Glory

Posted on by korgrocker

“There are also bodies in the heavens and bodies on the earth. The glory of the heavenly bodies is different from the glory of the earthly bodies. The sun has one kind of glory, while the moon and stars each have another kind. And even the stars differ from each other in their glory.”
1 Corinthians 15:40-41 NLT

Paul briefly ventures into the realm of astronomy with these verses today, and he discusses the glory of the heavenly bodies, such as stars, the sun and the moon, comparing them with the glory of earthly bodies. But what is glory? It obviously depends on what we are talking about, as each “body” has a glory of its own. But there is one Person whom Paul omits from his list, and that is God Himself. His glory infinitely surpasses all other glories.

“The heavens proclaim the glory of God“.

If we look up the word “glory” in a dictionary, all we find is something like “high renown or honour won by notable achievements”. I remember being informed of the “glory” experienced by the athlete Roger Bannister all those years ago when he finally broke through the previously impenetrable barrier of running a mile in under four minutes. The prowess of some athletes who have battled incredible hurdles to win at their sport is remarkable. Take, for example, Laura Kenny, who won six gold medals and had to overcome childhood asthma and a collapsed lung to reach the point of success. But these human examples of glory, good as they are, are rather pathetic and lifeless when compared to the true glory of our Heavenly Father. Paul looked into the heavens to find an example of glory, probably because he remembered Psalm 19:1-2, “The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship. Day after day they continue to speak; night after night they make him known”. 

“Holy, holy, holy is the
Lord of Heaven’s Armies!
The whole earth is filled with his glory!”

How do we define the glory of God? The glory of God is the beauty of His Spirit. It is not an aesthetic beauty or a material beauty, but the beauty that emanates from His character, from all that He is. God’s glory is eternal and never fades or disappears. An athlete’s glory, that moment of victory, fades away with time, as Peter wrote, “As the Scriptures say, “People are like grass; their beauty is like a flower in the field. The grass withers and the flower fades””. (1 Peter 1:24). But not so with God. Moses asked God to show him His glory; Exodus 33:18, “Moses said, “Please show me your glory””. In the next verse God defined His glory as His goodness, “And he said, “I will make all my goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you my name ‘The Lord.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy”. In the Old Testament, a manifestation of God’s glory was often accompanied by natural events such as earthquakes or fire, as we read from the Mount Sinai event in Exodus 19. Isaiah received a glimpse of God’s glory that radically changed the course of his life. Isaiah 6:1-3, “It was in the year King Uzziah died that I saw the Lord. He was sitting on a lofty throne, and the train of his robe filled the Temple. Attending him were mighty seraphim, each having six wings. With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. They were calling out to each other, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Heaven’s Armies! The whole earth is filled with his glory!”” 

In the New Testament, the glory of God was revealed through Jesus. John 1:14, “So the Word became human and made his home among us. He was full of unfailing love and faithfulness. And we have seen his glory, the glory of the Father’s one and only Son”. Jesus continued to reveal His glory through the miracles that He committed. The first was when the supply of wine for the wedding had run out, and Jesus performed a miracle. John 2:11, “This miraculous sign at Cana in Galilee was the first time Jesus revealed his glory. And his disciples believed in him”. It is sad, though, that many people seek glory for themselves, looking for sources other than God. “Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things” (Romans 1:22-23). 

But to define God’s glory completely is beyond human understanding and expression. But one day we will find out for ourselves in Heaven, which is a place where we will experience God’s glory. The Psalmist referred to Heaven itself as “glory”; “You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will receive me to glory” (Psalm 73:24). We pilgrims are a people who are truly blessed because we have received a glimpse of God’s glory through Jesus. Peter wrote, “Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls” (1 Peter 1:8-9). So, we call out to Him through our spirits, drawn to His love and kindness, grace and mercy. 

Remember the old Fanny Crosby hymn, “To God be the Glory”? The first verse is something we can hum and dwell on in the day ahead.

To God be the glory, great things He hath done,
so loved He the world that He gave us His Son,
who yielded His life an atonement for sin,
and opened the life-gate that all may go in.

Father God. We echo the words of the hymn and pray as Jesus taught us, “For Yours is the Kingdom, the power and the glory, for ever and ever”. Amen.

Resurrection Bodies

Posted on by korgrocker

“But someone may ask, “How will the dead be raised? What kind of bodies will they have?” What a foolish question! When you put a seed into the ground, it doesn’t grow into a plant unless it dies first. And what you put in the ground is not the plant that will grow, but only a bare seed of wheat or whatever you are planting. Then God gives it the new body he wants it to have. A different plant grows from each kind of seed. Similarly there are different kinds of flesh—one kind for humans, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish.”
1 Corinthians 15:35-39 NLT

Obviously, some people in the Corinthian church had asked two questions – “How will the dead be raised?” and “What kind of bodies will they have?” These seem like logical questions, perhaps asked by a new believer who had been raised in a culture that didn’t really believe in such things. Mainstream First Century Greek thought generally rejected the idea of bodily resurrection, viewing it as impossible, even for gods; to them, death meant the permanent dissolution of the body, with the soul going to a shadowy Hades. So here was a man called Paul, preaching about the Son of the only real God, the God-man who had been killed on a Roman cross, buried in a tomb carved out of rock, but who had been resurrected and provided with a body that was real, although it also had special powers. But Paul continued with the astonishing revelation that all believers will also receive a body just like that of Jesus.

