can receive the gift of God and stand righteously before Him. Lastly, when we pass through the Gate we enter into God’s presence. In Hebrews 10:19 we read, “And so, dear brothers and sisters, we can boldly enter heaven’s Most Holy Place because of the blood of Jesus.” 

The Psalmist asked for the gates to be opened. Tick. The Psalmist said the righteous can enter. Tick. We can go into God’s presence. Tick. So what the psalmist said in Psalm 118 was confirmed many years later by the first coming of Jesus. However, there is just one more thing we must do once we are in the presence of the Lord. That is, we must thank Him, and never stop thanking Him. Joining with many saints around the world and in past, present and future times. Thanking God for all He has done for us. Must be worth an amen?

Lost Sheep

Posted on by korgrocker

“I have wandered away like a lost sheep;
    come and find me,
    for I have not forgotten your commands.”
Psalm 119:176 NLT

Psalm 119 ends with a strange verse. How can the Psalmist find himself in this position, describing himself as a “lost sheep”, after such a cornucopia of expressions of the greatness of God and His wonderful works and laws, and His relationship with the writer, who had been clever enough to devise a Psalm of sections, each of eight verses and each beginning with a letter in the Hebrew alphabet? What happened to him?

Sheep are animals with a predisposition to get lost. They wander off, steadily grazing their way into places where they shouldn’t be. And then they can’t find their way back to the rest of the flock or a safe place. A lost sheep is very vulnerable, at the mercy of predators and prone to get caught up by its wool in thickets or trapped somewhere by a difficult terrain. In spiritual terms, we can be like “lost sheep”. We wander off the track marked out for our pilgrimage through life, and before we know it we are in a place of great danger, in a place of temptation and sin.

Jesus was very aware of the challenges facing us, God’s “sheep”. In Matthew 18:12-13 we read, “If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them wanders away, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others on the hills and go out to search for the one that is lost? And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he will rejoice over it more than over the ninety-nine that didn’t wander away!“. There are two significant pieces of information here that are worth considering. Firstly, Jesus Himself searches for His lost sheep. He calls, He looks, He goes to extraordinary lengths to find us when we stray. Secondly, finding us is not guaranteed – we also can go to extraordinary lengths to avoid being found by Jesus. We can ignore His calls. We can hide away from His gaze. I have known good men and women who have wilfully deserted their Christian faith, no longer counted in Jesus’ flock.

A sheep gets lost when it abandons its familiar territory. When it thinks the grass elsewhere is greener and more palatable. And so it is with us. We can leave the familiar territory of God’s Word and be attracted to something new. Then we can become “lost”, and the frightening thing is that we might not even know it. I think the Psalmist ended this Psalm, with a warning. Don’t abandon God and get lost. Always keep home in sight by checking things out with His word. Always be aware of dangerous terrain, where sheep should never go.

Seven Times

Posted on by korgrocker

“I will praise you seven times a day
    because all your regulations are just.“
Psalm 119:164 NLT

The Psalmist says he is going to praise God seven times a day. Why seven? Why not six or eight? What’s so special about seven? In Scripture, the number seven refers to completeness, perfection even, so the use of this number by the Psalmist is particularly significant. In essence, he was saying that he was going to praise God continually and totally. Why? All because he attributes justice to God’s ways. 

To someone today this might appear to be archaic, unnecessary, unachievable or even just plain wrong. But nothing could be further from the truth. Superficially, we probably associate praising God with singing a hymn on a Sunday morning in church. Perhaps, “Praise, my soul, the King of Heaven..”. Or if we’re really bold we might praise Him every day in our “Quiet Times”. And our praise merges into thankfulness for things God has done for us. But when was the last time we praised God for the justice of His ways? Either this Psalmist was on a different planet to us, or there is more to praising God than we might think.

When we become a Christian we embark on a journey aligning our lives to God’s ways. And as we do so, the Holy Spirit works in our lives producing fruit, the fruit of the Spirit that we read about in Galatians 5:22, “But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,”. (We have that number again, with seven different flavours of fruit.) We praise God with our lives as we get closer to Him, following His ways more closely. As we remain in contact with Him. As we respond to Him in obedience. 

We are on a pilgrimage of praise. We praise God when we are faithful to Him. We praise God when we refuse to get angry with the bad driver in front of us. We praise God when we love those around us. We praise God when we wait patiently in the queue for our Covid jag or the supermarket checkout. We praise God when we offer a kind word to someone we meet in the street – sometimes just saying “Good Morning” might cheer someone up – who knows – they might not have heard a kind word for days. The list of praising opportunities are endless. And don’t forget, we praise God because of who He is – our wonderful and amazing Creator, our Heavenly Father. Let’s look around for even more opportunities to praise Him today.

Being Double-minded

Posted on by korgrocker

“I hate double-minded people,
but I love Your law.”
Psalm 119:113 NIV

Two strong, emotionally-charged, words come out in this verse – “love” and “hate”. In meaning, they are opposites. But in the context of this verse what is the connection between being double-minded and God’s law? Is the implication something to do with the reality that we must be single-minded when it comes to following God and His ways? Is being “double-minded” something that is at odds with a Godly life?

First of all, what does “double-minded” mean? One dictionary definition says that “double-minded” means “wavering in mind, vacillating”. Perhaps we get some idea what these verses mean from James 1:6-8, “But when you ask, you must believe and not doubt, because the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That person should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Such a person is double-minded and unstable in all they do.” What James is describing here is a person who has divided loyalties. On the one hand he or she wants to follow God and His ways, but on the other hand they still want to live a worldly life. They are “double-minded”. 

But surely “hating” the “double-minded” isn’t right. I think the Psalmist uses such strong language to highlight the importance of not wanting to keep a foot in both camps. There is no middle ground. I think we have all seen videos of someone who has tried to step out of a small boat onto dry land, only to end up in the water because the boat wasn’t attached to the bank. It’s a bit like that – if we try and keep both feet dry, we will end up wet in a place we didn’t want to be! We need to “hate” the thought of trying to be two things at once. In Revelation we read about the message from Jesus to the Laodicean church. He said, “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm – neither hot nor cold – I am about to spit you out of my mouth“. Jesus used strong language in referring to double-minded people.

In our pilgrimage, we can’t afford to be double-minded. We have to press on towards the goal that Paul described in Philippians 3:14. If we persist in pursuing other goals we will fall by the wayside, unable to finish the race. The key in doing this is the second part of our verse in Psalm 119. The Psalmist said, “I love Your law.” Single-mindedly, we pursue God and His ways, sure of our destiny, keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus (Hebrews 3:1). There is no other way.