Unceasing Strength

 "They will be called oaks of righteousness - planeted by the most high, to express His unceasing glory. They will build up the ancient places, raise up what has become devastated causing this to be renewed - the defamation of many generations will be swept away".  Isaiah 61:2-4).

The messages good work to unprocessed is not only that they shall be rescued from their trial, but that full and unceasing redemption will come in the fact that all that has been repressed and devastated from the evil of oppression will be full restored.

We see this first expression of this in the promise of our physical resurrection. Death will not have the last work over us - the very natural powers which currently appear to dominate everything are themselves subject to a far greater, everlasting authority.

Our spiritual renewal now leads to our becoming clothed in a flesh that is immortal - but that is but the opening line of the glorious plan that God has for His creation.

In Romans 8 the Apostle proclaims that all of creation is to share in this splendour - to be renewed to share in the life that flows from our extraordinary saviour. All that was made with the intent to truly express the marvel and unfathomable richness of God's extraordinary love and joy will indeed do so in a manner that will take eternity to hold.

That is our hope, and evident in the appearing of Jesus Christ.

The Wrong Olympus

 So, what does this year's serious biography cinematic event say about the days in which we live?

Well, it tells us why all the 'prophets' of doom regarding the end of the world are looking in all the wrong places for the cause of a demise. It isn't because we merely need to tweak our life styles of all embrace that latest expression of yoke culture. Something fare more pernicious is at play, and our living in an atomic moment is simply a fundamental expression of this fatal condition.

To come to the film itself...

So Nolan's "Modern Prometheus" tale of Oppenheimer is told between two, oh so telling scenes involving another vital player on the stage of modern physics, and the conversation at the centre of these scenes - as the conclusion of the film implies - is so much larger than what was done at Los Alamos. This theme is repeated in a brief, vial meeting with Bohr around to thirds of the way through the movie, reminding us that the vital structure for this 'new' atomic world was very much born in the old world so fertile for the evil of nazism and eugenics which itself had been born out of the misery of mechanised warfare unleashed in the trenches of world war one as a result of the ideology that spawned from the enlightenment that killed the true health of the West. 

That is our inheritance. That is why our world is dying.This horrifying tale reminds afresh of just how deep the present pit is that modern man has thrown his world into in respect to severing us from what we should be - children of our caring and gracious God, who, thankfully, is able to reach down even into the lowest depths of this pit to make us free in the redeeming blood of His only Son - the one true hope for this broken world.

Worth your time.

 I want to address your attention to something really worth your time today.

A few recent thoughts, however, I'd like to share before taking you there.

Most of us are no doubt familiar with the Apostle’s warning to Timothy how in the last times, the very nature of what would be manifest amongst people  - the very expression of the human condition would clearly become even more disrupted and distorted than it had been in prior periods and seasons of evil.

Paul speaks of this as being a particularly difficult time because even people’s natural (normal) affection for each other will fade and be replaced with a state of explicit selfishness expressed in the pursuit of purely material wealth and well-being;  a brash, savage attitude towards what should actually genuinely define life - a perpetual existence, in other words, that becomes more and more a silencing of the truth which enriches us in favour of what leaves us devoid of any true virtue and love.

The route into this nightmare is clearly being expressed all around us today -

go with the flow, play the game your being instructed to play and don't ask any questions, not only regarding those calling the shoots, but of yourself - just fall in line, because yes, why you are being manipulated, it's done in such a way that it "does you good"... at least until it's too late to get out of the web.

Applying this approach of course has vast consequences for everyone - it bends and distorts the fabric of whats true until its so warped we cannot see it any longer.

We're either dying in the worse sense or being saved in spite of ourselves - those are actually the only real options.The present 'culture' is all about the first of these.

So, what is at the centre of us, of all - that makes or brakes?

Liberty which is external and internal is what's required if we are to see a conclusion to all tyranny - so is that where our journey now is taking us?

A wicked king - a foolish life - seeks to build treasure cities in this moment whilst it oppresses any who denies its folly.

I say all of this to invite you to sit and listen to wisdom that cracks and yet rescues the world, and us along with it, if we have ears that can lead us to wisdom.

So take time to listen, and understand the wonders that our true Creator and Deliverer has wrought amongst our world: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GEASnFvLxhU&t=3410s

Part one of a truly series on the Book of Exodus.

And there it is...