My wife and I have a two-year-old great-grandson, who is at the “why” stage in his early years. Faced with a new situation, he has to find out “why” he is getting a particular response from an adult around him. His mind is like a sponge, absorbing all the new knowledge he is given, a process that places a specific responsibility on his parents and others who come into contact with him. A new Christian, recently saved, will also have many questions, although in the two questions today we have a “How” and a “What”, instead of a “Why”. In response, Paul used the analogy of a seed being planted to produce a plant. We all know the result of planting a seed in fertile soil: after a period of time, a green shoot will appear and keep growing until it becomes a mature plant. He said that the seed planted is different from the plant that grows, a process that follows God’s purposes for the vegetable kingdom. Paul continued to describe the differences with the animal kingdom. 

There is a general belief that once they die, a person’s soul goes to Heaven and then looks down on the loved ones left behind, showing approval, or otherwise, of how they are living their lives on earth. But there is a problem with this expectation, because it is not based on anything more than an emotional whim. The Bible teaches that there are two places for the disembodied spirits in the afterlife. For a believer, their spirit immediately goes to be with the Lord in a state of conscious presence. “Yes, we are fully confident, and we would rather be away from these earthly bodies, for then we will be at home with the Lord (2 Corinthians 5:8). Paul also wrote, “I’m torn between two desires: I long to go and be with Christ, which would be far better for me. But for your sakes, it is better that I continue to live” (Philippians 1:23-24). This state of “conscious presence” Jesus described as being in paradise. The thief on the cross next to Jesus said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom.” And Jesus replied, “I assure you, today you will be with me in paradise”” (Luke 23:42-43).

There, the spirit of the believer will live until it is given a new resurrected body. But the unrighteous go to a place of torment. We read in the story of the Rich Man and a poor beggar called Lazarus that the Rich Man died “and he went to the place of the dead. There, in torment, he saw Abraham in the far distance with Lazarus at his side. “The rich man shouted, ‘Father Abraham, have some pity! Send Lazarus over here to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue. I am in anguish in these flames’” (Luke 16:23-24). There, the unrighteous spirits will await final judgment in the “Lake of Fire” (see Revelation 20). To an unbeliever, all this seems a bit harsh, and, sadly, many people, when presented with Biblical facts, will reject them.

So, the responsibility for us pilgrims is to do what Jesus has asked us to do. To those believers questioning why it was taking Jesus so long to return, Peter wrote, “The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent” (2 Peter 3:9). We pilgrims have been commissioned to make disciples of the people around us, fulfilling God’s desires and purposes for this world. Jesus said that all who believe in Him will not perish. “Perishing” is the default state, leading to the position the Rich Man found himself in after death. But Jesus continued that all who believe in Him will inherit eternal life in a place He called Paradise. This has to be Good News. But we won’t find Good News presented to us in news reports and social media. Jesus has left the responsibility for spreading the Gospel to us. I carry tracts in my pocket just in case I meet someone whom the Holy Spirit has prepared for such an encounter. I expect pilgrims everywhere will do the same, but perhaps the next person we meet will go away with a new revelation of God, and the angels in Heaven will start preparing for a party. Are we ready for just such an encounter? Mordecai said to Queen Esther, “If you keep quiet at a time like this, deliverance and relief for the Jews will arise from some other place, but you and your relatives will die. Who knows if perhaps you were made queen for just such a time as this?” (Esther 4:14). We pilgrims are in a unique place in history, in this world for “such a time as this”.

Dear Father God. You want no one to perish, and neither do we. Thank You for Your grace and patience. Amen.

Falling Asleep

Posted on by korgrocker

“After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.”
1 Corinthians 15:6-8 NIVUK

Paul outlined a series of events that occurred after Jesus’ resurrection from the dead. According to Paul, the first person to experience the risen Lord personally was Peter, and the last was himself, “as to one abnormally born”. But, sadly, the first person to really see Jesus and the empty tomb was a woman, yet she wasn’t mentioned in Paul’s list. “Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance” … “At this, she turned round and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realise that it was Jesus. He asked her, ‘Woman, why are you crying? Who is it you are looking for?’ Thinking he was the gardener, she said, ‘Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have put him, and I will get him.’ Jesus said to her, ‘Mary.’ She turned towards him and cried out in Aramaic, ‘Rabboni!’ (which means ‘Teacher’)” (John 20:1, 14-16). What an experience for Mary, who loved Jesus so much. In those heady days after the resurrection, many men and women would have seen Jesus, but Paul just listed the men according to the customs of his day. 

Some of those who had seen Jesus in the flesh had died in the interval between His appearance and Paul’s first letter to the Corinthian church. Paul said they had “fallen asleep”, a lovely alternative to the finality of the word “death”. But believers do in reality just ”fall asleep”. Through the faith of us pilgrims, we are assured of eternal life, resurrection, and an eternal relationship with God. Jesus said to Nicodemus, “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16). God knew who would accept His Son, Jesus, as their Lord and Saviour. “Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure” (Ephesians 1:4-5). Just think for a moment. Before God created the universe as we know it, He had each of us in mind. Our names were before Him. Every aspect of our characters and physical make-up was there in His plan. And all because He wanted the pleasure of our company forever. This is mind-boggling stuff, folks!

“God loved us and
chose us in Christ to be holy
and without fault in his eyes”.

So we won’t really die. Jesus said to Martha, the sister of Lazarus, “ …I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying. Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die. Do you believe this, Martha?” (John 11:25-26). So there is a process by which we leave this life, leaving behind our physical bodies, which we no longer have use for. Anyway, most people’s physical bodies have worn out by this time, and all that is left for our loved ones to do is to ensure that the remains are given a decent burial. But our souls live forever. They go on, as Jesus said to the thief on the cross next to Him, to a place called Paradise. At the right time, God will provide new bodies for us. 2 Corinthians 5:1, “For we know that when this earthly tent we live in is taken down (that is, when we die and leave this earthly body), we will have a house in heaven, an eternal body made for us by God himself and not by human hands“.

I love this thought from the story of Lazarus in John 11. He got sick and died, regardless of the valiant attempts of his two sisters to nurse him through the sickness. In accordance with Jewish customs, he was prepared for burial and interred in a tomb, all within a very short time. But then, four days later, Jesus showed up and asked to be shown the tomb. It was a cave with a stone rolled across the entrance. But we know the story. Jesus told the people gathered there to roll the stone aside, which they did despite Martha’s protestations, “ …  Lord, he has been dead for four days. The smell will be terrible” (John 11:39b). However, the next thing that Lazarus heard was the sound of Jesus calling his name. If we apply this thought to our own end-of-life experience, once we have “fallen asleep” in the Lord, will the next thing we hear be Jesus calling our name? Just a thought.

Father God. There can be no place better to fall asleep than into Your Heavenly arms. Thank You. Amen.

The Temple of God (2)

Posted on by korgrocker

“Don’t you realise that all of you together are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God lives in you? God will destroy anyone who destroys this temple. For God’s temple is holy, and you are that temple.”
1 Corinthians 3:16-17 NLT

Paul said some other things about the “temple of God”. He wrote that “anyone who destroys this temple” would themselves be destroyed, and that “God’s temple” is holy. Just to recap, the temple Paul was referring to was the Corinthian church, and it was made up of the Spirit-filled believers there. It was not a physical “temple” made with stone, bricks, and mortar, but the people who met together as believers in Jesus.

It is an interesting coincidence that the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed just a few years after this letter from Paul was written. Was that because the traditional, Law-bound Jewish leaders had tried to eliminate those who believed in Jesus, those men and women who believed that he was the Saviour of the world? We remember how a man called Saul burst onto the pages in our Bibles with a reference to him holding the coats of those men stoning Stephen, the first Christian martyr. And then we read just over the page in Acts 9:1-2, “Meanwhile, Saul was uttering threats with every breath and was eager to kill the Lord’s followers. So he went to the high priest. He requested letters addressed to the synagogues in Damascus, asking for their cooperation in the arrest of any followers of the Way he found there. He wanted to bring them—both men and women—back to Jerusalem in chains“. But Paul’s pogrom was short-lived, because we know what happened to him on the Damascus Road. Perhaps what happened to the Temple in Jerusalem stands as a stark warning to those people today who would desire to destroy God’s people. 

In the UK, we have the Humanists who promote a society based on rational thinking and one without God. It is an obvious tactic of the devil because humanists do everything expected of Christians, but have created a clone that has shifted worship away from God to themselves. Are they, with their evangelistic zeal, trying to destroy the “temple of God”? As an aside, in my case, it backfired because I used to work with a member of the British Humanist Association who was always teasing me about my lack of any sort of belief. I was sitting on the fence when it came to any faith at all, but it was his vision of a self-based humanistic religion that so horrified me that it led to my becoming a Christian (with help from others at that time, of course). My work colleague was not happy when I attributed my faith in God to his humanistic efforts to convert me. Here in the UK, there is no overt persecution of the Christians who make up the “temple of God”, but the signs are ominous, with levels of persecution starting to increase through legislation and societal attitudes. Our schools here are promoting ideologies that are against God’s order and commands. And then we have the nations in other parts of the world that have made a belief in Christ a capital offence. Places such as Afghanistan and North Korea. These regimes will not last for long because God has promised to destroy those who destroy His temple. There are also Islamic militant groups that persecute and murder Christians when they find them. God’s people are under threat in many places in this world.

Paul’s final reference to the “temple of God” in this section was about holiness. This is a reminder that the people of God, through their repentance of sin and acceptance of Christ’s atoning sacrifice, are declared righteous and can come into God’s presence as His children. Peter wrote, “But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” (1 Peter 2:9). We are a special people, shown God’s favour, and able to live in the light of His presence, as the Holy Spirit lives and works within each one of us. Paul reminded the Corinthians that because of their identity as God’s holy temple, they had responsibilities to live a life worthy of that identity. He was gently saying, no more factionalism, no more jealousy and quarrelling, no more living as worldly people do, with their sinful natures to the fore. 