The very popular Joe Rogan podcast came up trumps again this week, when he invited Steven Myer to come on the show and discuss the subject of Intelligent Design in the universe. It was a fascinating discussion, so here are some of the key moments for you to enjoy:

Clip 1. What the images from the James Webb telescope are actually telling us about our universe.

Clip 2. Finding God in the universe.

Clip 3. Marrying our being here to the greater reality in which we live.

Enjoy!

 

Why this counts...

Why the movie that’s making bigger box office than I Jones matters and why the main stream media don’t want you talking about it…

https://youtu.be/bXWJkIAoC7M

The Demeaning

"It was for freedom that God has made you free".

Paul to the Galatians.

How distressing it is when you encounter someone who is choosing, of their own volition, to take steps that results in them becoming so much less then they should be - to cripple themselves in a fashion that holds them back from, yes, engaging with life in a way which may require a level of risk and challenge, which could launch them into a much richer place of truth and health than they had previously known.

This world is saturated with ideologies and cull de sac approaches that so readily impression us . Paul himself (the writer of the verse above) had once been so caged by his religious convictions. As a consequence, he judged his view to be superior (the best that could be held), and this superiority spurred him to shed blood, justified by his misplaced convictions concerning truth. Only a full-scale divine intervention broke his total bondage to such bleak pride.

Sometimes, of course, the chords which grip us just as tightly appear far more secular and mundane, but are just as deadly in their consequences. A young man, for example, is given an opportunity to employ his abilities in a role so he can begin to extend his skills. He chooses instead to rest back, not applying himself to the opportunity. What will those who have provided such an opening make of this? How long will it be before such an attitude results in loosing all that has been gained. Such a fool finds themselves quickly loosing what they had been provided as a means to so much more.

Of course, the road block can be so often seem to be something even more necessary to us than mere laxity - we might even view it as something truly benevolent.

Jesus met those for whom their wealth, or family, or some other "imperative" held them back from taking the necessary steps that were key to obtaining life which would allow them to become genuinely rich. When our presumed "obligations" enable nothing but our stumbling into a prison of missing the divine intention for our days here, then we truly become lost. The cares of now are no more than deadly traps when they remove our gaze from what is truly to be gained - a liberty which makes all that was purposed and intended by our Maker (aiding something spread out before us to be obtained) - whatever troubles must be faced to truly inhabit such wealth.

The Apostles were wealthier in chains in prison than the materially richest man who has ever lived, because they owned a freedom that will never cease and cannot be taken away. Will that same anchor hold us in the days that are to come?

T h e - C o n v e r s a t I o n

 Sometimes, a moment comes along in social media that is worth our attention. This conversation is certainly such a moment.Take a look.

Serious Business

 If you were to ask a group of thirty odd randomly people what is Christianity all about, I seriously doubt any of them would give as their answer knowing the deepest forms of joy.

Jesus informed His disciples that He taught them what He did so that their joy may be truly complete.

C S Lewis noted that our becoming truly rooted in this particular gift, however, is the true, profound business of heaven - but keeping to the place where this is vitally true isn't a easy thing. Recall the story of Mary and Marta and Lazarus. When death falls upon their lives, the narrative informs us that Jesus deliberately delayed comping to them until that death had reached its full conclusion, putting Lazarus in the grave for several days. Not a situation any of us would in any way view as the harbinger of unbound joy. Heavenly joy, however, is something that vastly exceeds the bounds of our own current longings and expectations.

What follows, as Lazarus is freed from physical death, is a clear realisation that with God, the putting aside of our mortal bodies is merely a transition to the place where we reside until what was merely mortal is clothed with the flesh of immortality - the implementation of a restored creation that never fades or wares out.

We are creates created filled with desires, and the truth is that God wants us to delight in His investing of us in this fashion in our fellowship with Him so that He can bring these longings to their true and fullest fruition within His creative work (Psalm 37:4). This involves shaping us and the world around us in such a fashion that even through the deepest times of trouble and pain, the fruit that is produced from this will be something which eternally endures because it is endowed with an everlasting virtue of genuine and unfading joy which will come to mark us as creatures enterally freed by His astonishing love and righteousness.

Eternity will be the realm where those spenders we have barely begun to grasp and comprehend are given their fullest, most enduring and truly enriching expression, because there our joy will be eternally full, as it flows and returns to the makes, saviour and maintainer of our being - the dear Lord Jesus.