We pilgrims are a 21st-century manifestation of the “temple of God”. We may meet in different places, in different denominations, with different skin colours and languages, but we all have one thing in common, and that is that we are God’s children, fellow believers in Jesus, who died for our sins. We are people born again in the spirit, and because of that, we are obliged to function as God’s holy people, with Paul’s warnings and instructions ever in our minds. Peter wrote, “As you come to him, the living Stone – rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him – you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1 Peter 2:4-5). Priests? An image of a man or woman decked out in strange clothes and wearing a funny hat comes to mind, but that is not what Peter, or Paul, was referring to. We are all part of God’s Kingdom and have a responsibility to offer sacrifices to God, just as the Levitical priests offered up animal sacrifices so many years before. But our offerings are spiritual and holy, and fitting for the One who died for our sins. “God’s temple is holy”, wrote Paul, and that is what we aspire to. After all that Jesus has done for us, what else can we be? Peter wrote, “So you must live as God’s obedient children. Don’t slip back into your old ways of living to satisfy your own desires. You didn’t know any better then. But now you must be holy in everything you do, just as God who chose you is holy. For the Scriptures say, “You must be holy because I am holy” (1 Peter 1:14-16). That doesn’t mean walking around with our hands clasped in an attitude of prayer, a halo delicately poised just above our heads. Being holy has the meaning of being set apart. So we don’t behave in an unGodly way. We avoid places and practices that are, or could be, sinful and likely to draw us back into the worldly society around us. We live differently, we think differently, always remembering that in Christ we are holy, totally and completely. We have a new identity as God’s children. We are now citizens of God’s Heavenly Kingdom, assigned for a time to Planet Earth to bring God’s Message of the Cross, the Gospel, the Good News about Jesus, to the people around us, all the time praying that we will not be drawn back into the ways of the world. We have help of course, and the Holy Spirit living within us will lead us into all truth.

Dear Heavenly Father. We understand that we are set apart from the world around us, but we also understand that we have to live in it for Your works of service. Please help us get the balance right so that we never let You down. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Foolish Preaching

Posted on by korgrocker

s the Scriptures say, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and discard the intelligence of the intelligent.” So where does this leave the philosophers, the scholars, and the world’s brilliant debaters? God has made the wisdom of this world look foolish. Since God in his wisdom saw to it that the world would never know him through human wisdom, he has used our foolish preaching to save those who believe. It is foolish to the Jews, who ask for signs from heaven. And it is foolish to the Greeks, who seek human wisdom. So when we preach that Christ was crucified, the Jews are offended and the Gentiles say it’s all nonsense.”
1 Corinthians 1:19-23 NLT

A mini-rant from Paul about the dichotomy between human and Godly wisdom introduces the theme in these five verses before us today. In his day Paul knew of men who, by reputation, were considered philosophers and who made their mark on the culture at the time. Men such as Seneca, who was a writer and advisor to the Roman emperor Nero. Then there was Epictetus, a Greek Stoic, who was born into slavery and later founded a philosophy school in Greece. Philo of Alexandria, a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher, attempted to harmonize Jewish scripture with Greek philosophy, particularly Platonism. He believed that reason was a gift from God and that philosophy could be used to understand divine revelation. Three “wise” men, great thinkers of their day, but of whom Paul said God had made look foolish. Oratorical skills, brilliance of mind and thought, and a scholarly background all conspire to produce … a fool. Not because of their gifts, but because their thinking was all about human matters and, in the context of God and Heaven, had no value at all. A “brilliant debater” will not get into Heaven. Regardless of his words, he will still die and find a lost eternity.

Interestingly, Paul wrote that God said “that the world would never know him through human wisdom”. No-one can get into Heaven by their own efforts. I know someone who claims to have had a revelation as to what is there, and has even gone so far as to describe what God has revealed to him about Heaven. Such knowledge, he said, revealed to him that God had made Heaven with different compartments, each for a world religion. So the Buddhists would be in one place, Muslims in another and so on. The poor man, undoubtably intelligent as he is, suffers from delusions because his wisdom is earthly in its origins, and is based on his own thoughts alone, without fact or divine revelation. Part of my own testimony involves several months of trying to find God in the Bible purely by my own efforts, until, in the end, I discarded what I had thought I had found and instead called out to God for Him to reveal Himself. My prayer one Saturday night was something along the lines, “God, I can’t work this out on my own. If You are real then You will have to reveal Yourself to me”. I woke up the next morning with the assurance that God was real and through His grace He had indeed revealed Himself. That was the start of a journey, bumpy at times, but one from which I have never wavered. There is only one way to Heaven, as we know from John 14:6, “Jesus told him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one can come to the Father except through me“. And God in His loving graciousness has gently showed me the way, at a pace I can absorb, and He will continue to do so until I meet Him face to face. My wisdom and thinking was ineffective in its arrogance, but it was only when I came to the end of myself that God could start His work in a human being.

Paul wrote that God “has used our foolish preaching to save those who believe”. Is it foolish, to tell people everywhere about God’s saving grace? Most people we meet will say so, because their minds are limited by human wisdom. How do you introduce concepts of the spiritual world around us to people who have closed minds and who have rejected any thoughts of a “higher power”, who believe that we only live for a span for 70 or 80 years, and then enter a realm of unconscious extinction? People such as Richard Dawkins, a modern day philosopher and evolutionist, who said, “Be thankful that you have a life, and forsake your vain and presumptuous desire for a second one.” People such as him have closed their minds against God and His Son, and instead deny any efforts to help them discover the truth. Such people will one day have a terrible shock, because they firstly will find themselves, not in a blank state of nothing, but as souls in a holding place called Sheol or Hades, and then secondly they will find themselves resurrected to stand before God to give an account of their lives. Why did Jesus describe hell as a place of wailing and gnashing of teeth? Matthew 22:13, “Then the king said to his aides, ‘Bind his hands and feet and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth’”. The reason is that such God-deniers will have to spend eternity in a state of regret, that they rejected the One who saves and there is nothing that they can do about it. What a terrible thought!

So we pilgrims continue to be foolish in the world’s eyes as we preach to a people who are devoid of any vestige of God’s wisdom. People who are resistant to the idea of a spiritual world unseen by their natural senses, and who instead quote their human wisdom as the reason for their incalcitrance. But there is only one way that such people will ever discover God and that is through our “foolish preaching”. Paul wrote, “But how can they call on him to save them unless they believe in him? And how can they believe in him if they have never heard about him? And how can they hear about him unless someone tells them? And how will anyone go and tell them without being sent? That is why the Scriptures say, “How beautiful are the feet of messengers who bring good news!” But not everyone welcomes the Good News, for Isaiah the prophet said, “Lord, who has believed our message?” So faith comes from hearing, that is, hearing the Good News about Christ” (Romans 10:14-17). So let’s double our efforts to be as foolish as we can. We never know, because such foolishness in our stories of God’s love and grace might be just what someone needs to hear and experience.

Dear Father God. There is nothing foolish about a child of God, because we have heard the divine call and have reached out to the only One who has the message of eternal life. Please help us to pass it on to the people around us. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

The Holy Place

Posted on by korgrocker

“Who may climb the mountain of the Lord? Who may stand in his holy place? Only those whose hands and hearts are pure, who do not worship idols and never tell lies. They will receive the Lord’s blessing and have a right relationship with God their Saviour. Such people may seek you and worship in your presence, O God of Jacob.”
Psalm 24:3-6 NLT

David asks a question – “Who may climb the mountain of the Lord”? But before we move on to the answer, we must ask what the Lord’s mountain is, or was, and where it actually was. To the Jews there was a sacred place on which the Temple could be found called Mount Zion, a hill located in Jerusalem. So David was perhaps focused on a specific place when he wrote this Psalm. But in answer to the original questionnaire “Who may climb“, the “mountain of the Lord” was a “holy place” and was not to be defiled by anyone who was a sinner. Anyone coming into the Lord’s “holy place” needed to be clean and pure inside and out, and telling lies and the worship of idols were specifically highlighted as impure actions. Not just that, however, their hearts had to be pure. David may have written this Psalm in anticipation of the day when the Temple was finally built by his son Solomon (2 Chronicles 5) and he could foresee a procession of priests carrying the Ark of the Lord into the Holy Place. Or perhaps it was earlier than that, with the Ark brought into the special tent prepared by David to his City, Jerusalem, as we read in 2 Samuel 6. But there was a misconception in those days that to worship God you had to be in a special place, somewhere considered holy, somewhere such as when Jacob had the ladder experience in a dream. We read in Genesis 28:16-17, “Then Jacob awoke from his sleep and said, “Surely the Lord is in this place, and I wasn’t even aware of it!” But he was also afraid and said, “What an awesome place this is! It is none other than the house of God, the very gateway to heaven!”” Before he left Jacob anointed a memorial stone, naming the place the House of God, or Bethel. 

Much later, when Jesus stopped by a well on a journey from Galilee to Jerusalem, he had an encounter with a Samaritan woman who asked him a question, “So tell me, why is it that you Jews insist that Jerusalem is the only place of worship, while we Samaritans claim it is here at Mount Gerizim, where our ancestors worshiped?”” (John 4:20).In response, Jesus told her, “ … Believe me, dear woman, the time is coming when it will no longer matter whether you worship the Father on this mountain or in Jerusalem” (John 4:21). In Matthew 6:6, Jesus said, “But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father, who sees everything, will reward you”. Jesus set the scene for believers everywhere that the “holy place” in their lives was somewhere private where they could be on their own with the Lord. 

At first glance, these words about mountains, holy places and idol worship seem to be a million miles away from us pilgrims on 21st Century Planet Earth. But there are some lessons to be learned, and some spiritual insights that we would do well to follow. We pilgrims look around our country, the UK, and can see many churches, considered sacred places of worship by many. Apparently, there are over 40,000 “places of worship”, many of them ornate and impressive buildings. But it may come as a surprise to many of our fellow believers that they don’t have to go there to find God. For many years, particularly as a young boy, I was convinced that there was something of God underneath that ornate cloth draped over a table called an altar at the front of the church, the place where the minister went through certain ceremonial functions particularly in the communion service. Every time the minister or church official walked in its vicinity, they genuflected before moving on, further affirming my thoughts. Without a doubt, many Christians are helped in their faith by the stained glass windows, the altar ornately decorated, the carvings and the statues. God may be there but only inasmuch as He is everywhere, always on hand for those who call upon His name. In Jeremiah 23:24 we read, “Can anyone hide from me in a secret place? Am I not everywhere in all the heavens and earth?” says the Lord”. David wrote, in another Psalm, “I can never escape from your Spirit! I can never get away from your presence! If I go up to heaven, you are there; if I go down to the grave, you are there. If I ride the wings of the morning, if I dwell by the farthest oceans, even there your hand will guide me, and your strength will support me” (Psalm 139:7-10). God is omnipresent. And regarding all the churches, Isaiah wrote, “This is what the Lord says: ‘Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool. Where is the house you will build for me? Where will my resting-place be?”(Isaiah 66:1). No matter how wonderful and amazing a church building is, it will never be good enough for God to live there. The answer to the question “where is God” is perhaps found in the hearts and minds of believers everywhere, wherever they are.

We pilgrims can draw close to God regardless of our location, latitude or longitude. My favourite place is in God’s creation, the woods and parks that adorn our countryside, because it is there that I find that God listens to my fumbling prayers. Amongst the trees and birdsong I find a “holy place”, where, in His presence, I first confess my sins so that I can indeed “climb the mountain of the Lord” with a pure heart. Others find a place of communion with God in their bedrooms or studies or even a prison cell. But cleansed of our sin, regardless of where we are, we can indeed climb into God’s presence, where we will receive His blessing, and worship Him once again.

Dear Father God. In Your presence we find peace for our souls and comfort in our struggles. You are the only One worth worshiping. Amen.

Darkest Valleys

Posted on by korgrocker

“The Lord is my shepherd; I have all that I need. He lets me rest in green meadows; he leads me beside peaceful streams. He renews my strength. He guides me along right paths, bringing honour to his name. Even when I walk through the darkest valley, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me. Your rod and your staff protect and comfort me.”
Psalm 23:1-4 NLT

Notice that David wrote “when” not “if” when he considered the darkest valleys. We know that David suffered some dark times in his often eventful journey through life. Take what he wrote in Psalm 31:9-10 for example, “Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am in distress. Tears blur my eyes. My body and soul are withering away. I am dying from grief; my years are shortened by sadness. Sin has drained my strength; I am wasting away from within“. Was that a “darkest valley” for David? 

Elijah came to suffer in a dark place too, as we read in 1 Kings 19:4, “Then he went on alone into the wilderness, traveling all day. He sat down under a solitary broom tree and prayed that he might die. “I have had enough, Lord,” he said. “Take my life, for I am no better than my ancestors who have already died.”” In Elijah’s case, he had just been God’s front man at the epic event on the top of Mount Carmel, where God sent fire to consume the sacrifice, after which Elijah despatched 450 prophets of Baal. But the miracles didn’t stop there, because the three and a half year drought came to an end and “the Lord gave special strength to Elijah” allowing him to run faster than Ahab’s chariot. But then we read that Elijah literally did a runner after Jezebel’s threats, ending up in a “darkest valley” in the wilderness and under a broom tree, whatever that was.

One of the darkest Psalms in the Bible is Psalm 88. It was written by a man called Heman the Ezrahite and contains eighteen verses of gloom and depression, describing a valley so dark that it is a wonder that he could have written it at all. Verse 6, “You have thrown me into the lowest pit, into the darkest depths“, and he finishes “Darkness is my closest friend”. Oh dear! But to Heman perhaps the most poignant verses are 13 and 14, “O Lord, I cry out to you. I will keep on pleading day by day. O Lord, why do you reject me? Why do you turn your face from me?”

Being in a “darkest valley” is indeed a terrible place to be. A blackness descends over all aspects of a person’s thinking, to the extent that no good can be found anywhere. But there are varying degrees of “darkest valleys”. Today we would perhaps suggest that such a place as a “darkest valley” is the mental state of depression, which seems endemic in today’s world. In the context of Psalm 23, a spiritual “darkest valley” is more likely than a physical “darkest valley” of which there are many around the world in the wildest and most remote parts, valleys sometime scary but mostly harmless. But why should we pilgrims ever experience depression, because, after all, God loves and cares for us. There are many causes of depression, a study of which is beyond our morning’s read, but the reality is that a Christian is no more immune from a valley experience than an unbeliever. Sadly, some consider depression as a sin, and although that could be the case in some situations, it is unhelpful to treat the depressive as a sinner. 

I occasionally meet people who tell me that they are depressed about the state of the world, usually in response to me sharing about my hope in Jesus. Their response is a forerunner to a question that goes something like this – “If God is a God of love why does He allow so much suffering and mayhem in the world?” They reject God because they consider Him to be the architect of all their, and the world’s, woes, or, if not, He is at least powerless to stop them. Without waiting for an explanation, such a person walks away, continuing in their depressed state, one more hopeless person in a hopeless world. But we pilgrims have a message of hope for such people and we pray for the opportunities to share all about God and what He has done for us. God is indeed a God of love, but He is also a God of righteousness and justice, and we will never know, in this life, the extent of His gracious power in holding back the forces of evil, intent on destroying God’s created human beings.

But what should we pilgrims do when we get depressed? We get medical help just in case the condition is treatable, and we call on our pastor and Christian friends to pray for us. We remember all of God’s promises. Ones that have helped me include 1 Peter 5:7, “Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you“. David prayed Psalm 43:5, “Why am I discouraged? Why is my heart so sad? I will put my hope in God! I will praise him again— my Saviour and my God!” Jesus said to His disciples, “I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). And we pray for ourselves, believing God for a solution. But in those “darkest valleys” where things are so black that we cannot even contemplate anything to do with God, we are assured that He is close behind us, protecting and comforting us. And we remember that every valley is followed by a mountain top. Valleys won’t last forever.

Dear Father God. We know that in Your presence there is no sickness and pain, and we look ahead to the time when “darkest valleys” are no more. Thank You Jesus. Amen.

The Heavenly Shepherd

Posted on by korgrocker

“The Lord is my shepherd; I have all that I need. He lets me rest in green meadows; he leads me beside peaceful streams. He renews my strength. He guides me along right paths, bringing honour to his name. Even when I walk through the darkest valley, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me. Your rod and your staff protect and comfort me.”
Psalm 23:1-4 NLT

We now move onto Psalm 23, that well known and incredibly comforting Psalm, containing “must read” verses often spoken out at a funeral or in difficult times when someone is facing into seemingly insurmountable problems. Just the thought of the Lord being a Shepherd can bring feelings of comfort that help dispel any feelings of loneliness or despair. But to us Western pilgrims, mostly living in an urban or city environment, the profession of “Shepherd” is relatively unknown. We don’t have flocks of sheep wandering around our town centres munching the grass in our green and open spaces these days, and the only contact we have with them would tend to be on the supermarket meat counter. But there are supposed to be 31 million sheep populating the rural parts of the UK and they need many shepherds. On long journeys cross country, however, we will notice the fluffy white animals and while I am writing this many of them are producing lambs, that run and play and amuse us with their gambolling. I’m sure we could soon work out a job spec for a shepherd, but the reality is a long way from a paper description. Many sheep live on farms in inhospitable parts of our country, and the shepherds role is hard and often lonely. Sheep have a tendency to get into bother, woolly coats caught in bushes, or getting stuck in muddy places and the presence of their shepherd can be life-saving for them. 

And all that brings us to the point of this Psalm, because David was a shepherd in his early years and he honed his craft in the presence of the Lord, giving him insight into the work of the Heavenly Shepherd Himself. It was easy for David to imagine people as a flock of sheep, knowing their tendency for sin and doing wrong things, and he knew that the Lord Himself would lead and guide them out of trouble – if they let Him. At first sight, verse 1 could be interpreted as the Lord meeting physical needs. In David’s day, the shepherd would lead his flock between pastures containing the food needed for the physical well being of his sheep. But today, us townies would mostly fail to connect God with our food. We might say grace before a meal but that would be about as far as we would go. In a restaurant in Fife near where I live there is the Selkirk grace written on the wall in large letters, a grace written by Scotland’s well known poet, Rabbie Burns. “Some hae meat and canna eat, And some wad eat that want it, But we hae meat and we can eat, Sae let the Lord be Thankit!” A naval chaplain I used to know was famous amongst sailors who knew him for the briefest grace possible – “Heavenly Pa, Ta!” But how many of us really look at the plate before us and realise that what we see is all down to God’s grace? He created a world on which all the food we need has been grown. The trouble is that we don’t tend to dwell on the complexities of our lives on this planet and we have forgotten what Jesus said about concerns we may have about our food and drink. He said, “That is why I tell you not to worry about everyday life—whether you have enough food and drink, or enough clothes to wear. Isn’t life more than food, and your body more than clothing? Look at the birds. They don’t plant or harvest or store food in barns, for your heavenly Father feeds them. And aren’t you far more valuable to him than they are?” (Matthew 6:25-26).‭‭ 

But the first verse of Psalm 23 contains the phrase “I have all I need”. The Lord’s prayer includes the words, “Give us this day our daily bread” and as we ponder on the meaning of these words, we soon realise that God’s provision for our bodies is a complete food, that nourishes body, soul and spirit. Our cornflakes for breakfast may fill an empty stomach but did we remember our spiritual food this morning, the Word of God? How many times have we set off on the activities of the day hungry and unsatisfied souls, our spirits shrivelled and unable to cope with the pressures of life, our spiritual resilience missing and leaving us forgetful of the Heavenly Shepherd. He holds in His hands the food that we need but have we decided to go without for another day?

Our Lord and Shepherd knows what we need, just as David knew what his flock needed each day. But wouldn’t it have been strange if his sheep arrived at a lush pasture and then refused to eat, instead just lying down and ignoring the feast before them? We can be a bit like that some days. We have the richness of God’s Word, loaded with a veritable banquet of food for our souls, and yet we instead pick up a newspaper, full of sin and evil reports, bad news that will do our spirits and souls more harm than good In fact, the world’s news will sap all the strength remaining in our souls, leaving us with no resilience to face the day before us. All the media will do is to introduce fears and anxieties that turn us away from God and His Kingdom.

So, today, we reach for our Bibles in anticipation that there are some rich and nourishing morsels there to fill the needs of our souls. As we ponder and meditate upon them, we won’t be disappointed or hungry in the day ahead. In the strength of the spiritual food we have received, we will find that our Heavenly Shepherd, Jesus Himself, will lead and guide us through the minefields of life.

Dear Lord Jesus, our Heavenly Shepherd. Thank You for Your complete provision for us and the strength to face into the day ahead. Amen.

The Heavenly Message

Posted on by korgrocker

“The heavens proclaim the glory of God. The skies display his craftsmanship. Day after day they continue to speak; night after night they make him known. They speak without a sound or word; their voice is never heard. Yet their message has gone throughout the earth, and their words to all the world. God has made a home in the heavens for the sun.”
Psalm 19:1-4 NLT

David wrote that God created the heavens and they were so wonderful that they continually display His glory. Day or night the message of who God is, is proclaimed without sound but as a visual presentation to everyone in the world. And that is true, because wherever we live on this planet, God’s glory in the heavens is there for all to see. The message of the skies “has gone throughout the earth” David wrote. But what was and is the message?

Paul wrote a clear explanation about this message in Romans 1:18-20, “But God shows his anger from heaven against all sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness. They know the truth about God because he has made it obvious to them. For ever since the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky. Through everything God made, they can clearly see his invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature. So they have no excuse for not knowing God“. But such is the sin of man that they have devised an explanation for the craftsmanship in the skies that excludes God. Instead they attribute the presence of the heavenly bodies and everything else in the universe to an event that took place many billions of years ago. In recent years the “Big Bang” theory has emerged, based on observations about how the galaxies and stars are moving. The scientists, with the aid of mathematical formulae, have worked out a theory that about 13.7 billion years ago the origin of the universe was a small, intensely dense and very hot, piece of matter that suddenly exploded. However, they fail to explain where this piece of matter came from and why it suddenly exploded. But if someone, observing the heavens in all their glory, asked such a scientist about how all the stars got there, they have a natural, Godless, explanation ready and waiting to be rolled out. And sadly, this theory is bundled together with the theory of evolution, and rolled out in our schools and places of learning as fact, not theory. 

Paul called these God-and-creation-deniers “sinful, wicked people who suppress the truth by their wickedness”. But why do people deny the existence of God, even when there is so much evidence about Him in the heavens, where God made “a home … for the sun”? The Billy Graham organisation claims that people deny the existence of God because of pride. People want to run their lives their own way and don’t want anyone, especially God, to interfere with the way they are living. They want to be in control of everything they do, and they know that if they were to believe in God, they’d have to change their lifestyle. Instead of living by their own list of what’s right and wrong, they’d have to take seriously God’s moral standards. But we pilgrims know the consequences of such a life-choice, because we have read the last few chapters in the Book, chapters that the God-deniers claim are just fairy tales for emotionally needy people. The first three verses of Psalm 14 read, “Only fools say in their hearts, “There is no God.” They are corrupt, and their actions are evil; not one of them does good! The Lord looks down from heaven on the entire human race; he looks to see if anyone is truly wise, if anyone seeks God. But no, all have turned away; all have become corrupt. No one does good, not a single one!” This Psalm, another written by David, is unequivocal in its conclusion that the God-deniers are fools. Of course, they have to be, because otherwise who would want to spend eternity in the company of the devil and his cohorts?

The message written long ago in the heavens, the message of the glory and existence of God, is there for everyone to observe, and one day everyone will stand before God to give an account of their lives. What will the God-deniers say? Probably nothing, as the enormity of their foolishness and pride suddenly dawns upon them, as their minds try and process all their sinful and evil ways in the light of God’s presence.

But on a positive, we pilgrims look up on a clear day or night, and are reminded once again of the wonderful God we worship. He loves us and cares for us, because we have chosen to cast aside our pride and arrogance and instead live His way. We know that it was our sins that nailed Jesus to that cross, and we bow in worship to the One who has forgiven us because we confessed our sins. God now sees us as His righteous adopted sons and daughters. How amazing is that? 

Father God, we thank You today in wonder for the extent You have gone to, to save mankind from hell. Please help us endorse Your Heavenly message to those we meet, those who are heading for a lost eternity. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

The Fate of Nations

Posted on by korgrocker

“The nations have fallen into the pit they dug for others. Their own feet have been caught in the trap they set. The Lord is known for his justice. The wicked are trapped by their own deeds. … The wicked will go down to the grave. This is the fate of all the nations who ignore God.”
Psalm 9:15-17 NLT

‭It is not just the wicked who end up in a grave, of course. We will all die one day and our physical remains will ultimately end up either in a grave or our ashes scattered where our families decide. Cheery subject to start the day, I know, but one that cannot be avoided, no matter how hard we try. So when David wrote about the “fate of all the nations”, he was stating the obvious. But other Bible versions substitute “grave” for “hell” or “Sheol”, and this makes more sense in the context of these verses. David writes that there are consequences for individuals and nations who “ignore God”, in that they will be trapped by the very tactics they use against others. I suppose the last world war comes to mind, with a militarily-aggressive Germany ultimately ending up as a defeated nation and its evil leader dead. The Nazi programmes against the Jews and others put the German government well into the “wicked” bracket and even those like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who vocally opposed the evil being promoted, failed to turn round the wickedness present in that nation and at that time. The AMP version of Psalm 9:17 reads, “The wicked will turn to Sheol (the nether world, the place of the dead), Even all the nations who forget God”. 

But what is this “Sheol” (or “Hades” in the Greek), called the place of the dead? If the wicked nations end up there, will believers join them in the same place? Simplistically, Christian thought is that when we die, our spirits end up either in hell or Heaven. The story of the Rich Man and Lazarus in Luke 16 gives some credence to this thought, with Lazarus, the poor man ending up with Abraham eating at the Heavenly banquet, and the Rich Man in a place of torment. Luke 16:23 (AMP), “In Hades (the realm of the dead), being in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away and Lazarus in his bosom (paradise)”. But whatever we believe, it is inconceivable that a wicked person or nation will ever end up in a place called Heaven or paradise, and that is what David wrote about the “fate of all nations who ignore God”. 

We UK residents are living in an increasingly secular society with Christians being marginalised by legislation at variance with what God has ordained in His Word. But there are also green shoots of a new move of God starting to emerge. In my home town of Dunfermline, in Scotland, there are some exciting things happening with new Christian groups emerging and some existing churches growing almost weekly with new converts and baptisms. And we thank God for His grace and favour, with believers providing a ground-swell of opposition to the ideologies and laws that promote rebellion against God but will not end well for their adherents and promoters. One day they will find themselves in Sheol, in the company of the Rich Man, even desperate, like him, to send a warning back to those they left behind, colleagues or family members living a life ignoring God.

We pilgrims probably will never fully appreciate the impact we have on our societies as we continue as salt and light, beacons of hope in a Godless nation. We look to Jesus, as we read in Hebrews 12:2a, “We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith …”. And we extend God’s love and grace to those around us, who are journeying to a lost eternity.

Dear Father God. Not for us to be a part of a Godless people who will end up in a place they don’t want to be. Please encourage and empower us to spread Your Gospel each and every day. In Jesus’ name. Amen.